Thou Shalt Not Squeal

I’ve been dabbling a bit in unseemly pools, and I’ve not been forthcoming about it. My sister knows, as do three of my girlfriends, but that’s it. It’s as though I’m too embarrassed to admit that I’m…human.

My very sweet aunt is still around and hopefully leaving soon, having used up what should have been the awesome part of being alone, that nourishing half Paul Johannes Tillich affectionately dubbed solitude. Its shadow aspect, loneliness, recently offered itself as a replacement. My sister lives in Hawaii and regularly finds herself overwhelmed by circumstance and declares herself unavailable to me. Luke has been working on outside projects more than ever before, and we can’t even go out to eat anymore since my doctor put me on a special diet for 26 food sensitivities. In fact, because of that, I eat every meal at home, where my mom is either preoccupied or absent altogether, spending her spare time cooking and delivering meals to my grandma, who hardly puts a bite to her lips now that she is withering away in a nursing home.

“Why should I eat?” she asked, gobbling up her Thanksgiving dinner for the novelty of it, I assume. It’s not the usual beans and tortillas fare. It’s creamier. “I can’t even walk. I want to die.”

She somehow put her sad right hand to her head, that same hand which has steadily lost coordination, and she then burst into tears. Before they had dried, she revisited a conversation we’ve had hundreds of times. Perhaps thousands, thanks to dementia.

“You married, mi hija?

“No.”

“You not with Luke?”

“No.”

“Oh, you not in LOVE with him. You don’t have a boyfriend, mi hija?”

“No.”

But this time she threw in something extra special:

“Why not?”

“Because the boy I love doesn’t love me.”

Thus my greatest disappointment was revealed from behind a curtain to her new roommate at the rehab center.

Grandma doesn’t understand. In her world, her “so pretty” granddaughter should have no trouble snagging a suitable beau. Frankly, I don’t understand either. I haven’t had one in 9 years. I am rarely intrigued by anyone, and those few times I’ve turned my head, it’s blown up in my face, each more horribly than the last.

It’s been this way for so long that sometimes I think my eggs will simply go to waste, and I will have to take extra care to prevent the development of all of those diseases you get from not having children. Maybe I have some kind of genetic mutation that evolution needs kept out of circulation. It’s sad to think that I will not pass on these quips, hips, and lips, particularly when so many less endowed specimens have enjoyed the privilege of replication. I try not to think these thoughts, and although I haven’t mastered them, they are no longer my master.

That said, I am torn. Visualize one fabulously shoed foot in wealth, the other in love. Then further imagine my hands in Twister-esque play, one in health uncomfortably reaching to the left, the other in perfect self-expression, stretching back far behind my legs. It’s precarious. It’s the perfect recipe. For falling.

Something unexpected has caught my attention. And I’m not sure it should have.

My Wisdom of Avalon cards seemed certain enough, though, and who am I to doubt the wisdom of Avalon? These are the moments I wish Sarah Negahdari had enough time to befriend a tiny girl like me; she is the only other person I’ve met who owns this deck.

So I beat on, a boat against the current, Fitzgerald rules, yadda yadda, but I just have to do this. Sure, I’ve gone completely fairytale on you, but here’s a reminder: I’ve got everything to lose or everything to gain. 50/50.

It’s hard for me to be composed. I want to squeal. I want to cry. I want to explode. But I can’t lapse into emotional displays without missing what is really happening.

The part of me that dismisses my existence as my mother’s terrible mistake is at war with the nobler facet that admires my genius. Am I just an ugly, abused, untalented piece of crap with a possible DNA abnormality that my suitors can taste when they kiss me? Or has no one yet been able to handle my most magical incandescence? Have I been reserved for a most discriminating connoisseur? I’m a lot to say yes to, I realize.

I’m putting every effort into remaining calm. And daring. Indeed, I will be the boldest I’ve ever been, holding my favorite supergoddess Björk very close because, after all, it takes courage to enjoy it. Erica Jong knows that, too.

“Do you want me to tell you something really subversive? Love is everything it's cracked up to be. That's why people are so cynical about it.... It really is worth fighting for, being brave for, risking everything for. And the trouble is, if you don't risk everything, you risk even more. Life doesn't leave that many choices.”

So this is either going to blow me up or blow me away.

P.S. Fingers crossed for the latter.

A Chance to Be Nerd

I am trapped here with an aunt who has overstayed her welcome, having "visited" since mid-September. Recently she proceeded to ice this cake with the incessant burping that apparently accompanies acid reflux. She could just stop eating wheat to cease aggravating her gluten allergy, but no, she won't. Not everyone has my discipline.

She continues to belch away any possible enjoyment I might derive from eating at a time when I am forced to dine at home. My food sensitivities test came back negative for a gluten allergy but mildly positive for 26 other foods. For three months, avoidance is mandatory, and because one of the culprits is PEPPER it's virtually impossible to find suitable food for myself outside of my house. Before 3:30, when I leave for rehearsal with Sean, Luke, and Vanina, I have to prepare and pack a dinner and snacks that are basically devoid of fun and flavor. Whatever I take has to be enough to power me through the pehrspace party tonight.

But hell. At least I CAN eat. The National Inflation Association's new projections came out yesterday, and they are horrifying, but because I am in a state surrounded by "progressives" who deride "conservatives" for policies that are virtually indistinguishable from their own, I have learned the hard way to keep most of this stuff to myself. I still don't see how bashing mirror images of ourselves advances our humanity, but if you do, feel free to enlighten me.

Almost all of my facebook friends applaud the free lunches that are killing our currency. Round two of quantitative easing is upon us, but we're drowning in petty talk and pejorative terms. Both sides are pushing monetary policies that will likely destroy the dollar, and the only thing, I think, that will unify the people behind a better way will be the hardcore experience of struggle that lies ahead. "Within a decade a loaf of wheat bread may cost $23 in a grocery store in the United States, and a 32-oz package of sugar might run $62. A 64-oz container of Minute Maid Orange Juice, meanwhile, could set you back $45.71 (http://www.naturalnews.com/030309_food_inflation.html)

We are looking at a deadly combo of price inflation and dollar deflation, and not enough of us are talking about it, and even fewer are suggesting solutions because who wants to be that guy? That unpopular dude who will make the cuts that will hurt? A representative of sound money? WHO? There are a few, but they're kept on the periphery for the most part. Alienated. And I feel their pain.

When I used to be a "progressive" who derided "neocons" as racist buffoons, I would have found solace in my facebook roster of liberal cheerleaders. Now that I actually read about the world beyond mainstream media sources, I have a broader understanding of the ideological framework, and both parties leave me unimpressed. These days I'm cheering for a new team. Gerald Celente suggests it is the emergence of the progressive libertarian, but it's not growing fast enough to save me from alienation today. So I stand by and watch my friends on both sides gut each other over nothing, wielding that ever-potent weapon of deletion.

Then I go quietly to practice what I no longer preach. I buy only organic food. I use baking soda and lemon and vinegar to clean my house. I have my own garden. I filter the chlorine and fluoride out of my water. I exercise. I support sustainable businesses, and I am starting my own, details to come, of course. I refrain from unnecessary travel as a boycott of increasingly intrusive searches, and if I must travel, I will opt out of naked body scanners. I embrace holistic medicine. I use pure cosmetics with fruit-pigmented ingredients. I read. I breathe. I make an effort to be a good girl. For these reasons and many more, I appear to be a radical among my peers when the truth is I represent a growing minority of people who have no allegiance to anything that doesn't serve themselves, their contemporaries, or their planet.

I'm sort of a transcendental vigilante in a sea of distraction and complacence. In 1856, antislavery orator Wendell Phillips warned, "Eternal vigilance is the price of liberty," and that really resonates with me lately. I feel it viscerally. A primal desire for unadulterated freedom. And, like Tantra, it has opened up new pathways in my brain, body, and heart. My most recent creation, "South," is a record of this unrestrained way of being, and it's just the tip of iceberg for this "queen of cool," to cite my own lyrics.

I can't wait for tonight. It's going to be so much fun having a proper lineup instead of a phantom one like that band of bones in the Grateful Dead's "Touch of Grey" video. Who am I kidding? Even those skeletons are a realer band than we have been over the past couple of years. Finally. A chance to be heard. What every artist wants. To revel in my devotion and my difference. And maybe when I've accomplished that much, my social acceptability will simultaneously soar, and I'll be lauded for my liberty-loving, article-devouring, discipline-cherishing self. A chance to be nerd.

For those of you who cannot make it to the show tonight, you can buy our EP on iTunes!

http://itunes.apple.com/us/album/audition/id402380199

OR if you want a hard copy, hit me up ASAP! My limited edition jersey girls are already selling out, and they're not even officially for sale yet. They include four acoustic tracks. Positively charming!

UGH! After staring at me all the way through the rough draft and the rewrites, my aunt has begun rummaging through my stacks of nutritional information, supplements, and receipts. Talk about intrusive searches! Mother drssshhhhhh!

A Very Carrion Birthday To Me

These days are definitely the worst I've had to endure--not because of the number or severity of my triggers, though they may be plentiful and powerful right now. What's supremely yucky is that I am in the wilderness.

A liminal space. An unnavigable transition. The magic is missing. I have an urge to drop some cash on one of my gurus, who could succor me with suggestions that I may not be divinely disconnected, but even stronger is my desire to be independent of outside reassurances. I feel like I should be able to untangle on my own the frayed and twisted cord that once tied me to abundance.

And it is in this atmosphere that I greet yet another year of my life. Will this be the one that delivers me from evil? Will I finally be deeply happy?

I hope so. Hope, though, does not galvanize universal forces like faith does. Fearless faith.

This, then, is really a faith rut. There is evidence for this rut, to be sure, but there is also evidence for an unseen glut.

That is precisely the stuff of now. I'm not where I used to be. I'm off to greener pastures, and the process, it turns out, is grueling. At the same time, I'm not convinced I've been cut off completely from creative currents. Maybe I'm just incredibly impatient to taste what's waiting for me on the other side, and in the process, I've clamped down a little on my good.

Case in point, I had my first solo vocal lesson this weekend. His pokes and prods seemed relevant in every way:

"Don't work hard."

"Feels like it's a little bit of work up there. What does it sound like if you don't?"

"Feel less; work less."

"Slow. Just let it go."

"When you get to that fork in the road--sound good or let go."

"There's a choice there: struggle or let it sound bad. Let it sound bad."

The critic in me resents having to choose between these. Isn't there another option the experts have failed to mention? One that allows the preservation of both my pride and my perfection?

I am welded to control; I never want to lose. Yet, in so many arenas, I am losing despite all of the restrictions I have set up for myself and others. The past proves my philosophical objection to letting go, while the present makes a break in that movement, pushing instead for a future of absolute freedom. Surrender to what is seems the only decent decision I could make today simply because my way isn't working anymore.

I'm not sure what letting go will look like or feel like, but it will certainly sound bigger. A very scary proposition indeed, but I'm almost ready to foreclose on formers and exchange everything for this expansion. Really? REALLY.

This Wednesday's show at Club Moscow will be part-birthday, part-funeral, as every proper solar return should be. We will distance ourselves from the decay of what was and drench ourselves in the truth of what is, dismissing our incessant need to know what's to come.

The Chicken or the Egg?

380 million salmonella eggs. Not yummy, but, apparently, neither is 80% of the chicken. It's regularly contaminated with the very same salmonella involved in the recent recall. Still, no one is talking about that. People only speak in sound bites now--even my adoptive Italian Grandma stated: "It's not worth the risk." Just hours later I read her exact words in an article by Mike Adams.

No, the FDA, the CDC, and the USDA aren't telling you to throw out of those tiny tainted chicken corpses. Proper cooking kills the contaminant. Same with the eggs. They don't report that.

So was it the chicken or the egg? Both? Neither? In this case, if you plow through the misinformation, it is obvious that it is the farming practices that are wrong.

Awww, come now. THAT doesn't make for exciting television. We need sensational news stories with sci-fi endings, like the idea of nuking all the eggs, eradicating nutrients along with the contaminants. Why attempt to cure the big agribusiness disease completely when you can invent a new oppressive solution that will evenly distribute poor health to everyone? Now that's equality!

What's useful about the age-old chicken-egg question is that it probes for root causes. What started it all? That's why I almost became a naturopathic doctor. I appreciated the methodology: restoring balance by addressing the most basic problem.

Nowadays, we treat the surface. Not just in conventional medicine. In so many arenas.

Take, for instance, insults to supposed "teabaggers" by so-called progressives who believe that Tea Party values are without merit simply because neocons like Palin, desperate for followers, are hoping to capitalize on this record-level disenchantment by posing as champions and saviors. They are not. This situation has smeared the good names of Patriotism and Political Dissent, which are GOOD THINGS. Vital things.

If Republicans are racists, Democrats are socialists, and Independents are just wasting their votes, where does that leave us? You know. Us. The people.

Nowheresville.

Popular adherence to the false left-right paradigm is infuriating and dangerous.

When will pseudo-progressives and faux conservatives quit their petty assaults on each other?

Isn't it evident that most politicians, be they Democrats or Republicans, are beholden to corporations whose primary motivation is not our well-being but their profit?

In this atmosphere of zero accountability, we can expect that such interests will contribute to the promotion and election of more corporate shills who seek to co-opt movements by both true conservatives and true progressives and to subvert their agendas. The problem is not the other side: it's the infighting among those of us who realize something is amiss. We need to befriend the Other. We need to dig into our differences and find the overlap, or it is curtains for our country.

The exacerbation of political difference is our greatest weakness. We are powerless until we see this. Only from a place of empowerment will we be able to identify those parties who wish to exploit that weakness by fomenting tensions and thereby keeping us too distracted to start rooting for ourselves and each other. You know. The home team.

French Kissin' for the DNA

When I hear a boy has a cold, it is an immediate turn-off for me. If he eats white flour and sugar, my heart suddenly stops fluttering. If he is regularly exposed to chemicals, I hide my cuteness from him. If he smokes, I think, "What a waste!" and promptly begin searching out a new crush.

My friends and family dismiss my criticisms as "weird" and "picky" and suggest that I broaden my horizons. I vehemently protest until they switch topics.

Apparently, I am not alone. Vastly outnumbered but not entirely alone.

Yesterday Luke had bubblegum for breakfast and an ice cream sundae for dinner. Sure, it was organic raw vegan ice cream, but where was the balance? What kind of nutritional debt did he accumulate that day? I scolded him for not preserving his genetic integrity in front of our new drummer because he knows better. No, it didn't earn me points with either of them, but I get angry. I have invested in his health. I have taught him. He has been the beneficiary of all my diligence. The countless books and articles I've studied have allowed me to impart sage advice whenever applicable. He's been lucky to have me as his personal nutritional counselor/gourmet chef/health guru. I do realize that he usually eats properly and that, more importantly, he prefers to, but sometimes he gets disappointingly lazy, and I just can't stand it!

Sure enough, last night Natural News sent out a video and article about the "genopocalypse." It discusses how humans are destroying their fertility and their very genetic code via poor diet and lifestyle choices. Studies in small mammals have demonstrated that, even if you don't see genetic anomalies in the next generation, some reproductive irregularities will appear consistently in third and fourth generations and beyond. In his article, Adams claims that vegans will be the ones making viable deposits to the sperm bank, but I disagree; only the most discriminating vegans who are supplementing correctly will be able to contribute to the cause. All of the vegan boys I know eat mass quantities of unfermented soy, which is mostly GMO, highly estrogenic, and definitely unsuitable for consumption by men or anyone, really, unless they want to end up like these poor rats:

"...female rats fed a diet of GM soy experienced a drastically higher infant death rate, and their surviving infants were smaller and less fertile than the offspring of rats fed on a non-GM soy diet. Male rats fed the GM soy had their testicles change from pink to blue, and the GM soy was also observed to damage the DNA of sperm and embryos. Fertility problems such as abortion, infertility, premature delivery, prolapsed uteri, infant death, and even delivery of unformed infants (bags of water) have been observed in farm animals fed GM cottonseed and corn."--
Doctors Warn About Dangers of Genetically Modified Food



After watching and reading, I called Luke again. I told him I believe he has a moral obligation to his progeny to make healthy choices and implored him to do so.

Sometimes I suspect we've strayed too far from our primitive roots to ever connect fully with our most basic urges, but on this account, I was right. It may be socially unacceptable to say these things, but biologically I've always known it to be true. No matter how my contemporaries have fought me on it, I continue to feel this need to couple with someone who is fastidious about his health--not, of course, to an extent that is unhealthy! Just someone who puts genuine effort into his body, mind, and spirit because he finds value there. As I do. Simple.

Maybe someday soon I will get to reclaim and recontextualize the terms weird and picky. Maybe what's weirdest about me is how uncannily right I am to consciously and meticulously choose a partner who doesn't represent a genetic dead end.

Dusting Off My Brutes

Noticed this afternoon that my room was a little on the dusty side. Pulled everything off the shelves before leaving for rehearsal.

I returned home to my floor, as I left it, littered with coated-grey objects. I was just about to tackle the issue when an ex decided to make an appearance.

We'd ended on bad terms. Remember? He's the one I publicly humiliated at a party by pouring lemonade on his cheating skull.

As you may recall, this is the umpteenth time a major cleaning, corporeal or otherwise, has summoned unfinished emotional business before me. Indeed, the lemonade incident itself remains a shining example of this very phenomenon.

Years later he didn't want to explain, really, or even entertain explanation. He merely wanted to convince me that, though we made a "dangerous pair," I just might want to flirt with that danger yet again.

Ahhh, so he wasn't married with 3 kids! That's how I envision the whole lot of my former interests: snatched up by better women than I and now, miraculously, fully invested in completely enviable lives of which I dare not learn a single detail lest I become ill over what could have been.

And why wasn't he living the perfect life I pictured for him? Perhaps because he isn't a good kisser or because he is wildly insensitive or because he is always an enigma or because, ultimately, he could care less about this litany of complaints I am now cutting short out of consideration for you, kind reader.

He tried and tried, but time healed AND educated. I met a boy better suited for me, and THAT didn't even work. Here he was presenting me with a lesser option. Absolutely no temptation. Sooo easy to brush off.

There are reasons we aren't together, reasons we aren't with our formers, reasons that aren't always evident because we're not quite ready to see in the midst of the collapse--reasons that later become cause for celebration.

Thank goodness I am not with this man! Thank goodness I am not with any of them!!!

Oh, yes. Sing it with me, and take this scientific morsel with you: next time you think you miss someone or you're simply wondering where he is, you have only to pick up a broom or grab a glass of green juice. Fixing those little kinks is only one sweep, one sip away.

Zen Cool Kitten

It is said that the Tantric experience is cool rather than hot. Thus, a Tantric version of Paris Hilton would instead chime, "That's cool." My teacher is always encouraging us to use this lens beyond the bedroom, and I've toyed with it for some time now without huge results, but, all of a sudden, I seem to have fully integrated this knowledge.

Likewise, my beloved Dr. Loretta Standley often speaks of spiritual romance, and I didn't realize it until today, but boy, am I in love! Today as the priest performed last rites on my grandmother, he was reading this passage, and I'm going to have to call him on his cell phone tomorrow to find out exactly what it was, but it sounded like a love letter. To me. To everyone. I know it sounds crazy, but it was so beautiful I had to hold back the tears.

Dr. Standley sees God as the Father, whereas I usually envision the Universe, but this evening I got a glimpse through her eyes.

My kitty Blake is a bad boy. When he isn't sleeping, he terrorizes his surroundings, knocking things off shelves and crying incessantly to get whatever he wants at the time, that is, until cuddles ensue late at night. Needless to say, he had to be locked in his room while the priest was here. With my "Thank you, Father," Blake was unleashed upon the household once more. He started brushing up against my legs, looking to earn some extra food, so I picked him up, scratched his precious white chin a bit, and let go, expecting him to immediately jump free. Surprisingly, he remained. Still. Tranquil. Just drinking it all in.

He would eventually bounce off of my thighs and onto better things, but those 25 seconds were magic. Right then, when he wasn't fussing and complaining and trying to make things happen for himself, my wish was to simply give him everything. Immense generosity that perhaps only a parent would know. Thus meandered a mind briefly imprinted with the word "Father." Quite the education.

I believe the Universe wants to give me everything, and it is asking that I be calm and cool rather than clamoring to receive. Flossie already told me this two years ago, and it's finally sunk in. In the placid, there is power, so stay zen, my little cool cats.