The Bared Souls Dead Sea Scrolls

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Discovered deep in a cave on a high mountain recently, these are the Bared Souls archives. The badly damaged papyrus scrolls provide proof that there once was a different type of message board...

From its inception in 11/99 through 4/00.

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BARED SOULS - EXCERPTS FROM YOUR LIFE





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Created by Don Pitcher
Share entries and commentary from your life's diary or journal.

Don Pitcher 10:53 AM EST, 11/3/99 (Message #1 of 451)


It's been quite easy to see a common felt bond develop between some of those who post on these boards with a regular basis. And with that, at times, a willingness to open up with thoughts and feelings that would probably be withheld under more public circumstances. And sometimes in sharing like that, a person finds out that they're not so "alone." Who hasn't felt at some time that they were odd or a misfit because of what they carried around in their head and then found relief, camaraderie or even support when they discovered that someone else had a similar experience.
I figure that this board will either bomb or find its own use and personality some how. I just thought that from some of the commentary that I've ran across elsewhere to open a forum dedicated to those moments in life that have affect you. I've kept a journal and other letters & writings for years - I feel sure from what I've gathered from other personalities here that I'm not the only one. So if you feel up to tearing a page out and posting it here, feel free.
Lastly, if this board does get some response, let's make an agreement to also from time to time include some lighter moments from your lives. Diaries and journals can tend to be dark little beasts...I think that most can find space to let some lightheartedness shine through.
With that, let the observations begin:


Don Pitcher 11:26 AM EST, 11/3/99 (Message #2 of 451)


4:13 AM
We just got back from Lafayette. Mom went right upstairs to try and sleep. I just felt like remaining downstairs for awhile. It's kinda cool out - just enough to want a jacket. Sky clear, of course a lot of stars; and it is still down here.
I'm thinking of him. It's too early to feel much of a change yet. A few minutes ago I was looking about the room and I noticed over by his chair, his cane leaning up against the wall. It's frozen there, as is the portable oxygen unit, with its pale green hose coiled on the floor beneath it. They stand there frozen, waiting; not knowing, as if somehow they should.
And then, on the other side of town, I hear a train whistle blow and shortly the rhythm of its wheels as it draws nearer. The whistle sounds its note again and again until I remember another time that I heard the same.
It was the first night that I ever spent in this house - 12 years ago, plus a week or two. Just my dad and I were up here. The reason being that I had to start school early; the rest of the family was coming the next week. We had no furniture in the place yet, not even any hot water.
Anyhow, we slept on two camping cots set upstairs in one of the bare bedrooms. And after awhile when we had turned out the light and we laid there falling asleep, a train came through town, sounding just like the one a few minutes ago. And my dad spoke in the dark from the other side of the room and asked if I ever cried at night. I can't recall exactly what I said, but being just fourteen, I probably didn't admit to much. And then he told me that when he was young and had just moved away from his hometown (this case being Chicago), sometimes he would hear a train whistle at night and it would make him cry. He always imagined that that train might be going to Chicago and if he could be on it, he would be home again.
My dad never told me many things that could be regarded as somewhat private and personnel as that was. And from time to time I'd think of how he shared that with me. He knew how I was feeling having to leave all the comfort, warmth and security of a town that had been a part of me all my life.
And now, 12 years later, I have a second drastic change in my life, a far greater security by all means. And yet, I find I can still sit here and feel comfort. It just came in the sound of a lone train passing in the night. Thanks Dad, thanks.
I found the above yesterday tucked away in a drawer - it'd been a while since I'd read those scraps of paper that I had written on that night. My father had just died about an hour beforehand. Years of smoking had left him with emphysema - a cruel and slow erosion. He was 57.


FreeToys 12:55 PM EST, 11/3/99 (Message #3 of 451)


You're a good writer



lbbshell 8:34 PM EST, 11/3/99 (Message #4 of 451)


Not everythings in black and white
Some things so dark, and some so light
That all can see the beautiful colors
and widening shades of grey.

Rainbows flow across the sky,
dancers paint pictures in the ice
and all around us life goes on
In the widening shades of grey.

If ever you see a small shoot of color
off a day-sprung flower
sing it a song of love and happiness
and widening shades of grey.

And when all else fails
and you think that lucks run out
Please hold your cries in side of you
and think of all the beauty there
and the widening shades of grey.

If ever you set down at night
to watch the stars pass by
please stop and think of life about
and the widening shades of grey.


Don't you love random scraps of paper?? They don't always have to make sense



Prince of Cats 8:35 PM EST, 11/3/99 (Message #5 of 451)


Wow.

(sounds of P.O.C. seaching for words)

That is very very good writing. I don't like to read long posts, most are just drivel but that's great. Thanks Don. I'll have to dig through my piles of stuff to see if I can find anything to match that intensity. Great idea for a board, by the way.



Dobs 5:23 PM EST, 11/4/99 (Message #6 of 451)


Lbbshell, I like that one! Makes me think of Duritz.


leaf twirled in spirals
dry ribbons falling.
you were like fall.
your body - spare, cold.
yet eyes burning
like red leaves
chasing wind.

in your loudest pleghm whisper
you said
how you wanted to fly
for the clouds
up, up, up
above your blue body
to dance so not even
death could see you.

but i knew it already
when horror drowned you
bluer than the grave in the sea
chairs faster than your tears
mass of us in horrified shimmers
you couldn't even scream;
it took that away from you
as you passed out.
the silence of sulfur in the hospital.

this picture remembers
your frank freckles,
sea grey sadness,
and bittersweet hands.
how you loved childhood!
you couldn't hide laughter
no more than your coughs.
did you ever know brighter tears than yours?

your welcome was the most disconcerting poetry.
like gold trees and grey sky
departing with the leaves
in such smiling sadness.
yes
i think i love
autumn best.





wallpaper 9:58 AM EST, 11/5/99 (Message #7 of 451)


About four years ago after a failed business and feeling a little trapped in a relationship with one of the nicest girls in the world I started writing songs.
At first I wasn't really sure what all these words/lyrics meant - it was as if I was channelling or something. Looking back at them now some make sense, some are still a mystery...

This song is called:
"Sandpaper" (c) by me 1996
Falling fast
Living High
Questions, suggestions. Why?
My head is the weirdest place
I've ever been
Rivalling the strangest things I've ever seen
Truth left abandoned
Love takes a back seat
Imagine this - imagine it at your feet
I've got plenty out there
I'm flooded until the end
And do I need you in the end?
Stranger than a stranger, and
stranger how are you?
Love don't come near me, I hate you.
I've got plenty out there
I'm flooded until the end
And do I need you in the end!
In the end, all I'm gonna say
is what I feel.
And what I feel is what I feel
I have the patience
to live until the end
I know that's not quite what I've said
You have the patience to
squeeze me and suck me dry
Love o love o love o love not tonight, not tonight
Sandpaper binds the books
bounded by the breeze
Bound for someone more than
just another fucking tease
Sandpaper grind me away
Shred me and let me decay
Crush me and despise me as you say...
Rain rain go away go away
Come again some other day...
This is probably my favourite of all the songs I've written. It's not commercial at all and the music is quite heavy and droney. But I love it. The lyrics really mean something to me, and take me straight back to that time about four years ago.

Freetoys or anyone: is there any way I can post a bit of the song as some kind of sound file here? I only have it recorded on a CD and dat.


FreeToys 11:49 AM EST, 11/5/99 (Message #8 of 451)


You can upload a wav file to my ftp site and I'll convert it into a Flash4 file that compresses it with MP3 technology
There's a tutorial on how to accomplish that here
strato is trying to upload one now. We'll make a new topic for 'member's songs'
(The words that LLB wrote struck me as some that would make a good song)


Don Pitcher 12:09 PM EST, 11/5/99 (Message #9 of 451)


Sandpaper binds the books...I like that image there.



Dogmeat99 10:28 PM EST, 11/5/99 (Message #10 of 451)


My wife and I practiced the whole "talk to your baby in the womb" routine for our first child. We did the music, the talking, everything. When it came time for her to be born, there were some complications and and she was taken directly from the delivery bed to a corner of the room where there were a bunch of doctors working on her and trying to clear her lungs. I've never been so frightened in my entire life. When she finally started crying(and I mean SCREAMING) it was the most beautiful sound I'd ever heard. Things calmed down and everybody smiled. My new daughter was laying in an open topped incubator wrapped in blankets. We named her Anya. I walked over to her and just watched. Here was this little life, completely dependant on my wife and I. I leaned over and said aloud "Hello Anya, I'm your dad, and no matter what happens to you in this world, I'm always going to be there for you." She had been laying on her side with her eyes closed, and when I spoke to her, she rolled in the direction of my voice, opened one eye and looked directly at me. She stared at me for a moment and then closed her eye and rolled back over. I understand there are those of you who would say she just wnated to know who was waking her up, but I choose to believe she was recognizing the voice who had been talking to her for all these months. It was the first of many magical moments which continue almost four years later. Every day is a new adventure, with opportunities for joy to be witnessed whenever it comes along.


Llbshell 11:01 PM EST, 11/05/1999 (Message #11 of 451)

ooh. Its the most non-cynical thought I've heard in awhile... I think I'm gonna cry...


Zoe Gatsby 0:34 AM EST, 11/06/1999 (Message #12 of 451)

This is a great idea for a board. All you guys are write really well. I write poetry, and toy with movie ideas. I'm too shy to post any of my poetry right now...maybe a little later.


Dobs 4:08 AM EST, 11/06/1999 (Message #13 of 451)

Hey Zoe, don't be afraid to share your stuff! You're among friends who'll appreciate your thoughts.

?

look a little closer,
leave your quiet hate
behind your shadowy eyes.
you fear me because
i am,
but you judge nonetheless.

you are moved; you are silent;
you look at me with cold rage
for growing taboo flowers in your field
of quaint superiority.
i write it into your heart,
and it screams.
but
i am nothing without you.

i speak words
that you impregnate with reckless glee
the mirrors make you stagger
at your ugly reflections on me,
open hands
wide eyes
empathically pleading to your gossiping silence.
will you hear my case?

i remind you that
you and religion are not speaking terms.
like an ex-friend you hide
don't tell others of your secret love affair
that you stole from me
for your vulgar displays of confession
oh how you were who i needed
i am nothing without you.
and you're making offerings
of chaste reconciliation
impatient imitation of harmony
just so He can see you in the window,
while you look at me with precise condescension
my stick body vertical
did nothing, but inside the organ dies
and rises from your burned conceit
to come for you
my godbastard
the words are nothing without you.


FreeToys 7:34 AM EST, 11/06/1999 (Message #14 of 451)

From a song:
How many times do you have to cry
prayin' to somebody above?
How many Beatles have to die?
All you need is love
How many times will your leaders lie
hurtin' their own people with greed?
How many leaders have to die?
Love is all you need
But all you want is money
All you want... is power
All you want... is sex
But all you need... is love
(c)1998 RADenney


Don Pitcher 11:14 AM EST, 11/06/1999 (Message #15 of 451)

"The Street Sweeper"
When I was little, once a week or so, the street-sweeper would come through our neighborhood. All the kids would pass the word and we'd all run down the street to catch it, standing on the curb as it passed. A big revolving brush in front and a smaller one at the side, we watched as it hissed slowly down the street, leaving a wet trail behind.
Now almost 24, late at night and I hear the street sweeper making its rounds outside. And as I sit upstairs in my window and watch it go by, a part of me yearns to run and chase it down the curb.


the_rooster 12:24 PM EST, 11/06/1999 (Message #16 of 451)

"Another long day"
As I sleep
Chills run down my back
I wonder what will come of me
As I strugle in the sack
In my dreams I can go
Anywhere I please
But it all comes out the same
I wake in vain
Hearing the blowing of the breeze
How I wish I could just leave life
Lost on the outside
But sadly enough
To my life
I have been confined
And still in my bed I wonder
Should I care about the thunder?
For life I do not want to wait
But life I have begun to hate



Don Pitcher 4:16 PM EST, 11/06/1999 (Message #17 of 451)

March 2
Passing time - like I do every night here at work. Or at home, or at any other place for that matter. I'm always passing time. Better put: it's passing me by.
I had a guy hold me up here at work -- what was it,,,early on the 10th of last month. He pulled out a gun, and after he had gotten all of the bills, there was a moment that just hung. He had what he wanted, the pistol was pointed towards me...thinking back on it now, I realize how out of control I was of my very life right then. I even realized it right then I suppose, but again, it comes back to the fact that I couldn't change anything even if I had wanted. If he was going to pull the trigger, he would. I remember waiting for the impact, expecting it. I didn't panic or freak out or anything. In fact, the true realization of the entire ordeal didn't hit me until 36 hours or so later. Then for awhile it was on my mind a lot.
Yeah, my life could have ended right then. I don't mean to sound so dramatic, but dammit, it could have. Things like that do happen. Not that much of a reason for it if you stop to think about it. Why take a man's entire life from him (not to mention the grief caused to others) for only $213.00? I'm just here to do a simple job -- it's not even my money.
It's not worth it. I shouldn't be here watching the time pass.
March 9
A week later now from the last entry that was made. I'm sitting in my car, writting this on my lap. A bright, cool morning -- outside I can hear different birds making their glorious calls, making me realize that Spring is coming soon, very soon.
I'm parked in the cemetary here in town -- near the grave of Jeanne (Gilbert) who they buried two mornings ago. She died 24 hours exactly after I made that last journal entry. Killed after another robbery at the motel. She was working my night there; we had traded the previous nights so that she could go see her daughter cheerlead at her high school's sectional game.
$247.00. There is no reason.
Not easy to describe living with that episode. Kinda puts you outside of most everyone else. This single mother lost her life in my place just by chance of fate that I took a Thursday night off rather than a Friday. The same person(s) had killed another motel clerk an hour earlier up the interstate. Jeanne they robbed, abducted, raped, then shot and left naked, dying on a country road. All in the middle of nowhere Indiana.
Years later now, and no one has been found for it.


20thCenturyFox 5:15 PM EST, 11/06/1999 (Message #18 of 451)

Wrote this a few weeks ago after I woke up with these really long, $2 sentences in my head....this is excerpts from throughout the eight pages, put together in hopefully some kind of order. ("...." indicate segue into another part of the essay, so if it doesn't make perfect sense, it's b/c I'm leaving parts out)
Rambling Realizations at 5 a.m.
The only thing I was sure of anymore was that I'd begun to completely romanticize my quest for happiness. I thought that if I ever found it, it probably wouldn't be half so great as I'd been expecting. My relentlessly naive penchant for idealism had deluded me into believing I was old enough to handle all the adult decisions I was making. I was a freight train building up steam until the sheer number of issues and decisions started to overwhelm me and I knew I'd derail before too long.....There were a million or more factors influencing my every action, but at the time I thought each to be an unrelated, independent decision. At this point I was wise in the ways of what not to do; however, I seldom recognized a situation for what it was: just another desperate incarnation of the last....I didn't like accepting guidance from anyone - one such example had lent a Freudian-big-brother angle to a relationship that I had, the humiliation of being recognized for who I was - a facade - ruining the potential for anything gratuitous and superficial enough to protect my vulnerability. Whenever I'd meet the rare person that understood the level of pretentiousness I'd reached, I was sure to back away before they could see just how pathetic I'd become. How could life have gone so wrong? How could it be so hard to discern truth from image? Scam from reality? Hope from doubt? Myself from the herd of struggling black sheep amassing the uncertainty that we all felt into something average, something 'cool'?....I was so desperate for input that I grilled everyone for information - naturally every answer was completely different and entirely wrong. I was the only person who could determine what I was capable of, what I needed, and I didn't want to discover it yet. Maybe I was scared. Can you imagine living your life for years, only to realize it wasn't your destiny that you were living out? All the time that you'd perceived yourself to be happy, now obviously hollow reassurances from that part of you that died with the effort of making sense of everything. I couldn't imagine anything more horrible....What it all came down to, for me personally, was need. I needed so many things. I needed support. I needed to learn to trust, and maybe to love. I needed guidance. I needed time to straighten things out. I needed experience. Naivete was such an undesirable quality, but there are no short cuts to its elimination. By definition it is lack of experience, and the kind of experience I was constantly pushing myself into was not what constituted wisdom.


20thCenturyFox 5:21 PM EST, 11/06/1999 (Message #19 of 451)

Sorry that last post was so long and pretentious - I know it's annoying when someone uses a lot of long fucking words all jumbled up to intimidate people


Don Pitcher 7:48 PM EST, 11/06/1999 (Message #20 of 451)

Fox - excellent!!
I think that at any age one of the worst things that a person can do is claim (or think) that they have it ALL figured out. You see, once you do that, you stop growing!
All your worries, doubts, etc. are there for good reason: to signal that there is that further growth. Shit, I kept a journal for so damn long that I gave up writting the the thing. Why? Because it got to be where I was just writting the same shit. Mostly about relationships, just toss in a different girl's name...
Putting all the pieces together can be quite a game (an ever changing game as well, because you evolve, the different people come in & out of your life, etc.). But I tell you one of the most important piece to try and hold onto is yourself. Be true to yourself, understand and try to find some sort of peace there. Then it's easier to reveal that true person to another. See, I think a lot of times we're something that we're really not with others and that is bound to lead to unhappiness/unsatisfaction, whatever. Like faking orgasms: how would you ever get that other person to really satisfy you if you're giving a phony response to what they're doing? They'll just keep doing that same thing because they think THAT is what trips the trigger! Everyone ends up losing.
Anyhow, I'm rushed for time here -- sorry this wasn't quite the response to what I was wanting to give, but I'm sure others may post some reactions too. (I knew you had a little somethin' going on in ya)

20thCenturyFox 10:32 PM EST, 11/06/99 (Message #21 of 453)

Thanks so much Don....I'm sure you can tell I'm the kind of person that needs approval and reassurance, it means a lot to me. You strike me as a very intelligent person in the sense of the word that actually matters- maybe someday I'll catch up
(About the faking orgasms part - I finally figured out it does more harm than good, and now that I can let myself go, a lot more than my sex life is changing. Sorry to get too into detail...but it's kinda like a real orgasm is the epitome of self acceptance and becoming comfortable enough to allow someone to see you in such a vulnerable position.)


20thCenturyFox 10:31 PM EST, 11/06/99 (Message #22 of 453)

I can't believe I just confessed that about orgasms, but something is keeping me from deleting it. Maybe I just wanted to share the good news with everyone, it being such a new experience and all


Don Pitcher 11:42 PM EST, 11/06/99 (Message #23 of 453)

Actually there's a lot of reference that backs up that a woman can have difficulty in achieving orgasm due to inhabition. The mind does play a HUGH part in it. A similar thing with guys (yes folks, the truth be told, there IS a difference between an orgasm and an ejaculation). I've understood with some partners how even though we are being "intimate", that there can still be that bit of a barrier there. The best thing that can happen is when two reach that level of trust and can feel secure inwardly as well as outwardly with that other person.
On the other hand, sex with a one-night-stand can be hot too but maybe because then a person doesn't give a shit what the other thinks, expecially if they're not so tied into trying to impress them for a relationship -- it's just more outgoing for the kicks and then the inhabitions run wild (unfortunately, you'll miss out on the heart-to-heart connection).


Yakomo 11:57 AM EST, 11/07/99 (Message #24 of 453)

man, I can't wait 'til I have enough time to post to this board. Everything everyone's written so far has been awesome - not in the crappy ninja turtles way, but in the real way.


Don Pitcher 2:24 PM EST, 11/07/99 (Message #25 of 453)

Looking forward to hearing from you Yakomo! Perhaps you could enlighten us too why you hate driving? I found that to be rather curious for one just getting their license.


20thCenturyFox 3:37 PM EST, 11/07/99 (Message #26 of 453)

Oh no doubt!! I just read that, Yakomo...curious indeed. My license has been restricted (drinking and driving...yes I SO learned my lesson) for the last 5 1/2 months - I've got 27 days (and $125) to go until I get it back...I will be so happy. It's the crappiest punishment ever, as I still drive but live with the fear of getting caught and spending 90 days in the Big House. One of my favorite things to do is fill up my tank, grab some good music, and go for a drive - it's great for all that introspective, self-revelation thought process. And I meant to comment on everyone else's writing...it really is good, much of it really enlightening. Great idea for a board. I'll be posting some more stuff once I get it organized.

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Don Pitcher 5:25 PM EST, 11/07/99 (Message #27 of 453)

Going back a bit: I couldn't agree more with some of Dogmeat's comments. Kids can be such magic - and I hate seeing parents that seem to miss that. I'm more than looking forward to the day to when I have a family.


Dobs 6:45 AM EST, 11/08/99 (Message #28 of 453)

American Beauty was the reality for my friends when we were growing up. I see alot of people who are really good with kids and always wonder if that really was such a good thing. Maybe, all the humiliation and cruelty you get in childhood is what will make you an exceptional (or exceptionally messed up) person someday. I don't know. It just seems that alot of my friends who had these really great families and great childhood seem to me to be more shallow, selfish, and self-centered. They weren't really spoiled.

That's not always true, though. I fell in love with a girl who had very loving parents and whose dramas revolved around her friends' issues rather than her own. She says she counts her blessings everyday, always tells her parents and friends she loves them, and gives everyday a chance to be a beautiful one.

Mind you, she's definitely not carefree and she always has things on her mind. And her poetry can be dark. But, her happiness is genuine, peaceful and generous. And I can't imagine that happening without her parents' nurturing.


lbbshell 7:59 AM EST, 11/08/99 (Message #29 of 453)

I'm not going to comment on nurturing vs. non-nurturing.. no wait, just a short one.
Some of the more self-centered people I know were the victims of a traumatic divorce. They are spoiled, stuck-up, obnoxious, and surprisingly fragile. Its like a defense mechanism to them to be this way.
Then again, the nicest people I know are from divorce situations as well.... Its either one way or the other. I don't know many people who are not from a divorce situation, and those that I do know are in a situation similar to mine, and are getting more and more twisted on love and life and all these other things every day.


jesuslookslikeme 10:56 AM EST, 11/08/99 (Message #30 of 453)

This accident of birth - I can almost imagine the midwife saying to my mother "Congratulations. It's a little middle class English boy" - has robbed me of the capacity to feel. We are raised to the sounds of stoic silence, at home and at school. Any moment of openness, even a child's tears, are admonished by an embarrassed adult as unseemly (You can almost hear the ghosts of colonial Britain whispering "Stiff upper lip, old boy" in the background).
But what struck me after I shed not a tear when each and every one of my grandparents died, was the thought that this was just an excuse. How glib of me to blame the social mores of the English middle classes on my inhumane ability to ever feel anything. Maybe I am just a cold fish. You think I exaggerate? Even when my child was born I stood back a little and merely thought 'interesting'. I'd like to say that I've just shocked myself in writing that, but that's not true; rather I feel a sense of moderate, seemly, self- disgust that is too low to register. At least in public.

I wrote that stuff a few years back, and cringed later at how pretentious and self-indulgent I was being. But then I had a nervous breakdown, and realised that I'd stored everything away, always. Still do. Which is probably why I like to sneer so much at everything else, and have always dreamed of appearing on a satirical news quiz.

FreeToys 11:21 AM EST, 11/08/99 (Message #31 of 453)

They hurt you at home and they hit you at school
They hate you if you're clever and they despise a fool
'til you're so fuckin' crazy you can't follow their rules
'Working Class Hero' - Lennon


Dogmeat99 1:49 PM EST, 11/08/99 (Message #32 of 453)

I come from a split family, hell, just about everyone I know does. All this has done is solidify my committment to not letting my family fall into that statistical purgatory. My parents were divorced when I was in college and already dating my future wife. My dad was almost textbook uninterested in my upbringing. When My kids were born I swore I would never exert that kind of punishment on them. Cheesy, but it reminds of Ally Sheedy's comment in "The Breakfast Club" When she says her parents ignore her. My God, how awful that must be. Kids are vessels waiting to be filled. No child is ever born knowing how to hate, or to be violent, or to kill. these are all things that have to learned. The line between what is too much love and not enough is a fine one indeed. You don't want spoiled brats, but you want to give them the world as well. It's a brand new tightrope that must be traversed every single day of your parental life. One last thing, my 3 1/2 year old knows all the words to Shania Twain's "Man, I Feel Like a Woman". Somebody help me, Please.


wallpaper 8:11 PM EST, 11/08/99 (Message #33 of 453)

Another self-indulgent moment from wallpaper:
These are the lyrics to a song I wrote about three years ago:
Direction Is

(c) 1996 me

And would you believe
the wind that destroys her
defines me
It divines me
It divides me
from the crowds and the stations of every man
And if you believe
you can see through the colours
of every man
come to me
Come to me and live in the pockets of poverty
And when you can see
you're out of the circle
of influence
Ride with me
Ride with me
into the future you want to see
The future with me
(Long-ish instrumental bit here)
So could you deceive
the friend that has showed you
the lighted way
Decide the way
Direction is
a friend that will follow you into
the greatest darkest warmest
abyss

This is one of my faves, but it must be so weird reading the words without the music. Hopefully it doesn't lose too much in the translation.
I would love to hear any comments: good, bad or indifferent.
I guess criticism from strangers is easier to take...


Dobs 9:28 PM EST, 11/08/99 (Message #34 of 453)

Is it a folk song? Has a bit of a "Like A Rolling Stone" vibe to it.

My favorite lines -- "And if you believe you can see through the colours of every man. Come to me and live in the pockets of poverty" So true.

Your lines have a nice rhythm and repetition to it.

"Warmest abyss." Nice line.

My only suggestion, and your lyrics are good mind you, would be to probably change some of the words to color your connotations. For example, instead of "ride" maybe "tread." I like it though.


the_rooster 7:57 PM EST, 11/09/99 (Message #35 of 453)

What a great idea for a board! I would post some deeper thoughts, but to be honest, my life is to young and my innermost thoughts are something I would probably end up in a house with padded walls for.
Wallpaper, you really should get into songwriting for your writing is very good. I used to try writing songs, but to be honest, while I could write lyrics, the song would end up sounding like exactly what I was into at the time. It gave me a new respect for songwriters. Am I babling? I think I should stop now...............


Prince of Cats 8:28 PM EST, 11/09/99 (Message #36 of 453)

I guess it all came together for me when I realized everyone's going to hurt you. She wrote to me that "everyone's going to let you down" why should she have been an exception? You place so much faith in one person and they can never live up to what you make of them. And whose fault is that? I used to lie awake at night and wish she was here or I was there but a lot of good it may have done. things just couldn't be the same.

Flashback to the summer. The inertia of lonliness led me to that place I thought I wanted to be in. But I guess there are no second chances for a mistake of that gravity. This was all before I met Her, yeah, with capitals. I had another her (sans capitals) and she was my Aphrodite, my goddess, my everything, and she broke me like no one has before or since. I suppose I allowed myself to get caught up with someone I didn't love. she (lowercase) had shattered my illusions of love, in a mere two weeks.

I used to think love was enough.

Anyway, I let the loss of the lowercase push me to things I may not have done before. And now things have been pushed so far, I don't know if I can allow myself to love Her.

And if I did, whose to say she wouldn't hurt me again? Can I even trust myself anymore? Ah me! I am a fool.

(In case anyone's curious, this is the journal entries of about a year, abridged. I suppose it's pretty vague, but that how I write to myself. I figure I know all the names and situations. Besides, like my situation is all that unique. I'm sure this applies to almost anybody. Hell, you could probably fill in the blanks with names of people you once knew.)


Prince of Cats 8:33 PM EST, 11/09/99 (Message #37 of 453)

Post Script
It just struck me that that was pretty self-indulgent and well...long. If anyone reads it all, I'm sorry. I need to hire an editor.


the_rooster 8:35 PM EST, 11/09/99 (Message #38 of 453)

Actually, I think it's quite good.


Don Pitcher 1:24 AM EST, 11/10/99 (Message #39 of 453)

Prince: you're right on line with some of what I was expecting to see here on this board. Don't apologize for that slice of life - that's part of why I started this. And you're right, perhaps the "situation" does fit a lot of us here, but the emotion that you're sharing is yours.
I read that, and it makes it so that I don't feel so whacked out about times when my heart's been drug through the muck. I know that I haven't been the only one to beat my head up against the wall, or been at that stage of being afraid to try again, lest I get crashed & burned even harder. Yeah, we can relate, but sometimes hearing it from another can boost us onward (Lumen, you reach out yet to that guy???).
"Allowed myself to get caught up with someone I didn't love." Beeennnn theeerrree! I sometimes think that not being truthful to our own selves leads us into more confusion over Love than the other person in the picture actually does. So let me throw this out for discussion among all of you:
Have you ever stayed with a person for an extended amount of time knowing that you didn't really feel deeply for that person, yet carried on as if you did? Why? To avoid lonliness? To avoid hurting that other person? Just plain didn't realize it in yourself? (this could bring some interesting feedback)
And Rooster: don't feel need to hold things in pal; show your "insanity" and I think you'll quickly see that you're not alone. And age certainly doesn't matter -- you've got a mind, heart, & emotion reacting to the world about you just as any of us does.


Dobs 4:00 AM EST, 11/10/99 (Message #40 of 453)

Sometimes, it really bothers me how much I "sold out" when it comes to relationships. I hate it.

That's why it's better for me (just for me) not to believe in love. It lets me look at the mirror everyday and see bullshit.

But, on a more cheery note, here's part of a letter I wrote for a friend and her boyfriend. It's her first time.

" . . . In fall, people carry an inexpressible glow, and you remark how beautiful the people you love are. Inexpressibly, intangibly, like they came out of their shells, them not knowing the one or the other, them knowing that the entrance of winter means that you will not go away. You would never go away. Not with your hands on mine that tightly, not with your eyes looking open like the ocean blue, not with the pianos playing in the trees calling for the funeral marches. He looks at you and you're inexpressibly beautiful, a child, youth, adult, all before him, mixing like oil and paint in canvases upon her face, she talking like cocoa powder in warm milk, sharing the dry, brusque noises in sweetness and light, and wearing her sweater and head piece, knowing that damn well, this is fall and she's a beauty.

And then he steps outside and he see you and him, two people by the subway, sharing coffee, directions, and jokes while people in the back and foreground jetting back and forth, with their coffees, directions, and jokes, and the two people, one being you, are laughing, are swaying back and forth like the trees, are just a pair in the confusion of citygoers. That's okay because it's beautiful how everything is. Like even if the wind blows, you'll catch some bird catching it such that it's seemingly in an effortless nonmovement, everything about the bird, feathers, beaks, the twigs around it, in flurry but the body, center of brain, heart, and last night's dinner, holding court in all this change. It's beautiful because everything is not changing.

So, today when you kiss him, your boy, you celebrate the essence of fall."

specialsause 4:16 PM EST, 11/11/1999 (Message #41 of 453)

This is something I wrote when I was 14yrs old. I don't remember exactly how it went, but it was something like this....
They come in the night....They tear me apart limb by limb
On my body I find Their fleghm
Their screams pierce deep into my soul
Their eyes burn through me, balck as coal
Their odor make me choke, Their touch makes me gag......
They are the beasts, and they've come, and I wear Their tag


specialsauce 4:22 PM EST, 11/11/1999 (Message #42 of 453)

By the way, I was extremely full of pain during my childhood! My parents moved around every couple of months, so as soon as I would get close to my friends, I would be taken away w/out even being able to say good-bye. I have tons of old, twisted poetry from my childhood!!


Yakomo 10:09 PM EST, 11/11/1999 (Message #43 of 453)

Thanks for the encouragement Don. I'll probably post somethin tomorrow, when I have time.
On the other hand, if everyone keeps writing this good, I may be too cowardly to post.
JLLM: Very interesting (don't know what else to call it, and I realise I risk trivialising it, sorry). Do you have any more?


Don Pitcher 0:18 AM EST, 11/12/1999 (Message #44 of 453)

SpSauce: that is pretty dark -- any history behind it in particular? Does make you sound alone & defenseless.
The following goes back in a way to the question I threw out a few posts ago about staying with someone you know you're not really well suited for.
"A QUICK GLANCE"
Face:
Over your shoulder
calm smoldering eyes.
Irony sought grin; fancy
meeting you here.
Yes, I knew you well
face...
Once.
This was written a Halloween several years ago. I had been out trick or treating with a girl I was seeing and her 3 y/o, when we just happened to cross paths with another girl I had dated out with her little sister. She looked over in the dark and smiled real big, but turned when I started to speak. Saw her again later on the next block, she said "hi" and we talked a moment, but she denied seeing us earlier.


Prince of Cats 6:18 PM EST, 11/12/1999 (Message #45 of 453)

I don't know if I believe in love anymore.

I having a hard enough time believing in myself, should it be any easier to understand the abstrtact and complex thing called love?


specialsauce 6:42 PM EST, 11/12/1999 (Message #46 of 453)

Don, at that time, that was exactly how I felt, "alone and defenseless"! There was no one particular incident that led up to that writing, it was just my whole life before it.
Don't worry, I am a happily married, well adjusted adult now!!


strange neighbor 8:50 PM EST, 11/12/1999 (Message #47 of 453)

Whoever said it's quiet, said it too loud,
Whoever said it's their fault, said it too proud,
Whoever said it's dark out is blocking my sun,
Whoever said it's not me, must be the one


Yakomo 1:49 AM EST, 11/13/1999 (Message #48 of 453)

Rant No. 1: the Pathetic State of my Love Life
[warning - this will be long]
I hate couples. I really do. My brother and his girlfriend, my friend and his girlfriend, my parents, _everyone_.
Well, "hate" is a little too strong a word. I'm insanely jealous - that may be more like it. Now I would never, ever, in a million years try to break these people up in my jealous - it's more longing than bitterness.
I can hear the thoughts of any females (and possibly some males) right now - "Naw, he just wants sex." Well, bullshit. I'm not denying that I like sex, and that it would certainly be a welcome part of being in a relationship with someone, but if that was really all I was after, I'd just either go to Las Vegas and pay for it legally, or stay around here and pay for it illegally. So what do I want?
Now, I have a long history of over- intellectualizing my emotional motives, so I'll tell you exactly what I want. As a young, healthy male of 18, technically speaking the only feelings I'm feeling are part of nature's attempt to get me to breed and pass any beneficial characteristics on to the next generation.
Fuck that. The need to love and be loved is as old as we are. I blame society, quite frankly. Even ignoring the fact that I grew up with the tacit assumption that I would never have a girlfriend, simply because I don't fit society's standard of beauty (let's just say I weigh less than Homer Simpson, and more than Ally McBeal), even ignoring that, I still blame society.
I mean, it's been proved time and time again that it's beneficial for babies to be touched, and it's also good for the rest of us. And barring the occasional handshake, tap on the shoulder, or hug with a family member, I last touched someone or was touched (in any way)... well, never. And it's our god-damned repressed society that ensures that, believe me. Hell, my friends aren't even comfortable with me tapping them on the shoulder - what does that say?
But even beyond the physical bit, I'd still like to be in a relationship. I mean, I've fallen in love with a couple girls already, and if that alone is that exciting, I hesitate to imagine what it's like if the other person likes you too. My problem so far is that I only fall in love with girls after I know them fairly well. I'm not saying I'm never going to date or whatever, but so far whenever I've finally gotten around to asking they wheel out the dreaded "I value our friendship too much" gambit (I really hate that one. If I like you enough to go out with you, i'll still be friends with you if we break up, believe me). I have no idea whether this is the actual reason, or if they just don't find me attractive. I've been assured multiple times, by numerous friends, that in university the girls stop focusing as much on looks and more on personality. But at this point the rejections I've gotten have made me _very_ hesitant to ask anybody about this sort of thing. I mean, it took my _6 months_ to work up the nerve to finally ask someone out last time I tried it, and that didn't work. I may just have to wait until somebody asks _me_ out, and I see that happening.... never.
Well, that rant sputtered out. I apologize again for it's length.

[strat-0]

FreeToys 2:01 AM EST, 11/13/1999 (Message #49 of 453)

You may have to stop aiming for the supermodels and try cultivating some of those lonely girls in the shadows who are feeling the exact same way that you are?
Don't bring up the 'relationship' aspect.. just take an interest in them and let things develop on their own. Few people are immune to thoughtful comments about their better qualities. Plant some seeds like that and one of the girls will eventually realize;
"Hmmm.. that Yakomo is the only one who appreciates me, I wonder where he is?"
Sure, most will become the dreaded 'friend'... but not all


Yakomo 2:14 AM EST, 11/13/1999 (Message #50 of 453)

Ha!
It's very flattering that you think I approach the supermodels, but believe me, I don't have the guts. Things just don't seem to be working out with the lonely girls, either.
On the other hand, it's nice _someone_ read it all. Thanks for the advice.

FreeToys 2:23 AM EST, 11/13/99 (Message #51 of 453)

Lonely girls won't want you either if you only come off as the pathetic guy who's absorbed in himself and lamenting about his lack of love.
You might be creating a 'self-fulfilling prophesy'
Try focusing on them and being the cool guy.



Don Pitcher 3:24 AM EST, 11/13/99 (Message #52 of 453)

ah...how 'bout just being himself? No image, but y-o-u. People can see through images too; then where do you go?
I will say that you have a personality that comes out in your typings here -- there's an intellegence that works, some threads of good humor, even some veiled compassion. Give yourself some points here dude! A girl that is going to value you is going to value these sorts of attributes. And if you're less than happy with not appearing like Brad Pitt, take a walk around a mall or something sometime and check out all the different sorts of couples that you see. Bet there's a Chris Farley for more than every Pitt.
As for falling in love with a friend, I was so in your shoes at 18. Out of four years of high school, I made only two friends. Both girls, who more or less barged their way into my life while I was a Senior. I've felt love for each of them, love that went through a lot of changes and continues to this day to evolve. I only had a "relationship" with one of them and man, if didn't give me a learning experience about Love (still is). I've sliced open my arms, kicked/punched holes through walls, made late night calls to crisis hotlines, gone down into the gutter and crawled my way back out again. All in sake of trying to understand why I didn't have what I wanted. There was no answer that was ever handed to me.
Looking for that answer is what drowned me the most. You make Love SOOOOO big, become SOOOOO desperate for it, it ends up eating you up. Not love itself, mind you, but the quest for it. Better to be like the image Ayn Rand sets forth in "Atlas Shrugged" of having this impossible oppressive "weight" bearing constantly down upon you -- don't fight it, chuck it off instead.


FreeToys 7:19 AM EST, 11/13/99 (Message #53 of 453)

I don't think Yakomo being a 'cool guy' is an act
I think it's a facet of his personality that might be getting buried if he dwells too much on whatever he perceives as 'problem areas' right now.
We all create our own situations.
Being 'cool' merely means bringing out your good qualities and using the tools available to you. There's nothing phony about taking more of an interest in the girls and attempting to lighten the mood instead of wallowing in your own doubt and self pity.
Why do you claim that people changing for the better has to be a 'false image'
Once someone responds to him the lonely Yakomo will no longer exist.
That is the false image that he should shed.


Don Pitcher 2:26 PM EST, 11/13/99 (Message #54 of 453)

Toys: I see by using the word "cool" you weren't asking him to go about posing as The Fonz. I think we're on the very same wavelength here: act yourself; let your positive traits shine through.
And if it's my last post referred to, I don't see where I claimed a change for the better would be a false image. That plain wouldn't make sense. But sorry if that's a drift you got anyhow -- reading between the lines off boards like this sometimes results in poor communication.


Dobs 2:29 PM EST, 11/13/99 (Message #55 of 453)

Freetoys, most of us been there, don't be so harsh. It's not something you just pick up one day and decide to be. It usually takes quite a few situations or years of reinforcement.

It's not unusual to fall for somebody only after you know them pretty well.

Yak: Ask your female friends what they think of you. You'd be surprised how different your self-image and their impression is. Don't worry about it. The #1 thing women like is a SENSE OF HUMOR. Yak, you got that IN SPADES. Be yourself, be funny, and things will work out for you.


Dobs 2:32 PM EST, 11/13/99 (Message #56 of 453)

On the other hand, being "yourself" doesn't exist for us Leos. We're "drama kings" at heart.




Yakomo 2:34 PM EST, 11/13/99 (Message #57 of 453)

Thanks for the advice (and the compliemnts) guys.
However, as well taken as your points on facets of personality have been taken, we should remember that I'm differant in real life than on the net - and so are you guys, I would imagine. The fact is, I bitch about that sort of stuff here on the Net so I _don't_ come across as some desperate geek in real life.
"You make Love SOOOOO big, become SOOOOO desperate for it, it ends up eating you up. Not love itself, mind you, but the quest for it."
Very, _very_ good point. I really do think I've been able to mellow out about it quite a bit, but that's why that post was a rant - sometimes we all need to vent.
"I don't think Yakomo being a 'cool guy' is an act"
"Give yourself some points here dude!"
Awww... if this keeps up, I may blush. ;-)
Thanks again! I now return this board from being "the psychoanalysis of Yakomo" back to "Bared souls".


Yakomo 2:35 PM EST, 11/13/99 (Message #58 of 453)

Missed dobs post - more flattery!
Of course, as he could tell you, being a Leo I love this stuff.
i've never had my ego so boosted... thanks again, to allthree of you (and everyone else, of course).
Maybe next rant I'll pick something less contraversal to talk about - like politics, or religion.


Prince of Cats 2:36 PM EST, 11/13/99 (Message #59 of 453)

Ayyyyyyye!

God, I LOVE the Fonze!

Yeah, falling in love with friends is all well and good, but...I wouln't recommend it. If you've ever had a relationship that you thought would last forever crumble apart and then have to be friends with that person the next day...? Personally it hasn't happened yet. Yet because I haven't seen this girl since. (She's on the mainland) but come Christmas I'm sure all I'll be able to think about is my arms around her watching the stars on a summer evening and...opps! Shit, I'll never be able to do that again will I?

It's a good road to Bittersville.


Prince of Cats 2:37 PM EST, 11/13/99 (Message #60 of 453)

Maybe I'll just curl up in my dorm for the winter.

specialsauce 4:40 PM EST, 11/13/1999 (Message #61 of 453)

Yak, At this point, (after the day I've had), I'd say just be patient, and in the mean time enjoy your youth and your freedom. I'm a waitress at a very busy place, and I've been working 7 days a week. My husband just came in cussing at me, calling me a bitch,among other things, all because he sat outside the resteraunt waiting for me for half an hour, and I didn't see him. I was in the back peeling 50lbs of onions, (LITERALLY), then caught a ride home w/ another waitress. I don't think I deserved that after I work my ass off all Saturday, while he sits on his.


20thCenturyFox 4:44 PM EST, 11/13/1999 (Message #62 of 453)

Wow Yakomo... a lot of the stuff you were saying (especially the couple-jealousy) hit pretty close to home for me...and the rest of you were giving some good advice!! I liked the bit about making it into such a big deal that the idea of it overwhelms the actual thing...very true, something I'm very guilty of doing. Must have something to do with us being such young 'uns.


20thCenturyFox 4:56 PM EST, 11/13/1999 (Message #63 of 453)

I found this...it's pretty cheesy but I remember feeling really..enlightened? before I wrote it, like a cloak was pulled off of my eyes or something.
I feel okay. I do. I even went as far as to say it aloud as I walked home in the pouring rain. 'I feel good. I feel okay. I AM okay.' And I believed myself for once. It's funny, the things that reassure a person, but if they work...hey, whatever. I was beginning to believe that my whole life was going to hell, and in ways it still is. But trudging through the puddles, watching the beauty that transforms even the ugliest of places when all is dark save the reflection of the lights of civilization on the rain-soaked pavement, I continued my self- journey. My introspective revelations, I realized, aren't unlike that of the street lights and neon fast food signs showing what may in fact be their true colors when displayed in an unconventional situation. Life is what you make it. I see now that's not just a sentiment of comfort, it's true. Everything is a choice in this world. Some things may not be exactly what we'd plan, but there really is a way to make the best of every situation. A key factor is acceptance: accepting yourself, accepting what you can't change, can't take back. Accepting the fact that what makes you different may be what makes you who you are.


specialsauce 5:04 PM EST, 11/13/1999 (Message #64 of 453)

Nice Post, 20th....


20thCenturyFox 5:18 PM EST, 11/13/1999 (Message #65 of 453)

WARNING: THESE POSTS WILL BE LONG. Under the influence one day I decided to write a 'miniseries'. I haven't named it yet, but it's kinda a 'Gulliver's Travels' type of thing.
Episode One
I went exploring today. I had a half tank of gas, a half pack of cigarettes, and a mind full of questions...what better way to kill time and sort things through than to go for a drive.
I grabbed some old 70's funk - a little Curtis Mayfield, a little James Brown - and I was off. Big Rapids is a funny little town. It's as if some council decided to stop all possibility of urban sprawl, before the city even becomes enough of the former to begin the latter. Nearly every street is a dead end once you get away from the main drag. The ones that extend more than a few blocks often make a drastic switch from friendly suburban neighborhood streets to barren, poorly-paved roads in the space of a few yards. These roads literally lead to nowhere, as they also become dead ends after a few miles of this desolation.
I turned at the light and headed southwest. Just a boring stretch of road crowded with a surprising amount of traffic, all rushing to be someplace while I was meandering without a particular destination. Reached the community of Rogers Heights, something that appears to be a few redneck snowmobile and tire shops, along with Rudy's Bar, surrounding a lake. Of course, the Height's Party Store, complete with the obligatory misplaced apostrophe.
Continued down the same road, passing a few places of interest with no luck. There was a construction crew at the dam, and Browers Park was closed, so I drove on. My journey reversed itself in the parking lot of Ginny's Buffalo Inn, located in another equally charming burg called Stanwood. Incidentally, the misplaced apostrophe here was the Four Season's Restaurant. The sky had grown so heavy with gray that I almost didn't see the preadolescent white trash boy pedaling his bike down the wrong side of the road, but this seems to be such a fixture of depressing little nowhere-towns that I'm alarmingly used to it.
Foot hovering on the gas pedal, I was too unfocused to keep a steady speed. Thoughts drifting, shifting around, seeing things but absorbing something else. I remember passing a giant dollhouse of sorts for sale in someone's yard. A beautiful replica, exquisite detail, but I'm sure it carried a hefty price tag. Not too much for someone with money, though, someone who'd figured out he couldn't buy his happiness in the real world. Instead he could recreate it in an oblivion from reality, all the same amenities, only pint-sized. What better way to be omnipotent, to gain ultimate control...
Although I desperately needed another job, I passed a few places with 'Help Wanted' signs without stopping. Did consider stopping at the funeral home, though. My only question - was I requesting an application or a reservation? Wouldn't much matter, I suppose. It's all the same in the end. The only difference is length and direction of route.
What was - what am - I waiting for? There it was, death, the final frontier. Why do I spend my days watching the clock, waiting for nothing particular? So time passes - so what? All anyone's got to look forward to is dying. May as well enjoy life as long as possible, not spend it waiting for the minutes to tick by as you're cruising dirty back roads.
I pulled into the parking lot, exactly like all the others filled with their twin cars, surrounding the identical buildings. I returned to my apartment with gas and cigarettes halved, but questions doubled. Maybe next time.


20thCenturyFox 5:25 PM EST, 11/13/1999 (Message #66 of 453)

Specialsauce - thanks for the compliment-sorry your day sucked- that's the kinda bullshit that makes me wonder if anything's worth it.


Don Pitcher 5:00 AM EST, 11/14/1999 (Message #67 of 453)

Fox, all I've got to say is that I'd like to ride with you...
that was nice to come home to -- well done.


lbbshell 7:49 AM EST, 11/14/1999 (Message #68 of 453)

20th... strangely, no matter how bad it gets, its always worth it.


Yakomo 10:38 AM EST, 11/14/1999 (Message #69 of 453)

20th Century - great posts, and thanks. I forgot to add the part where my attached friends tell me I should be _happy_ to be single, it's saving me money.
Specialsauce: That sucks. Hope it gets better.


Don Pitcher 3:42 PM EST, 11/15/1999 (Message #70 of 453)

"IF ROSES HAVE THORNS"
There is a fear behind every flower
Brought on by its softness
its frailty
its beauty
its scent.
The fear is death.
(written while thinking about losing something precious)


Prince of Cats 10:48 PM EST, 11/15/1999 (Message #71 of 453)

>P.O.C. lets out his breath<

Impressive post 20th. You ever think of writting? I mean professionally. That's the road I'm on, but I know when I'm humbled.

Seriously. Good post.


Yakomo 9:40 AM EST, 11/16/1999 (Message #72 of 453)

Yeah, I'd have to agree with PoC. I'm hopefully going to be writing _something_ one day, but you are _good_.


TrpnBly 11:36 AM EST, 11/16/1999 (Message #73 of 453)

Dogmeat99 - post #10 is pure beauty.


lumencandle 3:19 PM EST, 11/16/1999 (Message #74 of 453)

well, i've been sitting in the corner being moved by the things you kids have written long enough. i've enjoyed every single post, you guys are some good writers/philosophers. myself, i shy away from letting people know what i really write. i lack structure, so it all somes out as incoherent ramblings. and i'm looooooooong-winded as hell. so let me apologize beforehand. anyway, i'll start by telling you all why i've never had sex.

guys were allergic to me until i was a senior in high school, and by that point, my self-esteem was in rotten, shriveled flakes on the gound. i had extremely bad luck getting dates. i decided no one asked me out because i was "ugly" and freakish, and that my only hope for dates, and love that i hope to have later on, was to be funny and nice. i thought i'd only have my personality to make people think i was appealing, and i was bitter about this.

well, just when i accepted my fate as the ugly girl, people started saying strang things to me like "you're beautiful". it sent my world into total collapse. TO ME, i was always decent looking, but that never mattered. i felt that if no one else thought so, it just didn't matter. so once i had so-called beauty i'd wished for, i realized i didn't want it so badly. i was breathless and dazed the first time someone i was actually interested in asked me out. i was happy. truly happy. i had always planted my hopes of happiness in what other people thought of me, so when other peole said i was beautiful, it should have meant so much. and it did for a brief, blissful while. soon, after dating so many guys who stopped calling me when they learned i wouldn't have sex with them on the second date, i grew to hate this "beauty" thing. i was ashamed i had devalued myself so much for so long. and it didn't make life any easier.

i want someone who wants me for my mind and humor and personality and kind heart, not my supposed pretty face. so, it's like a double-edged sword. i don't want to go back to being the dateless girl who feels hopeless about prospects for love, but i'm so so distressed when people stare at me or hit on me shamelessly. it's embarassing and i still can't get used to it. or worse, when they make unwanted sexual advances, then accuse me of being a tease, when all i did was be nice to them. which leads to:

the subject at hand. why i'm a virgin. i've always wanted my first time to be special and all that blah blah. no one night stands here. i'm not holding out for marriage, although maybe i should. i'm just waiting for someone wonderful who'll stay that way once they realize i'm not an easy lay. i've dated so many who act how they know i want them to, who cater to me, in hopes they'll fool me into something. but then their true priorities show through. i've nearly lost my faith that i'll find someone who cares about me as more than a potential source for sex, and have nearly compromised my no sex principle just so that i'd have someone. you see, i'm really jaded and cynical bout the whole love thing because of sex. well, lack thereof.

i once wrote this in a journal:
"people think if they see something beautiful, it's theirs. they try to touch it, without even the slightest permission. they pursue and pursue, refusing to care if it wants to be captured. they'll do anything to get within inches, close enough to take it. and as soon as they touch it, all they want to do is ruin it. like a child with a new toy, they want so much, but when they hold the object of their obssession, they're helpless to keep from destroying it. then they find some other beauty to steal and waste." this pretty much is a description of my opinion on males. but i've NEVER been with anyone who made me think any differently. i'm a fragile person. i'm really still a little girl. and it makes me cry when i think of all the people who've tried to take advantage of me. but as naive as i seem and feel, i haven't let anyone succeed in ruining me. i've never had my heart broken, but then again i've never let anyone get very close to me. and sex just seems like the epitome of close to me. it means trust and caring to me, and i don't want to share it with just anyone who thinks i'm "cute" or "sexy" and nothing else.

sorry. yakomo's post got me thinking about things...i've said so much, but i still haven't made as much sense as i'd like to.


specialsauce 5:06 PM EST, 11/16/1999 (Message #75 of 453)

lumencandle, that was a great post, and I understand completely how you feel. The only difference between you and I is that I realized beauty can be a curse as much as it can be a blessing at an early age. I went to a few different schools a year, beacuse my mother moved around alot, so I was always the "new girl", which made me the new pursuit for the guys. I hated it so much, and got so tired of hearing "You're beautiful", and knowing that was the only reason why everyone wanted to be around me. (I was never at one school long enough for anyone to ever really get to know me.) As I got into my mid teens I was taken advantage of so many times because of my "beauty" that it still hurts to think about it. As an adult now, I can't even walk a few blocks home from work w/out a man stopping. I'm a waitress right now, so you can imagine how much worse it makes this "beauty" thing!!


specialsauce 5:09 PM EST, 11/16/1999 (Message #76 of 453)

Sorry that was so long, but I was just sitting there thinking about the curse of beauty the other day.


specialsauce 5:11 PM EST, 11/16/1999 (Message #77 of 453)

Sorry that was so long, but I was just sitting there thinking about the curse of beauty the other day. Read my post on "Anything Goes", and you'll know why!
I admire your strength :-)


specialsauce 5:12 PM EST, 11/16/1999 (Message #78 of 453)

Sorry that was so long, but I was just sitting there thinking about the curse of beauty the other day. Read my post on "Anything Goes", and you'll know why!
I admire your strength.

[strat-0]

TrpnBly 5:17 PM EST, 11/16/1999 (Message #79 of 453)

I admire everybody's strengths...I mean everybody's got the trauma in their lives that they have to deal with....but the curse of beauty isn't nearly the cross to bear as the curse of the truly ugly.


FreeToys 5:17 PM EST, 11/16/1999 (Message #80 of 453)

It wasn't long. You're too meek.
Beauty might be a curse, but the alternative is worse.


Pickaxe 5:16 PM EST, 11/16/99 (Message #81 of 453)

Fuckin hell does specialsauce love herself or what?


Don Pitcher 5:37 PM EST, 11/16/99 (Message #82 of 453)

Danielle, you have a way of expressing yourself just fine -- so don't have any worries of not coming across or making the perfect sense of what you feel inside. Your essence shows through quite easily when spoken from the heart like that.
There are guys out there with values such as you seek. You probably even know that -- it's the time spent up to the point of meeting them that is such a bitch. You can feel yourself dying of lonliness or on the verge of dropping into insanity if you focus too much upon it. Being involved with Life about you can help maintain yourself and bring happiness in from different paths.
But there's still that emptiness and wondering about "that guy," right? I'm not going to start preaching the idea that there is a 'soulmate' out there. Oh, I do believe that there can be some sort of magical feeling when some people do come into your life, but in a good true relationship, I think it's an equal, if not more, of a matter of what happens within a person themself rather than something their partner brings to them.
This will sound cheesy as shit, but the hell with it: I would have to say that the first time that I thought I really felt a true love with a girl was actually right in the middle of sex. Now I had known her for years and we had had this relationship part of things going for a while too. I also had a love for her already from all that we'd shared up to that point. This was a person that I wouldn't have wanted to harm, this is a person who I cared for, this was a person who I would have always tried to be there for. That sort of love was already established -- which is a great sort of love to have with another person. I'm just saying that this one night, it went into some sort of another level.
(this isn't written with into to "arouse" anybody) We were there right in the middle of the act, joined together as on any time before, and I remember kissing her and looking down at her face in the dark...the moment froze. I wasn't creating the moment, I wasn't controlling it. In fact, my mind was only clear. And into that moment somehow came this realization, as if I just then only really truely saw this person that I was with, and that I loved her with my whole heart, my whole being, with no selfishness for my own concern. There, I knew, I had the capacity of Love. It came without calling, from a place that was both deep within me and also from all points surrounding me. I can't describe it any other way.
Now half an hour has passed and I haven't replied to your post as I had planned. Sorry my mind took off in a different direction there. I'm sure there'll be some thoughts by others who've been visiting this board. I was going to draw a parellel of one of your last paragraphs to some of what I was trying to say with "If Roses Have Thorns." To hold something so beautiful IS to risk destroying it -- that "fear" of ruining it. To give another a rose, a virginity, a love...carries that chance that it won't survive. But don't let that always be the reason to not experience the possible beauty.


specialsauce 5:51 PM EST, 11/16/99 (Message #83 of 453)

Pickaxe, from what I've read about you, I don't know if I should even bother replying to that post! Actually, I don't love myself sometimes, _I_ _DON"T_THINK_I"M_BEAUTIFUL, It's everyone else, who has made my life a living hell, that claims I'm beautiful.


specialsauce 5:51 PM EST, 11/16/99 (Message #84 of 453)

Freetoys, "...and the meek shall inherit the earth..."
I remember that from somewhere in the Bible :-)


TrpnBly 5:55 PM EST, 11/16/99 (Message #85 of 453)

And I'm still saying that I'd rather be in your shoes than say Rocky Dennis's (kid from The Mask).


specialsauce 5:59 PM EST, 11/16/99 (Message #86 of 453)

I guess so, Trpnbly, but if you knew all the shit that's happened to me, you may feel different!


Dogmeat99 6:09 PM EST, 11/16/99 (Message #87 of 453)

TrpnBly-Thanks a lot, it came from the heart. I'm afraid that when I talk about kids, especially my own, I have to be careful or else I start to sound like Kathie Lee Gifford and no one wants to hear that. I truly believe that children are our legacy and we have a responsibility to put them first above all in our lives. The payoffs can't be described. I came home from work the other night to put my 3 1/2 year old to bed. (Kathie Lee moment on the way) As I got up to leave the room she hugged me and whispered "I love you Daddy". You can't put a price on that.


Pickaxe 6:13 PM EST, 11/16/99 (Message #88 of 453)

Yeah, she's had like 20 stalkers (so I keep reading) and is wanted by every man in her state. Blimey, life must suck eh.

I can't believe this girl is for real. I mean who could possibly be so pig headed? Little tip for you Penelope Pitstop. None of us can actually see you, you're wasting your time.


specialsauce 6:14 PM EST, 11/16/99 (Message #89 of 453)

Fuck You again, Pansy Ass.


Pickaxe 6:17 PM EST, 11/16/99 (Message #90 of 453)

Ooooh repetition, 1-0 to me :-)



TrpnBly 6:23 PM EST, 11/16/99 (Message #91 of 453)

Doubt it. I mean c'mon specialsauce - so because of your beauty you feel that people never really know or care what the true you is like, that they are too busy wanting to "possess" in some way your beauty. Well an ugly person has all the same problems associated with others' not seeing them for who they are/not taking them seriously, but they are ostracized, ridiculed, and generally shit on - not revered, stalked, or put on a pedestal.


specialsauce 6:30 PM EST, 11/16/99 (Message #92 of 453)

Ok, point taken, maybe I've revealed too much about myself! But, I'm having fun w/ Pansy Ass right now!


FreeToys 6:30 PM EST, 11/16/99 (Message #93 of 453)

If it's a burden, it's because you're too meek.
Stand up for yourself like you just did against pickass and it won't be such a problem.
Tell your mate what you told us instead of keeping it to yourself and he may see things from your viewpoint. If you say nothing he'll only get more demanding.
There are plenty of beautiful girls who don't take any shit from anyone and are loving their lives.


Pickaxe 6:30 PM EST, 11/16/99 (Message #94 of 453)

Ahh Trip man, don't start her off. Next we'll be hearing how sh'e was courted by Hasslehoff to star in next years Baywatch. She's probably an old boiler who like a Turkey only gets stuffed once a year.


Pickaxe 6:33 PM EST, 11/16/99 (Message #95 of 453)

Free Toys - with a name like that I take it you cater for hard up, bored frustrated housewives or something? Yeah, i tell you what you can do with one of your 'free toys' stuff it right up your arse mate.


specialsauce 6:32 PM EST, 11/16/99 (Message #96 of 453)

Fuck you, yet again, Pansy. Go drink some lauger (sp?) and dream about me.


Pickaxe 6:38 PM EST, 11/16/99 (Message #97 of 453)

Heheh! It's lager_shouting LAGER LAGER LAGER MEGA MEGA WHITE THING MEGA MEGA WHITE THING GOING BACK TO ROMFORD!!

Remember the tune??


FreeToys 6:39 PM EST, 11/16/99 (Message #98 of 453)

Haha what a lamo
This is the guy who's supposed to be outrageous and funny according to the few who've spoken up for him?
Hardly... pathetic and desperate for attention is a more accurate description.


Prince of Cats 7:11 PM EST, 11/16/99 (Message #99 of 453)

I'm going to invoke some playground wisdom with this particular imp. "Just ignore him and he'll go away."

But if you want to see what Pick is really like check out his board "Why do women only like shit music?" Makes me sick to be male.

Got that, all? Ignore this chump and his posts. Their sole design is to get a rise out of you, and I can see his pasty white ass cackling with glee every time he gets someone upset.


Pickaxe 7:12 PM EST, 11/16/99 (Message #100 of 453)

Why are you laughing Dild? I hate that when someone laughs who doesn't get the joke.


Dobs 7:18 PM EST, 11/16/99 (Message #101 of 453)

About the beauty thing --- I think SpecialSauce just says she wishes she wasn't judged so much on her looks.

Really, personality is the most important thing. Beautiful women with strong personalities are seen as "b***es" as much as not-so- beautiful women with strong personalities.




Pickaxe 7:21 PM EST, 11/16/99 (Message #102 of 453)

We should be in a chat room.


Prince of Cats 7:20 PM EST, 11/16/99 (Message #103 of 453)

-Dialogue-

Is it fair for you to let yourself fall in love with her? I mean, where do you get off thinking that she even wants someone to fall in love with her? Did you think for a moment that maybe she had plans or maybe you were responcible for how your actions effected the emotions of others? How fucking dare you?

I'm not sure when I wrote this but it wasn't long ago. I still know the girl, in fact I'm still considering chasing her. But I'm pretty sure she and I are going different ways. But that doesn't make it hurt any less. Maybe I just wish I were someone who could let himself get tied down to one person. Not to say I'm a player or anything like that, it's just I know in two months I'll let some other girl in some other state kick my teeth in and I'll be writing something equally sappy about her. But that doesn't mean I wish any less that I could settle down with this one.

What? What was that? Did a hat just fall? Well then, I must be in love. >sigh< I often surprise myself with how foolish I can be.


Pickaxe 7:23 PM EST, 11/16/99 (Message #104 of 453)

Yeah man you're young. Play the field while you still can ;-)


Pickaxe 7:28 PM EST, 11/16/99 (Message #105 of 453)

Dobsy - read the posts, between the lines. This girl is up herself.


specialsauce 7:27 PM EST, 11/16/99 (Message #106 of 453)

Thank You Dobs... My point exactly!


specialsauce 7:29 PM EST, 11/16/99 (Message #107 of 453)

Pansy, it's getting late. Time to get out the butt plugs, time to stop posting.


lbbshell 7:27 PM EST, 11/16/99 (Message #108 of 453)

I think I have a headache...
No offense y'all, but could you create your own board to have this bitchfest?? Its awfully difficult to follow any of the other random things that are supposed to happen in here if between three boards there is the same exact conversation.


Pickaxe 7:33 PM EST, 11/16/99 (Message #109 of 453)

Time to get a SOH I think Special. Why did you call yurself 'special' incidentally?

I didn't start this shit Blondey, I come here and theres a hundred posts by these shmucks slating me on the favourite poster board.


specialsauce 7:38 PM EST, 11/16/99 (Message #110 of 453)

What is "SOH"? Are you getting angry Pansy?!



Pickaxe 7:41 PM EST, 11/16/1999 (Message #111 of 453)

No, not really.

Sense of humour. Have you got one? Do you have to call me Pansy BTW? It's awfully childish.


specialsauce 7:44 PM EST, 11/16/1999 (Message #112 of 453)

What is BTW??? Yes, I enjoy calling you Pansy. I have been having a good laugh throughout all of these posts!


Pickaxe 7:47 PM EST, 11/16/1999 (Message #113 of 453)

Well I'm glad to hear that. Would I be here if I wasn't having 'fun'?


lbbshell 7:49 PM EST, 11/16/1999 (Message #114 of 453)

LMAO- laugh my ass off
BTW- by the way


Dogmeat99 8:02 PM EST, 11/16/1999 (Message #115 of 453)

Hey Pick, the people who have issues are on another board. With all due respect, try the favorite posters board and you'll find more than enough people to vent your spleen at. peace


Pickaxe 8:02 PM EST, 11/16/1999 (Message #116 of 453)

L of fucking L


specialsauce 8:07 PM EST, 11/16/1999 (Message #117 of 453)

Dogmeat99(??), What is that supposed to mean...


Dogmeat99 8:16 PM EST, 11/16/1999 (Message #118 of 453)

Well, when I logged on to this board, it was bared souls. In the course of my typing, it became the PickAxe Playroom. I was really enjoying the board I was on but it had taken a decidedly sour turn. Correct me if I'm wrong but most folks who had issues with ol' Pick were on the favorite poster board. I invited everyone's favorite antagonist to take his arguments there, rather than on a board which had been pretty cool and clear of personal attacks. This was not to be. Rather unfortunate really, it was a nice board. Peace.


the_rooster 8:38 PM EST, 11/16/1999 (Message #119 of 453)

Man, this board was getting to be really fun and all the sudden it turns into a flamefest! Restore order here so we can at least have 1 peaceful board! Pick: I have apsolutely nothing against you but try and stay away from this board if you (or others) come into here to flame each other. Dogmeat: you beat me to posting this.


Don Pitcher 8:45 PM EST, 11/16/1999 (Message #120 of 453)

Thank you for your comments Dogmeat & Rooster -- I'm with you on that.
Now, perhaps back to things....


20thCenturyFox 9:26 PM EST, 11/16/99 (Message #121 of 453)

Going way back here...thanks everybody who commented for enjoying my little spouts of nonsense...I used to want to be a writer but it seems like more and more often I just don't get any inspiration anymore...but ya never know. These little essay/journal type things have just been pouring out of me lately, 2 or 3 a day, so maybe there's hope yet.
Lumencandle...(post 75 or thereabouts) The whole appearance/beauty/self-worth issue is a hard one to figure out. Personally I was horribly awkward looking until age 14 or so, and just overnight I completely blossomed. I'm not beautiful by any standards but I'd consider myself upwards of average...and in a small town where everyone's inbred like the one I grew up in, if you look decent before a six-pack you get pursued pretty hard. I was so unsure how to deal with it...one minute I was being made fun of, the gawky, chubby little nerd, and all of a sudden everybody was trying to get in my pants. I reacted to the attention the only way I knew how-making people happy by giving them what they wanted-and it has taken me awhile to get over it, to gain any self-worth at all. I've always been a quiet person, so I've always felt I had no personality...and when I think back to all the times I let myself get taken advantage of (or was I taking advantage of myself....) just to get noticed? appreciated? it makes me sick. I recognize the power of looks now, but I still have a hard time dealing with it. My automatic reaction, when someone compliments me, is pay them back somehow...my twisted little mind tends to think that if I don't lay somebody right away they'll hate me, and so will everyone else, and I'll never find happiness unless I go around screwing virtual strangers to please them.
Sorry, I got a little carried away...


lumencandle 5:06 PM EST, 11/17/99 (Message #122 of 453)

and to think, i figured no one would have posted any thoughts on what i had to say......geez, it IS like the playground in 3rd grade. well, getting back to the subject...

i hope i never implied that i think i'm a beauty queen at all, 'cos like every woman, some days i feel goergeous, but most days i feel very far from it. the most important thing i've learned is how much i wish looks didn't matter one way or the other. and i don't feel at all like some PC poser saying that i know looks are not the most important thing to me. no one wants to be "ugly", but pretty is hard to handle, too. and believe me, i've been ridiculed and made fun of as long as i can remember because i look so different. and it stinks. but it made me realize the strength of character, intelligence, personality, humor, charm, kindness and all that.

all i'm trying to say is that for anyone, it sucks to be defined by your looks. anyway, thanks for your feedback, everyone.. (thanks, don, for the insight and optimism.)


FreeToys 5:17 PM EST, 11/17/99 (Message #123 of 453)

Virgins are cool


lumencandle 5:21 PM EST, 11/17/99 (Message #124 of 453)

only because most people would just love to be the one to "deflower" them.


FreeToys 5:41 PM EST, 11/17/99 (Message #125 of 453)

That's part of it.. but they're also admirable for their purity and principles.


pickaxe. 10:22 PM EST, 11/17/99 (Message #126 of 453)

I like it when the little boys in my neighborhood play in the park by my house. I watch them and play with my wanker.


Yakomo 10:28 PM EST, 11/17/99 (Message #127 of 453)

Back to lumencandle's near- legendary post (we just keep mentioning it), know what I _really_ hate?
Most guys. all the ones she described. Dickheads like that completely ruin it for the rest of us. We're not all sex-crazy assholes, believe it or not.


pickaxe. 10:43 PM EST, 11/17/99 (Message #128 of 453)

Yak is right.I am that dickhead. I ruin it for everyone else. I am a sex-crazed asshole.


tylerdirdin 10:43 PM EST, 11/17/99 (Message #129 of 453)

Whoa....did pickaxe snap or something? Little boys?


Dogmeat99 10:56 PM EST, 11/17/99 (Message #130 of 453)

Yak pointed this out on another board, it's not pick. different username, note the "." on the end.



Somebody_II 11:25 PM EST, 11/17/1999 (Message #131 of 453)

I dont know. Generally I think most people try to add more emotion to sex than it really holds. Virginty and lose of is particularly guilty of this. It's something that most people hope will be special yet it rarely turns out that way. My first in counter with sex was like that as was most of the people I know. My girlfriend at the time and I where both virgins and it we had fanatised about how wonderful the first time would be for us. How the light string drenched backround music would start playing mentally for both of us. Needless to say, it didn't quite turn out that way. It was good but aqward. Most people I've talked have had simular experiences.
I'd be lying if I saud sex meant nothing to me in a relationship but I've discovered it's by far not the most important thing. The most important thing is to have someone that I can talk. One of the worst things I realized about my relationship with my ex was that we really didn't care what the other had to say. One of would say something, the other would mumble a response, then go on to something else. It'd be so wonderful if I could find a lover that I could talk with for hours and hours in things we both loved.

[strat-0]

Dobs 1:43 AM EST, 11/18/1999 (Message #132 of 453)

Alot of people, particularly young teenage women, believe that sex = love. Music, movies, media, they're just some of the things that puts that idea into your head.

Truth is, I think that's the best sex education. Making young teens realize that sex and love have nothing to do with each other. You can both, of course; but, most just assume sex = love.

I think losing your virginity doesn't make you grow up. Rather, realizing that the person whom you shared this experience with will be sharing this exact thing with somebody else (in probably 1/8th the time it took for you two to fuss over it), just as you will with somebody else, that's what makes you grow up. Sex, like love, can be special. But, it's not yours to keep.




specialsauce 4:41 AM EST, 11/18/1999 (Message #133 of 453)

I'm getting ready for work, so I just got up. I had the most beautiful dream last night about people I've never seen before! The dream took me through decades of this couples' love and mishaps. It ended w/ me seeing through the eyes of the woman, riding on the back of a motorcycle, (standing) , with my arms in the air seeing only the beautiful blue sky, and feeling the breeze. Then, the motorcycle fell over, but we touched the pavement so gently, almost like landing on a cloud. It was a comforting feeling. Wierd, huh?!


specialsauce 4:42 AM EST, 11/18/1999 (Message #134 of 453)

I just thought I'd share that. Maybe I'll get some feedback on what it could mean.


Somebody_II 6:52 AM EST, 11/18/1999 (Message #135 of 453)

I'd have to agree with Dobs 100% on that one way. Sex and romance often have nothing to do with one and other. I think even when it's with someone you have feelings for, it often doesn't get above the primal urge. The 'romamce' of only comes from time to time.


gann515 9:37 AM EST, 11/18/1999 (Message #136 of 453)

No chance for impulsiveness
Overwhelmed by responsibility
A lack of identity
Causes of despondency
Decide to let go
Make some decisions
Let me be who I am
The misery lessens
Ask my opinion
Listen intently
Have faith in my reasons
Live contentedly
Written after a big fight with the hubby.


Yakomo 1:13 PM EST, 11/18/1999 (Message #137 of 453)

Y'know, there's a damn good reason why love, and liking the other person, is much more important than sex in a relationship:
You can always have sex alone.


FreeToys 4:20 PM EST, 11/18/1999 (Message #138 of 453)

Sex with someone you love can be a very spiritual experience.
Gann.. sounds like you're ready to lay down the law
Saucy.. maybe it means you envy a mysterious couple who have a beautiful relationship that is both close and adventurous?...
... or maybe it just means you should wear a helmet and leather if you get on a bike?


Dobs 4:32 PM EST, 11/18/1999 (Message #139 of 453)

Dancing with myse-elf oh oh . . .

It's troubling how much importance we put sex in a relationship. While sex can be very a special, spiritual experience, I would think the relationship itself would have those qualities to make it happen.

In a way, sex is a "quick fix" and an escape from the real issues in a relationship. Many books/mags play on this -- How to improve your communication in your sex life? How to increase intimacy with your sex life? Discovering yourself and your sexual identity? Sex is the act, but the context is still relationship.

Gann: Your poem suggest that he's being controlling AND irresponsible at the same time. Is this the issue you have him with him?


specialsauce 5:00 PM EST, 11/18/1999 (Message #140 of 453)

Freetoys, I don't know about that! Then again, maybe it came from my subconscious, about my first love!
Gann, great poem. I feel the same way at times.

FreeToys 5:06 PM EST, 11/18/99 (Message #141 of 453)

I have no interest in New Age things such as astrology.
But dreams do come from our subconscious and like hypnosis, they are very revealing.


Mary Blaney 5:45 PM EST, 11/18/99 (Message #142 of 453)

Perhaps I really ought to post this on the "I Love and I Hate" board, but since it's really an elaboration on Dobs' comment...
I intensely dislike all those magazines - for both men and women - which consist of nothing issue after issue but sex advice, oddly cast as "relationship" advice. Invariably after reading an issue of Cosmopolitan you'll know 101 ways to use a cucumber that never occurred to you before, but you won't have the first clue about the basis for a real, human relationship.
Of course the magazine will also give you the impression that if you aren't 5'9" and don't weigh 105 pounds, you'll never have sex anyway. Just about the worst thing you could possibly be in the world of Cosmo is a virgin. I just find those magazines incredibly insulting to anyone who doesn't live in a world where sex is the be-all end-all of human existence.
Bah, I'd rather read about a good rock band anyway.
Cheers,
M


Yakomo 6:27 PM EST, 11/18/99 (Message #143 of 453)

A very wise literary critic once refered to James Joyce Ulysses, where Joyce basically has two autobiographical characters. He pointed out that that's really the only way you can truly portray a real person in writing and still have them be viewed as believable. _everyone_ has far many more aspects to their character than anyone else realises (no, really,) and these are so contrasting that if you attempted to contain all that any of us is in a fictional character people sinply wouldn't believe it. We are all capable of great acts of love, hate, kindness, humour, spite, pettiness, beauty, charity, despair, etc, etc.
And, for me anyway, the _real_ shame of the human condition is how we don't realise that about each other. I mean, I've done and thought things I wouldn't want others to even think I've done or thought in a million years, and I've also done things I'm immensely proud for of for one reason or another. Hell, _I_ have trouble reconciling myself with... uh... myself sometimes.


specialsauce 6:32 PM EST, 11/18/99 (Message #144 of 453)

Freetoys, I'm not interested in the "new age" stuff either. But, I do believe some dreams have a meaning. Especially when they are in vivid colors, and you remember every detail of the dream, even names. There was a man named "Williard", in this dream. I don't know anybody by that name. I find that odd!


Don Pitcher 6:37 PM EST, 11/18/99 (Message #145 of 453)

5'9", 105 lbs....I'd have to cook that girl a meal or two!
SpSauce: the woman in your dream has a sense of a daring spirit that feels free and competent. Even in the face of fear of an accident (the tipover), there is reassurance of a safe landing. Perhaps from "living" so much of her life & relationship, and realizing her own ability to persevere during hard times & mishaps, you picked up the idea that she will succeed on all levels.
As for the ongoing sex vs. love discussion (just for lack of better description), I think that there's another element involved that hasn't been brought up. For some, the act becomes not only a time that creates pleasure (with or without the love feeling), but is also a moment of sometimes extreme vulnerability. It's hard for some people to bare themselves and put themselves in that position, even if they have experienced sex before. (no puns intended in that last sentence...)


specialsauce 6:47 PM EST, 11/18/99 (Message #146 of 453)

Here is something very personal, but this is "Bared Souls", right?! When I was 15yrs old, I was on my own. I lived on an Island, called "Pleasure Island". To get to the point, I lost my virginity, due to partying. (Bluntly, I was drunk) After that sex was a normal activity when I partied. SO, eventually, I started getting sick when I partied. I suspected pregnancy. I took a nap one day, and this little girl came to me in my dream, holding a blanket, and sat on my roomate's bed across from me. (The whole dream was in the same room I was in, the same time of day, the sun shining through the pink blinds) She said, "I have to go now." So, I raised my head in my dream and told her Bye. When I woke up, I went to my sister's, told her about it, said "Please God, don't let me be pregnant", smoked a joint w/ my brother-in-law while discussing the dream, went home and had a miscarriage.


specialsauce 7:04 PM EST, 11/18/99 (Message #147 of 453)

Good interperetation Don. As for my last post, there was a couple more "supernatural" signs before the dream, to let me know I was pregnant. They are almost unbelievable. I still carry the guilt w/ me to this day for pretty much killing my own baby in my womb. (By partying so much) I had no proof, tho, no money for a preganacy test, (15yrs old, on my own, on an island), just the supernatural messages. I almost committed suicide after I miscarried, and had it confirmed that that's what had happened. I didn't know what was going on, and had the 1 month, 2week old baby, in bathroom. (Heartbreaking, and disgusting) I saw the embryo (?), in a huge blood clot after 5 hours of excruciating pain.
WoW. I got that off my chest! But, I'll never get it off my mind, or out of my heart.
Sorry. This was a heavy post!


Dobs 7:37 PM EST, 11/18/99 (Message #148 of 453)

A cucumber is very good for you. The salads you can make . . .

Yak: Ahhh. . . . . I completely agree with you, but I also think that in moments of true humility, we must also admit that we are probably less interesting than in our pompous minds.

For some reason, James Joyce is not the author that comes to mind. From my very limited understanding, he wrote not in the viewpoint of characterization -- I would disagree that he intended to make his characters any specific way or reflect any sort of sensibility.

Hemingway would better fit that mode. Though much is said about the "Hemingway Code Hero" archetype, he believed that you could create fully 3D, ambigious characters if you depict them as they are.

One critic who hates Hemingway noted that he was no more than a glorified Darwinian-wannabe naturalist. And that's probably true. I enjoy his writing style, but I also think that there's really not as much hidden profundity as his plundits make it out to be. Hemingway simply wanted to depict events, language, people and places as realistically as possible in such a way that they seemed to exist in the novel without some authorly hand guiding along the way.

I'd probably change my mind if I read that critic's piece. But, it seems to me that modernism was less about human being than the characters they are portrayed in the novels.

I would say that the movie Blair Witch Project is in that same vein of naturalism that was popular in late 19th century plays. But, then, I think I'd be giving the movie way too much credit.




White_Man 8:45 PM EST, 11/18/99 (Message #149 of 453)

Damn. You guys are sickos. I guess that's what rock n' roll does to one's sanity. Ditch the CD's and seek help, you crazies.


Prince of Cats 9:47 PM EST, 11/18/99 (Message #150 of 453)

Sex schmex!

Who needs it.

aforementioned relationship, THAT'S the rub.


specialsauce 10:11 PM EST, 11/18/99 (Message #151 of 453)

Don, that is a very good, and suprisingly close-to-like-my-life interperutation! I would have never thought of that, but then again I rarely have time to think anymore. Thank you! I was thinking more along the lines that I may crash soon, (Give it all up), yet be relieved and comfortable. (Does that make sense?)
I take dreams seriously, because I've had a couple that have come true, or tryed to warn me of something to come. Since this is "Bared Souls", I will tell you of one, if you are curious.


Dogmeat99 10:13 PM EST, 11/18/99 (Message #152 of 453)

Oh, Do Tell...


Pickaxe 10:19 PM EST, 11/18/99 (Message #153 of 453)

yes do....


gann515 10:50 PM EST, 11/18/99 (Message #154 of 453)

FreeToys...Oh I always do

Dobs...you're right...but there is more to it. A lot of it stems from my own issues.

Awesome interpretation Don! I used to go to a message board that was all about dreams and people would try to interpret each others...I lost my damn bookmarks though and haven't tried to look for the site again.


Don Pitcher 3:25 AM EST, 11/19/99 (Message #155 of 453)

Yeah, it's amazin' what you can get from an Ouija board & a dead chicken!
Actually I think a lot of times you just really need to read yourself open and simply to pull out answers. Hey it's your mind...I don't think someone else can hold the same meaning behind dreaming of standing in a vat of warm chocolate pudding, wearing an Indian headdress, singing "Titwillow" from The Mikado while a rain of flounder & smelt fell about you. I mean, you're just NOT gonna find an answer in some book on describing that!
Dobs, I've been reading Hemmingway all week...you got a board 'n chicken over there too?


jesuslookslikeme 5:02 AM EST, 11/19/99 (Message #156 of 453)

Thank fuck there were no more buffalo to murder. That spared us an aging decline from a high point of mediocrity.

Anyone here tried John Fowles? 'The Magus', in particular (especially all you existentialists who stopped at L'Etranger)


Yakomo 6:58 PM EST, 11/19/99 (Message #157 of 453)

Thanks dobs, oddly enough I've never read Hemingway. Or Joyce, for that matter... still workingon Dante and Lovecraft first.
specialsauce: Just out of curiosity, how the heck did you wind up living alone on an island at 15? I would have loved that at that age, tho apparantly it didn't work well...


Dobs 8:51 PM EST, 11/19/99 (Message #158 of 453)

A typewriter, a bottle of wine, and a Cuban Cigar; that's the life!

One of my Hemingway books is "Garden of Eden"; his females in that story are rich with character.

Ahhh, yes, L'Etranger. Maybe the most misunderstood book of the 20th century?




Dobs 8:51 PM EST, 11/19/99 (Message #159 of 453)

A typewriter, a bottle of wine, and a Cuban Cigar; that's the life!

One of my Hemingway books is "Garden of Eden"; his females in that story are rich with character.

Ahhh, yes, L'Etranger. Maybe the most misunderstood book of the 20th century?


***************************************************************

Prince of Cats 1:45 AM EST, 11/20/99 (Message #160 of 453)

I've read exerts from Fowles, but not anything extensive. I've been meaning to though, he has some great quotes.



20thCenturyFox 3:59 PM EST, 12/04/99 (Message #161 of 453)

Episode #2
My travels tonight were accompanied by the soundtrack to 'The Crow'. I dropped my sister off at work, then, unable to resist temptation, I stopped at some friends' house. Luckily neither was home - I don't like to hang out in any one place too long and I was beginning to feel I'd overstayed my welcome there.
Where do I cruise to now? I circled town a few times, but nervously. My Magic 8Ball had informed me something bad would happen today, and my driver's license is suspended. I decided to hit the back roads.
I kept making giant squares accidentally, but finally I was able to get myself good and lost. Relying on my sense of direction, I've decided, is a sort of test of my common sense. It's kind of funny - usually I know if I'm headed north, south, east, or west even if I'm a blindfolded sleeping passenger in the trunk. However, since I've moved, I've been very disoriented. The more comfortable I've become with my new life, the easier it is to find my way, but it's as if my social and emotional uncertainty actually blocked my mental compass, just to complete my uneasiness.
Lots of curves on these roads. Lots of assholes refusing to dim their headlights. I'm surprised by the number of houses already decorated with Christmas lights. Makes me a little nostalgic.
Good thing my brakes work - two deer standing on the shoulder of the road. I remember it's the opening day of firearm deer season and suddenly I feel like crying. These creatures are so beautiful and they look scared, like they've been running all day. I know they'll probably be dead before the month's over, and I hate the hunters for it. Usually I couldn't care less, but the deer standing before me seem so innocent. I honestly believe I'd have an easier time gunning down a human being, capable of destruction and evil and worse, than a defenseless animal.
Eventually I ended up back in town, having passed my self-test. I thought I'd stop back at my friends' house, since it'd been about an hour.
Door was unlocked this time, so I went inside. Someone was upstairs - someone I have a history with - and he yelled for me to come on up. I did, and I could hear HER voice, and I thought I was okay with this new situation, but it was trippy. She's sitting in MY chair, posing more than sitting. He's using the same cheesy lines and genuine feigned interest, looking into her eyes with that same overly- seductive stare. Both made it painfully obvious that I'd interrupted a 'personal' discussion, so I didn't stay long.
He's smooth, I've got to hand him that. Of course, choosing naive conquests always younger than himself probably helps, but she's a super-Christian, nearly virgin goody goody with a serious long distance boyfriend. I mean, he told me to come back in a few hours, right in front of her, but I'm betting she gives him some in the meantime anyway. Silly little girl.
I resist this equally silly urge to cry and/or to peel out hard enough to spray gravel into his car windows. I've got to go home, get some gas money, some angrier music, and hit the freeway.

[strat-0]

20thCenturyFox 4:14 PM EST, 11/20/99 (Message #162 of 453)

Me: "Well, you know that one redneck thing where you 'punch' your lights at stop signs when you're driving through the country at night, so you'll see any other headlights and know if you have to bother to stop?"
Eric and Joel: "Yeah?"
Me: "I was cruising out on 19 mile and I almost did it, but for some reason I kept debating it in my mind, although I don't usually think twice about it...I ended up stopping, and it's good that I did, because the road branched left or right...all that was in front of me was swamp and trees. And all of a sudden I could hear the branches scraping on my car, and the bumps underneath it, and feel that dread that comes with knowing you've really done it this time, hopefully you'll come out alive, groping for the brake and not being able to find it...it brought back so many memories of other close calls that were a little closer, I had to stop the car and just sit there for a few minutes."
Mo: "Jesus, Emily, why do you push yourself to such extremes?"
Me: "I don't know."
Justin: "Here, have another beer."


Don Pitcher 4:41 AM EST, 11/21/99 (Message #163 of 453)

2CF=>Hey, those were nice to pop in here and find! Spent the last 3 hours in a bar with NOTHING going on (tho' the band kicked; all the way to 3 AM too!), left feeling nothing was really accomplished, now I can read the above and feel that I've been someplace after all! Plus the second one gave me a laugh that I needed.


FreeToys 7:41 AM EST, 11/21/99 (Message #164 of 453)

Yikes! That mention of the Island made me check previous posts and I had missed that one about living on the Island. ( I hate when that happens)
Pleasure Island? Where the heck is that? Sounds like you grew up fast?


Yakomo 11:35 AM EST, 11/21/99 (Message #165 of 453)

Ah... the one board were sanity and good writing still reigns...


20thCenturyFox 4:02 PM EST, 11/21/99 (Message #166 of 453)

Sanity reigns here? Guess I'd better go find someplace else to post! I am so tired of these boards fucking up all the time...you absolutely cannot edit a post and every time you try to post something it tells you it didn't work, but it really did, and I just am plumb not enjoying it.
That Pleasure Island thing confused me too...is that a figurative thing? I figured it must be (I tried living there too) because taken literally it didn't seem to make much sense...the only Pleasure Island I know is a skanky nasty water park that features Go- Karts and a putt-putt golf range
You know what bar I'd like to hang out in? Cheers! Really. I think it would be so much fun. I used to date this guy who worked for the post office and all my friends made fun of him...they called him Cliff. Of course, I reckon any bar is more fun if trying to buy a drink doesn't get your underage ass kicked out....


Don Pitcher 4:31 PM EST, 11/21/99 (Message #167 of 453)

I don't know if the place I go to would necessarily be Cheers material (not Yuppie enough - as I viewed Cheers), but it is a great place to escape to (halts from singing "where everyone knows your name") and not have to feel like you're makin' some sort of 'scene'. Reputes to being the oldest bar in Indiana as it's been in business since the late 1800's. Lots of old wood and moldings, etc. Good mixed crowd of Purdue students, old hippies, plan middle-aged folk; no one ever fights, carries on, and isn't even close to what you'd call a 'meat- market' pickup-joint.
Best is that they have tons of good imports, wait staff is superb, and the music (blues + some jazz) at most times will just blow you away.


lbbshell 5:34 PM EST, 11/21/99 (Message #168 of 453)

lumen- (post 122) you're starting to sound really cynical...


lbbshell 5:43 PM EST, 11/21/99 (Message #169 of 453)

My astronomy teacher is the greatest man alive. He seems odd to a lot of people, but he makes sense...
His wedding took place on a mountain, pastored (sp?) by a friend of his... When they turned around to greet the guests after the ceremony was completed, he and his wife were wearing pig noses... all the people in the audience were wearing paper bags over there heads with the Groucho Marx glasses painted on them... He has a 9 year old son named Forrest, whom he absolutely adores... The play I was in, with the maniacal director, he came to see on opening night... He and his son sat in the second row and stayed until the end of the second act, with the son sitting on his lap the entire time... It was one of the most precious sites I've ever seen. My friend Chelsea and I spent three minutes hiding behind the scenery trying not to be insanely jealous of Forrest.


lbbshell 5:45 PM EST, 11/21/99 (Message #170 of 453)

And that is why we love my Astronomy teacher.



pickaxe. 9:06 PM EST, 11/21/1999 (Message #171 of 453)

He sounds like a great guy, and a good dad, too.


Don Pitcher 4:47 PM EST, 11/22/1999 (Message #172 of 453)

members.aye.net/~aat/RB&R/kn ickerbocker/knickerbocker.html
The above address will take you to some pictures of "Don's Place" as talked about in my last post. A funky band & a packed house!


specialsauce 8:44 PM EST, 11/22/1999 (Message #173 of 453)

CF, reminds me of being in Michigan (Onstead) this past weekend. Where are you from?
I'll reply to other posts later. I'm trying not to think of negative things from my past, at this moment!
"It's Been a Long Day, Reach down Your Hand In Your Pocket, Pull Out Some Hope For Me..." Long Day-Matchbox 20


specialsauce 8:47 PM EST, 11/22/1999 (Message #174 of 453)

Well, "Pleasure Island" is the actual name of Carolina Bch. ,NC!


Prince of Cats 0:56 AM EST, 11/23/1999 (Message #175 of 453)

Hey Don, you a Hoosier? Pretty flat state, non?

I liked your post Ms. 20th. 'Specially about the deer. I always wonder...


Prince of Cats 0:59 AM EST, 11/23/1999 (Message #176 of 453)

..what goes through the head of those people as there's a crack of a gun and the frigile life before them is no more.

specialsause...since the boards are so fragged right now I didn't read your pleasure island post until tonight. Heavy stuff, but...but what? Beautiful? Not really, but it's real, and that's more important.

I've never had dreams like that.


Don Pitcher 3:56 AM EST, 11/23/1999 (Message #177 of 453)

I hear they keep some hills down in the southern portion of the state, just never drove that far. I think it's just a rumour myself...


Dogmeat99 6:33 PM EST, 11/23/1999 (Message #178 of 453)

What's everybody doing for Thanksgiving? Those who celebrate it I mean, not wanting to offend those from overseas. I myself will be working. Thank God for Turkey Day football, not a whole lot of news otherwise.


Don Pitcher 9:55 PM EST, 11/23/1999 (Message #179 of 453)

I used to work most every holiday. Running a video store we were open every day of the year 10 AM - Midnight, and being a boss on salary, well, I set my responsibility as covering when needed. Plus I tried to be good to my employees and let them get their family time in. I could open on Thanksgiving Day by myself and hold off w/o help until about 1 or 2 PM, then it just would start to get a little nuts (my location was the busiest store out of 700 nationwide). I was always so grateful for those people who did work for me on those days. Tried to accommodate them as well as I could (the customers too).
Now, it's been a year since I've had to worry about juggling schedules and such. Probably will go have a small meal with my mother, if my sister doesn't plan on crashing in on her place. Yeah, yeah: suppose to be a time of family thought, etc., but I'd rather too keep peace & my sanity in check. Not meaning to sound hateful towards her ('cause I'm not), but I plain don't feel reason to be about people who I have little respect for, relation or not.
(sorry to put out that bit of a damper in the end there -- ah, I'm just grumpy this week.)


FreeToys 3:32 AM EST, 11/24/1999 (Message #180 of 453)

I'll just go over to the estate and keep the bird company. I'll try not to do any work and will probably just play some pool and wax my bike. I'll go home in the afternoon and watch the Dolphins and Cowboys.
My boss has an 'employee' dinner at his marina but I'm not interested.


lbbshell 5:44 PM EST, 11/24/1999 (Message #181 of 453)

I don't celebrate Thanlsgiving...I'm also not from overseas



Dogmeat99 10:32 PM EST, 11/24/1999 (Message #182 of 453)

No Offense. Have a great day anyway:) Peace.


lumencandle 11:32 PM EST, 11/24/1999 (Message #183 of 453)

well, thanksgiving was never a happy occasion for me, even when i had a family. now that my parents are divorced, it's just me and mom, and we really have nowhere to go. and it's just too lonely to do the whole sit-down meal with just the 2 of us. and we both have to work, mom in the morning, myself at night. i never cared much for the history behind the holiday but it was one of the few times out of the year when we tried to function like a "normal" family. now we can't even pretend, which makes me a little sad. but i am thankful the parents split up, so maybe i should shut up.


lumencandle 11:39 PM EST, 11/24/1999 (Message #184 of 453)

oh, yeah, just found out yesterday that my fabled financial aid is NOT coming in like my aid counselor said, so this whole semester at school counts for nothing!!!! and as of now, i no longer have any classes to go to. what a shock, life's not working out. only a few things left to do:
a. sell drugs on the street.
b. sell myself on the street.
c. rob a bank. hmmm................but yes, i did mention something about not complaining anymore.


lbbshell 0:52 AM EST, 11/25/1999 (Message #185 of 453)

lumen- I'm sorry... what you need to do is go in there and kick that sorry counselors ass.


Don Pitcher 1:53 AM EST, 11/25/1999 (Message #186 of 453)

That pisses me off just to read! What the FUCK! I am too real sorry to hear about that DMw.


pickaxe. 10:47 AM EST, 11/25/1999 (Message #187 of 453)

HAPPY THANKSGIVING TO ME MATES ACCROSS THE POND!



Don Pitcher 9:49 PM EST, 11/25/1999 (Message #188 of 453)

<TEXT=CENTERTHE TURKEY'S IN THE MAIL
</TEXT=CENTERIt's a bit natural I suppose to be nostalgic over holidays. When I was little, I had a sister, two parents, two sets of grandparents, and an aunt. Thanksgiving and Christmas and birthdays (to a singular extent) were cause for a stage to be set in the house. A lot of activity in the air, mostly just centering on the meal itself. The extra center leaf was put in the dining room table, table cloths were used, linen napkins placed at each setting. The foods were put out on special platters (the "good" china) and cut glass serving dishes. And we had these dark thin green glass goblets which I can still see holding my milk.
And the cars would pull up, the relatives spilling out with baskets and foil covered dishes - each had their own certain contributions. My aunt and homemade applesauce, her sister and a loaf of dill bread, cookies & candies made from scratch from my other grandmother. My mom of course handled the center item: a ham speckled with cloves or a turkey that had been thawing in our steel sink from the day before.
All this in and out activity from room to room, the odors being unleased throughout the house causing it to warm just from the overpowering scents. Being young and underfoot, I would typically be trying to steal a taste here and there while items were making their journey from the kitchen to the table. Oh, I would always have a black olive or two smuggled into my mouth before the clan was called to take seats. My aunt was the watcher for this, ever ready to banish me from the area. I never failed though -- as if she didn't know.
And so we gathered. Plowed through all the offerings, making sure to get a little bit of everything, but knowing that there would always be seconds available on all. With all those people, it was indeed a circle about that table. We were all attached there in those communal meals; held by conversation, food, and the very setting laid out.
Today I made the 45 mile trek up to mom's. Other than my sister, the rest of that circle have since died ten years back or longer. And as the past number of holidays have been, it was just to be me and my mother; 71 years old, but active as ever as it's applied to one of her age. Normal health, clear mind and all - nothing to be worried about.
Parking in front of the house and walking up to the door was familiar as yesterday. The location pattern of the funiture inside hasn't changed for, well, it's never changed. The house is warm, and yes, amplified with the smell of the cooked food. The dining room table is there, but is covered entirely -- not with a meal, but books, letters, bill statements and other simular paper items. In the front room, one in front of her chair facing the TV and another before a rocker a short distance across, were set two TV trays. No longer a circle but two opposite stations from which to eat.
We loaded up plates in the kitchen right from the pots & pans still on the stove. A medium-sized breast of turkey was on a platter, still warm from its time in the oven. "I got that through the mail," said my mom. "This catalog had a special of a turkey breast, a roast, and a unique carving knife, all for $25."
Well, hey, it did taste like turkey.
With that, she went back to the final bits of readying everything there, making a couple trips out to the front room with stuff. I got into the fridge and poured some Juicey-Juice into a plastic tumbler for myself (she had some whole milk, but I only drink skim nowadays -- healthy, ya know).
I wandered about the downstairs rooms with my cup. Watered a plant there that I had left behind when I moved out, looked out the front door to the same houses across the street, tried to stir up the dog, but he just looked up at me with his hound eyes from where he layed on the couch.
The Bears were losing on the TV; I called the score out to her back in the kitchen. She kinda let out a disgruntled sigh that was audible from where I stood. I smiled to myself, reached down to a small dish set on her tray and popped an olive into my mouth.


specialsauce 12:28 PM EST, 11/26/1999 (Message #189 of 453)

That was a nice post, Don!
I went to work as usual, but my boss let me off early, partly because of the pain in my back from a fall I took there on Halloween. A friend from work came over and helped me clean my house and dress a couple chickens our boss gave me! (Too cheap for turkey) My husband' parents brought a turkey over, and my mother-in-law cooked a few side dishes. They are Latino, so Thanksgiving is not a highly celebrated Holiday for them. We arranged all the platters and meats on my coffee table, watched t.v., talked, drank some beers,a couple Bloody Marys, a little cognac, (sp?, and that was it!


FreeToys 4:20 PM EST, 11/26/1999 (Message #190 of 453)

So you ate the Turkey with the chickens after they got dressed?
I love olives but hate the black ones. I liked that story though. It sounds like something that the 'Reader's Digest' might buy. Have you ever submitted any of your work?

[strat-0]

Don Pitcher 11:10 PM EST, 11/27/1999 (Message #191 of 453)

Writing well takes a lot more than just telling a story like that. Like, I used to write poems/songs until a college prof loaned me a book on poetry and I saw what really went into constructing good writing. It so put me in my place that I seldom -if ever- wrote after that.


Don Pitcher 3:35 AM EST, 11/28/1999 (Message #192 of 453)

(I've spoken before of a small blues bar that I escape off to here in Lafayette [see pics here: Kni ckerbocker This link was messed up earlier; I fixed it to go to a main page. From there, click on "Pictures", then scroll down to the outer shot of The Knickerbocker and click on it to get inside].
To sound like a total geek here, I'll also tell you that I sometimes walk in with a pad & pen to jot down a letter or just thoughts of what I pick up about me. Yeah, it's the existance that I live - and I guess that I'm sharing it here. But you know, I think some of you would like to be along some night. The atmosphere is there...step on in for a moment
Knickerbocker : 28 Nov. 99 : 1:05 AM
Just read back over that last entry - band that night was overwhelming. Climaxed with a rendition of Prince's "Purple Rain" that had people swaying back- n-forth with lit lighters held aloft. Guitarist stepped forward of the floor monitors and just killed on the solo. Remember sitting there wishing I had someone to share it with, or at least the video camera with me to capture it with.
Tonight's another packed house. Had to end up sharing the end chair of one of the tables down the center of the room. The people at the other end are probably wondering what he's sitting here scribbling down. The band is still on break and as usual there's a beehive of voices going on. A girl (former Video Update employee) was sitting at the bar when I walked in. A quick "Hello" but I didn't feel like catching up right at the moment. What's there to say from my end? So rude...I'm sure that there's things goin' on in her life. Guess I'm afraid to try to relate.
Oh, but now the music starts and my heart begins to lift. Just a few beats in and two couples have already hit the front of the room to begin to dance. Hips sway and catch the air in tandem with the slap of the snare. Instantly the room is thick with the sound and energy. The people become electric and soon crowd on the floor so that I can now only see glimpses of the band members between the flowing bodies.
"I'm gonna play the blues now, ya'll", the guitarist proclaims - his verdict is just - the people accept it - cry, cry unto the night.
Now so many blues bands do up "The Thrill Is Gone", but there is a real edge of sweetness to it tonight. Slinky notes piercing through the cigarette smoke - was there a better song to be played in a bar? Not tonight. Ask the 20-something girl at the table in front of me: young, full of life, doing a tight twitch in her seat here - looking over her shoulder, searching the other tables as if to hunt for her own singular thrill.
Such a game played but somehow here it is of no harm. A few minutes of looking pass, then she's up moving to a back table. I catch a breeze of sweet perfume as she passes by me - fresh and young as she is.
The band drops into Marvin Gaye's "What's Going On" -- fitting. The girl had just returned to her seat and 'lo, within a minute or two is asked up to the dance floor.
Dancing is no longer a solo act at this point. Pairs move as a tide across the width of the room....ah, let's get it on indeed.
(damn, this is such a great place to slip away to...don't need to even get drunk or fucked up...just soak up to it all. HMMPF! I need to get out more, don't I people?)


FreeToys 7:15 AM EST, 11/28/1999 (Message #193 of 453)

There are many different levels of writing. The poetry that humbles you might be meaningless to some of us 'simpler' types.
'Plain' writing like yours can mean something to a much wider group. If you had kept it up you would have undoubtedly evolved into the 'higher' state that you admire
Hemingway was just trying to describe his scenes the best he could.. but he was deified and the critics write much meaning into his work that he never considered.
You see the same thing happening to Beatles songs.
I think the best writers are those whom the masses can relate to. Shakespeare's language sounds a bit archaic now but it was understood even by commoners in his time and is acknowledged now as the basis for almost all plots today. This is because he revealed what is in our souls. That's the same thing you are trying to do.


20thCenturyFox 3:51 PM EST, 11/28/1999 (Message #194 of 453)

I like that a lot, Don....I felt like I was there as I read it. I think that the best writing is the kind that evokes a feeling, just an unexplainable emotion, the kind that seems real.
It's definitely hard to 'write well'. That's why my writing is so simple...if I tried to make it "good" I would fail miserably, and it's safer to stick with what you know than to try something new and fail. At least that's always been my reasoning (admittedly pretty lame reasoning)....


Don Pitcher 5:50 PM EST, 11/29/1999 (Message #195 of 453)

I guess when I mentioned "good" writing, it was just that some do put so much more meaning behind their words. How some poets worked with the sound of words in creative ways brought out even more that I had never realized before. I had just been writing for myself, but these guys tackled it as a craft. In some ways it took the enjoyment away; having to study something rather than just read it.
I agree with what both of you have said. I've seen so many posts by others that quickly humble anything that I've offered, and I like that. It was my hope with this board to see people express themselves like that -- openly, without the risk of being shy, and show how we may all intersect each other in ways not realized before. Just, as Foxy said, make it real.


Dobs 7:40 PM EST, 11/29/1999 (Message #196 of 453)

This is one of my favorite boards. I really enjoy reading everybody's thoughts. Don, you write really well. It seems a bit voyeuristic at times, but if I don't think about it like that, it's really enjoyable.


Don Pitcher 1:46 AM EST, 11/30/1999 (Message #197 of 453)

Voyeuristic? On my part or yours?


lumencandle 1:12 AM EST, 12/02/1999 (Message #198 of 453)

yes, yes, i enjoy this board immensely. a place where it feels like we're all old friends, sitting around with hot chocolate or cocktails or something, talking about the important stuff, the matters of the heart and soul. i'm glad you've called it "bared souls".


Don Pitcher 1:45 AM EST, 12/02/1999 (Message #199 of 453)

But you know, as my opening post said, I saw a lot of that taking place around the discussions here anyhow. I had hoped that something like this might draw those humanistic touches together; it's been a cool thing to see. Like I mentioned then: you find that you're not so alone in some areas after all.


BrandonZ 0:16 AM EST, 12/03/1999 (Message #200 of 453)

Hmm... I don't know what to post. I have a whole website full of personal writings (also lyrics and quotes). I guess it would be easier to go there and read if you would like to: here


strat-0 5:45 PM EST, 12/04/99 (Message #201 of 453)

Well, it's taken me a while to get caught-up. I'd overlooked this board before, and felt it my duty to start at the beginning. Some very impressive, well thought out things on here. Sometimes one can forget that these are real people with real lives interacting, here. I wish it could be as Lumencandle said in her last post, crossing over that barrier of the keyboard and moniter, into "real" life, but the anonymity is probably what makes it work. I've gotten to know some of you in a more real way, and I value that a great deal. I've also enjoyed interacting with many of you, simply on the boards. This should be a perfect board for me right now, but I find it much more difficult than I had thought. I've read with interest all of your thoughts, experiences and philosophies on love and life, with a special interest. You see, I'm going through the worst experience and pain of my life right now (and I'm old enough to have had quite a large experience reference base). Something I never could have even imagined happened three weeks ago. Three weeks ago, I thought my life was nearly perfect, and I was very happy. I had been in a state of emotional bliss for five years. But things were not as I perceived them to be. Something had quickly and suddenly changed, and I had no idea, or warning. Now, I have nothing to live for (not suicidal). Just like that. I still feel like I've been kicked in the stomach. I feel like a fool. I feel humiliated and ashamed. I didn't do anything wrong, and I'm not going to be given a chance to do anything right. I'm not trying to be cryptic, here; I'm sure you all can guess. It's just so hard to go into it; the pain is so profound and paralizing, like NOTHING I've ever felt, and as I said, I've been around the block a time or two. We think we know the souls of the people with whom we are most intimate, but sometimes we are mistaken. I have no words of optimism for anyone now; my faith in humanity has been shaken to its foundation. Marriage and the entire human condition now cynically reeks of selfishness and falsehoods. My family and friends have been a comfort, but nothing can stop the brokenness of my life, and my heart. So, I really don't know what else to say. I suppose I'll include a lyric I wrote a long time ago, before I knew the warmth, stability, strength, and security of the love that I thought would last a lifetime.

Whirring differential and the whistle of the wind
Music to my ears, my old and faithful friend
Endless winding ribbon and the pallid vapor lights
Safe behind my high-beams, stabbing through the night

Had to go a long way and it took a long time to find
You just caught up to yourself, leaving yourself behind

Seventy miles an hour, baby, setting my steady pace
I ain't out to make no time, ain't trying to run no race
Twenty-five thousand miles upon a thousandth of an inch
And when it got down to it, she pulled me through the pinch

Had to go a long way and it took a long time to find You just caught up to yourself, leaving yourself behind

-from Leaving Yourself Behind (C 1990)

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20thCenturyFox 9:16 PM EST, 01/08/00 (Message #202 of 453)

Sometimes I don't understand why I try to punish myself the way I do. In theory, I know what a healthy relationship is, and exactly what I should stay away from. Do I do it? Of course not.
I'm hopelessly infatuated with him. Never mind the fact that I haven't known him long, I can't stop thinking of him. Everything about him is wrong - from the drug and alcohol addictions, to his redneck demeaning attitude toward women, to his violent temper, to the ex- girlfriend that he still tries to control obsessively....but he has that trademark sweetness, that ability to make a person feel victorious for capturing his attention. He reminds me of so many past mistakes...maybe that's why I am attracted.
Last night I drank most of his Jack Daniel's. Three of us were lying on the bed, two on the floor, just kicking back and having a good time with friends. All night he being more -friendly than usual, just stupid little flirtations, wrestling matches - junior high stuff really, but the attention felt good. When we were on the bed, he formed the top part of a 'T' and I the bottom, my head was resting on his legs. It wasn't sexual at all at that point, just comfortable. Later I went, more stumbled, downstairs. I came out of the bathroom and he was sitting on the stairs, blocking my way up. He pulled me down so that I was sitting on his lap, and I don't remember exactly what happened next, but we were kissing. It wasn't at all like I expected - he was almost reserved about it, not nearly as aggressive as the way he does everything else in his life. It was far closer to sensual than sexual...really sweet, gentle even. We pulled apart after a few moments because someone was coming down the stairs, but I've known so many guys to try a lot more than just a few kisses even in that short amount of time.
After that the liquor caught up to me, and the black out period...and the only memories I have of the remainder of the night are those of him taking care of me. I remember him taking me outside for air and holding me up, stroking my hair, rubbing my back, just acting sweet.
I know it meant nothing to him, but just the fact that he didn't take advantage of me is important to me. More than that, every person needs touch, attention, to feel wanted...and it was so good to get some of that finally. I have no clue what will become of anything...nothing, I suppose, and that's probably exactly what should happen. How can I, in good feminist conciousness, actually entertain the idea of being dominated by someone like this? Yet I think that may be exactly what I want. Can I possibly feel that low about myself that I want to trade independence, positive self-image, a sense of worth, for the possibility of attention that could never become love without jealous possession? Why does some sick part of me find that idea romantic? Or is this normal...


FreeToys 9:39 PM EST, 12/04/99 (Message #203 of 453)

He can only dominate you if you submit to that. He might find someone who stands up to him irresistable?


FreeToys 9:43 PM EST, 12/04/99 (Message #204 of 453)

strat-O
Your situation, or my own when love has dissolved, reminds me of that Stones song.. "Dead Flowers"


20thCenturyFox 10:05 PM EST, 12/04/99 (Message #205 of 453)

FreeToys - But that's the thing...it seems as though he's incapable of really loving someone, the best he can do is own them and become obsessed with them. If he couldn't dominate me I don't think he'd be interested at all. Of course, I could be wrong...maybe he would go for a non-submissive type, or maybe he wouldn't be interested even if he could decide when I was allowed to breathe. I really don't know.
strat-0...I meant to comment on your post earlier, but as you can see, I am too self- centered for that. All I can say is I'm sorry...I guess I've got nothing to be concerned about compared to something like that.


FreeToys 10:08 PM EST, 12/04/99 (Message #206 of 453)

Well, what have you got to lose by standing up for yourself? You lose him and don't get to be a slave? Or are you afraid that you can't keep from slipping into the submissive role?


20thCenturyFox 10:15 PM EST, 12/04/99 (Message #207 of 453)

I guess I'm afraid that I'll be like, "oh yay, a relationship, I can't live without a man now, I've finally snared one and I better not let him get away...." and put up with any kinda shit he wanted to give me just because I'm so needy and anxious to be accepted or loved or something.


FreeToys 10:30 PM EST, 12/04/99 (Message #208 of 453)

Well, realizing that.. is the biggest hurdle in overcoming it.
We all create our own situations.
Just 'cause you might tend to react like that doesn't mean you are doomed to an existance of being manipulated by others, and by your own perceptions of your shortcomings.
What's worse, being without a man or being someone's pawn?
Is it worth feeling like a chump because you're someones footstool, just to get a sense of acceptance.. or a twisted facsimile of love?


20thCenturyFox 10:42 PM EST, 12/04/99 (Message #209 of 453)

You've got a good point...it's just that I've been alone (relationship-wise) my whole life, and what's scaring me about this is the way that I can envision the scenario and the fact that it doesn't bother me. I'm getting ahead of myself in this particular situation - I mean, it's not as though there's anything going on between us (yet?) but realizing that I would accept that really throws me for a loop. There's no reason something like that should appeal to me, yet it does...the man-as-protector, subservient- housewife traditional roles that I grew up scorning suddenly don't seem so bad. blech!! this is crazy.


FreeToys 10:56 PM EST, 12/04/99 (Message #210 of 453)

Shut up and get me a beer bitch



Don Pitcher 0:06 AM EST, 12/05/99 (Message #211 of 453)

2CF: You seem to already spell out some of the answers you seek; read back over what you wrote.
Question - there's a lot said of what you want from him...or the needs you dearly wish fulfilled within yourself by somebody; where lay your desires to give?


Somebody_II 1:07 AM EST, 12/05/99 (Message #212 of 453)

2CF-
I think Free Toys is right on this one. The need for touch, attention is a desire about everyone has, some more so than others. I understand how you feel because I don't often run into someone who will be tender with me so when I do find someone who will, I'm often falling over myself for them. This is pretty much what happened with my ex actually. She was very dominate over me and gave me standards I had to live up to if I wanted her. This didn't really bother me at the time because she treated me better than anybody else had ever treated me in my life. Slowly, it started to get to me. I was losing who I really was and that was kind of scary. My advice is that you make you interest except you on your own terms and as you are before you get seriously involved with him.


Don Pitcher 2:25 AM EST, 12/05/99 (Message #213 of 453)

AH - another touch upon what I was getting at: you can build yourself up to such a hurt when seeking to gratify your OWN need. I'm not debating that all of us desire that sort of feeling coming from another, but to RELY upon it so is what sucks, what hurts, what leads us into damage. And so right in that it can also cause us to lose center of ourselves.
In your case Fox, it sounds as though you'd sacrifice or overlook those charactoristics of this guy that you know you dislike or that are wrong (can we say "Danger Will Robinson"?) in order to feel a moment's kiss, a comfortable embrace.
Oh, but girl: as if I don't understand. I too would welcome such a moment; many would. But judge that moment well. Live through it, enjoy it if you may, but understand it for what it may be.
Find strength in knowing who you are Foxy. Be honest there. To yourself, know no wrong.


Don Pitcher 2:30 AM EST, 12/05/99 (Message #214 of 453)

And if any married folk out there who has read upon Strat-0's post (Ken, Gann?) and has any thoughts/opinions or shared instincts, why not drop a line?
Jeff, you know that I wish to be able to relate to your extent.


strat-0 4:19 AM EST, 12/05/99 (Message #215 of 453)

Thanks, Don. By the way, I'll be popping that tape in soon; feeling stronger by the day. As for the rest, well, so much for "Bared Souls." I guess it really is only cyberspace, after all. Don't know if I'll be doing that again soon. Perhaps I should email Pickaxe for some heartfelt sensitivity. Thanks, 2KF, you are probably right, at this point in life.

I hear you, Specialsauce.

Luck to all.

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Don Pitcher 6:07 AM EST, 12/05/99 (Message #216 of 453)

It's a crime, these minutes -
They steal away from our future hopes.
To endure their time
Is the hardest of all lessons learned.
Indeed: luck to all, luck to all.


strat-0 3:46 PM EST, 12/05/99 (Message #217 of 453)

Very nice, Don, and appropriate. What's it from? Yours?

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Don Pitcher 3:54 PM EST, 12/05/99 (Message #218 of 453)

Just sitting here at that hour, read what you wrote and typed it in from out of my head. That, and a bottle of Chardonnay I was killing off.


20thCenturyFox 4:14 PM EST, 12/05/99 (Message #219 of 453)

Freetoys...right away, honey, did you want me to open it for you too?
You guys are right as usual...I have this tendency to think everything in my life is SO big and SO important, I guess you could say I have a very passionate nature. I carry everything to extremes and feel everything so much at a particular moment...here I am today thinking 'what's the big deal?' Of course, the next time I see him again will probably dredge up all this confusion and willingness to sacrifice, but we'll see. I appreciate you all helping me to see the one- sidedness of this - even if that's not how you intended to come across, I am realizing that it's not really about hooking up with this guy in a lot of ways...it's just me coming back to my old spoiled standards and expectations of fairy tale romance because I 'deserve' it.


Somebody_II 4:43 PM EST, 12/05/99 (Message #220 of 453)

Fox-
I wouldn't really call it 'my old spoiled standards and expectations of fairy tale romance because I 'deserve' it'. Again, that's something that everybody wants in their own way. Everyone wants a lover that will sweep them off their feet, that will understand them when others have been clueless, to be their for them when they need someone the most, etc. You're going through a lot of feelings most people do when they're smitten with another.

[strat-0]

gann515 7:49 PM EST, 12/05/1999 (Message #221 of 453)

I think that in any relationship it's inevitable that you will lose some sense of your identity. Sometimes, I feel so overwhelmed by being a wife and mother...I think that both people being able to compromise, yet also knowing when to admit you're wrong and give in, is an important part of making a relationship work.
It sucks when someone you thought you had "something" with just up and leaves...sorry to hear it strat...but it could be for the best. True story...after 10 years and 2 kids, this guy finds out his wife was cheating and leaves...then finds out that both kids aren't his...it was a hell of couple years but he's now happy again with someone else. You never know what's around the corner.


lumencandle 8:20 PM EST, 12/06/1999 (Message #222 of 453)

yes, yes, everything happens for a reason, strat, i believe that , too. but i can guess how shitty it must feel and i'm awfully sorry about your situation. i've never endured a hard break-up, mostly because i never get too close to anyone. but as afraid as i am of getting burned, i still believe that relationships (even the ones that end badly) have to be worth th epain. and as much as it hurts right now, that love was important. but please don't give up yet. i hate to hear anyone sound so dead to life. there are happy times ahead and happy relationships to come. i know i've said some pretty cynical things about love, but i'm truly optimistic for myself and you. there are happy times ahead, even happier relationships! this is cheezy, but it's true: it won't hurt forever. anyway, please don't be offended by what must seem the naive offerings of an inexperienced teenager. it's no tmuch, but it's all i've got for you. i just wanted to tell you i hear you and i feel for you.


pepperhead 9:51 PM EST, 12/05/1999 (Message #223 of 453)

This board might be just what I need right now. I just returned home from a 4 week stay in , shall we say, a controlled environment (no, not jail) and may take advantage of this topic to kind of vocalize things only my shrink knows. Judging from the other posts I have read this seems like a positive and supportive forum to do just that, so I see no harm in doing so (although they may tend to be lengthy and maybe even boring to everyone else).Through out the past I have managed to keep journals pretty consistently for the past 11 years, and may pick writings that seem relevant to post.
I am gonna go under the assumption that people will , at best, skim through what I write because they quite simply may not be interested, and I don't blame you at all. I am selfishly doing this for me.


Don Pitcher 10:46 PM EST, 12/05/1999 (Message #224 of 453)

Lumen: that love was important...I liked that. I thought what you wrote was very heartfelt, and that's the best thing to give.
Gann: As usual, you speak with a voice that knows both the tides and the ties of a relationship.
Somebody: Again backing that we all have a lot in common.
Fox: Things in your life should be important! Live with passion from within; by chance & time you may meet another who lives likewise.
Pepper: It was my thought from the start that one could come here and be open as they please and with 200-some posts since, I think it's been great to see how it's come along with minimum BS. It's fine to do it for yourself -- that's mostly what the rest of us are doing.


pepperhead 11:01 PM EST, 12/05/1999 (Message #225 of 453)

May 29,1990
I already know I will never be able to shake the feeling that I felt that moment, the moment that seemed to last 10 days, at least. The phone rang, and time just....froze.I sat there watching Reegan age. He went from a child to an adult in a flash, and I watched it happen. After he dropped the phone I picked it up and put it to my ear, but between the coke and the situation at hand I only picked up phrases here and there,"...massive internal injuries...":...very sorry...""...did all they could...""...ID the bodies...".Still holding the phone, my arm dropped to my side, and all I remember is Michael Stipe telling us to not go back to Rockville. The music was the only sound in the all of a sudden way too big house.
I didn't even hear Kate come in, I just saw her in the doorway. And she was crying already. Nobody had said a fucking word and she somehow knew. I finaly said "Mom and Dad", and that was all that had to be said. Kate just collapsed, bawling her eyes out, but somehow completely silent. She didn't make a fucking noise, but at the same time she was hysterical.
"Kaitlen, Mom and Dad are dead"He finaly blurted out.It was not needed to be said,but he continued to repeat it over and over, as if somehow he was actually telling himself, "Mom and Dad are dead".All I kept thinking was ....why couldn't it had been my parents instead? So we sat there, the 3 of us. 2 junkies and an angel. All together, all alone.


FreeToys 7:40 AM EST, 12/06/1999 (Message #226 of 453)

welcome home pepper


Prince of Cats 6:46 PM EST, 12/06/1999 (Message #227 of 453)

Damn straight.

It makes me scared sometimes but it's a Hell of a lot like home.

At least to me...


lbbshell 6:49 PM EST, 12/06/1999 (Message #228 of 453)

Thought I'd have my selfish moment of the day:
So, maye you've heard, maybe you haven't, but my school almost burned down on last Wednesday. What I thought was f-ing 'ilarious at the time is so depressing now that I want to cry. I went back to school today for the first time since the "incident". The school REEKED of smoke and chemicals. Someone stole the "sacred jersey" which belonged to a once student who died of cancer his senior year.
Its the fact that it was arson that really bothered/bothers me. I mean, it was probably a student/teacher I deal with everyday on a daily basis. I don't think we should have gone back to school today. I and all of my friends were scared shitless that it was someone we knew. We were afraid to eat in our normal place, and instead hid in the lunchroom. We had the most interesting school assembly we've ever had in my entire school career on the topic of fire. It involved a large group of students asking "why in the hell are we in school today??" It certainly didn't help that by third period, the nurse had seen 130 students out of 800 of us. She lost count by first lunch and closed the office. People threw up or passed out in the hallway from the stench. People got faint in classes. Whole classes were held outdoors today, whether it was raining at the time or not. It was raining for all three of the classes I ended up going out for. The only one that it wasn't raining for was Chorus. Chorus was held three doors down from where the fire took place. I'm surprised I wasn't ill.

on a completely unrelated note, maybe I've mentioned my friends before. I mean I love them to bits, but I can't handle one more of them telling me that they are going to kill themselves. Yesterday morning I woke up at 10:00 to someone calling me to talk them out of slitting their throat with a butcher knife. Three hours later, she was finally calmed down enough to get off the phone.
::crawls back into her little hole and shuts the hell up::


Prince of Cats 7:03 PM EST, 12/06/1999 (Message #229 of 453)

Anyway, I thought I really ought to say something because I've got a major...shall we say...trauma coming up. I'm going home.

I never thought those three words would ever give me anything to be afraid of, but every time I think of it, my stomach ties in knots. The people I thought I was in love with. The people I thought would just fade away. And it scares me to death.

Enough with the vauge ambiguities, I fell in love with Gwen a few summers ago, but nothing happened until three days before I left for college. It was a lot like Fox's tender moment, only I'm not the overbearing type. I stood silently by this girl for a year telling myself I was just her friend, when I knew I loved her. Then three days before I left, it just happened. She was in my arms, shaking and crying. My lips brushed across he tear- streaked face til I found her lips and it was everything I had always hoped for.

Then I left for college. It was okay, I'm used to tragedy. Besides I figured I'd come home and things would be...perfect.

I was wrong. She was in love, and that meant that she wanted us to be on the same page, religion- wise. I didn't think this would be an issue. After all I'm a Christian, she's a Christian. Go figure. It was not enough. I don't know if any of you have ever recieved a letter that just utterly destroyed you. I have. The text of the letter was so easy to disbelieve. Gwen blasted every aspect of my faith, and said we couldn't be together as long as I believed the way I did. For the longest time I refused to believe she had written it. I still don't. But I'm going home. Soon I'll talk to Gwen face to face. I can't disbelieve that.

Plus, to complicate things, I've gotten all dopey for some girl I met out here. With all this going on, I still fall in love at the drop of a hat. And I don't know what I can do about this until I fix what's wrong back home. Which is absurd because I don't even know what would make me happy with Gwen.

Whew. Thanks for reading it, if you did. Just writing it was almost enough to make me feel better.


FreeToys 7:13 PM EST, 12/06/1999 (Message #230 of 453)

I would be enraged at anyone who demanded that I adopt their beliefs.
llb ... I would have gone home as soon as I got a whiff of that place. Screw the consequences.


Don Pitcher 7:44 PM EST, 12/6/1999 (Message #231 of 453)

This may seem like a whacked-out thought, but maybe your school administration believed that trying to return to some sort of normality would be a helpful thing.
And if you have a lot of friends turning to you at such times, perhaps they see you as a stable caring person that would understand their desperations.
Pepper: that's straight from the core; lost individuals surrounded by reality.
I've gathered an acceptance of Death since my teens (I will say losing a child would be the hardest to deal with). I remember my favorite aunt dying, and sitting in the front pew of the church hearing all these people behind me crying. I wanted to stand up and face them saying, "Hey, she was here. She lived. That was given to us and is what we should celebrate."
Don't get me wrong -- I'm not saying not to mourn. Oh, surely do! But gather too that essence of the person and realize what has been given there won't be taken away.
My first entry here was of my father's death. Granted, it wasn't sudden as the one told in your post. Him in that house though, the years of smoking slowly knocking him back. Death has a smell -- like this body of this man in his mid-50's was slowly sufficating, decaying inside.
So many trips to the hospital. It was almost strange that the final one turned out so different. It was usually in for a week or two, then back home for a period. Always pulled back around. When the doctor came out of the ER that last night and spoke to us in that little room...my first words were, "Well there's peace man."
I went back there shortly afterwards. I never had much physical contact with my father while he was alive; yet now I took his hand. Held it. Held it for a long time while I cried. Eventually I noticed that the hand I held was cooling. It was almost amazing to me as I looked down at it in mine. At that moment too, I was struck by the size of it. An ambulance attendant had come into the room and took a waiting postion off to my side -- a familiar face from so many past trips. "I never realized how big his hands were....I never noticed." I repeated my awed statements, still looking down at the grip I had so seldom shared; the pale cooling continued, the last essences slipping further away.


Don Pitcher 8:04 PM EST, 12/6/1999 (Message #232 of 453)

PoC: Sounds as though she's been in your life for a while. I'll imagine that feelings for each other go back just as long. Religion hasn't been an issue all this time then? Not until the relationship stepped up a notch at least.
So there's a choice now then between the two of you. I'd say go ahead and be fair & open with each other (and to yourself!) and talk it out when you see her. Keep it in heart and mind though to try and retain that close friendship, if it is still of worth to you.
People are gonna have differences, and I agree 100% with Toys that you shouldn't fall to someone's way that is not your own. (I also can't judge her whole motives, or exactly how she presented all this at you -- that's something you're gonna need to size up) But you can also still stick by your guns while accepting that there's a difference of opinion and still perhaps keep a piece of closeness.


Prince of Cats 8:15 PM EST, 12/6/1999 (Message #233 of 453)

Thanks...thanks Don.

...everybody too.

In advance even...


sidnero 8:42 PM EST, 12/6/1999 (Message #234 of 453)

I would post in here but the incoming stream is so heavy, mine would get washed away before it was read by more than 2 people.


gann515 8:59 PM EST, 12/6/1999 (Message #235 of 453)

Looking at the time it seems very ironic that I'm at this board at this particular moment.
Four years ago, almost to the moment, is the last time I heard the voice of a person that was very special to me.
He was married to my very best friend. For many years we loathed each other, simply because of the common person which we both adored. It went so far that we refused to become a part of each other's lives. Shelly and I did our own thing. Her and John's life were separate from mine & my husbands. It was better that way...I thought. Until fate had it that Shelly and I both got pregnant at the same time. We started to socialize more often as couples and a miraculous event occurred. The guys had a lot in common. They even became good friends...and John and I began to realize that we could share our relationships and make them richer by doing so.
Late September, Shelly and I deliver baby girls on the same day. John & Nick go out and celebrate together. As this was our 2nd child and their 1st, we help them to adjust to the newfound joy of parenthood. Thanksgiving passes...there was much to be thankful for.
December 7, 3 am...the phone rings. I answer groggily, it's Shelly. My first thought is the baby...then she says the words...John's dead. I'm dumbstruck. HOW? WHY? What do I say? Nick is awake now...I whisper the words to him...saying them still now doesn't make any sense. I hang up the phone and we weep. No more sleep...as soon as the kids are up, I'm there...trying to comfort that person that I so selfishly did not want to share...with the wonderful man who's now...dead? Dead...leaving my best friend alone with a newborn daughter...Damn YOU!
I'm not angry anymore...still very sad...sad that we didn't share more memories...sad that their daughter will never meet the man in the stories we will tell her...sad that my friend lost such a wonderful love. But we continue to grow...and hopefully, not to make the same mistakes.


FreeToys 9:04 PM EST, 12/6/1999 (Message #236 of 453)

wow
well told


Don Pitcher 9:23 PM EST, 12/6/1999 (Message #237 of 453)

Thank you Gann - dp


Don Pitcher 9:28 PM EST, 12/6/1999 (Message #238 of 453)

Sid: I know how you feel; like getting lost in the shuffle of weightier things. Pick a moment all the same - whatever may feel good for you.


gann515 10:15 PM EST, 12/6/1999 (Message #239 of 453)

Even though I've discussed it before, that is the first time I've put my feelings into print. Don, when you posted about your reaction to your father's hands...it just came flooding out...I was actually just taking a break from writing an economics paper and now I can't concentrate anymore!
Let it out sid...


pepperhead 10:23 PM EST, 12/6/1999 (Message #240 of 453)

June 2,1990
I'm home now. Well, my fathers home anyway. I guess I don't really have a home.
I left everything at the house. I stopped by after the restaurant but never made it out of the den. I just sat there listening to the same REM cd that has played constantly throughout the last couple of days. Nobody has the strength to change it or God forbid shut the damn thing off completely.
I couldn't stay there. Meli told me I was more than welcome to stay for as long as I wanted. She said her sister would have wanted that. I couldn't handle her saying that. It is a statement that reeks of death."She would have wanted..."
I have no desire to clean up right now. That is another reason I could not have stayed out there.On top of everything else, Kate came to the realization that both her brother and I are in trouble. Hell, I didn't even realize Reegan was as bad as he is. It was really weird hearing his grandmother saying what a shamne it was that at 16 he was smoking.The horror! I almost turned around and said "that's nothing, granny, 10 minutes ago we shot up in the garage". Hope that the center he's going to helps him, but I couldn't even imagine going through that again right now. I need to be numb a little while longer.<BR. Again.
Happy 16th Bday to me, huh. Do I get a wish?


Don Pitcher 10:24 PM EST, 12/6/99 (Message #241 of 453)

I think that a part of me needed to hear what you wrote to, Gann. Thanks again.
(BTW: I've been pronouncing it G sounding as in "gut" with ANN sounding as the girl's name. Sorry if that's off...)


Don Pitcher 10:27 PM EST, 12/6/99 (Message #242 of 453)

Pepper: Interested in hearing about how far you feel you've come in the past nine years.


pepperhead 10:38 PM EST, 12/6/99 (Message #243 of 453)

I thnk I need to post something a little more upbeat.
October 19,1990
I think I forgot how it feels to feel OK. But I am starting to remember again. I know, its only been 33 days but, holy shit, Its been 33 FUCKING days IN A ROW.When was the last time that happened? 6th grade?
I actually said, out loud, that I was in a good mood. I thought my Mom was gonna shit when she heard that. It was really strange. I just sat there , lit a cigarette, and said it.
"I am in a good mood today." She was like, "What?". She's been great. We talk now. She knows everything I've ever done, and I regret even thinking that I hated her. God, the thought of even going into the City seems ridiculous right now. I run into people everyday and that is all they say."Hey, let's hit the City tonight.Cruise by the park, score a bag hang out at The Limelight"
Shit, Limelight. I feel to old for that place and I am still too young to even legally get in there.I think it is safe to say those days are behind me. (I know, I know, take it slow).
"I AM IN A GOOD MOOD TODAY"


Prince of Cats 11:11 PM EST, 12/6/99 (Message #244 of 453)

I forget who said it, but this quote personifies what I went through a few years back. Pepper's post delved it up.

"Believe that life is worth living and it will be so..."


sidnero 7:38 PM EST, 12/8/99 (Message #245 of 453)

Im a fan of conversational/folk lyric songwriters like Liz Phair, and Dan Bern. Heres a little rhyme I wrote during a break at work today- not yet finished. Its meant to be funny and sad at the same time.
She wont remove the chain from the latch
Because I have blue eyes and a collar to match
She wont give me the time of day
Untill I convince her that I'm gay,
By complimenting her choice of shoes.
Slurr my S's and trip over P and Q's
But then I would have to look her in the eye,
(nope) I'll just add blindness to the lie.
Then she might ask, how I can know,
or see that she wears a stiletto.
(easy lie) I heard you walk in,
As She pitys my toothy grin,
Fully convinced that Im blind,
and gay, untill someone moves from behind.
assuredly my eyes followed to a tee,
the back side of someone even more pretty.


Howenstein 9:05 AM EST, 12/9/99 (Message #246 of 453)

I like it, sid. Has a Lou Reed feel to it. Keep it going!


samples 11:39 AM EST, 12/9/99 (Message #247 of 453)

Where did Strat-0 go?
I'm kind of been amazing myself lately, too. I'm happy. Not REAL happy, but happy. I thought I'd never be that way again after I lost my dog, my beautiful, weird Magnolia. That was a tragedy. I felt like crying forever and ever. It was awful. I'd sit in lecture, the professor would say something that made me think of Magno, and I'd try to hold back the tears. I cried every night. Every day. It was the lowest point in my life. It was only five months ago. But things are changing. I'm not exactly "getting over it"... even now, I've got a largish lump in my throat. But -- I don't know -- I just feel better somehow. Stronger. More grown- up, I guess. It's nice.


FreeToys 12:19 PM EST, 12/9/99 (Message #248 of 453)

R.I.P
Magno

[strat-0]

samples 1:06 PM EST, 12/9/99 (Message #249 of 453)

Thanks, Toys. Got a hankie?


samples 1:40 PM EST, 12/9/99 (Message #250 of 453)

I don't even know what they did with her. I had my hand on her side as she slowly slipped away... I could feel her pulse getting slower... and slower... until she was gone. I will never EVER forget the way she looked. Sort of heavy and thick. Limp. Dead. She wasn't even smiling.
samples 1:41 PM EST, 12/09/1999 (Message #251 of 453)

I don't even know what they did with her. I had my hand on her side as she slowly slipped away... I could feel her pulse getting slower... and slower... until she was gone. I will never EVER forget the way she looked. Sort of heavy and thick. Limp. Dead. She wasn't even smiling.


samples 1:42 PM EST, 12/09/1999 (Message #252 of 453)

But, hey, I'm better now.
Right?


FreeToys 3:12 PM EST, 12/09/1999 (Message #253 of 453)

Are you gonna get another dog?


Don Pitcher 6:45 PM EST, 12/09/1999 (Message #254 of 453)

Had a picture of myself that I looked at a couple of days ago. 5 years old, dark blonde burr-hair cut, dressed sharply in a little boy's Easter coat & tie. Real small standing there outside in the back porch sunlight. Even smaller was the small, grey kitten happily cuddled in my arms. I'm smiling, looking up at the camera with him tight to my chest. Little 5-year-old and his first pet.
That cat was there throughout my childhood. There when I first started grade school. There when my family moved from place to place. There as I grew older, until I had graduated high school. Then there to greet me when I drove up from work (if he was on the front porch, by the time I had stopped my car, he would have walked all the way down and be sitting there by the curb to meow me a "hello").
He was always there -outliving 1/2 a dozen dogs my parents had- a member of our family almost as long as I had been.
"Howard's not a cat," my dad said, "He's an Institution." Just about right.
He died after about 16 years. Put to sleep due to advanced cancer. My dad called me at work to tell me. I'd seen him that morning, laying in the sun outside on the porch as I had left. He'd given me that short "meow" of greeting. I'd responded to it, like thousands of times before, because we knew each other so well.
I did miss that call when I got home from then on. Or the familiar way my bedroom door would suddenly swing open as he plodded his way in,, again with that short- voiced "hello." But it was okay. We had a lifetime between us -- we knew each other still.
(I realize that this would have fit on Sample's Pet Sounds board under "Pop Culture" too {which animal lovers ought to check out} -- just responding to her comments here due to that photo still being so fresh in my mind. Having such a nonjudgemental being in your life can be helpful at times, that's for sure.)


sidnero 7:41 PM EST, 12/09/1999 (Message #255 of 453)

Your too kind Howenstien, btw your name has always reminded me of the closing line of( the prince of tides) But now that I brought it up, I remember it started with an "L".... Forgive the stereotypes of women and homosexuals, I just go where the rhyme takes me. I do realize that the rhyming in pairs (if at all) can make it sound juvenile and weak. It was a dreary gray day, this side of my screen and so goes the rest of my poem.
Then She would add 2 and 2, while looking quite confused.
Pause, and make her scene, playing all the part of drama- queen.
Ofcourse this was all hypothetical, and any real chance is in hell.
Are my standards too high? (don,t care) reality need not apply.
To those in court, who swear. that they are being judged unfair,
If only by themselves. And also the Keebler Elves.
To those caught inbetween, a nightmare and a pipe dream.


strat-0 10:20 PM EST, 12/09/1999 (Message #256 of 453)

Well, since this board is for journal entries, etc., and we've been talking about pets, I offer an excerpt from a journal I kept a few years ago. When I wrote this, I was living in a tent in a piece of woods in St. Louis. I think they call that "homeless" now. This was 1981. This blessed dog was with me for 16 years. Warning: it is long, so anyone who doesn't like long posts should just skip it. Samples, and Don, you have seen this.

"The Squatter

I feel like jotting down a few items. Living in a tent in a swamp for over a month makes you look at things kind of differently. What a bizarre endeavor it's been. I've known fear and I've been feared, although I certainly don't present a very fearsome spectacle: a scruffy, long-haired man in a faded denim hat, with a guitar and a scraggly-looking grey dog. My fears, however, have been a very real and different matter. It's very vulnerable, living in a canvas house in south St. Louis on God-knows-whose land. Last Sunday morning I had a disturbing experience. I woke up, stepped out of my tent, and took a nice stretch. Looking up through the trees toward my truck, I could see some men rifling through it. I grabbed the blue- jean hat I'm in the habit of wearing, and hurried along the path and up the hill. I had to pick my footing carefully near the top, where it gets really steep, so the visor of my hat blocked my vision of the crest of the hill, until suddenly there was a nightstick three inches from my nose. "Where you runnin' to, boy!" I looked up, startled, and saw six county sheriff's deputies surrounding me, with their hands on their guns. "I'm running up here to see you - I don't want you to tow my truck away!" Rhiannon heard the angry voice and charged out in front of me, barking menacingly and bearing her teeth. They all pulled their nightsticks and drew them back, threatening her. They all shouted at her and at me, while I tried to get her calmed down. I pleaded with them, "Don't hit her! Please don't hurt my dog!" I finally got her under control; she started wagging her tail and sniffing them. A few of them patted her head; a dog can be a disarming influence in more ways than one. I asked them what this was all about, but they were asking the questions. I looked around and it seemed there were police cars everywhere; I think there were four. I started to feel kind of sick. "What are you doin' down there?" "You got any guns or knives?" "What have you been doin'?" "You got a knife?" "No, sir... but I've got a hatchet," I said, as if they might want to borrow it. They led me down to the campsite and started rooting through everything, kicking stuff around. They searched my tent thoroughly and came out with the aforementioned hatchet and an old pair of hemostats. "You been smoking dope down here, boy?" "Oh, no, sir - I can't afford any. I'm trying to save up my money so I can go home." I lied. "Well, if you have any, you better tell us now; it'll go much easier on you if you do. If we have to find it, it'll go hard on you." My mind flashed on my pipe and my stash, hidden under the floor of the tent. "No, sir." Then I told them my story (some of it, anyway), and told them where I worked, while I scrunched up my hat in my hands, looking down subserviently. I was sure I was going to jail. I asked them if there had been any complaints, and what this was all about. They poked around some more, looking at each other and shaking their heads gravely. It seemed like a lot of fuss over a vagrant and his dog, to me. Finally, one of them admitted that there were no complaints on my account. They seemed satisfied with my story, but a little disappointed. Then one of them told me that a newspaper stand a few blocks away had been robbed at knife-point that morning, and the suspect was still at large. Then they went up the hill, got in their cars and took off, in search of their man. I breathed a huge sigh of relief, a bit shaken. Then I thought about the armed robber. I found my big fire- poking staff (every camper needs a big staff) and set it next to me, then I called Rhiannon over and gave her some well-deserved affection. I decided, better yet, we'd drive off somewhere for lunch, somewhere with people. I had restless dreams that night."

Long time ago... Rhiannon was a great dog, though... Samples, I know how you feel; I held her in my arms as the euthenasia was administered, the tears flowing unabashedly. I was expecting her eyes to close, like some story- book ending, but of course, they did not. I tried to close them, but they would not close. I held together pretty well, till I felt the need to tell them what her name was, "Rhiannon," and saying it in the past tense (her name *was*...) was more than I could bear. But I'd gladly face it a thousand times if I wouldn't have to face what I'm going through now.



samples 10:11 AM EST, 12/10/1999 (Message #257 of 453)

Ah, geez. That's what I like about these boards. You find out that you're never alone in your experiences.
Don- What kind of cancer was it? Magno got lymph cancer. It was horrible... She got so lumpy that it felt weird to pet her. But I did anyway. I probably petted, stroked, hugged her more in her last two months (from the time we found out to the time she passed away) than in the rest of her life.
Toys- Part of my "recovery" was due to my getting two puppies. I love them to bits, although it was hard at first to watch them playing with the same toys as Magno had just a few months before. But they're helping to heal the wound in my heart. (Sorry if that sounds stupid.)
Strat-0- Glad you posted it! I didn't know you had to put her down. It's hard, isn't it? Especially the drive home, with all the tears clouding your vision. :-) Magno's eyes didn't close either. They covered her with this old blue towel and left her there on the floor against the wall while we walked out the door. I wonder what they did with her. Please tell me they don't do the soylent green thing and make dog biscuits out of them.


strat-0 4:38 AM EST, 12/11/1999 (Message #258 of 453)

Most of them get incinerated, while some just go to landfills, as-is, I'm told. The best thing is to plant them at your residence, with all the respect you feel they are due.

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gann515 9:42 AM EST, 12/11/1999 (Message #259 of 453)

I can sympathize with the pet stories. This morning I have to go say goodbye to my Max cat. He's actually more my parents cat now. I brought him home almost 15 years ago, but when I moved out I had to leave him. He's been sick for about a month. Won't eat anything. My parents have spent a lot money on vet bills and medicine but they still don't know what's wrong and he's not getting better. They are putting him down this afternoon.
The really hard part is what to tell my kids. They visit my parents pretty often and have also grown to love this cat. I want to bring them with me to say goodbye, but I also don't want to upset them by telling them what is going to happen. I know I'm going to be broken up and crying though. I'll probably tell my older daughter, just because I remember when I was about 16 my parents had another cat put to sleep and didn't tell me until after the fact. I was so mad.
I'm really glad my dog is still a puppy.


strat-0 2:14 PM EST, 12/11/1999 (Message #260 of 453)

Perhaps it's toughest to lose the ones you grew up with (like Magno). You think they are immortal (like you), and then you find that their presence here is short and fleeting (like ours). On the other hand, I don't know that it ever gets less painful, you just learn how to deal with it better, with experience (as with people). Hey, how does anybody find out when a regular board- poster passes on? I guess unless there is a significant other/parent/child who knows their habits and passwords, we wouldn't. Everyone's immortal on the RS boards! What a place!


gann515 3:23 PM EST, 12/11/99 (Message #261 of 453)

Well, Max got a reprieve. My dad took him to the vet and they decided to try one last ditch effort. They have to give him IV fluids and valium, if you can imagine! Anyway, he is really old but if this will get him to eat and give him some strength then we'll have him around a little while longer.



Don Pitcher 5:13 PM EST, 12/11/99 (Message #262 of 453)

I am by no means wanting to sound callous here, but why hide death from children? A friend of mine involves her two kids whenever she's lost an animal; there's a burial with sometimes a little funeral. I picture that it lets them understand the process a bit better than just coming home from school one day to an empty water/food dish or something.
My family was always the type to sweep things under the carpet. Like, "let's act like nothin's going on," and by god's sake, leave the lid of the coffin closed!! Heaven forbid that we come in contact with the actuality of something that might be emotionally disturbing...


FreeToys 6:24 PM EST, 12/11/99 (Message #263 of 453)

I had been thinking that same thing myself Strat-0
People just drop off and you never know if they grew bored, their computer died.. or worse.


Don Pitcher 9:14 PM EST, 12/11/99 (Message #264 of 453)

Like Yakomo (sp?) ... like he finally got his driver's license and just split the scene or what??


FreeToys 9:21 PM EST, 12/11/99 (Message #265 of 453)

Yeah
and someone recently mentioned Halloweengirl. Does she only come out in October?
Where's Zoe?
Who else is missing?


sidnero 11:00 PM EST, 12/11/99 (Message #266 of 453)

My generation is suppose to be the most apathetic to date. wich leads me to the question- what generation are y'all from anyway? When the dog I played with every day had to be put down for some incurable disorder, I was there to take it to the humane society. Cant say I understand how all of you can feel so sad about a loosing a pet. If your that sad then , how does the death of a loved one (human) compare? I never lost a close family member yet, and wonder if I will be sad then, or just accept it as inevitable. Like when a realy good TV show gets canceled. Yes i realize how wrong that sounds to you , and should feel like a freak for saying it. But they would be imaginary feelings if I did. then again, could they all be imaginary? Mayebe my imagination is so active in other areas that it rarely creates emotions any more ( just a theory ). The human alien hybrid theory , has yet to be debunked.


Don Pitcher 4:25 AM EST, 12/12/99 (Message #267 of 453)

(Being the weekend, taking a timeout to go back downtown and bring back some of the ambiance)
Knickerbocker Saloon - 16 Oct - Sunday 1:22 A.M.
Got a fine seat here tonight - only thing is that it's undeterminded if the band still has another set to go or not. Bit of a late hour for them to be taking a break and these guys I know usually call it a night by 2:00 A.M. On the bill is Tony Zamora's Jazz Ensemble, Tony being leader and sax player for the group. He is currently sitting up front on a stool with various audience members going up and chatting with him. His sax cradled in his lap like a lazing spent weapon. His guitarist sits off to his left in a chair, absentmindingly strumming George Benson-like notes... notes that sound as if they're drawn out of a feather bed, seen more than felt as they drift about the room.
Ah, well, we're in full swing after all: drummer has appeared, bass dude all strapped in, and a middle-aged guy picks up the mallets for his vibes. Maybe they waited around for me to come in. You ever hear a solo done up on a xylophone? A jam that chimes?? Tony sits on his stool, laying back, rocking to the rhythm and smiles. It's not hard to disappear here. It's funny how this music can seem at once so loose and free, yet each and every note contributed by each musician is seemingly so planned as well. They each compliment each other, falling into place just when needed.
2:20 A.M. - all over and done with and I'm stuck here with a full glass of Brazillian black stout (which, I may add, is way too cold to be drunk at this time.). Almost wish that I was the type to mingle. Oh, if it was to be a female though...all the one's I've seen tonight are all taken. There was one here earlier - just sitting on the opposite side of the room - all cut out for this place and the music tonight. Tall, dark, in a short skirt and a low V-neck shirt that she wore the cut of extrememly well. Oh shit, "guy talk", eh? An image passing through the night.
Funny how I should even be sitting here. I took a pause just now, sipped slowly froum my tall glass, and I thought of myself and my current position. I have absolutlely no money what so ever. None. I'm in total debt, a place that I have never been in my life. I feel as though I ought not to be in public what so ever. I am not free - I don't have the slightest ability to exist. Literally: I am living on my honor.
My next thought is of how I used to be a year ago. Coming down here was like running to a haven. And even as I sat here, I could still feel the stress - couldn't shake the job as it hung over me. I had that small black box clipped onto my waistline - waiting for it to jump into life, putting a warm pulsation through my hip - to pull me away from my temporary reality and back into the almighty J-O- B.
It never left me. Not until I left it. For cryin' out loud: it was only a video store, ya'd say. Maybe I felt like I took too much responsibility at that - and that's probably true. But that was my job, man. Just wanted to do it well and do it right.


strat-0 4:54 AM EST, 12/12/99 (Message #268 of 453)

I sure hope Yak didn't meet up with a concrete embankment, or something...

Sidnero, I can understand how you might feel that a flippant response was in order, to some of these posts. I would have to say this: I have lost quite a few people who were very important in my life, to death. I buried a woman that I lived with, and planned to marry, when I was about your age; I have buried my father; I had to attend my best friend's funeral, while his two young girls cried, and said that their Daddy was suppposed to be there for them. Those are just the "toughies," because there have also been others.

I think it is hard to lose a beloved pet because they seem to be so innocent. And they are so loyal. Even cats, with whom you really just come to an agrement, and, of course dogs, who will do anything for you, including put their lives on the line, enrich our lives tremendously.



sidnero 3:07 PM EST, 12/12/99 (Message #270 of 453)

Flippant? (had to look it up) If my inquisitive nature seems disrespectull or not serious that only prooves that im more of a freak than thought. I was serious about the whole post. a few years back when I wasntnt accustomed to this feeling of alienation, I actually entertained the idea that I was part alien, (or less than human) . that theory would be partly correct, if my other theory (that we are all part alien and part primate, or just retarded aliens, dropped off here by dissapointed parents)could someday be prooven.
I am still uncertain if the emotions that I do express, are real or imagined. how can you tell, with something unquantifiable? Yesterday I saw a crying child and I could feel his pain ( of rejection) through his expressions, But did I really feel his pain. Or did I imagine it completely? I think even my facial expressions matched his, unlike the other adults (I sat with) who told the kids to play nice, and forgot about it.
mayebe his pain was contaigoius like a yawn, (science cant explain either phenonemon).

Don Pitcher 4:48 PM EST, 12/12/99 (Message #271 of 453)

So you're saying you're unsure if you felt sorry for the kid?
I think true emotion is spontaneous and not something that requires thought. Why debate your feeling a reaction that is something natural as that? Maybe there's just something in your emotional makeup that senses a caring in you towards that child and thus you share in seeing his pain.
How do you analyze it when you laugh at something? Is it a questionable emotion when you react to a sight that spontaneously strikes you as funny? Or do you roll with it?
Maybe you're somewhat of an existentialist -- you could always go to a library and hunt up "Nausea" by Sarte; it has some deep threads running through it that I wouldn't be very good at in explaining here. I read it just out of high school when I was feeling a bit "lost" and out of touch with things within/about me.


strat-0 6:27 PM EST, 12/12/99 (Message #272 of 453)

Sid, no offense taken; the question was legit.

Gann, good luck with Max.

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gann515 8:22 AM EST, 12/13/99 (Message #273 of 453)

It's not that I wanted to hide it...but it's hard to explain to a four year old. I told her that Max was sick and was going to die soon and that it would probably be the last time we saw him. I just couldn't tell her that he was going to the vet and they were going to make him die. Too complex. I could just hear her questioning every time one of us went to the doctor..."Are you going to die now mommy?" My older daughter understands why sometimes it's better to end the suffering. But knowing it doesn't make it any easier to accept. Our pets are like an extension of our family...I mean, I'm not as upset about Max as I would be my husband, kids or parents, but I do love that cat and I will miss him and I don't think that it's inappropriate to grieve his loss.


samples 6:37 PM EST, 12/13/99 (Message #274 of 453)

Two Die
I knew it had to happen.
A monster, snapping at her heels,
I finally let it catch up with her.
Three bodies in a car.
Two quite alive,
One on the brink.
She lay panting in the back
panting for her life.
I was panting for a slightly different reason--
It was my life I was worried about.
Too selfish to know
that this deed was best for her.
But no.
Only thinking about me.
She died against the wall
With my hand against her heart,
Both of us heavy, limp, dead.
She didn't look like she was in heaven.
But who am I to guess?
It wasn't fair.
We were both of us dead,
But only one of us got to leave.
Was it she or me?

[strat-0]

sidnero 7:38 PM EST, 12/13/99 (Message #275 of 453)

Not so much feeling sorry for the child, but rather sensing what he was feeling,, or what my subconscience thought he was feeling.
About laughter, I dont consider it an emotion. tickling causes the same response in me, and mayebe comedy stimulates the same area of the brain. The standard comedy routine doesnt come close to cracking me up. It takes something original and shocking to make me laugh. laughing is very important in social situations , because it makes you at ease, and forces attention towards the source. It forms a mutual bond, everybody likes to laugh and the comedian likes to make you laugh.
About the book "nausea",if I put that on my list of things to read, I might get to it by 2015. havent read anything for over a year, because I can watch 15 movies in the same amount of time it takes to read one book.
I think the reason why I feel others emotion more than my own is because of my suit of armour (figurative) that keeps people at a distance. then both consciencely and subconsciencely seeking expressiveness in music, movies, art, everyday life , so I dont have to express anything of my own or take off the suit.


strat-0 8:43 PM EST, 12/13/99 (Message #276 of 453)

Samples, *you* didn't let it catch up to her; that's what you have to come to terms with, because a similar issue may someday present itself. You felt helpless because you *were* helpless, and that happens again and again.

Man, I can't contribute much on the child development/when can they understand issue. But I think by the time kids are about 4 or 5 they know that certain entities go away permanently, and don't come back. Of course, understanding it on an intellectual level, and understanding it on a personal and spiritual level are two very different things. I didn't come to grips with the latter until I was 18, and many don't until much later, if ever.

FreeToys 9:48 PM EST, 12/13/99 (Message #277 of 453)

abortion?


strat-0 8:16 PM EST, 12/14/99 (Message #278 of 453)

Huh?

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samples 5:37 PM EST, 12/15/99 (Message #279 of 453)


(Just thought I'd keep this thread going.)


specialsauce 5:05 PM EST, 12/16/99 (Message #280 of 453)

About two months ago, my sister and I, with her 2 young girls, went to see our Grandfather, for the first time in 10 years. As we drove down the long dirt rode, we saw the big blue barn that he used to teach, and call, sqare dances in, and was laced w/ his thousands of baseball caps he collected over the years. We saw his old porch swing, riding lawn mower, old cars,... all of which we played on, and around, when we were just little girls ourselves. As we drove up the long gravel drive- way, my grandfather came out to meet us, just as charasmatic and sarcastic as I rememebered him! He always said he wanted to be "buried w/ all his money"! My nieces played in the barn, on the swing, ran around all of his beautiful land,...the same as my sister and I used to do.
I took my husband to meet my Grandfather 3 weeks ago, and to see a part of my childhood. We found out he had pancreatic cancer.
Yesterday I saw him for the 3rd time in 10 years. He was in a coffin w/ one of his baseball caps, and a check that said, "All My Money".


Don Pitcher 5:24 PM EST, 12/16/1999 (Message #281 of 453)

Sorry to hear how a reunion after a decade turned so short. Was that suspected at all to spur the first visit?
It's touching to hear of the cap & the check; ties his life into the event of his death. It shares. I only hope that when I die, it could be the same. Don't just want a "box" sitting up there, shut off from it all. Part of a person's significance ought to be recognized.


strat-0 9:14 PM EST, 12/16/1999 (Message #282 of 453)

That's poignant, specialsause.

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Don Pitcher 5:36 AM EST, 12/17/1999 (Message #283 of 453)

(5:14 a.m. - first covering snowfall of the season tonight. Saw it outside, how it blanketed everything. Quiet, undisturbed. I made the walk to the machine on the next block to get Friday's paper. Only one car had been through the lot, leaving a single pair of tracks. So still out at this hour; like you could almost hear the colored lights blinking on a few of the apartment balconies. They alone were the only movement other than my shadow as I walked along.
The glass & steel door clanged shut after I got my paper, sending a dusting of white down onto my bare knuckles. Folding it up under my arm, I started back, following the footsteps I had made moments before. Ritual. The world only felt halted - and I so knew to where those prints returned.)
SO AND I WISH
I wish it would snow
So I could sit in my window
And watch it snow.
I wish I had a bottle
So I could get drunk some
And watch it snow.
I wish I could drink some thoughts
So I could drunkenly think of her
And watch it snow.
I wish that she could be here
So we could drink thoughts together
And watch it snow.
I would burn a candle in the dark
So we could pretend a bit romantic
And watch it snow.
I'd love to drink and think a love to love,
So I wouldn't have to be here alone
And watch it snow.


Howenstein 9:10 AM EST, 12/17/1999 (Message #284 of 453)

Ahh... the often ignored "downside" of being single, eh Don? You told the story well.


specialsauce 5:33 PM EST, 12/17/1999 (Message #285 of 453)

Don, we only knew that he hadn't been feeling well lately. My mother moved around so much during our childhood that we just lost touch w/ him. So, while I was visiting my sister in Ohio, we had decided now that we are adults, it was in our hands to keep in touch w/ our family, and drove to Michigan to see our Grandfather again. We had no idea this would happen. He was only 64yrs. old, and just retired. My sister and I decided at the funeral, everything happens for a reason.


gann515 5:48 PM EST, 12/17/1999 (Message #286 of 453)

Sorry to hear about your Grandfather specialsauce.
Yesterday, my parents finally decided that there was nothing left to do to help poor Max. He's gone.
Now, we have another dilemma (I swear it never ends). My husband's 89 year old grandmother is in the hospital...again. She's had heart failure twice since October. Since her own daughter is such a selfish bitch, my husband and I are completely responsible for Baba. It's not that I mind...I love her...but it's so hard. Our lives are so hectic already. And it's just so depressing...in and out of the hospital; waiting for the next attack. Just like with Max, I don't want to give up...but she's suffering too. She talks about dying all the time now. What the hell can I do?


FreeToys 6:35 PM EST, 12/17/1999 (Message #287 of 453)

Talk to her about dying
She's going on an adventure that we'll all experience one day


20thCenturyFox 9:22 PM EST, 12/17/1999 (Message #288 of 453)

Wow...I don't even want to post what I was gonna post after reading everyone else's serious problems. I'm so scared of death, but at the same time, I've become so constantly expectant to learn that someone else I care about is dead that I've kind of closed myself off to it. I look at it as an inevitable thing, and I consider each day lucky if I get through it alive along with my family and friends. Some time I'll recount the saga of two friends' deaths last spring, but it's too depressing right now.


The_Fragile_Reptile 8:18 PM EST, 12/18/1999 (Message #289 of 453)

This is a very impressive board, and I had not discovered it until now. I haven't read everything here, but a great deal of it. Listening to great music must be attributed to insight, eh?
I guess I'll post a poem. I don't have too many of them that I consider to be really good. This is my favorite, though. It exudes the influence of Edwin Robinson, one of my all-time favorite poets. The entire semi- irony and unexpected endings of his poetry is apparent. Well, enough of the analysis of the style, though I'm sure you'd love for me to go on
daily prestige
i think too much
i don't think enough
i like to laugh
i don't cry, crying's for wimps
it shows too much vulnerability
i mock you behind your back
i smile consistently
just to make you wonder
i walk with one eye closed
just to see the world differently
i am everything you wish you were
i have everything you hate
i hate everything you have
i wish upon the moon
because there are too many stars
prescription pills make me shudder
i can handle exhibition
i openly discuss lude acts
i think pornography is mandatory
for all teenage boys
i practice masturbation
i get off on that kind of thing
i am okay with circumcision
and other acts of varying religions
everything i say is contradictory in a way
i am superior to you and your kind
question that and feel my wrath
the futility of my peers makes me ill
i dance on the graves of your loved ones
i like watching others in pain
it makes me feel comfortable
right now, in my mind, you're dying
violently being torn apart
i am better off now than you pretend to be
i know you miss me
i know that i cannot be forgotten
i have my own morals
my standards are ordinary
yet they are my own
i am always considering suicide
i am always contemplating your death
and my own
i think too much
i don't think enough



FreeToys 8:26 PM EST, 12/18/1999 (Message #290 of 453)

Deeep
Have you considered getting a kitten?


The_Fragile_Reptile 8:30 PM EST, 12/18/99 (Message #291 of 453)

After re-reading my poem in a self- serving manner, I noticed that it would also fit well as a Mercer Mayer story book. You know, those Little Critter ones? Ah, those were the days.


strat-0 2:53 PM EST, 12/19/99 (Message #292 of 453)

Fragile, I was a late-comer, too. Took a while to get caught up on the posts. Don really tapped into something here; it took off like wildfire. Welcome aboard.

20thCentury, quite a complex dynamic going on there. I can say this much: He's got it bad. You may have to be very blunt.

Don, I liked your poem, and the prose that introduced it. I can relate, but for me it's rain. Don and Howie, yeah, the "downside." That's what I've been trying to get across to her. I know what awaits, and she has no idea. By the time she realizes the value and rarity of what we had, it will be too late. It was so good for so long, nearly perfect, and only needed some minor adjustments that I didn't even know about. Very strange. Here is a Christmas song I was working on in the weeks before it happened:

Christmas Time is Here
(c) 1999 Words and music by strat- 0

1. The smell of evergreens and baking pies
The firelight is dancing in your eyes
And, Darling, I think that you should know
In everything you are, I love you so

(Chorus)
And Christmas time is here
Laughter and good cheer
All your friends are here
All your loved ones near

2. The tree is trimmed and now the time is right
For sipping eggnog in the firelight
Christmas time is something we can share
Christmas is a feeling in the air

(Chorus)

(Middle)
Christmas time is here - the best time of the year!
Spread some good will - you'll thaw the winter's chill

(repeat with first verse and chorus as a round)



Christmas, Shmistmas!

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FreeToys 2:57 PM EST, 12/19/99 (Message #293 of 453)

Do what I do
Go to the mall and tell the kids that Santa Claus is dead



TrpnBly 11:29 AM EST, 12/20/99 (Message #294 of 453)

20th...man, it's stories like that that make me glad that a) I'm not single and b) I'm not 19. To tell you the honest truth, I think both you and him have quite a bit of growing up to do. Sorry if that sounds mean, but that's what I see.


gann515 11:01 PM EST, 12/20/99 (Message #295 of 453)

I really don't want to talk about death right now...i've been thinking about it all day.
Sex...20thCF, make it PERFECTLY clear...don't toy with the boy; decide what you want and get it!
Reptile...I often feel contridictory!?
p.s. BAH HUMBUG!


The_Fragile_Reptile 11:20 PM EST, 12/20/99 (Message #296 of 453)

Here's some rants that I've posted on my webpage. They're some things I've heard and noticed at school.
When asked the question, "Are you a leader or a follower?", the guy sitting next to me in class said proudly, "A leader!" It's important to note that he said that while wearing Nike shoes, a Nike shirt, Nike socks and Nike shorts.
"I'd hate to go with the trends." - A quote from an avid fan of Limp Bizkit.
I heard some freshman talking to the teacher in class about how he thinks gays should all be killed because he's afraid they'll hit on him.


lbbshell 7:56 PM EST, 12/21/99 (Message #297 of 453)

Life sucks and then you die.
This may seem a little oddly innapropriate, given the season, and all that feel good bullshit, but hey, who cares anymore??
Sunday, at 12:00 Midnight, a friend of mine was driving along a highway. He had just returned from christmas shopping. All of a sudden, the car in the other lane veered out and struck his car. He was 19 years old.
19 FUCKING years old and hes dead. He had just completed the first finals of his freshmen year at college. He got killed by a drunk driver. Add that to my list of people I know who have died because of drunk drivers, and the fact that I have been in a car accident caused by a drunk driver, and that this 19 year old left behind a six month old little girl, and you would think I'm a little pissed at drunk drivers...
Well, actually, I'm a LOT pissed at drunk drivers. Those stupid bastards have wasted the life of one of the best people I knew. The only guy in the world who didn't give a shit what was going on in his life, he'd be the person to call at 2:00 in the morning. I went to his coming out party 3 months ago. I went to his graduation party 6 months ago. His baby daughter is my godchild. 2 days ago, at 1:00 in the morning, I got a call from his parents to tell me he was dead. Yesterday, I went with a group of people to pick out his casket. Tomorrow, after having to be cheerful and happy at a holiday concert, I'll be going to his funeral. He was 19 years old.


20thCenturyFox 8:14 AM EST, 12/22/99 (Message #298 of 453)

lbbshell....I won't waste my time telling you, "oh, it was for a reason - you'll get over it - etc. etc." because I know how much it hurts. Last May, about 2 weeks after my friend Detty's 21st birthday, he got in an accident on his way home from the bar. He died, my friend Eric, who'd just turned 22, died, and two others were seriously injured. I'm not trying to belittle your suffering by telling my story...just letting you know that I know how hard it is and that I'll be thinking of you.


Howenstein 11:44 AM EST, 12/22/99 (Message #299 of 453)

lbbshell, I can't pretend to feel your pain, because that has never happened to someone that close to me. I can only say that that theme has repeated itself far too often. There needs to be stiffer penalties on drunk driving. I am not looking forward to driving anywhere after my Y2K New Year's party.

For those of you hosting or attending Christmas or Y2K parties -- please don't let your friends get wasted and drive. I remember a friend who was drinking sloe gin fizzes all night at a party I hosted. He was totally blitzed after midnight, and wanted to drive himself home. When I took his keys he got very belligerant, but eventually agreed. I drove his car (I had only had about 6 beers in 6 hours) and a friend of mine who has mild epilepsy and can't drink followed in my car. When the guy got out of his car at home, he puked out red shit for what seemed like a half- hour. And this is someone who thought he could drive. Don't be fooled.


strat-0 8:51 PM EST, 12/22/99 (Message #300 of 453)

Very sorry to hear that news, lbbshell. No glib words can help; nothing can, except sufficient time, and that only provides a buffer zone that allows you to go on. The Grim Reaper has stuck his claws into my life for more than my share (considering there have been no World Wars or anything). Jump to #268 for details. Here's something from a journal, about the first biggie:

"In every young man's life there is a time of transition, a passing from one stage of life to the next. For some, the change is subtle or gradual; for others it is profound, rebellious, even violent. Some do not survive it. Mine was somewhere in between.

"I began to consider myself a man at the age of nineteen, after Brenda died. Brenda and I shared an apartment, and though we fought some, we talked of marriage. She died alone in an auto accident. Coming to grips with that shocking loss took many years, and started me on the road to manhood. This road would carry my life to four different states, to many towns and cities over the following three years: different people, different homes, different cars, different lives. Many of the memories have become hazy and dim with the passage of time; some seem as fresh as if they'd happened yesterday.

"One such memory is of the year I spent in St. Louis. I underwent the transition there, undertook a self-imposed emancipation. My memory has been aided by a little journal which I kept during the latter part of my stay. Written on scraps of paper, paper plates and napkins, it documents some of the experiences of my initiation..."

Yeah, it took me a decade to deal with that. I didn't marry til I was 35. Then I was tremendously happy for 5 years (WE were, until some moment recently, though I don't know what the hell happened), and now she's left without warning, or any chance for me. Jump to #201 for details. They talk about "old men" being soft. Well, I ain't no old man yet, by a damn site, but I can't even watch "Rudolf The Red- Nosed Reindeer" without getting teared-up. I don't know how much heartbreak a man can can take, but I know that you can always take more.

When I start to worry about the mortality of myself or others, I try to take solace in the idea that if we were cave men, or even lived in the middle ages, our life expectancy would be maybe 25 - 35 years. Hell, I'd be dead already. You don't get any promises, and every day's a gift. (Damn, I wasn't going to be glib!) I wish you a peaceful heart, this Yule, Llbshell.

I feel the need to add something about DUIs. I DO NOT mean to offer an apoligia for drunk drivers. Far from it. But I think it is a mistake to fall prey to the temptation to enact draconian measures and punishments because of this social ill. I'm talking about people who may be over the .08 limit (about 3 drinks), and were stopped at a road block, or because they had a tail light out, and find their lives or careers in a shambles. Our unhappy stories are not caused by these people. The fact is that human nature is flawed, and we've been drinking a lot longer than we've been driving. The human body is not designed to travel over about 15 mph. But that's beside the point. If someone is drunk and causes much property damage, or any injury, put 'em in the thumb screws. But trying to legislate changes in human nature and the human condition will not work, and will only harm undeserving people. It's something akin to mandatory sentencing for pot offenders; it doesn't make sense. (Now I'm sure everybody thinks I have a DUI record; I don't.) This is probably really bad timing.

Is it just me, or has this just been a fucked up Christmas season?

Well, for some lighter fare, a more light- hearted post from my journal is on this board, at #256. (I don't think I've ever included a "jump to" reference before, and here there are three.) Don, you've inspired me; my new signature is,


Luck to All



gann515 11:27 PM EST, 12/22/99 (Message #301 of 453)

Car accidents in general are awful. Anger usually goes along with sudden death.
Strat, this is the worst damn Christmas.
Here is poem I found in my attic tonight, written November 26, 1988.
My mind is being twisted
Inside and out
I suffer from confusion
Pain and doubt
I dream of another life
Where noone knows my name
But after all my suffering
I'm the one to blame

[strat-0]

The_Fragile_Reptile 11:51 PM EST, 12/22/99 (Message #302 of 453)

privacy
i refuse this
i define this
i will die this
i should not be left alone
but it keeps me sleeping
something i cannot repair
stroll through a small town
i walk the streets and stutter your name
looking around, i picture your face
in a steady admiration for the decay of our race
candy tastes better when it's taken from a stranger
i was sure i'd take the risk, but i never knew the danger
alone, as usual, and then there's nothing left
just a portion left...of my own despair
reaching and thrashing at my life, transposed in the air
i turn myself around; my psyche gathering the world
i try to walk, but can only remain
circling the earth, forgetting my name
to all the little boys satan's just a number
pulling up my sleeves and trying to recover
i fall to the ground and crawl back to that hole
taste the sugar on the lips of the biting cold
i pound my fists back into the pavement
kicking and screaming at my own displacement
my realization is setting in
i am so uncomfortable underneath your skin
mind's eye
i walked outside just for a moment
the other day when i was home alone
i saw an accident and suddenly remembered everything
it came back just like an old joke
i saw a ghost escape from her the first day that i saw her
i saw her die the day they cut him off
i saw her cry the day they killed her father
i saw her raped of the one she loved
i looked at space and decided i was leaving
maybe i will come back another day
then i looked down and i swear i saw the devil
in the shape of a cloud over my home
yesterday i met an asteroid named quintara
he promised me that all was good
two hours later he was crying for his mother
i promised him that all was good
and then i lied and i was dropped into the ocean
i swam and swam and found my pills
i downed them all with a glass of salty water
and then i climbed up on the shore
i fell asleep and woke up just this morning
some grass had grown upon my chin
i looked up and i could see quintara laughing
knowing i'd been fooled again



strat-0 3:39 PM EST, 12/24/99 (Message #303 of 453)

Nice, Gann. Fragile, I like "Mind's Eye."

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Don Pitcher 7:31 AM EST, 12/25/99 (Message #304 of 453)

Going on 7 AM here in the Midwest-- guess I could peak out and watch the sun come up on the "Big Day." Been quiet around the apartments all night; everyone's where they should be I suppose. Yesterday's inch or so of snow holds everything in place outside. I've got Vince Guaraldi's "Charlie Brown Christmas" repeating from the darkened living room where I just finished my usual wrapping of mom's presents. Over the years that's become probably the soul of my Christmas, that moment where I sit on the floor and do the wrapping. Always been on Christmas Eve too. Just my moment where I connect with the holiday by myself, where I take the pains of the scissors & bright colored paper. Shit, I've been working off the same rolls for the past few years still. Not much of a stack of presents -- just her. But then as I drug out the rolls from the bedroom closet, there was that one with the Disney charactors, of Mickey & Donald & Pluto...I'd forgotten about that roll. Bought it last year when I had a little boy in my life to buy for. Yeah, I remembered it -- remembered last year. Ah, holidays can sure bring out the best and the worst, can't they?
I sat on the kitchen floor, measured out lengths of paper, strips of tape. Me here, the Christmas tunes on the stereo, in a private world, like an island away from the other homes that were shortly due to begin this day. Thought of you Strat...like my unused Disney roll, I know too of a shift in life. Thought of you Gann, and Howe...the stir of kids that must soon envelope your morning. Thought of you BBP...bet it will be happen' there for you and wonder if dinner will somehow work some pesto in on the side. Lumen, 2CFox, Sp.Sauce, IBB...wonder if your little heads are awake yet,,,any of you, getting ready to go through the motions.
I've got dawn breaking and have yet to even be asleep yet. Mom works this morning so I don't even have to be up there until mid-afternoon. Plus the time difference gives me an extra hour too. Not sure yet how "up" I'll be for it later. There's always something lacking it seems; enough that I can too easily bring upon myself. Wish I had my own family here...that's always been an incomplete. Oooo, let's not dwell there -- not the point, is it? It's Christmas: to try to be one with all, and maybe with that, I'll leave with a bit of Dickens (and one that I try to read completely in a sitting each Christmas Eve) and let wishes pass out among all:
Let it be required of all men that the spirit within him should walk abroad among his fellow-men and travel far and wide; and honour Christmas in your heart, and try to keep it all the year. Live in the Past, Present, and Future, and that the Spirits of all Three shall strive within.


strat-0 2:47 PM EST, 12/25/99 (Message #305 of 453)

"God bless us, every one!"

I posted my Christmas song (post # 292, about Christmas and being with the one you love) on another board, also. I mentioned that I had 'shelved' it, being unable to work on it. FreeToys replied, "Save it, it'll work for you on another year". Save that Disney paper, Don. Where there's life, there's hope.

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besodeluna 9:01 AM EST, 12/26/99 (Message #306 of 453)

hello, i rarely or never post
anything on message boards,
often they consist of humanity
at its worst - elaborate flame
wars and vicious petty
disagreements over matters of
personal taste and opinion.

anyway i've seen several boards
lately similar to this one,
where people are actually
supportive of one another, and
where there is an atmosphere
of trust --- it takes GUTS to
post one's most private
thoughts, ideas, ruminations,
and writings that are painful
for me (an unknown person,
complete stranger)to even READ.
you are all very brave
to show your unique, special
humanity in these posts.

i know this post sounds kinda
smarmy and possibly a bit
melodramatic, especially
since i'm not a contributor to
this or any other message
board. i "survived" turning 35
this year and when i read RS
magazine i know i am not the
"target demographic" being
marketed to --- that is, i am
female AND way outta my
20s. but i have always kept
up with new music and i
often give friends my age my
git-outta-the-classic-rock-cave
speech. and yes, i realize i
am not alone in my thirty-
something RS reading OR my
interest in new bands as well
as GOOD classic rock stuff.

i'm meandering all over here.
i realize this.

i don't want to offend anyone.
i just want to explain.

after reading some of the more
painful material posted here,
specifically the things posted
by those still in their teens,
in high school, or in college,
it makes me look back on those
years when i felt no one
could possibly understand me,
i was too different to ever
"fit in," i'd go crazy if
i had to stand just being
alive and being ME one more
moment. i wrote poetry,
i felt suicidal sometimes,
yet externally, i was a
"normal" and not unpopular
honours student. and damn, my
boyfriend was SO adorable! ha!

i read this board now and
the painful brave posts,
especially the ones written
by people in their teens and
early 20s, when life often
seems to make no sense and
its random cruelty can be
so devastating (that never
changes, but it can be
realized and grudgingly
accepted as part of life
when it happens enough times
to you and to those you love --
and it WILL happen.) i know
i'm all over the place with
my thoughts here, but i just
want to tell those teenagers
and people in their early 20s
that if you think you are
alone in how you feel now,
you aren't. if you think
you'll never stop feeling
bad or self-conscious or
too weird to fit in, you
will. if you think it is better
to lay low and go with the
crowd rather than being your
own self, you are wrong. it
may be EASIER, but it will
ultimately make you hate
yourself if you don't
eventually decide to remain
true to yourself, and THAT'S
tough to do, yeah, it is, but
the unimaginative and
the insecure-underneath-it-all
idiots that want to tell you
how you should be are the ones
who are really very sad and
very, very wrong.

i think what has taken me too
many words to say to all of
you who feel safe baring
your most intimate and most
painful thoughts here for
WHOMEVER to read is this:
you are all beautiful.
the agony of this difficult
part of your life, i want
you to know, it WILL go away.
AND if anyone is not now
falling down laughing, gasping
for breath between guffaws
about this post by a 35 year
old, married 15 years,
childless by choice female
who loves freedom, road trips
and LOUD ROCK N ROLL,
i'd also like to say that
if i can help any of you
beautiful complicated
younger-than-i-am people
out there who think you really
will always feel confused
and alone and scared and
filled with indescribable pain
in your hearts, souls, and/or
beings, i want to help.
and if you really think
you cannot stand it anymore
and you really think it may
be a better idea to choose
to "opt out" of life and
to try that "easy" suicide
solution, please, get help.
talk to someone. seek out
and surround yourself with ONLY
"safe" people in your life
whom you love and trust.
or, hey, you can even WRITE ME.
why me? merely since i know
how you are feeling and i
remember how much hurt i
often felt mired down in
before i got to where i am
now -- 35 and in almost every
minority (except i have white
skin) due to the way i have
chosen to live my life.

i have tried not to be preachy.
if you read this post and
you think it outrageously long
and redundant & a bit strange,
i understand & respect that.
at least please try to
remember you have me silently
"on your side" and i really
DO understand how you can
feel so much pain it makes you
want to hide in bed, alone
and hurting from some
often-elusive place inside you.
but you are all beautiful
and unique, too, & this phase
of your life WILL go away,
you will NOT always feel this
sometimes-unexplainable pain,
so, well, PLEASE hold on,
hang in there, be your own
unique selves, & know this
smarmy wordy woman wants
nothing more than for all
of you to realize that
not only are you OKAY,
you're beautiful, even in
your pain, even in your
longing, even in your seeking.

okay, that's REALLY it. that's
all. some "gut feeling"
or freaky intuition thing
or holiday dementia (ha!)
gave me this idea i should
try to articulate all the
mess-o-thoughts ABOVE that
struck me tonight as i read
your very touching
life excerpts.

much peace and continued
courage to you all.

thanks.

[strat-0]

TrpnBly 8:54 AM EST, 01/03/2000 (Message #336 of 453)

I completely understand gann. I have a 4 year old son...I don't want him to use and if he came to me one day and told me he was using half the crap I do, I would be terrified.


FreeToys 11:54 AM EST, 01/03/2000 (Message #337 of 453)

That's a tough one Gann
Parents getting busted because of their kids is a very real and scary problem


Howenstein 9:26 AM EST, 01/03/2000 (Message #338 of 453)

I wish I could offer a better solution, gann, but your best course of action is to kick the stuff before your kids are old enough to REALLY know what's going on. And I'm not debating whether pot is a 'problem' drug. Smoking cigarettes or drinking alcohol in front of kids has the same effect. Your kids learn the most from you through the example you set. I, for instance, have a terrible temper. I see my kids developing the same thing, and it makes me physically sick. That's one area where I'd like to be a better example. Trying to stop my outbursts seems as hard as trying to quit drugs, though I've never had to do the latter.


gann515 11:12 AM EST, 01/03/2000 (Message #339 of 453)

See, the biggest problem is what to do about the pot. I'm very pro-legalization...that's what I feel like I really need to talk to her about. I want her know that I don't think smoking pot is "bad" and that there are many people that agree with me but for the moment it's illegal and that it's better to wait until you're older to do it anyway. We do smoke cigarettes too, but only outside, and we constantly complain about how awful it is and how expensive and how hard to quit, etc. I guess at this point, I'm most scared of them drinking, and that is something that they see an awful lot of. I'd definately be more upset if my kids were smoking cigarettes or drinking than I would about pot. Anyway, like I said earlier, I only use anything else on rare occasions now (and certainly when the kids are NOT around!) so I think I'll keep that little secret for awhile!
Now if this isn't a bad sign...my 9 year old went to the dentist last week and had her 1st experience with the "happy nose" (nitrous oxide). She liked it way too much...I know I'm in for some troubled teen years.


strat-0 10:23 PM EST, 01/03/2000 (Message #340 of 453)

Gann, A weighty issue. Just keep it away from them. The older one may already know what's up. The big problem is that the D.A.R.E. cops are like the Kmer Rouge (sp?), and with mandatory sentencing, you can wind up with some pretty ironically fucked up shit. I just went for an incredibly long bunch of months without a toke, for drug-testing considerations, and, gee, no problem... Sure wish I could find some 'shrooms, though.

Howe, I don't know if "kicking" was the word you were looking for.

FreeToys, yeah, but at least with smack, you got high once upon a time, instead of just some dizziness and heart palpitations like you get from cigarettes. Jeez, what's the point? And I am compulsively hooked on smokes.



lumencandle 2:12 AM EST, 01/04/2000 (Message #341 of 453)

well, gann, if it makes you feel any better, i asked "when can i do it again?", after my first experience with laughing gas when i was 6. and i've never smoked anything and only began with the alcohol during my first year at college. there's hope. and i can see how you want to be honest about the pot and your opinion of it, but it makes me think of the root of potential problem with any substance use or abuse: unhappiness. you said you wouldn't be so upset if your kids smoked pot as you would if they started srinking. but i fear, if i had a child, even though i think pot is harmless and certainly less worrisome than alcohol abuse, there's the simple idea that i don't want my kids to learn so early on that there is an easy way to feel good. i know kids are bound to experiment, but i'd hope to postpone it for as long as possible, and let them become stable enough to be able to cope with life without mind-altering sustances. and i fear that a little pot now and then leads to more harmful, stronger drugs. and alcohol use never leads to much that's good, imho.

i guess that's pretty idealistic. i mean, just 'cos i never used drugs doesn't mean i'm stable or that i know how to naturally be happy, 'cos i sure as hell don't. and i am just a motherless 20 year old. you seem to love your kids very much, and that's the most important thing. but it seems your drug use could get you and them into a lot of trouble. just be careful. you children deserve not to have you taken away from them over something like drugs.

BTW: thanks to all for the words of encouragement and wisdom on that strangest of human feelings. and thank you, don, for that beautiful passage. i'm getting there. slowly but surely, he's working his way into my life, and i'm pushing aside all that doubt that was planted in my mind before. we'll see.


gann515 1:26 PM EST, 01/04/2000 (Message #342 of 453)

We are as careful as we can be but I am aware of the risks. If anything ever does happen, my husband has declared that he will take full responsibility (and I'll be swallowing lots of Golden Seal). I wonder though, how do you raise a drug/alcohol free kid? I've known since I was a teenager that my dad smoked pot and did a lot of meth when he was young and I found out during my early 20's that my mom had used LSD and only quit pot because she had really bad allergies. Neither of them smoked cigarettes or drank very much. They were never really hard on me about drug use (man, the shit hit the fan when I broke curfew though!) and my mom worked in a methadone clinic for a few years when I was a teenager. I can't seem to figure out what would have prevented me from ever using in the first place. I have always suffered (to varying degrees) from depression, but I smoke pot because I like to... I drink when I'm depressed. The only factor I can see in the few people I know that don't use anything, is that they have strong religious beliefs. I was not raised in a religious home. Does that make a difference?


strat-0 4:55 PM EST, 01/04/2000 (Message #343 of 453)

I'm not knocking you, Lumen, I think it's great that you have made responsible life-style decisions, but I must observe that it seems that people who are down on pot usually don't know all that much about it. They tend to oversimplify the whole "altered states" thing, and usually have never tried it. IMHO, it's pretty benign. Moreover, you said to Gann, "you said you wouldn't be so upset if your kids smoked pot as you would if they started srinking." Well, I know I'd be a lot more worried if my kids started srinking than I would be if they smoked pot! (Sorry, I couldn't resist!) You haven't been srinking, have you?

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lumencandle 3:47 AM EST, 01/05/2000 (Message #344 of 453)

okay, i know you said you weren't trying to knock me, but then you did that condescendig thing, telling me basically how i just wouldn't understand since i don't use marijuana. i tried really hard not to take that personally, but i hate to be thought of as so naive, just 'cos i never smoked a joint. i never meant to imply i was a saint. thanks for judging me so quickly. what is it that i don't know, besides how it feels to be high on pot firsthand? personally, strat, i think you missed my point altogether. i certainly wasn't trying to praise my "responsible lifestyle decisions". i think avid potsmokers tend to oversimplify the reasons someone would avoid the stuff. (we're all scared or, better yet, just not open-minded enough to appreciate it. that's what i usually hear, even if that's not what you meant.) my point is that any substance use worries me, if it's pot if it's alcohol, whatever. and i certainly wasn't saying that alcohol is less worrisome that marijuana. i WAS saying that pot isn't completely worry-free as far as some of the psychological reasons for usage go. all i have is my own experience and what i've seen others go through firsthand. and the reason i started drinking was to feel good and loosen up. i couldn't do it on my own. and i have friends who smoke pot everyday, just because they don't feel good without it. and that's a crying shame. i know it's entirely too idealistic to think that everyone's going to learn to be happy without ever indulging a little, but it's not wrong for me to hope that my kids will have the best chance for at least trying to get along without "help". i never said that everyone who smokes pot has problems coping or is inept with feeling happy on their own, it's just the people i know. FTR: i'm extremely asthmatic and the only time i tried to take a hit off a joint i nearly suffocated before i even inhaled all the way. yes, that's probably the reason i never experimented further with the stuff, but, then again, that was only last year. i don't look down on people who do smoke it, but like i said, any substance use worries me, even my own. and i'm especially worried how kids are using drugs and alcohol at much younger ages than even when i was that age a few short years ago.

i can't type, so sue me. you knew what i was trying to say.


gann515 3:49 AM EST, 01/05/2000 (Message #345 of 453)

LOL strat! No offense lumen, of course we know what you meant, I'm sure strat was just kidding! I wonder though, is it any worse to be on prescription medicine for something such as depression? I mean, why is taking Prozac to get happy better than smoking pot (besides the fact that pot's illegal). It's still a drug and anybody I've ever known to take antidepressants has basically become dependant on them in order to stay happy.


Howenstein 2:23 PM EST, 01/05/2000 (Message #346 of 453)

Interesting point earlier, gann, saying you knew your parents used drugs, and now you are more open- minded about pot than some people. You may have proved how correct your fears are.

I was raised in a family where Mom drank a little wine and Dad drank A LOT of beer. Now I drink beer -- nowhere near to the excesses my father did. In fact, I can't remember the last time I had a beer at home. But your assessment is correct. I see people popping open a cold Bud, and think "no big deal." But when I see someone else lighting a joint, part of me still says "Bad! Wrong!"

I think the best any parent can do is try to instill self-confidence in their children. Get them to embrace their unique qualities, and don't load up on their negative ones. Then they will always know they are important whether they're high or not. I wish I could say my parenting skills are to this level, but I've got a long way to go.


strat-0 8:04 PM EST, 01/05/2000 (Message #347 of 453)

Lumen, you read far more into my post than was intended. I was sincere in the first couple of lines. Didn't mean to strike a nerve. I do stand by the rest of what I said. I was generalizing. Mainly, I wanted to get the typo joke in, which was apparently lost on everybody: "srinking" / shrinking / drinking... get it? Please read it again, agree to diasagree, and give me a small break (I could use it).

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gann515 9:32 PM EST, 01/05/2000 (Message #348 of 453)

Howe, I hear you...I love my kids and want the best for them, I want them to succeed in whatever pleases them...but it's so hard sometimes to help them boost their confidence when you're not quite sure of yourself and when every negative thing they do makes you want to yell...my parents weren't perfect and neither am I and neither will my kids be, but we've done alright so far.


Don Pitcher 6:50 PM EST, 01/05/2000 (Message #349 of 453)

Lumen: good posts.
Gann: why do you smoke pot every day?
Mon. => 14 hrs. @ work
Tue. => 11 hrs. @ work
Wed. => 12 hrs. @ work
ooohhhh, how great it is to be back....quarter till 10 and I haven't eaten yet either....
bye


Don Pitcher 6:51 PM EST, 01/05/2000 (Message #350 of 453)

Hey has Y2K fucked up the time shown on the posts? Sez I put the above in at 6:50 PM but it's more like 9:50 Eastern right now....Oh well, everytime my computer crashes and I have to reboot, it thinks it's the year 2094...



pepperhead 0:09 AM EST, 1/6/00 (Message #351 of 453)

...and my perticular problem has a two-fold twist. First of all, I am what you call a "Functioning addict" which means, basicly, I can function in society even though I am chemical-dependant. Some people can't do it. I can usually hide the fact I am high (if you pay close attention you can still catch me grinding my teeth or scratching my arms, but you got to really watch me to notice).
Secondly, I have very little incentive (right now, anyway) to clean up. I don't have to have a job, money is not a problem. I can just be a piece of shit and get by. This, though it may sound enticing, isn't helping my situation. I need some sort of motivation. I have now been sober , oh maybe 40 hours or so. I'm going back home tommorrow, and I'll be stoned before I arrive. Drugs are so much a part of my life, have been since I was 13 or so. Addiction is EVERYWHERE I look, most(all?) of my friends, some (most?) of my family(They are mostly fond of the drink. Your standard wealthy alcoholics.).
It is not an exaggeration to say I was high almost every waking minute of my life from 13-22. Most people would not believe it, but I would, honestly, smoke pot the second I woke up, and be at least stoned until I passed out at night.I mean before my feet hit the ground every morning I would take a few bong rips, still in bed. I used to grab a 2 little 10 0z. bottles of Tropicana OJ from the kitchen, take a big gulp of each, and top them off with vodka. I would drink one before I left, and have the other on the bus before school, where there was usually more pot, too. When I would be at school (a catholic high school, no less) someone always had a bottle of something we would pass around in the bathroom, or we'd buy a snapple and spike it, and then walk around school getting wasted. Absolutely wasted, like I mean fall down drunk. I would pass out when I got home, sleep till 6, then go back out. I used to go to The Limelight (if you've heard of it, you know the stories) and do all this blow, more to drink, smoke a joint on the way home, pass out again, wake up next morning, and repeat.I am so fucking disgusted. I am not bragging, and I hope that isn't how it sounds. I am just explaining a little bit about my situation.
More to follow, I'm sure...wish me luck. It won't work, but do it anyway.


FreeToys 9:37 PM EST, 1/5/00 (Message #352 of 453)

ironically, when we smoke constantly we're never really that high
It takes a day or two or three of abstinence to get really high.
Maybe you don't need a job or money.. but the best reason to kick the hard stuff is to give yourself a real life.
It might take a new environment and new friends for you to do something like that.
Just like with tobacco, no one can quit until they're really disgusted with it.
Best of luck


lumencandle 10:33 PM EST, 1/5/00 (Message #353 of 453)

okay, strat, i admit, i knew i was being too hard on you the minute i started to feel ticked off, but i just couldn't help myself. it's unfortunate for you that i hear that type of thing all the time, how naive i am about drugs, how i wouldn't understand, blah blah. i'm just fed up, so i took it out on you. i think it's safe to say i'm getting a complex...i apologize, i didn't mean it quite as a personal attack. please forgive me. there was the drama queen in me coming out. and i almost had you all fooled. or did i?

well, pepper, i'm not sure what even to say, but good luck, indeed.


gann515 4:33 AM EST, 1/6/00 (Message #354 of 453)

Don, it's more like every night. It helps me unwind and reflect on the issues of the day...I keep telling myself to write things down that I think of when I'm stoned because I always forget the next day...one of the drawbacks I guess .
Luck to ya pepper!


FreeToys 4:36 AM EST, 1/6/00 (Message #355 of 453)

Smoking weed can give you a bit of inspiration now and then. It undoubtedly can also make you lethargic enough that you'll never incorporate any of those 'brilliant' ideas.
It can make you happy
Or do you just become depressed when you come down and then need it to regain happiness?
It feels good to many people.
People can be suicidal during the six months after quitting smoking weed. That is considered the danger period. It seems to take that long for some chronic users to be able to achieve happiness again, naturally.



Howenstein 5:54 AM EST, 1/6/00 (Message #356 of 453)

And they say it's a 'benign' drug...

You are in my prayers, pepper. I'm glad to hear you say you are disgusted with it. You know that it's taken control of your life. I think that's a good sign.


TrpnBly 11:31 AM EST, 1/6/00 (Message #357 of 453)

More benign than any other drug.


Howenstein 12:54 PM EST, 1/6/00 (Message #358 of 453)

Which still doesn't make it good for you. Any addiction that takes over your life is unhealthy, be it drugs, booze, food, gambling, sex...whatever. My sister-in-law is addicted to money. I mean she actually CRAVES it. When our families get together, that's all she talks about. It's gotten so bad that she steals from her sister, whom she works for in the summer. Well, she wouldn't call it stealing. She deliberately over- charges customers, then pockets the extra. I've never seen anyone as sick about money as she is.


pepperhead 10:07 PM EST, 1/6/00 (Message #359 of 453)

I have changed environments. and friends. It is always the same result. I have an uncanny knack for being able to get whatever I want, wherever, whenever. For example, the summer before sophmore year in HS, I went on vacation with my father and his wife, my younger brother and my new step-sister. Disney World. Seems safe enough, right? I was paranoid to have anything on me on the plane, so I went down there with no drugs. 2nd day there I bought a bag of weed off a park employee.
Some people (I am NOT pointing fingers at anyone here, just a generalzation) are just oblivious to the rampant drug problem this country has. It isn't just the teens and twenty-somethings who make up the majority of the users anymore.I have gotten high with my teachers. Cops. Friend's parents. Town councilmen.God, the first person to shoot me up was my little league coach (He, obviously, wasn't my coach anymore. I was 17, not 11 or 12).Your neighbor does drugs. Your buthcher does drugs. Your doctor, maybe.
It is unescapable.
Besides all that, I had started to post random entries from my journal. At the risk of being self absorbant, I may do some more soon. Read if you want, or ignore them. Either way, thanks for all the kind words and well wishes.


Prince of Cats 7:20 PM EST, 1/6/00 (Message #360 of 453)

Yawn...

[The Prince of Cats steps lightly out of his secret lair hidden somewhere on the board. He smiles wryly and looks about.]

What did I miss?



Prince of Cats 10:12 PM EST, 01/06/2000 (Message #361 of 453)

Oh. Drugs.

Sorry kids, can't relate. I'm too messed up without 'em, I'd hate so see me with 'em.

But you're right pepper, major problem in this country.


Prince of Cats 10:12 PM EST, 01/06/2000 (Message #362 of 453)

Okay I take that back.

I was/am basically watching one of my dearest friends chem himself to death. Acid, pot, DXM, Coke.

He says he's clesning up now. I really really want to trust him, but I'm so scared I'll go home in April, and all I'll have left of him is a tombstone.

Not much scares me, but that does.


FreeToys 2:43 AM EST, 01/07/2000 (Message #363 of 453)

Yeah pepper
The environment factor is only one part of the puzzle
You also need that 'disgust' club in your bag and a determination to do something new

[strat-0]

TrpnBly 8:35 AM EST, 01/07/2000 (Message #364 of 453)

What the fuck is DXM?
Pepper...I firmly believe that some people can responsibly take drugs. Some people know when to party and when not to - they have a sense of balance in their lives. It's a fine line to walk and becomes even finer as the drugs become harder. The only exception to the rule, IMO, is heroin. Never have I met an occasional heroin user. I don't think it is something that can be controlled. And if smoking pot or eating some shrooms is merely a pitstop on the path towards heroin for you, then you shouldn't be doing those things either.


FreeToys 11:45 AM EST, 01/07/2000 (Message #365 of 453)

Quitting it all at once might be too much to ask for.
If you can give up the smack, use the weed as a crutch if you need to...
... unless you're unable to do it without 'escalating' to harder stuff, as TrpnBly suggests.


strat-0 12:09 PM EST, 01/07/2000 (Message #366 of 453)

It's ok, Lumen. Pepper, you've probably heard this already, but you might not be able to do it alone. There may be a deeper cause, and the abuse is a symptom. Of course, I know that when physical addiction takes hold, it eclipses everything else.

Everything is relative. My problem has nothing to do with altered states. Every day now, I have to find a reason not to go into the garage and crank up the car with the door down. And I don't suffer from clinical depression. Without a little mind-altering help, I might have already done it. (Of course, it may also give me the courage to do it, at some point, so there's a down side to that, too.)

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strat-0 12:12 PM EST, 01/07/2000 (Message #367 of 453)

It's ok, Lumen. Pepper, you've probably heard this already, but you might not be able to do it alone. There may be a deeper cause, and the abuse is a symptom. Of course, I know that when physical addiction takes hold, it eclipses everything else.

Everything is relative. My problem has nothing to do with altered states. Every day now, I have to find a reason not to go into the garage and crank up the car with the door down. And I don't suffer from clinical depression. Without a little mind-altering help, I might have already done it. (Of course, it may also give me the courage to do it, at some point, so there's a down side to that, too.)

Jeez, somebody post a journal entry or a poem or something.

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Howenstein 4:10 PM EST, 01/07/2000 (Message #368 of 453)

A song for an election year:

All over the country
Through the democratic world
Grown men are playing games
Insane games with you and I

It's the voice of the people
Don't know who you are, can't hear what you say
'Cause you really say very little
though your words may fill the page

"My fellow people..."
(I don't know who you are)
"...please lend me your ears..."
(What was it you said?)
"...I've got something to tell you..."
(Well, great, we've been waiting)
"...You've got nothing to fear"
(Then why am I afraid?)

You speak so clearly, but your words are so weak
You paint on a grin, we think it's a joke
Surely someone put the words in your mouth
But they're the words that we want...ambiguous

Faces in the crowd
Have had their share of life, it seems
So you kick them around
And spit in their face when you've won the race

All over the country
Most everywhere in the world
Men on high say very little
Though their words may fill the page

You speak so clearly, but your words are so weak
You paint on a grin, we think it's a joke
Surely someone put the words in your mouth
But they're the words that we want...ambiguous

"Ambiguous"
words and music by Stephen Howe
(c)1982, Bugsplatt Music


Marcus_Metcalfe 1:53 PM EST, 01/07/2000 (Message #369 of 453)

OK, I'm sorry that this is such a long posting; but that's just how many words it took to say what I wanted to. I'm also sorry that this seems to break the current thread for this board, but this seemed to be the best place for what I wanted to say. I will be initiating a new topic for this board, called "The Sixties". I am working on a book on this subject, and all of your comments and insights are welcome!

"If you're going to San Francisco; be sure to wear some flowers in your hair."

Well, if I'd had flowers I would have used them, but I wasn't actually wearing flowers in my hair; although I was singing this song at the top of my lungs crossing the Golden Gate Bridge for the first time in my beat-up aging Ford convertible during the Winter before The Summer of Love.

Like so many others, I was just heeding some siren call to "Baghdad by the Bay". Many of us knew nothing about Haight Ashbury (although within a couple of months I had set up my "crib" just a block from the famous intersection). I had dropped out after my second year of college at Marquette University in Milwaukee, Wisconsin (which was home), and I was now on a "mission of self-discovery" (which, frankly, has not ended to this day).

The first thing I did was acquire a $7 per week hotel room on Mission Street. Just $1 per day, and all the roaches you could catch! The Alkain Hotel had definitely seen better days. Probably around the turn of the century it had been a "suite" hotel, but by the mid-sixties all of the suites had been partitioned off into tiny individual rooms (most of which were being rented on an hourly basis by prostitutes working the "tenderloin"). I had come to San Francisco with my friend Fred, who also had rented a $7 room. (Later, to save money, we would get a "double", which we could rent for $10 per week - saving us each $2 to spend on "luxuries".)

In my $7 room, the metal-slatted headboard of my bed rested against a door which would have originally led to another room of the suite; but which now was permanently locked, but still had an open old-fashioned keyhole through which I could look into the adjoining "double" room. It took a little bit of time (and a lot of watching and listening) but I finally figured out that my "neighbors" were an unlikely pair of "escapees". He was "away without leave" from the U.S. Army (although I believed that he was actually Puerto Rican); and she had somehow been released into his custody while an inmate at a local psycho ward (where her family had committed her to help combat chronic nymphomania - although I suspected it was really more to shield themselves from the embarrassment she was causing in their VERY upper class lives).

I got my first introduction to "pot" through that keyhole, as they smoked incessantly. The routine was always the same. They'd "blow a few joints" until she would be just slightly more out of her mind than usual. After smoking, she would become incredibly "amorous"; loudly begging him to relieve the "pain" she was in. His standard reply was that he could only satisfy her needs when she had written a letter to her family requesting money. The final outcome I never learned, because after a couple of weeks, they vacated their "double" room; and Fred and I moved in.

The "double" room was in fact quite a bit larger, and even had a working sink (although only cold water was available). The door with the keyhole was still there however; although now it was working in reverse. Our new neighbor, who had moved into my old room, was not likely to be watching us through the keyhole (as during my entire stay at the Alkain, I seriously doubt that he was ever sober enough to find the keyhole, much less look through it). However, due to his highly "lubricated" state, he spoke very loudly - and constantly; providing continual "listening" entertainment for Fred and I.

Our neighbor (who I called Fred, and Fred called Marcus) was more prosperous than the average "wino" in the Mission District. He had steady work at a local St. Vincent dePaul charity center where his job was sorting clothing for resale to the even less fortunate. In addition to the benefit of earning a salary paid in cash, our wino friend was able to steal as much clothing as he could easily stuff into the pockets of his own garb. The stolen clothing (he favored "unstained" under-shorts) allowed him to "bribe" the other "street" winos he regularly invited up to his room.

The scenario (as we heard it so many times) always went pretty much like this. He would entice the vagrants to his room with the promise of a "sip" of wine (as he referred to it). Once in his unlikely lair, he would entice his invited guest to "sample" more than his wine. In exchange for "sexual favors", our neighbor would pass out samples of the underwear he was "embezzling" from the Saint Vincent dePaul Society. In order to make the exchange even more enticing, he would always say: "Look, no skid-marks!". How could anyone resist.

Later, after he and his guests would be in their cups, he would always lament on how his family had fallen onto hard times. He would go into a long discourse about his famous ancestors; with my favorite being "Frigham" Young. I was never quite sure, but I always assumed that he had meant Brigham Young. In any event, to this day whenever I meet a Mormon I always want to say: "Look, no skid-marks!".

Thus, for me, began a long strange journey through the Sixties. A journey which was given a point of convergence by the hippie movement. Today, looking back, it seems as though nothing in life prior to the Sixties (nor for that matter, anything since) bears any relationship to my life during the hippie era. For that all too brief period everything seemed to be in focus; everything seemed so clear; everything made it's own kind of "sense".

Today I believe that the Sixties really began a couple of years earlier; with the assassination of John Kennedy (engendering all of the disaffection of youth with the way the world was going); and it ended with the Charles Manson case (when the logical excesses to which this disaffection could stretch became apparent). Oh, there were roots to the Sixties earlier, and there remains today a shallow, hollow and underground element of "hippiedom"; but in San Francisco and Haight Ashbury during the last half of the Nineteen Sixties, a truly strange journey was begun and ended.


FreeToys 4:35 PM EST, 01/07/2000 (Message #370 of 453)

Hang in there Strat
If she doesn't appreciate you...
... she doesn't deserve you
you obviously have a lot of love to share. Give it time. There are a lot of great women who will treasure that.


wallpaper 4:52 PM EST, 01/07/2000 (Message #371 of 453)

Amen


strat-0 1:25 AM EST, 01/08/2000 (Message #372 of 453)

Wow, glad to see the song and the manuscript posts! Howe, that is really good. Sort of makes me think of Won't Get Fooled Again. Marcus, I thoroughly enjoyed that piece. Whether it's registered or not, you should include a copyright notice.

Thanks a lot for the moral support, FreeToys, and Wallpaper. Strangely enough, even across "cyberspace," (I know, a cliche) it helps a great deal.

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Don Pitcher 1:38 AM EST, 01/08/2000 (Message #373 of 453)

Had to read thru 20-some posts here since the last time that I had a moment to pop in here. Just gotta say that it is so cool to see some of the entries here -- thanks to all that have visited and "bared" yourselves.
We're all caught in this human existance and it's a great feeling to me to see the sharing that has gone on at this site. Just wanted to say that.
None of us are perfect. Life has dealt it's own blows in one sorted way or another, and though we're basically so much strangers to one another, isn't it comforting to find some sort of bond here and there among us.
Be cool to your neighbor -- he/she isn't that much different than you may turn out to be. With that may we all get along a little easier.
Marcus: cool post; I like that sort of writing.
Strat: your heart weighs heavy with me, as no doubt with others. Digging harder for answers sometimes only makes the problems deeper...
Gann: ok, I can accept that. Was just curious as to what your answer may be. You've always struck me as pretty much well together -- just wondered why you may feel a need for a daily "escape".
Pepper: What sort of life would you like for yourself? I'm not harping dude; like to hear of how happy/content that you may be with yourself, that's all.


20thCenturyFox 12:55 PM EST, 01/08/2000 (Message #374 of 453)

Marcus - I liked that a lot! I try to write somewhat like that...I just don't have enough life experience yet to make it interesting.


undrwatr 4:00 PM EST, 01/08/2000 (Message #375 of 453)

Hello everyone. I'm new here. Been hanging out and trying to catch up on the posts. This is the best board I've ever seen. It actually bears intelligent conversation--real life issues. I don't feel so alone; i.e. it helps amazingly to know how others deal with shit. Keep it up.


Marcus_Metcalfe 6:29 PM EST, 01/09/2000 (Message #376 of 453)

Thanks for your kind words strat-0, Don Pitcher and 20thCenturyFox.

I hope to see all of you (as well as others from this "Bared Souls" Topic) in the "Sixties" Topic of this same ("Sound Off!") Board.


20thCenturyFox 10:22 PM EST, 01/08/2000 (Message #377 of 453)

EPISODE THREE:
None of it makes sense. Swirling thoughts, feelings, colors, lights....get in and go. Go where? Nowhere is right, so I'll just drive.
It was two weeks, two weeks that I didn't see them and now everything's changed already? I don't get it...glad I didn't get too close...
Turn left, turn right. The stars are out, hypnotic enough to make you forget...watch that mailbox, now, you don't need to be hitting anything when you just got your license back.
Overwhelming. What is? I DON'T KNOW! It's so frustrating. I don't even feel it the way I used to, and I think I'd rather that I did. I may be happy now, but it's not me. I've lost something. I don't know what it is, I just feel uneasy, help I'm losing it, drive faster....
What was supposed to have come of it? I thought there was more. I thought it was different...and he's disappeared now too. Oh well, I liked the thought better anyway.... I feel so empty. Not in a (comfortable) painful way, just devoid of anything. I've become one of them. Drones. Sheep. 'Big Brother' got me. Feed an artist normalcy for a few weeks and she forgets who she is. It's like I've been brainwashed. My passion is halved. Sorry though it may be I don't even want to get fucked up anymore, I don't want to rebel, I don't really want to do anything. I just want to exist, whereas before, that's all I didn't want.
Stop sign - arrow sign - Seasonal Road Not Snowplowed By The County of Newaygo sign. What - Newaygo county? Where the fuck am I at? I'm just driving, I guess, and it doesn't really matter.


strat-0 1:22 AM EST, 01/09/2000 (Message #378 of 453)

Nice piece, 20th C. I love to drive. It seems like you are facing adulthood, and I don't mean that in any kind of condscending way. I mean that it's just something you come up to, and it doesn't care about your dreams, or hopes. And so you tangle and fight with it, and maybe come to grips with it, and write off some of your dreams. But you have to hold on to some of those dreams. Ah, yes, as Greg Allman wrote: "I've got my dreams I'll never see, to remember..." Some dreams are realized! But we all still have to pay the damn rent, etc....

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glenh 2:14 AM EST, 01/09/2000 (Message #379 of 453)

Man, this is awesome.
Ive never had it bad in life. Whenever I thought I did, I looked to others and thought, geez, ive never really had it bad. Which makes me extremely thankful. Everyones definition of bad varies, but I have been lucky so far. Sure, sometimes life seemed really strange, sometimes when I was younger I felt I had no hope. Serious. Somehow my friends would help me through without even asking or knowing. Music (however cheesy that sounds) probably saved my life a few times. I write lyrics whenever stuff gets to me. They sound comical in the end, but it helps. I dont know what this has to do with anything, but I think this is a damn good board. keep it up.


Don Pitcher 3:10 AM EST, 01/09/2000 (Message #380 of 453)

2CF: Strat hit about the same thought that I had going through my head upon reading your post. That "road" never really ends...you'll find that out more and more as you get older. Not to say that you'll always want to accept the landscapes you find yourself in while traveling it, but if you keep on going, sometimes that next hill isn't too far afterall and once over it,,,well, like any road: sometimes the scenery improves, sometimes not. But there's usually always another hill down the way. That never changes at any age.



wallpaper 3:25 AM EST, 01/09/2000 (Message #381 of 453)

Love the "landscapes" analogy


FreeToys 8:39 AM EST, 01/09/2000 (Message #382 of 453)

Check out the Fox movie

[strat-0]

wallpaper 12:56 PM EST, 01/09/2000 (Message #383 of 453)

I did. Pretty impressive!


lumencandle 9:04 PM EST, 01/09/2000 (Message #384 of 453)

good one, 20th, and believe me, i understand some of what you're feeling.

as for me, it's like i piloted my car right into the ditch between childhood and adulthood. a grand canyon between being a little girl and a woman, cheezy as it sounds. i want out, but i can't decide which side of the hole to climb to. and the in-between is a no man's land that keeps me depressed and anxious and totally uncertain. problem is, i want to be a little girl. but i want to be taken seriously and i want to feel like i'm in control. but i don't want to always have these adult problems that have been weighing me down since i was still a child. (and it really doesn't help that i'm always mistaken for a 16-17 year old, which makes me think i'll NEVER be taken seriously. people say it's the way i look and my voice, 'cos when they get to know me, people always say i'm an old soul and i'm surprisingly cynical. i'm just so inconsistent!) anyway, i'm stuck.

i don't even feel like rambling on about the rest of what i was going to talk about. you get the point. i'm one confused chick.

ah yes, but aren't we all.


20thCenturyFox 7:37 PM EST, 01/09/2000 (Message #385 of 453)

Glen - I feel the same way about music...at the very worst times I had to turn to it, or I would've had nothing at all left to turn to. Yeah, it sounds corny.
I never thought about it before, but maybe that's why I've got such a thing about driving and walking...just traveling in general. It really does parallel life in a way...can't believe I didn't realize that earlier.
lumen - right on, sista! Amen! (say it in an Aretha/Gladys/Della Reese voice) seriously you know what I'm talking about.
What a lot of that last post concerned was the fact that my messed-up self finally got put on antidepressants, and I don't know how to feel about it...my entire personality has shifted. Like it's not hard enough to figure out who I am and what I want, now the actual chemistry in my brain is different and I've gotta re- adjust, but parts of my life were almost better before...now that's confusing.


strat-0 11:10 PM EST, 01/09/2000 (Message #386 of 453)

20th C, I think I should get on antidepressants, too. I've heard there are some good ones, now. Maybe I'd start wearing my seat belt again.

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lumencandle 11:27 PM EST, 01/09/2000 (Message #387 of 453)

gee, i deleted the part about anti-depressants from that last post of mine....STRANGE. i've considered and reconsidered them. but i feel like once i go on them, it's admitting defeat and there's no going back. so i just keep putting it off. i just keep thinking that one day i'll be miraculously bestowed with the ability to cope with life in general. still waiting......


Marcus_Metcalfe 11:36 PM EST, 01/09/2000 (Message #388 of 453)

I'm new to this board, but I must say I'm impressed. (Actually, I have to admit, I'm new to all "boards", having never previously viewed any or posted to any in this or any other medium.)

To me, the most significant characteristic of "Human Society" is that, at our best, we work to overcome what would seem to be the natural order; and balance the paradigm of "survival of the fittest" with a more "humanistic" approach to life.

That is, we as humans are willing to devote a certain amount of effort to caring for others beyond our "family"; rather than just "culling" the species and succumbing to "natural selection".

If that premise is at all true, than this "web community" is truly a new variation of "human society" in the best sense of that term. What I see here is a real caring for others, and a real willingness to share knowledge and experience.

Call me a sap; but I like what I see!


Marcus_Metcalfe 9:10 PM EST, 01/09/2000 (Message #389 of 453)

Hey 20thCenturyFox. I've read your piece and watched your film.

You commented on my earlier piece; that you liked it and that you try to write somewhat like it but don't have enough life experience yet to make it interesting.

Writing (or any "art" form) isn't just about life experience. It's really more about finding your "voice" and having the courage and the will to make that "voice" heard.

Trust me. You're well on your way!


Howenstein 6:05 AM EST, 01/10/2000 (Message #390 of 453)

Responding to Strat-O's post #372 - Thanks for the compliment, and good observation. My band used to play both "Won't Get Fooled Again" and "Ambiguous," perhaps even in the same set! Musically, it's very influenced by The Jam, who were influenced by The Who...what goes around comes around, I guess. I only have a cassette tape version left from our old studio recording. How do I get that digitized so it sounds decent?



FreeToys 9:00 AM EST, 1/10/00 (Message #391 of 453)

The cooledit2000 software that I bought let's you sample a 'blank' area of the song. It then removes any noise heard there from the song itself. You can also adjust bass, treble, volume and use other 'sweetening' techniques


Howenstein 10:28 AM EST, 1/10/00 (Message #392 of 453)

I definitely need to get rid of some hiss on that tune before I let y'all hear it. The cassette has been overplayed. I wish I had purchased the master tape a long time ago (we did 6 original songs), but I obviously had nothing to play it on, so why bother?


strat-0 7:55 PM EST, 1/10/00 (Message #393 of 453)

Aw, what's a little hiss? If you want to hear something really bad, go to www.freetoys.com/mojos. (Sorry, I don't know how to do links yet; I'm proud to be able to do bold and italics and a few other minor miracles. Sound EATS space (though FreeToys can fix you up with some cool space- friendly formats that sound better than that bit. I'm slowly working on that now.

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FreeToys 8:18 PM EST, 1/10/00 (Message #394 of 453)

Mojos
or you can just click on Strat's photo in the
Rolling Stone Gallery


Charmed00 10:25 PM EST, 1/10/00 (Message #395 of 453)

That's a great site FreeToys. Love the cartoon of Pickaxe and Whiteman! Gann you're really pretty,nice looking husband too. Don that really wasn't fair, that picture sucked. Try again!;-) I sent you mine FreeToys, I don't always look that bad but, It was 2:30am and I was drunk. I also had my ring stuck in his hair. I couldn't hold the laugh in till the picture was taken. Howe, Lookin' good. Lucky guy.Very pretty wife.

Okay where's my cartoon???


Charmed00 11:15 PM EST, 1/10/00 (Message #396 of 453)

FreeToys That damn puzzle took me 20 minutes, I thought it was a fish!;-)


Don Pitcher 1:34 AM EST, 1/11/00 (Message #397 of 453)

The girl that sent me the picture of me goofed the thing up and that's how it came through to me -- maybe if I get over to her place sometime I'll do an update (got a slight beard thing going now anyhow). Still like Toys artistic touch; he did justice to my suggestion to turn the screw-up into pop-art.


gann515 7:16 AM EST, 1/11/00 (Message #398 of 453)

Thanks Charmed...I guess we kind of got off on the wrong foot because of the stupid Courtney killed Kurt board...Friends?
I've had so much on my mind lately...I don't really want to get into a long post right now though, so I'll just tell this little story.
I went to the grocery store today. I hate the grocery store on Sunday. I grabbed a ticket at the deli...number ninety. I looked up at the number being served...only seventy! I moved to the side, to a clearing where I could wait. My four year old was sitting at my feet and I was staring, in a dazelike trance, at the case full of lunchmeat. "And I Love Her" came on over the speakers and I starting singing. Out loud! I'm not sure who heard me, I was only faintly aware of my daughter's presence due to the warmth and pressure on my foot. "A love like ours/Could never die/As long as I/ Have you near me." The song must have been half over when a little old lady came cruising past me, pushing her cart dangerously close to my daughter's hand. By a startled cry I was jolted back to reality...then the song was over. The woman behind the deli counter called, "Number seventy-four!"


FreeToys 5:31 AM EST, 1/11/00 (Message #399 of 453)

I'll comment on the 'comics' and pics in the 'picture this' topic so that this thread doesn't get too diluted


Howenstein 9:12 AM EST, 1/11/00 (Message #400 of 453)

It sounds good to me, strat-O! You swing a mighty good axe.



Charmed00 1:41 PM EST, 1/11/00 (Message #401 of 454)

gann...friends! But can I be jealous?

Thanks FreeToys!


strat-0 8:46 PM EST, 1/11/00 (Message #402 of 454)

Thanks, Howe! I take the 2nd guitar lead in this one, and vocals.

Thanks for the links, FreeToys!

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gann515 7:03 PM EST, 1/11/00 (Message #403 of 454)

Don't be too jealous...the grass is always greener...


Yakomo 9:55 PM EST, 1/11/00 (Message #404 of 454)

Yeah, but that's just the pesticide.


Charmed00 10:05 PM EST, 1/11/00 (Message #405 of 454)

Yeah but in this case it's much greener. You have kids right? ya would never know it. I'm jealous.


gann515 10:16 PM EST, 1/11/00 (Message #406 of 454)

Just saw your pic Charmed...doesn't look like you have a weight problem. Hell, I remember being seventeen and complaining about my "pot belly"...I never would have believed what pregnancy and childbirth can do your body.