All posts by marilyn jaye lewis

writer, editor, publisher, thinker -- all-around joyful gal!

Oh No! Delicious Cozy Yum-Yum Strikes Again!!

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Yes, that’s right!

Last night was the first night of the season that I slept with the flannel sheets on the bed.

I always have this dim remembrance somewhere in the back of my overworked brain that the flannel sheets are always indescribably cozier than I remember them being, after spending about 6 or 7 months with really crisp cotton sheets on the bed.

Well, last night was no different. I simply could not believe how indescribably cozy my fucking bed was and I did not want to get out of it this morning. Seriously, I laid awake for an hour and half, just so cozy that I just kept snuggling deeper into it. I literally had to force myself to get my behind out of bed and go downstairs and feed the cats, myself, etc.

Plus, all through the spring and summer, when the windows are open, I also have all the Venetian blinds open in my bedroom. So even when I’m awake at 5 a.m. in the warmer months, I can immediately see the world outside my window, including the streetlight and any headlights of cars going off to work. (Well, the drivers of the cars are going off to work.)

But last night, I had the windows closed, the heat on, and so all the Venetian blinds were down and closed. So I was seriously in a dark little snuggly place this morning. Man. I simply did not want to get out of bed.

So, of course, now, half my morning feels like it’s gone. And I hate that. It deprives me of precious, valuable minutes within which I can sit at my desk and work!! Grumble, grumble…

Anyway. It is sufficient to say, I slept great.

I didn’t get any more writing done yesterday once I finished that new segment for In the Shadow of Narcissa. It actually took a lot out of me to write that one. Partly because, aside from just the difficult subject itself, there were specific things between my adoptive mom and my brother that I chose to leave out. It was just too disturbing to commit it to print.

You know, if it was about something that happened to me, it’s easier for me to write about it. But it’s not as if my brother gave me any sort of permission to write about him. I haven’t actually seen him in decades. I know he’s still alive but, understandably, he doesn’t want any connections to his adoptive family. I’m trying to select occurrences that best illustrate how I was learning to respond to my mother and not just specifically “what she did.”

In my opinion, she was inexcusably cruel to my brother when he was a defenseless little boy and it tore my fucking heart out to watch all that shit happen to him. (And to be honest, there’s a whole chunk of stuff I don’t actually know about because I didn’t see it; I only heard it and all I heard was heart-wrenching screaming. And what the heck do you do when the only person on Earth who can make everything all right — Mommy — is the one causing the Hell? How do you process it?) Shit.

And then there was a time when I was in my 30s, when my adoptive mother was in a really lucid and loving phase (she was on meds at that point), and she sat me down one afternoon, when I was visiting from NYC, and in a bewildered, heartfelt way, she  wanted to know why my brother hadn’t spoken to her in (at that point) something like 15 years. She said, “What did I ever do to him that was so bad?” She had no true conscious awareness of herself or anything she’d done.  I didn’t have the heart to shatter her, and it wouldn’t have helped, anyway. My brother wasn’t coming back and I knew it. All I could say to her was, “Mom, I just don’t know.”

Still, none of it means that it’s okay for me to write about my brother’s private life. It’s not as if I can undo it by telling a bunch of total strangers about what happened, anyway.

So, yesterday afternoon,  once I’d signed off on the new segment and sent it off to the editor at Edge of Humanity Magazine, I tried to focus on the play, but I just couldn’t.  I went outside and trimmed the hydrangea, finally. That took nearly an hour! It really had gotten so big this summer. What a glorious thriving thing that hydrangea is. Even while I was trimming all the dead blossoms off of it, I could still feel so much life just pulsing from that thing. (I call it a thing, because it’s hardly a bush, but it’s not a tree. Not sure what to call it, but it’s massive now and just full of palpable life.)

It was such a beautiful fall evening. Just perfect. I came back inside and, as I am wont to do pretty much 24/7, I sat back down at my desk. But I had not a thing to do at my desk so I got on pornhub!! Yay. I never have time to get on pornhub!! So! And then 3 hours later…

Jesus. You know? Where does the time go?

Oddly enough, me and porn don’t have the best relationship. Only because I find so much of it really predictable, unimaginative, overflowing with narcissism and tedium — and those are only the videos that last about maybe 6 minutes. To me, they feel unendurably endless after about 63 seconds. I love porn, and you’d think that in this modern world that is so saturated with porn now, that I would just be this happy camper in pornland. But, sadly, such is not the case. And that’s because, in my opinion, there is just such a plethora of bad porn out there.

Yet, once in a blue moon… even picky girls like moi hit pay dirt. It’s all about the key words, you know. I’m an extreme fetishist, to boot. Not necessarily in my private life anymore, but it’s still where my mind goes. I’m not sure why. It has a lot to do with human behavior and human thought processes — I find extreme fetishes so fucking interesting. Especially the people who dedicate their whole adult lives to one specific extreme fetish and turn an entire room in their homes over to doing this one specific thing. And it almost always involves owning expensive stuff that you can only find on Stockroom, or you have to make it yourself.

I just find that fascinating. But it doesn’t mean that just any extreme fetish will appeal to me. I have to hunt pretty diligently to find something that goes into that mind-bending realm that is not, you know, sort of just horrifically awful.

And then I have to find that perfect balance of energy between the male and the female. The guy has to be the perfect Dominant — balanced, not over the top and not cruel. And the female has to actually seem really super in to whatever’s going on and not just being tortured or something. And I also discovered that I like it a lot when I don’t understand the language they’re speaking. I like it when I have no clue what they’re saying. (Oh, and it has to be “amateur” — not amateur quality, but just not a professional porn company.)

And I usually don’t get into the same extreme fetish twice.  It has to be something new and, preferably, something I’ve never heard of before. (And at my age, with about 35 years of extreme fetishist friends and colleagues and co-workers behind me, it’s not 100% easy to find something I’ve never heard of before.)

Well, so you can see that me and porn are usually better left un-coupled. But once in a blue moon — say, last night, for instance– holy moly! And it really comes down to key words. Find a topic that might hold a certain appeal; click on it, then scroll down and look at the key words other people entered. Then click on one, then scroll down again and look at more refining key words that other people entered, and then look for the one that has the keyword “extreme” in front of it; click on it and then either shriek in horror at what pops up in front of you, or go, Whoa….. and be a happy camper in pornland for 3 hours.

I’m not going to tell you what I got into. Just that it involved somewhat expensive stainless steel instruments that you can buy on Stockroom. And it was something that I never, in a million years, would have guessed would not make me want to squirm or even to perhaps puke.

It all comes down to the people, you know? When people are really in to something, just totally getting off on it — that alone can get very compelling.

There were men I knew, who were my colleagues — really wonderful, intelligent men, back in NYC in the ’90s and early 2000s — who were Doms, into very intense extreme fetishes, and the young submissive girls would literally line up for the chance of getting a playdate with them on a Saturday night. You know: Please, please torture me for a few hours because I know you’re so fucking good at it. It really does come down to the specific person, to the personality, the specific human mind involved.

And now that I no longer live in NYC, then they have to also want to make high quality digital videos of what they’re doing and upload them to pornhub…

Okay. New topic. It’s going to sound related to the above topic, but it’s not. It has to do with the spirits that I am certain are in this house. And I don’t mean the house is haunted. I think it’s some sort of portal for amazing spirits. This whole town is. I don’t know how to explain it. But they don’t frighten me at all.

On Tuesday, I took off a pair of stockings. The kind that need garters to keep them up. Just a pair of regular Hanes stockings. Not expensive at all. I was feeling lazy and decided that rather than hand-washing them, like you’re supposed to do, I would put them through the gentle cycle in the washing machine and then just hang them up to dry. I had three other things I also wanted to wash at the same time. So I bundled it all in a towel and took it straight down to the washing machine. Then, 20 minutes later, the wash cycle was done and when I went to get everything out of there, one of my stockings was gone.

100% completely, thoroughly gone. I looked everywhere for it. Even thinking it could have somehow fallen out of the bundled towel and a cat had absconded with it, but it was absolutely nowhere. Just gone. I found this really endearing, you know? Like, Okay, dude, whoever you are — you can have it. It’s not like it was Wolford or something stupidly expensive. It was just regular old Hanes.

Too awesome, right? It will be so cool if; a.) it never shows up again, ever; or b.) it shows up someplace where it could not have ever gotten to all on its own.

All righty! I’m gonna scoot and get more coffee and get the day going. Lots of work to do on the play, still.

Have a terrific Thursday, wherever you are in the world! I believe Nick Cave goes back to Canada tonight. The Conversations are indeed winding down. Where the heck does the time go? I simply cannot believe it. That frightens me more than some unseen spirit making off with one of my stockings, that’s for sure.

Thanks for visiting.  I leave you with what was essentially the soundtrack for extreme fetish playdates everywhere in the early 90s!! Enjoy! love you guys. See ya!

Life On Earth, As We Once Knew It

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Okay, gang. Just a quick hello today.

If you’re keeping up with my memoir-in-progress about my childhood — In the Shadow of Narcissa has updated. You can read it here, or at the permanent link at the bottom of the side bar.

In the memoir, we’re in the second house in Cleveland, where my mom started to do her weird punishment stuff. But she was also still able to be this really beautiful mom most of the time. She didn’t start to get seriously awful until the third house.

The second house was actually an interesting time in my personal life, although that stuff isn’t in the memoir — or at least, not yet. Not in the online version, anyway. Maybe when I’m actually writing it as a complete book, more of my internal stuff will come into it.  I’m not really sure.

Even though, within about 10 years of the time period I’m currently writing about, my adoptive dad would do a complete about-face and become this truly nasty individual who only cared about money, in these early years, he was incredibly kind to me. Just so nice. And he was the sole thing keeping our little house sane. In those years, my adoptive mom really tried very hard to please him. And I think that’s what kept her struggling so hard to keep her mind on an even keel back then.

All righty. So.

It got pretty chilly around here — true October weather now. I’ve turned on the furnace and put the flannel sheets on the bed. Next, I’m gonna have to break down and trim back my hydrangea. Even though it’s been officially dead for a number of weeks, I haven’t had the heart to officially tell it goodbye. It looked so amazingly pretty this summer. And probably by the weekend, I’ll have to bring the potted plants indoors, too — which is never fun, because then I have to do constant battle with the cats to keep them from eating the plants. Especially the palm tree, which I raised from a wee bonny twig (it’s now about 4 feet tall).

As soon as that tree comes indoors, I think the cats literally wait for me to be asleep, and then they go after that poor palm tree, which always looks so glorious when it comes inside from having been on the porch all summer. And then, in the space of one single night, the cats do their best to get at as many of the palm fronds as possible, chew them, and then throw them back up all over the carpeting.

It’s the one time of year when I really just scream my head off at those darn cats. The things they put that poor tree through every fall, even when I try to barricade the tree beyond belief. They still manage to get at it and usually turn the whole tree over in the process. Soil everywhere. The tree flopped on its side, most of its leaves, gone.

It is so darn frustrating. The joys of living with feral cats.

All right, I gotta scoot here. Sorry this is so brief. I’m gonna tackle the rewrites on the play now. Hope your Wednesday’s been good! Thanks for visiting, gang. I love you guys. See ya.

Excerpt 4: Girl in the Night: Erotic Love Letters to the Muse

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Excerpt 4 is sort of like an intermission, in the style of a Litany. It is still in progress, so excuse typos if there are any!!

Excerpt 4:  Girl in the Night: Erotic Love Letters to the Muse. Contains sexually graphic material which will be inappropriate for some readers.  Please be forewarned. (Approx. 2 pages.)

Litany (One): The Girl Goes Down
For His Mercy Endures Forever

O give thanks    in those days, the land he came from was called Yugoslavia and he worked for the Soviets. In secret. In New York. Gathering, gathering. Information, all the time. From everywhere. From everyone. In my room at night, on my bed, he was the first man I knew who liked to be on top during 69. It was what I liked best about him. Flat on my back, my throat open – his cock went right down. And he never lost track of my clit. Even when he was coming. He made it easy for me to swallow it. I could come like crazy then. His cock down my throat. His mouth on my clit. I was 25, 26 – something like that. It was heaven, to come like that – with my legs wrapped tight around his back.

For his mercy endures forever.

O give thanks    two of them, now. Was I 46? We were all in our 40s. Single. We did it a lot. We liked one another. Well enough. In my house, my room. My bed. Flat on my back. My knees to my tits. The one between my legs is bitching about the condom. It doesn’t fit right. It’s annoying – to me, I mean. He won’t quit fussing with it and I’m so ready to fuck. The other one is backed up onto my face and I’m giving him a rim job. He loves rim jobs and so I love giving them to him. He’s holding my thighs apart to help the other one put his cock in my ass. I could be happy, if the other would quit bitching about the condom. The one with his ass in my face says, “just put it in.” “I can’t, this thing isn’t on right.” “Just put it in her ass. She wants it in her ass, come on.” “Just shut up.” “No, you shut up.” They’re arguing again. The mood is blown. “Will you both shut up? You’re arguing like little kids.” They were always arguing like children, like brothers.

For his mercy endures forever.

O give thanks     David Bowie’s Pinups is on the record player. I’m 13. The boy with me is the love of my life. A child, really. Like me. It’s a new skill I’ve learned – just two days prior. And I can’t wait to show him. It’s his first blowjob. We’re both very excited. We’re trying it. It’s working. But then, suddenly, he comes in my mouth. I wasn’t expecting that. He wasn’t expecting that. I’m stuck there – I don’t know what to do. Nobody had warned me about this part. I didn’t want to be rude. So I swallowed it. He looked at me. And I said, “Um. Excuse me.” And I left the room abruptly. Went into the bathroom and shut the door. Stood there. Looked down at the sink. Wondered if there was something I was supposed to do. But it didn’t come back up or anything.

For his mercy endures forever.

O give thanks     I’m 14. The man is fresh from prison. I like him. I’m giving him a blowjob on a Friday night. It’s summertime. He runs his fingers through my hair while his dick is in my mouth. He’s so gentle. He says, “Where on earth did you learn how to do this? You’re good at it, you know?” My heart was in it – kind of. For the moment.

For his mercy endures forever.

O give thanks      I’m 27. He’s 35. Working on a Dissertation at Columbia University. He’s a Physicist, from Cameroon.  He’s nice. Very gentle. We’ve had two dates. He wants to make love. I go to his room and we kiss. He has the biggest cock I’ve ever seen. I’m scared of it. I want to leave. “Don’t go,” he whispers. “Don’t leave. You’re so beautiful. Don’t go.” I stay. I undress again. I cannot even get my mouth around it. Eventually, we just lie down to go to sleep. He has a very narrow bed. We cuddle. He says, “It’s all right. You’ll get used to it. All the girls are like this, at first.” (He was right. I did get used to it. I loved his cock. I would somehow get it into my mouth; at least suck on the head of it. And he would lie back and whisper: Oh baby.)

For his mercy endures forever.

O give thanks      I’m 24. He’s 21. He’s my boyfriend. But we fight about everything – except sex. He has the perfect cock. He really does. And he worships my pussy, which is just so nice. I’m straddling him, for 69. I’m sucking his perfect cock, which I love to do. I never get tired of having his dick in my mouth. But right now, my soaking pussy is planted on his face and he’s got a firm grip on my hips – keeping me planted there on his mouth. His tongue is going for my clit and I can’t move. His grip on my hips is tight. I’m trying to be fair; trying to keep sucking his cock. I don’t want to be a glutton for all the delirium. But he’s holding my clit captive – it’s at the mercy of his tongue. His tongue is right up in the stiff little hood, wiggling it like crazy. He won’t stop, won’t let me go. I’m stuck there; my whole world becomes my clit and his tongue. I am finally forced to give up on his cock. I’m gasping out all sorts of inanities: oh god oh god fuck jesus god oh shit. And I come right in his face.

For his mercy endures forever.

O give thanks     I’m 20. He’s 40. Italian. He makes love to me. Like a grown man, who’s been around and knows what he doesn’t want. His wife is dead. She jumped from their window, timing it so that he would be coming around the corner shortly after she hit the pavement. His heart shattered when he saw her body on the sidewalk on E. 66th Street. It took him four years to kiss a woman again. That woman was me. He kissed my whole body, made love to it in every position. It was easy to suck his cock, to really suck it; his body was full of passion for me. I wanted him to come in my mouth but he wouldn’t. He wanted to lie down on me and come up inside me, instead. Fucking him was heaven. We made a baby.

For his mercy endures forever. He alone does great wonders.  He led his people through the wilderness. He parted the Red Sea.  O give thanks   Time is a mystery. Your cock in my mouth – it could define the future. He laid out the Earth above the waters. He made great lights. The sun to rule by day; the moon and stars to rule by night. Your cock could define the future – it could. Stars, sun, moon – all of it. For his mercy endures forever.    O give thanks.

© – 2019 Marilyn Jaye Lewis
Girl in the Night: Erotic Love Letters to the Muse

Hmmm. What Fucking Planet is She On…

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Yeah, well, I guess it would have been nice to have been alerted that a little PR blast about “me, the playwright” was going out yesterday. I probably wouldn’t have chosen yesterday to blog about being suicidal and going off to a convent…

Crap. You know?

This is why blogging is always so dicey for me. I actually blog about not only my real life, but also the constant insanity that is really in my head. And as pretty as I am on the outside, well you know, the Portrait of Dorian Gray is often in full bloom on the inside.

So there we have it. My experience of yesterday. All kinds of new traffic coming in through my (outdated, inaccurate) Wikipedia page because of a new crop of strangers googling me; and then finding out about all the joys of being moi.

Okay. We’re just going to move on. But I’m also going to bring this up again, as I so often do around here: When you’re a woman and you’re a writer, nothing will likely speak more to the heart of you than Virginia Woolfe’s A Room of One’s Own. If for some inexcusable reason, you don’t know the book; her overall premise:

“In referencing the tale of a woman who rejected motherhood and lived outside marriage, a woman about to be hanged, the narrator identifies women writers such as herself as outsiders who exist in a potentially dangerous space.”

And once having read it, nothing will feel so horrific as knowing that, even while Virginia Woolfe understood all of it,  she ultimately walked off to the river with rocks in her pocket. She should not have ended that way. I am not going to end that way, I just refuse; even if sometimes the only thing that will help me is taking cover amid a bunch of Carmelite nuns — women who also reject motherhood and live outside marriage but inside the auspices of the Patriarchy. (Wouldn’t that be cool? To just go off and let some guy take care of you? Jesus Christ, right? And no pun intended there… But the minute you let some guy take care of you, he gets to tell you what to do. And loyal readers of this lofty blog no doubt recall that I will always, without fail, say “NO!” even before I hear what the guy is even trying to say!!! AAAAAaaaarrrrgh!!!!)

But, Jesus. Come on. Even in a First World country, in the 21st Century, it is fucking hard to be a woman, be a writer, and live on a single, wildly fluctuating income — and afford a room of your own that’s quiet so that you can focus and write.

The pressure in my life sometimes feels insurmountable. I am someone who pulls miracle after miracle after miracle out of her hat. But it gets not only exhausting but also daunting: looking into that hat and wondering if another miracle is gonna manage to come out of there one more time.

And in this instance, unfortunately, I am talking about a situation involving other, private people that I cannot blog about. But it’s making me feel undermined and sniped at. And it hurts.

So — on to more beautiful things.

Nick Cave sent out a Red Hand Files newsletter yesterday that was just beautiful.  You can read it here. You know, is it wrong & selfish  to say that it’s too bad men like him (meaning, “rock stars”) weren’t around when I was growing up in the 1970s, or do you just feel appreciative that he’s alive right now?

Oh, and also, during one of Nick Cave’s Conversations in Austin the other night, a woman was sitting next to him on his piano bench while he sang “Shivers.” I ask you, just what kind of hat do you have to have in order to pull that kind of miracle out of it???!!! I thought my Miracle Hat was pretty cool but au contraire! It pales in comparison.

(The people in Austin eventually put a whole bunch of cool stuff on Instagram.) (I believe he’s going to be in Portland tonight. We’ll see what kinds of magical hats the people possess in Portland…)

Well, this week, when I’m not gently tearing my hair out over rewrites of Tell My Bones, I intend to write another short segment of In the Shadow of Narcissa. It’s a difficult one because it goes deeper into the abuse my brother suffered at the hands of our adoptive mother when he was just a little boy.  And to write it from the perspective of a 4-year-old girl. And not through the lens of my own fear of our mother, but from that desperate feeling of wanting to help my brother but being given the constant mandate from her that I was not allowed to care about what happened to him.

Not being permitted to feel things was probably the hardest part of living with her.

The fucked-up-ness was simply manifold.

But I’m also going to take a look at the 4th segment of Girl in the Night: Erotic Love Letters to the Muse. It’s going to be that “Litany” segment. It should just be very interesting. I’m very eager to write that because I can’t imagine how it’s going to hit the page.

Meanwhile, I’m going to get laundry started here. And at some point, I have to go back into town and buy groceries. I’m gonna wait until the fog lifts, though.  We’ve had an amazingly dense fog here since late last evening.

The fog as seen from my kitchen window just now. The same Carl Sandburg fog that “crept in on little cat feet.” Oh no!! Not more cats!!

Okay, gang. I’m gonna scoot.

Have a terrific Tuesday wherever you are in the world. Thanks for visiting. I leave you with two options, both equally from my own perception of life. The first is one I really enjoy believing in. I really, honestly do. Someday, I’ll meet my soulmate and we’ll go off to the Chapel of Love.

The second is more like how I experience love, for real. You know, intensely deeply, but no chapel anywhere on the horizon. (This song was actually playing on the record player when I lost — or got rid of — my virginity. Go figure. The gods are funny, for sure.)

All righty. I love you guys. See ya.

“Piece of My Heart”
Oh, come on, come on, come on, come on!
Didn’t I make you feel like you were the only man -yeah!
Didn’t I give you nearly everything that a woman possibly can?
Honey, you know I did!
And each time I tell myself that I, well I think I’ve had enough,
But I’m gonna show you, baby, that a woman can be tough.
I want you to come on, come on, come on, come on and take it,
Take it!
Take another little piece of my heart now, baby!
Oh, oh, break it!
Break another little bit of my heart now, darling, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Oh, oh, have a!
Have another little piece of my heart now, baby,
You know you got it if it makes you feel good,
Oh, yes indeed.
You’re out on the streets looking good,
And baby deep down in your heart I guess you know that it ain’t right,
Never, never, never, never, never, never hear me when I cry at night,
Babe, I cry all the time!
And each time I tell myself that I, well I can’t stand the pain,
But when you hold me in your arms, I’ll sing it once again.
I’ll say come on, come on, come on, come on and take it!
Take it!
Take another little piece of my heart now, baby.
Oh, oh, break it!
Break another little bit of my heart now, darling, yeah,
Oh, oh, have a!
Have another little piece of my heart now, baby,
You know you got it, child, if it makes you feel good.
I need you to come on, come on, come on, come on and take it,
Take it!
Take another little piece of my heart now, baby!
oh, oh, break it!
Break another little bit of my heart, now darling, yeah, c’mon now.
oh, oh, have a
Have another little piece of my heart now, baby.
You know you got it -whoahhhhh!!
Take it!
Take it! Take another little piece of my heart now, baby,
Oh, oh, break it!
Break another little bit of my heart, now darling, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah,
Oh, oh, have a
Have another little piece of my heart now, baby, hey,
You know you got it, child, if it makes you feel good.
c –  1967 JERRY RAGOVOY / BERT BERNS

Onward & Onward, Full of Grace

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First, the scale: Back down to my goal weight. I lost those pesky 7 pounds during the night.

Actually, it’s really sort of fun — having this new insane scale to step on first thing in the morning: what is it going to tell me? I don’t interfere with its read-out in any way; I can’t, actually. It’s a really cheap scale. It does what it does and that’s it, and all I can do is either step on it or not. So that element of complete  surprise is just an interesting new way to start my morning.

Plus, it’s super uplifting to lose 7 pounds during the night!! (And on those nights when I’ve gained 5 or 8 pounds, well. You know, it’s just a cheap scale and it doesn’t work! So disregard it!) (It only works when I reach my goal weight, which, thank goodness, is quite frequently. I’ve already reached it several times in the past couple of days.)

Okay. I am doing reasonably okay today.  I’ve been having mental issues again over the last several days.  I’m thinking it’s just stress. But it’s maybe other stuff, too. I’m not sure. Who the fuck knows. It got so bad yesterday that I was seriously thinking it was time to go back to the convent. (Loyal readers of this lofty blog probably recall that St. Therese’s convent is where I go when I get extremely suicidal. But since I’ve moved, it’s now 50 miles from here. But when you get there, you turn in your phone and then there’s a vow of silence. And they feed you if you want to eat, which I usually don’t.  They give you a little cell, and you can be alone with St. John of the Cross and Kempis’ The Imitation of Christ. But usually, I most prefer the  Beatitudes because sometimes I think that that’s all there is to it, really. Then there is that tiny but amazing old stone chapel, where it’s just you on your knees with Jesus for however long it takes. Get your shit back together; get back in your car and drive home.)

But 50 miles is 50 miles now. And I have these cats. And I have this house. And responsibilities. I wait until it’s really, really dire, you know, before I go there. But then there’s that grey area — if I wait too long, I can become immobilized. And then it’s just dicey, all the way around. I just hate that grey area. You have no idea.

But even when I get immobilized — when my brain sort of  puts me on lock-down and I can’t easily do things that will save me, I can still text. So texting is a true blessing. It really, really is. Even when I can no longer communicate verbally, I can always, always write. Usually all I need is just help getting out of the house — getting into the air, under the sky, remembering that there’s an actual world outside of my brain.

Anyway. Yesterday was heading in a bad place all day, and so I was thinking about the convent. But I decided to just sleep in the guest room last night and see if that would break the chain of negative crap. I don’t think of my own bedroom as negative at all. I love my room, and the energy in it. But I remembered how incredible it felt, the night before I left for NY, sleeping in my guest room for the first time and what a great room it turned out to be.

It was okay last night, but I think that other time, having my birth mom sleeping in the next room probably had a lot to do with the peace I was feeling. I was thinking I should call my mom and tell her she has to come back. But I don’t like to hold people for ransom  emotionally. Because of course she would come, but she does have her own life to live. I always somehow manage to get myself back on track.

It’s so weird how you can just turn a corner and wake up and be okay. I really do think it’s stress. Primarily, both Sandra and Peitor needing my attention to various projects, when right now, I need to give 110% to the Tell My Bones rewrites. Well, anyway. The noise just starts in my head.

I know what it is I need to turn off the noise and I also know I’m not going to get it anytime soon, if ever. So maybe adopting a little puppy would be the next best thing — unconditional love & devotion! But I can’t take on a puppy, or even a full grown dog. Aside from a house full of untamed cats that would freak the fuck out, I don’t have the time for the added responsibility.

So I’m just trying to focus on the writing and have that particular type of joy be all I need for the time being.

When I was meditating this morning, I got myself into a place of pure potentiality. That true realization that there is no such thing as the future and there is no past. The past is a memory — and if your memory is gone, your past is gone. And if your memory shifts, then your past completely changes. So what is the past, really? And the future is only an idea. It can be absolutely anything or nothing at all. The only thing that’s filled with wide-open potential is the infinite expanse of right now.

It was a beautiful feeling. The beauty and the openness of right now is where all that feeling of fulfillment is for me — you can do anything, experience the joy or the thrill or the satisfaction of anything right now, because all of reality is experienced in your mind anyway.

I’m not saying that reality doesn’t eventually play out in some way; I know it does. But for me, the true fulfillment comes from the creation of the idea. The “playing out” of the idea is where the baggage is. Not that baggage is essentially unmanageable. I’m just saying that, for me, the moment the idea is created — that’s where I find the most emotional fulfillment. I can do anything I want to in my mind, especially experience pure beauty and pure love.

Which, of course, reminds me of Ghosteen again. I was listening to it in the guest room last night, in the dark. God, it is such a gorgeous album (even though it is so fucking sad). Every time I think I’ve chosen a favorite “song” (I hesitate to call them “songs” because they simply don’t feel like “songs’), I realize that I can’t actually say that I love one over or more than another. They are each just so haunting and beautiful.

I really love “Spinning Song” and “Night Raid.” But then the other songs come on and I love those, too. So who knows. All I know for sure is that the whole album is sort of uncategorical.  It defies my mind’s ability to define it.  Meaning, I can’t simply say, “Oh, that’s a great record.” Or section it out into a group of songs, or something.

I did notice that there’s a bunch of cute little Ghosteen things that we can purchase now! I say “cute” because most of them have got the little lamb picture on it — but of course, little lambs (in cemeteries) are symbolic of dead children so my brain hesitates to identify with the little lamb as “cute,” even though it is. It’s incredibly cute. But, you know, it’s also unbearably sad. So I’m not sure what to do about that.  I really want one of those tote bags — but do I tote it around until the little lamb becomes common place or meaningless? I’m not sure I can do that.

Anyway. You can see that it’s best for me to pursue wide open expanses of blankness where I’m not encouraged to think about anything.

And on that note!! I will remind you to please go on Instagram and follow @tellmybones. And to go on Facebook and follow: https://www.facebook.com/tellmybones

The web site will be launching soon. Mostly, they have to figure out my bio, which is stupidly extensive and goes off in many directions. And I think once that’s solved, the site will launch. I noticed they picked that author’s photo of me from my novel Freak Parade — where I’m wearing my Mark Jacobs aviator shades that I just love! And I’m sitting on the stoop, looking totally dyke-y. Yay. Nothing like just going out into the world.  (You’d never know that I am a girl who loves elegance. I honestly do. I used to own the most gorgeous dresses. Anyway.)

So, thanks for visiting. I apologize for being all over the map today, but it’s better than not existing. So I guess I don’t really apologize for it. I would leave you with something from Ghosteen today, but I think you’re supposed to go purchase it. So, in the meantime, I leave you with this thought-worthy piece of questions. Have a good day out there, okay? I love you guys. See ya!

“LOSING MY RELIGION”

Oh, life is bigger
It’s bigger
Than you and you are not me
The lengths that I will go to
The distance in your eyes
Oh no, I’ve said too much
I set it up

That’s me in the corner
That’s me in the spotlight
Losing my religion
Trying to keep up with you
And I don’t know if I can do it
Oh no, I’ve said too much
I haven’t said enough

I thought that I heard you laughing
I thought that I heard you sing
I think I thought I saw you try

Every whisper
Of every waking hour
I’m choosing my confessions
Trying to keep an eye on you
Like a hurt lost and blinded fool, fool
Oh no, I’ve said too much
I set it up

Consider this
Consider this
The hint of the century
Consider this
The slip that brought me
To my knees failed
What if all these fantasies
Come flailing around
Now I’ve said too much

I thought that I heard you laughing
I thought that I heard you sing
I think I thought I saw you try

But that was just a dream
That was just a dream

That’s me in the corner
That’s me in the spotlight
Losing my religion
Trying to keep up with you
And I don’t know if I can do it
Oh no, I’ve said too much
I haven’t said enough

I thought that I heard you laughing
I thought that I heard you sing
I think I thought I saw you try

But that was just a dream
Try, cry
Why try?
That was just a dream, just a dream, just a dream
Dream

c – 1991 : Bill Berry / Michael Stipe / Mike Mills / Peter Buck

Adventures in Wild Weight Fluctuations!!

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I’m still keeping this new bathroom scale. If only because I want to try to hack the code.

Apparently, I gained 5 pounds during the night. (After losing 9 pounds the previous day.)

At the very least, the scale reconnects me with everything I ate the day before. You know, it sort of acts as a grounding rod for my wildly dispersed reality. From moment to moment, I can no longer tell you what’s happening to my life. I am just so caught up in my head these days. Absolutely everything flies past me. So this new bathroom scale — its seeming slight relation to reality — sort of helps anchor me. I step on the scale. I look at that wildly unexpected number. And it makes me stop and think and remember yesterday: What was yesterday?  What did I do? What did I think? What did I eat?

So the new bathroom scale is sort of an adventure in consciousness.

An alert just came through on my laptop that the drummer Ginger Baker died. This also serves as an anchor in reality: a.) I did not know he was even still alive; b.) I can’t believe he was 80; and c.) another part of my girlhood — gone.

When these things happen, I immediately feel that I either have to die right away. Like, I don’t know, tomorrow maybe. Or just live for some stupidly long time so that the main point to my whole existence becomes: Everything and everyone I ever knew is gone. This “in between” business — where you watch everything you ever knew disappear in bits and pieces; that part gets hard to process. So I’d rather just deal with one extreme or the other. Die now, or live so very long that nothing has relevance anymore and everyone assumes I simply am just never going to die.

On a sort of similar note… I’ve been thinking the last couple days that I’d really like to take a drive to the old Civil War battle ground in Cynthiana, Kentucky, and visit my great-great-grandfather’s grave. He’s buried there in a Confederacy War Memorial. For some bizarre reason, google maps assures me this is only 3 and a 1/2 hours from Crazeysburg. I’m not sure how that could possibly be. It feels like it should be much farther away. So I think I’m going to set aside a couple days here in the fall and do that. Find some sort of a strange motel there and stay over for one night. Maybe even drink bourbon for the first time in a couple of years. (I can’t imagine being in Kentucky again and not drinking bourbon.)

I’ve listened to Ghosteen a few more times.  And that anchors me, too, actually. It has such a presence to it that I just hone right in and everything else in my mind and in my world simply stops.  I’m just listening. Picturing all this stuff that I don’t understand at all — meaning, the images just come because the lyrics are so precise and so intense, yet I have no idea what any of that whole first part of the record means. (I don’t necessarily know what the second part means, but I feel like I intuitively grasp it. The first part — any hope of concrete meaning flies away from me in all directions but it sustains such an intense beauty, regardless.)

It is enigmatic, to be sure. I feel like there is absolutely no way in. By that, I think I mean that this is sort of an operatic painting about his life, his family, his marriage — and how can you ever truly understand how the inside of someone else’s perspective of life really feels? Well, anyway, I can’t. So I can’t find my way into it. Which doesn’t mean it’s not beautiful or that I don’t love it, or that it doesn’t cause me to feel a lot of things.

Nick Cave has said things before about how songs speak to you, personally; you know, you feel like a song was written just for you and it becomes yours, in a way. Actually, there is no Nick Cave song, ever, that I felt spoke to me, personally. I do feel that way about pretty much every single song Tom Petty ever wrote — starting with “American Girl.” I heard that song in my teens and immediately wondered, “How come that guy knows how it feels to be me?” But with Nick Cave — he’s on this whole other planet from me. It’s one that I absolutely love, with all my being and all my soul, but it could not be more different from my planet if it tried. Yet I still love, basically, everything he ever wrote. Or likely will write.  Still, this new record goes even beyond that. Really, like discovering a whole new planet. Complete with a language that sounds remarkably similar to the one I know, and yet, eludes me. I think it’s just something I have to feel in my heart. And maybe meaning will come later. Or the “meaning” is simply that I feel it all very intensely. That is the meaning to it.

Okay. And on that note, the Conversations continue tonight in Austin. Maybe one lone photo appeared on Instagram from last night so, clearly this “put your phones away” idea is working. Eventually, I will no longer have any reason whatsoever to be on Instagram! But that’s okay.

All righty!! I’m gonna scoot and get Sunday underway here. Have a great day, wherever you are in the world. Thanks for visiting, gang. I love you guys. See ya.

“American Girl”

Well, she was an American girl
Raised on promises
She couldn’t help thinkin’
That there was a little more to life somewhere else
After all it was a great big world
With lots of places to run to
And if she had to die tryin’
She had one little promise she was gonna keep.

Oh yeah, all right
Take it easy, baby
Make it last all night
She was an American girl

Well it was kind of cold that night,
She stood alone on her balcony
Yeah, she could hear the cars roll by,
Out on 441 like waves crashin’ on the beach
And for one desperate moment there
He crept back in her memory
God it’s so painful when something that’s so close
Is still so far out of reach

Oh yeah, all right
Take it easy, baby
Make it last all night
She was an American girl

c- 1976 Tom Petty

Just the Most Perfect Day!

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Now that I’m willing to allow myself to believe it’s really fall, it is just the most perfect day.

The sun is shining but there is a chill in the air, and the house is sort of freezing. Yay! I’m still wearing my favorite summer (cotton) jammies at night, and still have the summer (cotton) sheets on the bed because it is still getting into the 70s Fahrenheit during the daytime, but last night, I brought out the winter blanket and threw it on top of the summer stuff.

Me in my favorite summer PJs, but, oddly, I’m wearing them last December in Peitor’s bathroom in West Hollywood…

Last night, I slept the best sleep I’ve slept in a while. Only one window in my bedroom slightly open. Everything else in the house closed up. So, now, there are no sounds. no crickets, no cicadas, no birds. Just intense quiet.

I miss summer and the racket of all the earth, but the quiet is kind of nice.

I won’t turn the furnace on until it gets a lot colder. But I am looking forward to switching to the downstairs bathroom! I use that shower all during the winter months because the upstairs bathroom is really, really old. It was added onto the house back when it very first got indoor plumbing, back in the 1920s or 1930s, and there is no heating vent in there. The downstairs bathroom is much more modern and actually has heat…

Anyway. I like seasonal traditions, in general. And so now, here in the Hinterlands, in my 118-year-old house, that has become my autumnal tradition: switching bathrooms.

Pretty exciting!!

I had a really, really cool dream last night! One of those sex & love dreams! I was in love with some guy and we had sex, but I cannot for the life of me, remember who he was or what he even looked like. I can only remember the presence of him. A warmth. Like, a body warmth. There was also a woman in the dream who came on to me. For some unfortunate reason, I totally remember who she was. Not that she was unpleasant, but in the dream, I wasn’t in love with her, I was in love with the guy. But more importantly the guy was actually in love with me!

This is sort of unheard of in real life, so that’s why it’s doubly disappointing that I can’t really remember the dream…

But I do remember, vividly, that he made me really happy. So I guess recalling the feeling is good enough.

Here’s something extremely interesting!! The other day, I discovered (you are going to think I am so weird, but this only proves to you how extremely focused I am on work, and on writing, and on living at my desk), anyway, I discovered that all of my underarm hair has turned completely silver.

I was astonished by this.  Not just because it’s gone silver, but you’d think I would have noticed it before it had all entirely changed to a new color. I mean, I do shave my underarms. But I guess I just don’t ever really look at it. I mean, it’s not something I even think about. It’s automatic. I’ve been shaving my underarms for, like, 50 years. Well, maybe I didn’t start shaving at age 9. But  let’s just say something really close to 50 years.

Anyway. It was just weird. To say I am preoccupied with the world in my mind is now, I guess, officially an understatement.

Oh, and yesterday!! The best bathroom scale came into my world.

Back before I went to NY, my old bathroom scale finally broke. So I threw it out. At that point, I had put on 2 or 3 pounds, which I was making a mental note of getting rid of. But then I went to NYC and forgot about it. And then the other day, I noticed my pants felt a little tight, which usually means I’ve put on close to 5 pounds. So, posthaste, I bought another digital scale. Just to make sure that nothing got out of control.

The scale arrived and, lo & behold, it told me I had put on 8 pounds!! Whoa. I was not happy. I could not imagine what I might be eating that could make me gain 8 pounds. But I was at least glad I’d bought the scale when I did.

And then this morning, a mere 24 hours later, I got back on the scale and it told me I’d lost 9 pounds!!! Yay! Best scale ever. I reached my goal weight in 24 hours!!

Fuck, yes! I am keeping this scale!!

(I did actually get on it a couple more times, and it keeps hovering around that goal weight, so I’m guessing that the first time I used it, I probably had not actually gained 8 pounds…)

Still, what a great morning, right? A love & sex dream, followed by losing 9 pounds!! And beautiful weather, to boot.

Okay! Tonight & tomorrow night, Nick Cave is in Austin, TX doing his In Conversation on the Austin City Limits thing. (Does this mean that at some point we can watch it on TV?) (I don’t actually have TV so that doesn’t help. Of course, I’ve upgraded my iPhone, got a new laptop, got a new car, all within the last few months — I suppose I can just go out and get a new TV, too! Why the fuck not??) (Because I really, really need to fix my barn… I really do. I have the coolest 111- year-old barn. But it needs to be painted and it needs a new roof. And I never watch TV….)

Anyway. I guess we’ll see. (And I am really, really loving that Ghosteen. Gosh, it’s beautiful. I wish I understood it. I just don’t. But the songs are so beautiful.)

Okay. I’m gonna go drink a cup of tea. And think about life. And get back to work!! Thanks for visiting, gang. Enjoy what’s left of your Saturday, wherever you are in the world!! I leave you with a really rockin’ song from my sweet bonny girlhood. I was 6 when I got this album!! I absolutely adored it. (And I was born on a Friday, so you have to listen to the end to find out what Friday’s child is like!!) All righty. I love you guys. See ya!

Ghosteen Part Deux

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I got into my car late last evening, wanting to listen to  The Ronnettess’ Greatest Hits while I drove. And while  scrolling through the ‘G’s’ for “greatest hits,”  there sat Ghosteen! It was already out! I thought it was coming out next week!

So of course I played it again.

No oncoming trains.. No nothing. Just a beautiful night.

It really is such a beautiful album. I don’t understand that first part any better than I did the first time, and it still made me really sad. But it’s so beautiful.

Oh Man, I Knew It Was Gonna Hurt…

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I actually did get to listen to Ghosteen last night — the new album by Nick Cave & the Bad Seeds.  It was still available on YouTube once I got home and was safely in bed. In my room. The only place in the world that protects me from the world. Usually.

You perhaps recall that when he first announced the new album last week and described what it was going to be about, my initial, sort of primal reaction was, Oh no, now what. A sort of “please keep that away from me” kind of feeling.

I had barely survived the first time listening to Skeleton Tree. It took a long time for me to be able to listen to that album without feeling like the world was being pulled out from under me. And I was worried that Ghosteen was going to be worse. Meaning, just too emotionally intense for me.

And guess what, gang??!!

I was right.

It’s really just a beautiful, beautiful album.  Just stunning. On so many levels. But I’m wondering, would I rather be hit by a freight train, or listen to this album again?

I’m thinking freight train. But I’m not 100% sure. I mean, luckily, God saw to it that I have ready access to a freight train — it runs right past my door, sometimes several times a day. And night. I already pre-ordered both the MP3 and the CD of Ghosteen. So when one of those things arrives, I’ll wait to press the “start” button until I know for sure a train is coming, and then decide at the last minute…

Jesus Christ, right?

It is just too beautiful. And part of what tormented me most is that, a huge portion of it, I don’t understand. The whole first album, which is being told by “the children.” Or it simply is “the children.” And I don’t understand why it’s “the children.”  I couldn’t figure that part out.  Why is it “the children”? And I’m thinking it’s maybe because I never had any so I’m not able to access something important there. And that alone, that state of being childless, is just something that’s unbearable for me, on any given day, at any given time, in any given year.

So that got triggered, and from there, everything sort of spiraled down for me.  The only way I know how to handle that whole subject is to close the door and walk away. But, come on! It’s a Nick Cave album! He hasn’t had a new album out in a couple of years. I don’t want to just close the door and walk away.

The second half, the part about “the parents” was easier for me to at least maybe understand.  I could understand why “the parents” were saying that second part.

Well, anyway. I’m sure I will adjust over time. Find my way back from the train tracks and maybe not be any worse for wear. Or, maybe even create great art. That would be cool. (I’m being sarcastic there because, of course, I think that’s the sole reason I even exist — to create art.  And it gets tiring. Wouldn’t it be cool if God had created me for something/anything else?  You know, like: Let’s let her have this great LIFE so that she doesn’t have to create art in order to process the simple act of getting out of bed in the morning…)

So, anyway. In all honesty, it is a beautiful record. Majestic and exquisite. Just so beautiful. And whether or not I can process it, isn’t the actual point, is it? Great art is supposed to make you feel something, so in that respect, it was a truly GREAT work of art. (And I did, indeed, see that coming.)

Okay.

So Sandra texted me yesterday and guess what? She’s working on a new play. Writing a new play, I mean. I am her collaborator on theater projects so this means that I, too, am working on a new play.

We have two other plays on the back burner, that are just barely even developed. But it sounds like this new one has her complete attention. Even though she’ll be going to Stratford to play the role of Mama Morton in “Chicago” at the same time that we’ll be doing the full-length staged reading of Tell My Bones in NYC; and we have our other play to do in Toronto, although that one has come to a little bit of a standstill right now, awaiting words from lawyers and accountants. Apparently, we will be undertaking another new play.

You know, when she texted me that, I wanted to just lie down and refuse to get back up. I’m sort of wiped out. These new Tell My Bones rewrites are probably the most important work I’ve had to undertake in my entire career. I need to focus.

This is when it would be good to just say “fuck the world,” and just  drink & smoke.

But I don’t really do either anymore. So, onward.

The morning here — meaning 5:30 am — was quite, quite lovely. There was something sacred in the stillness. The heatwave broke. Fall is really here. Another opportunity to try to figure out what the heck any of this all means, and why love seems to still be at the root of all of it.

I woke up crying. Not sobbing, or anything, but tears were in my eyes from the moment I awoke and they stayed there all during breakfast.

But I stayed in bed for a little while, wondering about the “story” of a person’s life, juxtaposed against how that life might have felt to be lived. F. Scott Fitzgerald came to my mind. He is now considered one of the greatest literary writers of the 20th Century. If you know his life, his career, at all, you will know that his outrageously uncontrolled alcoholism defined him while he was alive. And his wife was nuts and every extravagant thing about her cost him a fortune. It wasn’t until he died that his writing, alone — his creations, his art — could stand on its own, without the pain of how his life felt to be lived. (I’m not even going to try to talk about Zelda and her tragic fate because now she’s too bogged down in revisionist, feminist theory kinds of stuff.)

But there was the “life” he was creating while he lived. Meaning his endless and amazing short stories (that he wrote to keep himself afloat financially) and then his beautiful novels — that not only document the times he was living in, but created them at the very same time: The Jazz Age.

And then there was his actual life. Complicated, frustrating, passionate, tragic, short. And absolutely saturated with booze.

I’ve been thinking about this stuff lately because I am so very, very tired of “my life” and how it lived. But because I know how to write, it “saves” everything, you know? I can create a reason for life to feel worthwhile. And most days, that’s enough for me. Other days, nothing’s enough.

Okay, I’m gonna scoot. Get more coffee. Look at the beautiful, sacred morning some more. Embrace autumn. Let love be enough. Thanks for visiting. I love you, guys. See ya.

“Bye Bye Blackbird”
c – 1926

Blackbird, blackbird singing the blues all day right outside my door
Blackbird, blackbird gotta be on your way
Where there’s sunshine galore
All through the winter you just hang around
Now you’re going back home
Blackbird, blackbird gotta be on your way
Where there’s sunshine galore

Pack up all my cares and woes,
Here I go, singing low,
Bye, bye, blackbird.
Where somebody waits for me,
Sugar’s sweet, so is he,
Bye, bye, blackbird.

No one here can love and understand me,
Oh, what hard luck stories they all hand me.

Make my bed and light the light,
I’ll arrive late tonight,
Blackbird, bye, bye.

Pack up all my cares and woes,
Here I go, singing low,
Bye, bye, blackbird.
Where somebody waits for me,
Sugar’s sweet, so is he,
Bye, bye, bye, bye, blackbird.

I said, no one here can love and understand me,
Oh, what hard luck stories they all hand me.

So, make my bed and light the light,
I’ll arrive late tonight,
Blackbird, bye, bye.
Make my bed and light the light,
I’ll arrive late tonight,
Blackbird,
I said blackbird,
I said blackbird,
Oh, blackbird, bye, bye.

c – 1926 Henderson -Dixon

A few little leaks

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That quiet and happy little boat I started out in yesterday sprung a couple leaks before the day was over.  The day was sort of a bust, all the way around.

My heart just hurts and life gets sad — what can you say?

Onward, though.

I really wish I could listen to Ghosteen tonight! But it seems like the only way I can do that would be to lock myself up in the bathroom with my phone for an hour or however long the album is, and I’m guessing that will not only be rude but would alarm everybody. So I guess I will have to wait until tomorrow.

Eventually I will hear it, though, and I know it will be great.

Have a happy Thursday, gang, wherever you are in the world. I love you guys. See ya.