I cannot get that novel I am thinking about writing out of head. It keeps wanting to get told and it keeps nagging me to write some of it down. I wrote the opening today, at least it feels like the opening to this novel. I will definitely put a scene in the novel involving listening to Mozart's Requiem for the Dead live in a church. This character has lots of catholic school girl religious guilt, lot of strange catholic school religious horror fantasies of the religious statues coming to life, listening to God's voice. Kind of like Emily Watson in that movie "Breaking the Waves". I think writing about a person's views about god and religion is so subversive, so perverse, so damaging, so un-PC and so much more interesting than any other controversial object out there.
Following in the Dark - opening paragraph.
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Pain is an odd thing. I like pain, physical pain. Emotional pain I can do without. Emotional pain tortures you 24/7. You can’t drink yourself out of it, you can’t watch TV yourself out of it, you can’t play music loud enough and long enough to drown it out. It’s an endless voice that drones on and on. That scene that keeps replaying over and over and over in your head. You know, like at Friday evening Easter mass when you do Stations of the Cross. But it’s like Stations of the Cross every day in my head. That’s emotional pain. But physical pain … ah the beauty and ecstasy of physical pain is it has a beginning and an end point. You know when it stops and you can pretty much tell when it ends. Finite pain. All those philosophers I read in school were wrong about infinity. Finite is definitely better at least for pain. And physical pain is really the only thing that stops emotional pain. It’s a displacement thing, one pain replacing another. But physical pain has its price like everything else in this world. Was it worth the price? After everything that happened, I don’t know. You be the judge.
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Wednesday, July 11, 2001
I must be in a publishing mood tonight. I found this ending to a story in my files. The beginning is finished, the middle needs to be written but I wrote the end because I know how this story is going to end. When I read this I cried and thought of my friend B from Dallas. Although this story is completely fictional, I imagine us having this kind of ending if we ever got into a relationship.
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I looked at him. I was confused, terribly confused. I knew he was right and that breaking up was the right thing to do but I was disappointed somehow. How can you spend your whole life wanting something and then when you finally get it, you give it up because it doesn’t make any sense to want it when you finally get it. I felt a lump in my throat that I knew was a silent scream that I felt too embarrassed to make. I was having a hard time thinking because when I get upset I can’t think straight and I desperately needed to think straight now. I kept searching my feelings like a desperate man in search of water. I felt all the frustration of the last two years creating anger in my heart and at the same time I felt teary eyed. This can’t be happening to me I thought, this can’t be happening. I looked over at him, sitting there calmly waiting for me to compose myself. He looked sad I thought, there was none of that exciting Texas spirit I always saw in his eyes, just the look of a man who has just made a gut wrenching decision and was now trying to live with the consequences.
I looked out the window staring at the flat dry landscape before me. Our whole relationship played through my head like a video on fast forward. I knew we had been happy for a time, very happy but I also knew that the happiness had been brief and short lived and the rest of the time we were together, we waged a constant but silent battle of wills. Was marriage worth this battle? His explanation kept playing in my head like a bad song that you can’t get out of your head and deep deep down in the recesses of my heart, I knew he was right and part of me kept trying to whisper that this was all for the best, but I couldn’t just accept it, not yet, not just yet.
I felt him pick up my left hand on the table and squeeze it. I wanted to wrench my hand away and slap him but I couldn’t. I knew he was trying to comfort me, to help me, and I felt a pang of guilt that my first instinct was to reject him. This is what I hate, I was losing a good friend, a best friend, who knew me sometimes better than I did. I knew we would always be friends, friends till the end of our lives, but I also knew that we would both avoid the intimacy that we had developed over these last two years so as not to open old wounds. Then I realized, it wasn’t so much breaking up that hurt, it was losing the attention of this wonderful man, this urban cowboy that I had grown to love very much, this connection to a part of my soul that this man had opened up.
I finally turned my head and looked down at his hand covering mine; even our hands together looked mismatched somehow although there were on top of each other. I let my eyes wonder up his sleeve, over his shoulder, over his face and finally straight into his eyes. Kind eyes, I thought to myself. There was always kindness in those eyes despite the pain and sadness I was seeing there now. I found myself drowning in those hazel green eyes of his and feeling like I had somehow secretly landed into his soul. There was comfort there as well sadness, a sense of failure, and pain, lots and lots of pain. My heart went out to him and I knew that I could now live with our breakup.
I turned my hand over and squeezed his hand back and smiled.
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Tear jerker of an ending, I know. I think alot of relationships end like this ... in silence ... with a single touch. Sometimes there are no words to express pain, sadness and longing. Sometimes there's just silence and the touching of skin and then silence again.
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I looked at him. I was confused, terribly confused. I knew he was right and that breaking up was the right thing to do but I was disappointed somehow. How can you spend your whole life wanting something and then when you finally get it, you give it up because it doesn’t make any sense to want it when you finally get it. I felt a lump in my throat that I knew was a silent scream that I felt too embarrassed to make. I was having a hard time thinking because when I get upset I can’t think straight and I desperately needed to think straight now. I kept searching my feelings like a desperate man in search of water. I felt all the frustration of the last two years creating anger in my heart and at the same time I felt teary eyed. This can’t be happening to me I thought, this can’t be happening. I looked over at him, sitting there calmly waiting for me to compose myself. He looked sad I thought, there was none of that exciting Texas spirit I always saw in his eyes, just the look of a man who has just made a gut wrenching decision and was now trying to live with the consequences.
I looked out the window staring at the flat dry landscape before me. Our whole relationship played through my head like a video on fast forward. I knew we had been happy for a time, very happy but I also knew that the happiness had been brief and short lived and the rest of the time we were together, we waged a constant but silent battle of wills. Was marriage worth this battle? His explanation kept playing in my head like a bad song that you can’t get out of your head and deep deep down in the recesses of my heart, I knew he was right and part of me kept trying to whisper that this was all for the best, but I couldn’t just accept it, not yet, not just yet.
I felt him pick up my left hand on the table and squeeze it. I wanted to wrench my hand away and slap him but I couldn’t. I knew he was trying to comfort me, to help me, and I felt a pang of guilt that my first instinct was to reject him. This is what I hate, I was losing a good friend, a best friend, who knew me sometimes better than I did. I knew we would always be friends, friends till the end of our lives, but I also knew that we would both avoid the intimacy that we had developed over these last two years so as not to open old wounds. Then I realized, it wasn’t so much breaking up that hurt, it was losing the attention of this wonderful man, this urban cowboy that I had grown to love very much, this connection to a part of my soul that this man had opened up.
I finally turned my head and looked down at his hand covering mine; even our hands together looked mismatched somehow although there were on top of each other. I let my eyes wonder up his sleeve, over his shoulder, over his face and finally straight into his eyes. Kind eyes, I thought to myself. There was always kindness in those eyes despite the pain and sadness I was seeing there now. I found myself drowning in those hazel green eyes of his and feeling like I had somehow secretly landed into his soul. There was comfort there as well sadness, a sense of failure, and pain, lots and lots of pain. My heart went out to him and I knew that I could now live with our breakup.
I turned my hand over and squeezed his hand back and smiled.
*********************
Tear jerker of an ending, I know. I think alot of relationships end like this ... in silence ... with a single touch. Sometimes there are no words to express pain, sadness and longing. Sometimes there's just silence and the touching of skin and then silence again.
Tuesday, July 10, 2001
I keep thinking about this novel that I want to write. I don't see myself as the kind of writer who writes novels. They seem way too long and way too involved. But this one particular story I think, will be so long, it will have to be a novel. I have a title. I seem to be great at coming up with titles for my stories. The title for this novel is called "Following in the Dark". I like it. It's a little strange but it seems to make sense at least to me. I think I am back in what I call "my twisted sister" mood. I have weird stories in my head that keep wanting to get out. And yes, stranger than my elf girl story. The stories are dark, twisted, tending to the shadow side of personhood. That's why I call them my twisted sister stories. They're usually about the dark think I keep hidden away, that nobody knows about, that sometimes even surprise me. I think everyone has secrets, a dark side, a sinister and gleeful side that even their closest friends don't know about.
It's the side that gets turned on by lurid and lewd things. Things which in SF are so politically incorrect but which are so deliciously evil and very funny in their own way.
This novel is about a woman who has this dark side, this sinister, closet evil slut side. She meets a man, Jake, who introduces her to the darker side of sex and lust. I don't think the story is about S&M, although some of it takes place in that world. The story is more about embracing your dark side and at the same time embracing your light side. I think you have to be both, to be normal. You can't embrace one without embracing the other, although most people do embrace only their light side. When you only embrace one side, the other side tends to leak out, spill out, spew out in the most surprising ways. I think the novel also has alot to do with pain. I think pain can be an interesting thing to think about. People have so many associations with pain. It's a loaded topic, so loaded that it starts to take on a life of its own. Pain can either be your guide or it can rule your life, it's your decision. And I mean pain of any kind, emotional, physical, sexual, whatever. Sometimes pain takes you on a dark and winding path that sometimes leads to transformation and other times lead you to pure hell. But I don't think you know until you go down the path where it's going to lead and even then and it's a 50/50 split either way. But again, it's that whole ying and yang thing. Heaven/hell, pain/pleasure. What is someone's pain can also be someone's deep, deep pleasure.
It's the side that gets turned on by lurid and lewd things. Things which in SF are so politically incorrect but which are so deliciously evil and very funny in their own way.
This novel is about a woman who has this dark side, this sinister, closet evil slut side. She meets a man, Jake, who introduces her to the darker side of sex and lust. I don't think the story is about S&M, although some of it takes place in that world. The story is more about embracing your dark side and at the same time embracing your light side. I think you have to be both, to be normal. You can't embrace one without embracing the other, although most people do embrace only their light side. When you only embrace one side, the other side tends to leak out, spill out, spew out in the most surprising ways. I think the novel also has alot to do with pain. I think pain can be an interesting thing to think about. People have so many associations with pain. It's a loaded topic, so loaded that it starts to take on a life of its own. Pain can either be your guide or it can rule your life, it's your decision. And I mean pain of any kind, emotional, physical, sexual, whatever. Sometimes pain takes you on a dark and winding path that sometimes leads to transformation and other times lead you to pure hell. But I don't think you know until you go down the path where it's going to lead and even then and it's a 50/50 split either way. But again, it's that whole ying and yang thing. Heaven/hell, pain/pleasure. What is someone's pain can also be someone's deep, deep pleasure.
Monday, July 09, 2001
I got bored posting so I stopped. Went on vacation to Hawaii, supposedly where Lemuria was before the earthquake broke it up and sank most of it except for the Islands. It was very hot, 85 degrees with 80% humidity. Did not run into any elves there but saw lots of pretty hula girls with very long hair. Growing long hair can be such a pain. I grew my hair down to my butt once. It wasn't very attractive. It thinned out and became stringy and even though I spent fortune getting it trimmed, it always looked witchy.
I know men fantasize about women with long hair but it's really not that great. Once while on top, my hair kept getting in my then boryfriend's face and he kept spitting it out of his mouth. Very romantic. Then at night, he would wind his hands around my hair and when he turned over he would take me with him. Yikes! I keep my hair shoulder length now. It's still long ut not too long and it's better than that butchy dikey short dorothy iceskater hair from the 70's that so many women insist on wearing. It's looks so dated, so unfashionable. Go to any town between the coasts and you'll finds heaps of women with that old lady hair. Nobody fashionable wears their hair short like that any more. Don't these women know? Women over 50 love that haircut. It's their teenage form of rebellion in their golden years coming through. Like didn't they already work out those issues when they were younger? Go to any mall and count how many women over 50 have that short iceskater 70's hair? You'll see. It's the mullet for women.
I know men fantasize about women with long hair but it's really not that great. Once while on top, my hair kept getting in my then boryfriend's face and he kept spitting it out of his mouth. Very romantic. Then at night, he would wind his hands around my hair and when he turned over he would take me with him. Yikes! I keep my hair shoulder length now. It's still long ut not too long and it's better than that butchy dikey short dorothy iceskater hair from the 70's that so many women insist on wearing. It's looks so dated, so unfashionable. Go to any town between the coasts and you'll finds heaps of women with that old lady hair. Nobody fashionable wears their hair short like that any more. Don't these women know? Women over 50 love that haircut. It's their teenage form of rebellion in their golden years coming through. Like didn't they already work out those issues when they were younger? Go to any mall and count how many women over 50 have that short iceskater 70's hair? You'll see. It's the mullet for women.
Wednesday, June 20, 2001
What is it with all those limos that drive down Park Presidio and 19th Avenue and then onto 280 during the morning rush hour? You know they're carrying Sili Valley execs who either live in Marin County, Presidio Heights, Sea Cliff or Pacific Heights. Why don't they just live in Sili Valley or the Peninsula, which is really Sili Valley North, or is it Sili Valley West?
At least they're not driving their own very expensive euro trash car and talking on the phone. Or, what's worse, typing on their laptop in the front seat as do the crawl down 19th avenue. One day I saw a woman, older, mid 40's, with perfect salon blonde and permed burnt hair, driving in her brand spanking new silver jaguar, which looks like a euro trash turbo charged Ford Taurus. We were both stopped at a light, probably at Pacheco. I look to my side and I notice she's looking down intently on her passenger seat. I straighten up and look over and she's typing on her laptop. I'm like, GIRL - get a life! You're driving that expensive car and it's 7:15 am and you're typing on a laptop in traffic. Was she in sales? Was she an exec?
What kind of life is that where you have to work as you drive? Is it worth it? Is all that money worth it? You've got the rich bitch accessories, clothes, jewelry, nails and hair but, is it luxury if you're typing on a laptop in your car at Pacheco and 19th Avenue? If you want to lead the life of the luxurious Sili Valley exec, get the limo and type on your laptop in peace.
At least they're not driving their own very expensive euro trash car and talking on the phone. Or, what's worse, typing on their laptop in the front seat as do the crawl down 19th avenue. One day I saw a woman, older, mid 40's, with perfect salon blonde and permed burnt hair, driving in her brand spanking new silver jaguar, which looks like a euro trash turbo charged Ford Taurus. We were both stopped at a light, probably at Pacheco. I look to my side and I notice she's looking down intently on her passenger seat. I straighten up and look over and she's typing on her laptop. I'm like, GIRL - get a life! You're driving that expensive car and it's 7:15 am and you're typing on a laptop in traffic. Was she in sales? Was she an exec?
What kind of life is that where you have to work as you drive? Is it worth it? Is all that money worth it? You've got the rich bitch accessories, clothes, jewelry, nails and hair but, is it luxury if you're typing on a laptop in your car at Pacheco and 19th Avenue? If you want to lead the life of the luxurious Sili Valley exec, get the limo and type on your laptop in peace.
Thursday, June 14, 2001
Wish me luck ... I've just registered for free trials to those popular online dating sites. What a hoot! I never know what to say when they ask to describe yourself. I mean, are they completely serious? Oh well, I'll only be in town for two more weeks and then I'm off to the beach for vacation and relaxation. If it goes very badly and I make a total git of out of myself, I have my vacation to recover. I'll be drinking pretty brelly drinks on the beach in July and laughing ridiculously about it all. It's absolutely maddening, this dating thing but such a necessary evil I'm afraid.
I am totally convinced that if you've done anything bad in your life, you will at some point end up standing in line at the UPS office on San Bruno at 16th Street in San Francisco. The pundits credit the demise of the dot com industry to bad business plans, but I think the gross inefficiencies of UPS contributed to the failure of 90% of the BtoC ecommerce sites. Most ecommerce websites relied on UPS to deliver their merchandise. Which is fine if you're a business that's open 8 am to 5 pm or you work or are at home during the day and never leave your residence. However, if you work outside the home and cannot have your packaged delivered to your workplace or don't want your packages delivered to your workplace because you don't want your coworkers to see what you're ordering, you're screwed!
Standing in the UPS will call line is the most frustrating experience I have ever had. It's not the waiting that I mind nor the drive out of my way to the UPS office. No, what's frustrating is the powerlessness I feel. The feeling that my time is not valuable as UPS' time and that I have to plan one whole week of my of my life around trying to get my package. And I know I'm not alone. I watch miserably as other hapless San Franciscans are told over and over again that their packages are not there. Who would want to order online and put up with this experience? Here's my usual experience with UPS.
Day 1 - UPS leaves that 1st day notice at my apartment building which sometimes I get, sometimes I don't. I call the number on the notice and I get trapped in voicemail hell because I can't talk to a live person. I log onto their website and finally find the number for customer service, because it's not the home page. I spend 15 minutes on hold till someone actually answers. I spend another half an hour trying to figure out where my package is. I am told I can have it held at will call at the San Bruno Ave, SF office. I agree.
Day 2 - After work, I drive to the San Bruno office. I stand for 1/2 an hour in line with my notice. When the CS rep looks up my notice, I am informed that my package is not there. The CS rep asks if I want to have my package held at will-call for pickup tomorrow. I agree and leave.
Day 3 - Once again, I drive to the San Bruno office and stand in line for 1/2 an hour. When the CS rep looks up my notice, I am again told that my package is not there and again, I am asked about holding it at will-call for pickup tomorrow. I've explained that this is what I did yesterday. The CS rep with no change in expression says sometimes they drivers don't get their messages.
It takes another two visits for me to finally get my package.
The fifth time this happened, count them, five different packages and 18 visits later, I overhear a man in line saying that he waits until he gets the white postcard saying UPS is holding the package. "It's the only way to get out of the dyfunctional UPS truck loop" he says. I'm listening to him as I'm staring up at the sign that says "Drivers need 1 day notice to have packages held". I test his theory on my sixth package and it works.
If you look at it from a business point of view, it's no skin off my back to wait until the white postcard comes in the mail. I just have to wait and then plan the one day to pick up my package. If UPS wants to spend three or however many days it takes to get the white postcard, delivering my package over and over again, wants to use their gas, their equipment, their manpower hour to waste their time, wants to use their postage to deliver my white postcard, then that's their problem. I just don't how this company meets their quarterly earnings forecast. And doesn't the delivery business industry have the slimmest of operating margins?
But all of that doesn't matter anymore. I'm happy because I now know the secret of avoiding UPS Hell. I just wait till my little white postcard comes.
Standing in the UPS will call line is the most frustrating experience I have ever had. It's not the waiting that I mind nor the drive out of my way to the UPS office. No, what's frustrating is the powerlessness I feel. The feeling that my time is not valuable as UPS' time and that I have to plan one whole week of my of my life around trying to get my package. And I know I'm not alone. I watch miserably as other hapless San Franciscans are told over and over again that their packages are not there. Who would want to order online and put up with this experience? Here's my usual experience with UPS.
Day 1 - UPS leaves that 1st day notice at my apartment building which sometimes I get, sometimes I don't. I call the number on the notice and I get trapped in voicemail hell because I can't talk to a live person. I log onto their website and finally find the number for customer service, because it's not the home page. I spend 15 minutes on hold till someone actually answers. I spend another half an hour trying to figure out where my package is. I am told I can have it held at will call at the San Bruno Ave, SF office. I agree.
Day 2 - After work, I drive to the San Bruno office. I stand for 1/2 an hour in line with my notice. When the CS rep looks up my notice, I am informed that my package is not there. The CS rep asks if I want to have my package held at will-call for pickup tomorrow. I agree and leave.
Day 3 - Once again, I drive to the San Bruno office and stand in line for 1/2 an hour. When the CS rep looks up my notice, I am again told that my package is not there and again, I am asked about holding it at will-call for pickup tomorrow. I've explained that this is what I did yesterday. The CS rep with no change in expression says sometimes they drivers don't get their messages.
It takes another two visits for me to finally get my package.
The fifth time this happened, count them, five different packages and 18 visits later, I overhear a man in line saying that he waits until he gets the white postcard saying UPS is holding the package. "It's the only way to get out of the dyfunctional UPS truck loop" he says. I'm listening to him as I'm staring up at the sign that says "Drivers need 1 day notice to have packages held". I test his theory on my sixth package and it works.
If you look at it from a business point of view, it's no skin off my back to wait until the white postcard comes in the mail. I just have to wait and then plan the one day to pick up my package. If UPS wants to spend three or however many days it takes to get the white postcard, delivering my package over and over again, wants to use their gas, their equipment, their manpower hour to waste their time, wants to use their postage to deliver my white postcard, then that's their problem. I just don't how this company meets their quarterly earnings forecast. And doesn't the delivery business industry have the slimmest of operating margins?
But all of that doesn't matter anymore. I'm happy because I now know the secret of avoiding UPS Hell. I just wait till my little white postcard comes.
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