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Monthly Archives: April 2017

Lightning Pounds Willoughby

28 Friday Apr 2017

Posted by Kristine in Uncategorized

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lightning, nature, storm

Weather and I have had a contentious relationship since I was a kid ranging from Godzilla/Tornado nightmares brought on by the usual suspects to blizzards that ruined birthdays and snowstorms that activated my asthma. I had a thunderstorm phobia for a very long time, but it lessened after I had been outside in them, my tender parts exposed to lash of the lightning, deafening thunder, but … it didn’t kill me.  It was time to let go of the terror.

I remember Mom Mom showing me the dryer lid, cratered and black like the mare of the moon, courtesy of ball lightning.  I remember one vicious storm when my son was a baby, still bottle feeding, its intensity was singular.  I sat in the middle of the living room, holding him, watching the lightning blind the world. One stroke was so bright and powerful I thought for sure it hit a tree outside, but no. Everything was okay. I recall a thunderstorm in Tennessee whose presence could only be the Stone Giants from Tolkiens’ Hobbit. There could be no other explanation for the gashing and cracking that would surely send our cabin into the ravine.

Living here on the Chesapeake bay I have learned that there are no buffers between us and the weather. No big buildings, no hills, trees or mountains to buffer the fury of the lightning and accompanying thunder. There were only a couple of mouthy lightning storms last year, so I learned how to deal with it: sleep on the couch with a light on.   Yesterday I heard we were going to get some rain around 4AM, okay, no biggie, but there was no severe weather predicted.   Right around 5:30 a thunderstorm rolled in. I could hear it through all the windows I keep open now that the temperature is mild. I watched the sky flash with heat lightning and didn’t think much of it, heard a thunder rumble, but I got up, got dressed, and went outside to survey anyway.  And then the real shit started.

I sat at the table near my windows and watched the lightning vary from silent flashing somersaults, cloud bling, to a little more aggressive light and a thunder reply.  Then the lightning decided to take victims, spears of anger, random, or not random, striking or not striking but blinding and angry nonetheless.  Thunder, lightning’s handmaid, tore everything, followed instantly or sometimes with a respectful pause. (No one steals lightning’s thunder, are you kidding?)  I stood in my bedroom doorway and watched the lightning seek ground for victims, all our ears in these buildings alert, at attention, and changing our morning routines because no one can sleep through this.  The wind became strong and the rain followed, but this is nothing.  This activity was more dangerous than a hurricane, and I managed through a hurricane which is a lot of heavy wind and drenching rain, but not lightning that’s stalking blinded, deafened victims.  I stood in a doorway away from the windows, phone in my pocket, because this was a fight club like I’d never seen before, and even my neighbors who’ve lived  here a decade said the same:  Sounds like somebody’s bombing the naval base.  I made my peace with god because I felt like this one was going to tear off the top of us, and that is saying something.  The storm was a procession of M80s in front of of us, on top of us, behind us, unannounced, blinding, and paving the way for a ripping thunder that claws its way from sky down below the foundations of this building, the floor shaking beneath my feet.  And it takes so long for the worst to pass.  One last grenade and it’s done. Wasn’t it? Then the birds started to tweet, the usual suspects at this half-dark time of morning, giving absolutely no f*cks that their tree was on the death star radar. Yeah.  Figures.  One last M80, like a final eff-you to the area, and all that was left was rain.

Movies, Journeys, And A Lump Of Coal

25 Tuesday Apr 2017

Posted by Kristine in Uncategorized

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abyss, anger, darkness, evil, evolving, feminism, Fury, movies, Nietzsche, sayhername, Solnit, The Handmaid's Tale, woman

 

And if you gaze long enough into an abyss, the abyss will gaze back into you. — Nietzsche

I saw my share of scary movies back in the day, but there were a limited few I refused to watch on principle. I believed some were touched by true evil, that if I looked into their celluloid eyes, the evil would surely look back into me and open me up to who knows what.  Superstitious tosh, you might say, certain and strong when the lights come on.  I guess my tender spirit just needed extra time to grow thick, comfortable, and confident enough to say “I got this.”  It must have, for I recently said to myself, “Come on now. Be a grown-up and watch the damned movies, they’re just movies for pete’s sake!” So I did.  I knew everything about them, alpha to omega and the minutiae in between, but never saw their scenes unspool in a dark, silent, living room.

“Rosemary’s Baby” turns out to be very good. It holds up for me as a “modern” viewer through a slightly-educated feminist filter.  In some ways, Rosemary had it all. (My friend suggests she was a fairy-tale princess.) She had a thoughtful, playful, loving husband, a fancy apartment, and the promise of starting a little family, all while getting to stay home and chat with the neighbors. What woman could want more? But from the moment she chose to take the step into motherhood it went from being a horror movie to watching a woman violated, stripped of personhood, all control taken away, from what to eat, what to wear, what to drink, what doctor to see, what not to read, not to think too much or worry, to disregard her instincts, and criticizing her dramatic haircut.  But she held on, she fought the gaslighting, fought for control of her body, her pregnancy, and her sanity right up until the end. I ask now what is more important? Having a quiet, happy, carefree life or being in charge of your body, en totale? Why not both?

“The Exorcist” was not as good as “Rosemary’s Baby.” After watching it in a silent, dark apartment with a taste of apprehension, I felt like I was missing something. Where was the horror? I guess I’ve seen “Constantine” so many times that my superstitious edges are dull. The story brought me a strong, successful, independent woman (Chris) struggling with her daughter’s failing health. Chris had it all: homes, fame, parties, friends, and a daughter she loved to the moon and back. What more could a woman want? But everything she earned was taken away when every man she encountered (doctors, priests, and the handyman) basically told her, “You don’t know what you’re seeing, what you’re hearing, and you don’t know what you’re talking about. You’re a hysterical woman that just needs to calm down.” She gave a simple order to her maintenance man: put rat traps in the attic. “There’s no rats up there,” he said. His statement implied that since he didn’t hear rats there aren’t any, so he’s not going to do what she asked.  I was furious! These movies were less about horror than about women having their voice, their personhood, beliefs, rights and authority taken away. And here’s a petty but fair question: Does anyone remember the name of the lady scientists in Jurassic Park?

Whoever fights monsters should see to it that in the process he does not become a monster.  — Nietzsche

Taking a journey means every now and then you have to lift your head up and look back to see where you began.  With hard work and some luck, there will be some good distance between those points. I look back at my teenage and young adult years to recall the injustices and inequality I saw everywhere, the anger that rose up in me. I remember Thomas Covenant raping Lena at the start of a very famous fantasy series. (I tossed the books and refused to finish them.) Watching my parents fight, powerless to stop mom’s tears.  Radio DJs mocking Nicole Simpson’s 911 call with a Guns ‘N Roses song. (And what about that Guns ‘N Roses album cover.)  Reading about female genital mutilation. The years of being bullied at school. I built some tough walls for self-protection, found some good ways to channel my anger, but I never learned how to cope with the soft parts, the crying parts, the wounded woman parts. The parts that are waking up and shaking me while I watch old, scary movies.

Looking back for me is like looking through a spyglass, sometimes distant and blurry, sometimes sharp and in focus. Sadly in focus, for the anger, the outrage is still here, and the distance between my journey points aren’t as far apart as I’d hoped. I acknowledge that anger will always be with me because I am human, but I have chosen to use what I’m learning to make things better for young women as my goal instead of wanting to kill, vigilante-style, the perps who had it coming.

And that is the danger of looking into my abyss, to allow it to open so that I may see the softest, most broken, sad, angry, fearful parts while watching a movie, re-reading “The Handmaid’s Tale” or essays by Rebecca Solnit. The real evil I should be on guard against is the anger that rises up when I think of women silenced and their rights taken away, or the smaller indignities like getting patted on the head or being told to smile. It is anger that stitches closed the arteries that should be feeding my womanhood. Kindness, forgiveness, and peace choked off instead of flowing out into the world.  It would be so easy for me to fall into that abyss, close it off, and never give you a kind word or a smile again. (You had your chance, world, now piss off!) Or…I could put my anger into that shiny piece of coal I found on the beach, as often as I need. It will be a safe place to acknowledge that my dark feelings exist and will always be with me, but they’re quite small and manageable sitting on the windowsill.  I named that piece of coal Fury, and we are partners, now, in the next act of this woman’s journey.

It’s Been A Daddy Kind Of Day

24 Monday Apr 2017

Posted by Kristine in Uncategorized

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dream, evolving, father

I dreamed of my father.  He was with me just now, as I remember him when I was a tweenager, back when I had a pageboy haircut and wore caramel-coloured velour shirts.

He was standing on the grass in the courtyard, much like this one only the buildings were taller and there were more trees.  I knew almost everyone here.

He was standing still as I told him why I was sad.  He listened to me and it felt kind.

When I awoke, my heart was pounding hard and I suddenly knew the reason for my sadness.  (I brought it on myself.) He didn’t have to say a word.

Thanks, Dad.

(then, of course, my brother calls me just now to ask me a question about him.)

Women’s Lives

24 Monday Apr 2017

Posted by Kristine in Uncategorized

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authority, child, death, dream, evolving, woman

The dream begins.
I was walking towards a large campus of low buildings, crowded with many people inside and out.  These are schools, elementary, junior, and senior buildings all in one place. The weather is neutral. Some folks are sitting on a low hill in the grass. All of the bathrooms were empty. No one wanted to use them because every room, every stall was polluted and broken.  I walked among throngs of people outside; no idea what the gathering was for.  A young woman approached me, her mother sat on the grass watching impassively. The young woman was shorter than me, her face round and young, her blonde hair long, very long, down to her coccyx, natural and wavy, recently unkempt.  She said she needed help, she needed to get back home. She was calmly distraught, if that can be a thing.  A great deal of the dream was me asking for her name, what is wrong, where are you from, but she wouldn’t answer. We kept walking through the crowds.  Finally, she brought out a picture from her pocket, a printed piece of paper and showed me an infant in a high chair, head and face bloody, a knife through the top of his head. She said she needed to get back to him and see if he’s okay.  Instead of recoiling and hating her, I could only feel a low, deep sense of need. She was in trouble and needed help. I put my hand on the small of her back and guided her towards one of the buildings to see if we could find “somebody” which I assume to mean “authority” to help us.  On the way I asked where she’s from, no answer. Every teacher I asked for help said, “She’s not in this school, sorry.”  In between jostling through crowds in the halls, looking for someone to ask for help, she confessed that she hit him before, the law knows about her, and she can’t ask anyone for help because of all the trouble she’ll be in. She just needed to get home, please help me. No tears.   I stayed with her.  Finally I came to a tall person in a white-shirted uniform. Seems he knew the situation with her from what through rumor and threadbare facts.  And then nothing.  The dream ends without me knowing what happens to the girl.

What strikes me most about this dream is that I can see her clearly, her mother stayed behind while I led her away,  that I feel empathy towards someone who apparently murdered a child, and that she showed me a picture she (or someone) took, and printed on a piece of paper.  I woke in the middle of the night recalling this dream, thinking, “are you kidding me? really? did this really just happen?” I spent some time with the dream before returning to sleep, soaking in details and I knew (somehow) I’d remember it in the morning.  What does it mean for me now?

No Big Mystery

20 Thursday Apr 2017

Posted by Kristine in Uncategorized

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birth, Equality, goddess, life, respect, sarcasm, woman

People are making a big deal that a female tennis star won a grand slam title while she was pregnant.  I say, so what?  Her body is doing what it’s supposed to be doing, and if you really want to impress me, let’s see her play in the men’s division–and win!

Look, we really need to stop putting women on pedestals just because they have babies.  It’s just what nature chose, the luck of the draw. Like seahorses, the males carry the eggs in their pouches, nobody makes a big deal about their fatherhood. They’re just doing what nature gave them.

So women, just stop with making women hallowed, blessed, saintly, goddess things just because they carry around babies and breast feed and work jobs. So what? Your body does all the work, it’s not like you have anything to do with it.  Feed yourselves good food, read up on parenting, call your mom when you get in a bind, and take care of the kid that you put in this world. This is not a big deal, people.  It’s been going on since the dawn of time.

Women have babies, men do not. It’s just that simple.  Men and women are not equal, never will be.  So raise your boys to be boys and girls to be girls, as God intended. If more people would just follow nature and not make such a big deal of things, it would take such a burden from all our shoulders. A collective sigh the country could breathe. Ten fingers and ten toes are all the blessings anyone could ever need, and it’s time we got back to thinking like real women and men.

April 19, 2017

19 Wednesday Apr 2017

Posted by Kristine in Uncategorized

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Tags

death, evolving, life, remember

Do you remember where you were on that day?

What day. There have been so many days.  It’s hard to keep track of that day.

Was it a traffic stop day? Tornado day? Something that happened over there, overseas, some place we will never see?  What is that day all those people were killed? Or that day that all those kids were killed, and what does it matter?  It’s all just people.  It’s all just another day.

He killed himself in prison, convicted.

She killed herself in prison, not even tried.

They overdosed in Ohio and West Virginia. Maybe it’s because they were sad about all those kids who were imported for house cleaning. Or sex.  Illegals. Criminals of victimless crimes. Or maybe they just wanted to get high.

I remember where I was on that day when that stuff happened.  I was either at school or working, flirting with a man-child. Tragedy took my eyes off him and thrust me into a world that was so much bigger than me. Than us.  That kiss.  That failing grade, those catty remarks, my fist, my failure to launch.

Where am I, on this day?

Morning Musings

19 Wednesday Apr 2017

Posted by Kristine in Uncategorized

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birds, dog, Mermaids, morning, neighbor, ocean, sunrise, thoughts, words

I hadn’t planned on waking with a jolt, but it happens sometimes. I open my eyes to a bright flash, like lightning, but there is no storm here.  Sunrise soon, so I slip into slouchy clothes, add another jacket because the winds are northeast, and you know what that means.  The dog walkers were out trying to be quiet, but their fluffies have one job and they are going to do that job every morning: yip at anything that moves, and that’s okay. By now most of them know I’m not bite-worthy, so they let me scritch their wiry necks and set them on their way.

I stand in the sand with camera phone in hand waiting for the molten orb to rise from the Atlantic, noting the ceiling covered by rows of narrow clouds, adjoined, pink, soon to be yellow then white when the whole thing is done.  I watch the fluffies trot across wind-blown dunes. I see early crab tracks and wonder if they’re sorry they got up too soon.  In the west, a pillar of rainbow over the Hampton bridge.

The laughing gulls were quiet for most of the year, but now that the “skimmer” gulls have arrived, the laughing gulls call constantly. Laughing gulls are more likely to share the breakwaters with the fuller-bodied gulls or tiny plovers who are no threat to anyone.   The skimmers fly by in the mornings but do most of their work of feeding in the evenings, skimming the tideline open-mouthed and faster than a white feathered bullet. Their morning calls are demure compared to the coarse laughing gulls, their bodies are the epitome of sleek, narrow, curved, pale, and far more seasonal. They are white silk arrows flown from heaven, and that seems to piss off the laughing gulls.

There is a tiny bird perched on the dead tree limb outside my window, breast curved and deep. He silently pivots like an unsure weather vane. What is he looking for?

My neighbor says goodbye to her cat on the windowsill every morning; she doesn’t know I see this, and she greets him when she returns before she opens the door.  I met her across the balcony this morning. I said hello, and she “confessed” her ritual. I think she felt like she was caught like a deer in the headlights.  We haven’t spoken but a few words.  I told her, “You should see him when you’re not home. All the parties. Had to call the cops a few times.” one-two-three…. She had no idea what I was talking about, but eventually she smiled and said, “You’re funny, ” and I wished her a great day as she smiled and made her way down the stairs.

Mad Libs was a fun game, and sometimes Jimmy Fallon, the late show host, fills out a Mad Libs form and acts out a scene based on the guests’ words.  I’ve watched Jimmy coax a great many words from his guests, and most of them disappoint me. They’re like me, trying to remember what’s a noun, verb, adjective. Most guest replies are often bland like a primary color wheel, and it informs me more deeply than a silly interview.  This morning I am pleased with Kevin Spacey who, unsurprisingly, immediately, chose wonderful and interesting words.  This matters to me, not so much because I want to win a date with Kevin Spacey, but more because it reaffirms my need for more, my need to be in the company of people who are curious about the world, who know things that I do not. Those who touch the mermaid of me.

April 17

17 Monday Apr 2017

Posted by Kristine in Uncategorized

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blessings, evolving, sunrise

What a difference “__” makes.  That variable is subject to debate for me. It could be time, unplugging, sunlight, warmer weather, winds shifting from north to southwest, mending fences with a neighbor, the departure of the bad energy downstairs.  Or it could be the determination, the want/need/fight, the will to sleep through the night and arise at peace with the world. All of the above.

I am better today than I have been in some time and am relieved.  There is still much work to be done, but at least I feel ready to begin (begin again) and again.  I forgot my blessings and address them again today in a rising sun that reflects the blinding yellow paint on the building next door.

I slept with a full belly. I slept with the windows open. I slept with hope for tomorrow.  I slept. And now, it’s time to write.

Musings

14 Friday Apr 2017

Posted by Kristine in Uncategorized

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life, sleepless, strawberries, thoughts

Sleep paralysis is not a plot device used by some dark gods to fuck up my night, my morning, my life.  I know what it is now, and I can fix it. (Furthermore,  I really didn’t need to recall  the “Sad Keanu” meme. It’s a bullshit way to start the morning.)

I like my strawberries room-temperature. My mouth crackles as I eat them, and I am grateful for this pleasant stimulus today as I walk along the edge.

Jackie is due in three weeks, and all I can think is that time moves so slowly, and so fast.

I lit a candle to honor the grief of someone I do not know. It only makes me feel better.

I watch a tiny black beetle who barely fits inside a window screen square make his way here and there. What is he looking for?

He found a message in a bottle on the beach that holds a child’s pain.

I’m the priest in that story who never wanted to hear music again because it’s all just noise compared to the singing of angels he once heard.

Loud generators, the bump and clank of hand trucks moving sofas past my window, and a door slam are not plot devices used by some dark gods to fuck up my fragile mood and ambitions. It’s called life, lady. Better get used to it.

It’s hard to stay mad

13 Thursday Apr 2017

Posted by Kristine in Uncategorized

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evolving, life, rainbow, relief, sunset, Universe, woman

when She dumps one of these in your lap.  *sigh*

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