Damn, tonight I am on a roll for wussing out. It started when I thought that I was going to write about “Big Girls Don’t Cry” by Fergie tonight but that switched gears when I got on a Mirror Ballroom kick about 10:30 tonight. By 11:00 I was messaging and asking her to come over (rhetorically – cam someone ever come over rhetorically? I may be altered) So I hypothetically ask her to come over – as in there’s no way in hell that I think there is a hundredth of a chance that she would, but for whatever reason, I think it’s fun to talk about.
Then when I got home to my silent house, I pulled up YouTube and one of my favorite videos were up on the front page which was Sarah McLachlan and Melissa Etheridge – so I clicked it. That is where the Mirror Ballroom spiral started.
There was a period of time that I was driving up to Southern Oklahoma and back. At that time, one of the albums in my car was Mirror Ballroom. I loved listening to a mix of Sarah Mclachlan, Ani DiFranco and Melissa Etheridge and I suppose that is resurfacing.
And then I tell her?! Maybe I should start writing a book on things that no one should ever do. I am quite sure that I am at least a few chapters in already. Tonight, I learn the value in my brother’s constant talking and interruption. I never have the time to drift down any rabbit holes.
Today, I am going to complain about something that doesn’t even matter but has me in a rage all the same. Madd has spent the last 3.5 years manipulating me and finding ways to control me and sadly – it usually revolved around her children. The hardest part about the relationship – wasn’t even the abuse – it was trying to act like I cared and I was interested when the world around me (including her) knew my heart was elsewhere – just waiting.
Well in 2017 sometime, she met some mechanic that came to work on our cars. Her name was Sarah and she owned a mobile mechanic shop. My pride was not feeling it when Madd stayed up all night with her working on the car – because “She needed help.” I doubt we got a discount for this help but either way that is when that started. Emotionally – I didn’t give a shit – I wished she would leave so I could go back to waiting peacefully. I learned quickly that there is no waiting when there are 2 small children involved.
Eventually she started threatening me – when i didn’t want to have sex that she was going to go have sex with Sarah and eventually she did. Her mental health issues exacerbated mine and we fought all of the time. She would try to control me, I would try to resist – she didn’t like that. As I learned more about the men she had dated in the past, I realized this was a pattern and she was not happy that I would say no from time to time.
Well the point of that is that we would break up all of the time – never get back together but break up constantly. Basically, she would tell me if we were together or not it seemed, because I found out in January – after she started sleeping with Sarah or I believe they prefer to call it fucking for some reason – but after I got pissed that she was ‘fucking’ Sarah she informed me that we broke up sometime in November. I decided to take it and run, though my pride and ego were a bit bruised.
I will spare the details of New Year’s Eve 2019 when she ditched me to go pick up Sarah and have a mental break down / fling for a week or two. I ended up having to go to the doctor to get my Xanax refilled. She made it very public so all of my friends and reports knew at work when we returned. Then a week later, I was informed that I was getting laid off – so suddenly I didn’t give a fuck about Sarah or Madd or anything else but what the hell I was going to do.
It took me 5 weeks to land a job – well I was hired on that 5th week – the very day that my love swooped down to save me. Well, she probably doesn’t know how powerful she was but she has a way of giving me strength when I need it most. That was February 20th. It was a long 2 months. My brother started breaking down. I think that he felt he had to leave. He has been living with me for free for years but I have had a decent job where I barely notice the impacted. I would live here alone anyway – there is no way I would have a roommate. There are less than 5 people that I am willing to live with and he is damn lucky that he is one of them because it is not because he is a good house mate.
But anyway – somehow she knew that I needed someone right then. I was losing everything – or so it felt like. I have my theories. It starts with wondering if her friend that happened to be on my brother’s facebook before any of us ever met – contacted her because he was having his own set of breakdowns, which were much worse and much more dangerous than mine. I just slept all day, he was done. I had to field so many texts from concerned friends – including my aunt and my 87 year old grandma is on his facebook. For a while, it was my full time job just watching him and telling people he was… okay.
This post was supposed to be about what happened to me yesterday and why I am incredibly let down yet again by someone that I never really trusted but took it upon myself to protect her 4 year old daughter – because I feel like if I don’t no one else will. So its relevant to say that January of 2018 we got in a fight, on the 18th. Do to her choice in fighting moves – she now has a pending case for unlawful restraint. I really didn’t mean to cause that charge by what I said – but they asked what happened and I told them.
She is significantly bigger than me – possibly twice my size and I feel like that probably played into it. The ‘Good Ol Boy’ police officers that showed up in Kyle, TX didn’t know what to do with a lesbian fight. I’ve tried to get it dropped. She still owes money to her lawyer, so the case is still open but that caused her not to be able to rent. She put in her notice here, because she lived in a small apartment behind me that she hated. It was $750 a month and her grandma paid for her rent and all her bills. I think she sent her about $1400 a month, She insisted on moving to Austin near Sarah. She needed a 3 bedroom place and ended up finding one for $1500. Her grandma pays the rent but nothing else.
She couldn’t qualify for that with her charge or no job – so she conned me into renting it for her in my name. I started to realize that I could get in a lot of trouble for it and decided to refuse when it started coming time. This bitch actually said, “If you don’t rent this house for me and my kids, we will end up homeless and they will probably get taken away. If you want my kids to end up like your brother, growing up in foster care and dying with a needle in their arm then don’t rent the house but you will have to deal with that for the rest of your life.” Now I am sure that is not an exact quote because I did not record it but I can say it meant just that. She then walked out of my house, because she used to just walk in whenever she wanted to. I was left staring in silence when couch boy, who was just in the living room, came in to apologize for her. He just looked at me and said, “I don’t even know what to say to that. You know she is mentally unstable but here is no excuse to ever say that.” She says “Well I apologized for it later.” I’m sorry, I have PTSD because of my mother and things she has said and done in front of me, you can’t erase that – but my dumb fucking self rented the damn house for her. This was in August.
Fast forward to yesterday. so they haven’t even been there 3 months yet and she called me last night to ask me to take her to go dry her clothes because her dryer is broken again. To start with – I told her that if she moved to Austin, she would need to ask all her Austin friends for help and not me because I don’t want to be driving to Austin all the damn time – but here we are. I know that she doesn’t really have other friends. She may think she does but in the end no one will help her but Jenn and I. Jenn is her best friend from who knows when and basically her only friend. Well I agree like a dumb ass to go help her once again. I drive my ass up there and because of traffic it took an hour. I get there and the garage that was nicely emptied on Thursday when I had to go pick her up from the hospital because she totaled her car while it was on my insurance – but that’s another story that I don’t even know what will happen now. Point of that is, the garage is filled with someone else’s shit and it’s not hard to tell that it’s a bunch of mechanic shit with lesbian stickers all over it. I ask the 9 year old whose stuff it is and he tells me “No one’s” so that’s cool. Now I am stuck taking Madd to whatever princess laundry mat she wants to go to (She took me 12 minutes away – way too far in my opinion) and you bet I complained about her moving Sarah into the house that is in my name. She seems to think I am immature and out of line but fuck a whole lot of that. I knew that she was going to take advantage of this somehow, but I really did not expect her to move Sarah into a house that is in my name. I am still scanning my brain for solutions. I am more than pissed and she doesn’t give a fuck.
My brother just said the realest shit to me and I don’t know why it is the first time that I have heard it. As he lectured me about things I shouldn’t do – I attempted to explain myself with the cliff notes version. I went back to December of 2013. The day I left work because I was mad about some other girl I didn’t even care about – but my pride was hurt because the cycle was repeating quickly. These were little cycles because I didn’t care, but I was trying to feel better about myself because I was confused and still didn’t understand much at all. I referenced the post that I stumbled across – so excitedly and replied to – and I know in that reply I brought attention to the fact that I had not read the post yet. When reflecting on this moment, I always feel her heart sink as she reads those words. Then we know what happens next, I read the post and a level of confusion that I had never experienced before surfaced. I was offended and wanted to know what was wrong with me. A question that I have decided to give up on because my brain has convinced me that it was so much more than that. The fact that I am where I am today only solidifies that. So in the end, why it happened doesn’t matter but what my brother said was:
You’re not emotionally stable enough to be a mess around with kind of girl.
Which I suppose I am fine with. I am much more emotionally stable that I have probably ever been and though a few people can push that limit when they actively try, I can’t say that he is wrong. I can tell myself one thing all day long but at the end of the day, those involved see that I am every bit of what someone would expect from me. A stereotypical Scorpio that has made every list of Scorpio traits nearly comical.
I try to remember my boundaries and stay on my side of the road but when I can’t resist, I make sure to be quite and respectful. I have so much to learn from her and I hope that she knows that I am more than ready for that adventure. I am no where near perfect but I have the desire and willpower to transgress into the next stage of my life if she ever decides that is something we should do.
This is one of the songs that my brother likes to play and sing, so I have heard it on repeat for years but when it came on the radio the other day on my drive to work – I paused all thoughts to listen.
As it turns out, I might not be any less jealous.. just better at controlling it and ignoring it or at least distracting myself by overloading – everything.
I found myself appreciative of her candid response. I knew damn well that I was not going to be picking her up from anyway, but yet, I ask – why one may ask and remind me of the basic definition of insanity, but still I persist.
Tonight, as I am trying to fall asleep, I think to myself… ‘He better not be touching her.’ and I realize that.. that it must be the full moon right? There should be something out of my control for me to blame my absurd emotions on. Oh yes, I started.. I don’t want anyone touching my dream lady because my body is preparing itself to have her baby.. that must be it.
That probably doesn’t make it any better than anything else. I have been day dreaming way too much today. I had sent her an email just as I was leaving work. As I was driving home my mind wandered to the ever circling question – does she even read them? That lead to a smile when I thought about my oh so casual trip up the stairs as I was walking and texting that day last week or so.
I was at Madd’s house doing laundry and I had intended on seeing the kid but she was asleep when I got there so I was already a bit disappointed. At some point I started texting my favorite person and as I was walking up stairs to grab something I received a quite unexpected but more than welcomed text that left we with the instant, ‘Well.. I guess she reads my emails…’ How can she possibly stand me? I mean, even I get tired of me at this point. I’m like fuckin’ Screetch – actually I hope not but I do feel like Erkle at times. So anyway – life is like that and I wish that she was holding me tonight.
Sometimes I tell myself that she doesn’t hold it against me because she knows how I feel. Maybe not for a specific person and maybe not a literal translation – but I’ve had some outlandish expectations for quite sometime and then ms. practical magic comes waltzing into my life with one blue eye and eye green eye and cracks the code to my heart as if it was never even encrypted. Then I follow down the path of enlightenment without question or hesitation. I hope that she knows that I would follow her anywhere and I am even more thankful that she is more than delicate with me. The more time that passes and the more things that happen, the more I am convinced that it was all because she really cared – and I don’t even know what that means yeah but I try my hardest to trust in something more powerful than myself and that everything has happened for a reason. It’s hard to believe that there is only two and a half months left in this decade. I have big plans for the 20s and it’s actually to just – wait and see what happens.
There are so many moments in time that I remember the exact conversation and remember just where I was – which direction I was facing and how it felt in that moment. A lot of times that moment felt like a punch in the stomach – probably because my stomach is incredibly affected by what I have learned is probably the release of brain chemicals – but I couldn’t tell you that in the moment. I either panic or melt. I prefer melt.
The earliest memory that I can remember at the moment was one that came back to cycle in my mind forever to come and it would feel different every time. I was with my grandma at Blanco State Park and we were camping relatively close to the public bathrooms. We were walking down the hill back to our camp site on the right side of the road when she said: “You know, if you keep dressing like that – eventually people are going to think you are interested in women. Are you?” I was so young that I honestly wasn’t lying to her when I got offended and said no, disgustedly – I would have responded the same way if she had asked if I was interested in boys – I am going to guess I was about 8 or 10 at the time. They had been struggling with ‘redirecting me’ lovingly but I don’t know that it is possible. My family has always adored me, I don’t think that they ever intended on being terrifying or offensive but in a way – they didn’t know better or thought it was the right thing.
Fast-forward to the day that my brother got bit by a copperhead at the state park in Edna, Texas. I can’t recall the name of the state park at the moment but we ate Thanksgiving there all of the time. It was the day before Thanksgiving in 2003 and my brother had already been driven to the hospital by my uncle (the one that I currently work with) and I had been tasked with collecting the snake to bring to the hospital – so my aunt and I were following behind with a dead snake in a bag. I used a shovel.
So the next conversation that is imprinted in my memory is when my aunt starts talking to me about being gay- at this point there was no denying it. I was in college, my first semester and everyone knew I was gay through I had not really brought a girl home yet – like to Christmas but that would come and they would do well. The conversation that we had that day in her car as we raced to the hospital to rescue my brother was her telling me that my life had just already been so hard and I was finally to the point that I was nearly out of my dad’s house. Everyone encouraged me to move out at that point because everyone was afraid of what would happen when he realized that his daughter was a lesbian – but nothing happened, thankfully. I acknowledged her concern and told her that I would be okay. She said that she just wanted me to be able to grow up and have the happy family that I have never gotten to have yet. She knows all too well what my siblings and I went through – and even at an extremely young age, I knew how to protect people from the trust – so I never even told them everything, I didn’t want to scare my grandma. The rest of my siblings have forgotten everything because they were so young, so my father and I are the only ones left suffering the burden of my childhood. No one hurt me, no one ever hurt me. I had a lot of people protecting me, but I watched my mom destroy my father over and over again and that alone has caused some damage.
I remember the moment that I almost fought my mom in my dad’s kitchen years before the above situation happened. My grandfather had just passed. I think I have talked about that before so I won’t relive the moment I almost got in my first fight and I feel like it would have been real. My dad knew it too and begged me to walk away – and I did.
When my brother was in the Edna hospital, I was standing with my grandma looking out the hospital window at my aunt, uncle and all the paramedics and probably entire hospital staff talking about what they were going to do. I must add that my brother had no insurance or even money to speak of. He had ran away from home to port aransas and he was still a minor. He wasn’t legally emancipated, he just left – so he had no legal guardian present, until they realized that I was 19, suddenly, I was his legal guardian. Back to the point about looking out that window, my grandma said, “Can you please go get George?” She was asking me to go get my grandpa, who had passed 3 years prior. My brother was on a hospital bed so doped up on morphine that he couldn’t speak to me and now my grandma wanted me to go get my late grandpa, I was about to lose it but instead I walked outside to the group huddled out there and just said, “Hey, Grandma just asked me to come out here and get Grandpa and this is becoming too much for me, can someone go do something?” That night was intense and not even part of this post but I will come back to that story some day.
Many years later, I met the woman that inspired this blog. It’s easy to say that I fell hard and quickly without even really realizing it. That’s when these moments stuck in my memory started to make me melt instead of panic. All of the previous moments were not that great but I will never forget them. The first moment that stands out in my mind was when she got to San Francisco, she called me and told me that her plane had landed. She told me that it was beautiful there and that we would live there one day. That was an immediate heart melt and that wasn’t normal for me. I reminded myself that maybe she meant something else, but I could careless – I heard what I wanted to and I was keeping it that way. I had already known that I had fallen in love with but I don’t know if I was ready to admit it to myself. It would be years before I would tell her – though I am sure I tried. I was in my old bedroom. I was standing on something at the foot of my bed looking out my window towards my backyard.
There are actually plenty of other things I remember quite clearly before that but there is something very specific about how these moments make me feel that differentiates them from others. There was a time that I read that Colorado had passed Same-Sex Marriage laws so I texted her and to my surprise she replied. I grew up believing that I would never get married because it just didn’t happen and of course, I planned to do what I want, but I had seen “If These Walls Could Talk II” and I knew that there were legal issues and everything else. I told my friends, I tried to educate people but at some point, I felt defeated and gave up.
Just a month before my youngest brother passed away. The supreme court passed the federal law allowing same-sex marriage. At the time I was a bit skeptical and I still am but since I was a bit caught up trying to help my dad figure out what to do to help my brother through his drug addiction – I hardly noticed. I was happy but just didn’t think it would last. After my brother died, everything seemed less permanent. I could feel myself detaching again. I had spent at least 5 years with little to no feelings but all you get with that is a wasted life. Thankfully, I had found my passion or desire… well I don’t have the appropriate word but there was a flame in my soul that would not burn out and I really needed that about then.
We went to get our hair cut a few days later. It was something that we had actually planned and I believe that she asked me if I still wanted to go. At that point, I needed all of the distractions that I could get. Everywhere I looked, everyone was falling apart and no one knew what to do about it. Secretly, everyone blamed themselves. He was just here days prior. He lived out of state so that was abnormal but he came down here to get off Heroin and we all failed him. He was nice to me. We bonded over African soap and I made him some that I was never able to give him. He fought with my mom and went back early. My mom’s mother died while he was on his way back up. I know that didn’t help matters any. My mom lost her mother and her son in the same week and she was less than stable to start with. My dad was hanging on with a string trying to balance everything. I was watching everyone that I thought had things under control show me that no one really did at all.
But there she was, holding my hand, smiling at me and we went to Mink to get our haircut. She had hers cut link tank girl. I sat on that bench watching her pink locks fall to the ground; trying my best not to admire her too much because I just felt like – I was the only one that felt that way.
That was over four years ago and doesn’t have much to do with my next vague story but last night while I was at Madd’s house doing laundry, we started messaging a lot. I had missed her a lot but was trying to give her space so I was super excited. I was telling her about the smocked dressed that I would wear because I loved my grandma but it was really hard for me because I really wanted into dresses at all from an early age. I had been walking up the stairs to go grab something when I saw she messaged me, so I opened it to read it because at the time I thought that I could read and walk at the same time but I may have read the message and tripped a little as I went to go reread the message at least 3 times before I believed that it said what it did. After my heart melted and I took my last step onto even ground – my next through was – well… I guess she does check that email address. And at the moment of being mortified that lasted less than a second, I continued to wonder how she could ever put up with me. I am afraid to go back and look at my sent messages because I know how bad I am. I used to do it and knew it was the worst mistake. She must really love me and I really love her. No one understands so I keep it to myself but I think it’s important to know that my life is full of love and excitement its just muted by fear and well I think that’s it, fear of the unknown.
This song came on the radio this morning and before I knew it, I was thinking about the day that my sister had her first sisterly love talk with me.
We didn’t grow up together. I am the oldest and my father has a large family. I grew to resent my siblings at a young age because I was jealous and didn’t understand. My dad did his best to explain compassion and generosity to me but as a child that dealt with getting made fun of for being poor all my life only to transition into getting made fun of because I was a lesbian – it just didn’t seem fair that my dad helped kids that weren’t even his but that’s another long drawn out story – today, I just want to bring light to the fact that my sister spent about 10 years in foster-care until she aged out. This makes her view on family a lot stronger than mine – because I take everything for granted.
My sister moved in with me in July of 2013 because she had been living out of motels with her boyfriend while my parents struggled to take care of her kids for a few months. When she moved in with me – we were pretty close. She paid attention to things that a brother would never notice. She watched me fall in love with a girl and then she watched me fall apart with confusion. At the time, I had spent the last 5 years of my life protecting my heart and then I met her. Suddenly I forgot to play defense and it was over in no time – but my sister know what happened 5 years prior. She knew that I was not really interested in caring for anyone because I knew that they would just hurt me eventually, so she was shocked when I was quick to forget all of that just a month prior when I met her.
At this point a few months had passed. My sister knew lesbians better than I did by now just because she was a good listener – and a woman. There are not many people left that will try to tell me what to do or give me advice because they know that I will just do what I want to do anyway and this was no different but my sister tried her best to be the best sister possible and I feel like I pretty much called her a liar or suggested she was confused. Her facial expression said it all (Something like – well, I guess I will have to tell her I told you so later…) It was a sad defeated look. There are a few people in the world that absolutely hate when I get my heart ripped out and she is one of them.
She had been at Walmart that day with my oldest niece, which was about 5 at the time. They saw my love interest from afar and my niece yelled her name and wanted to chase her down – she was equally as excited about her.
My sister noticed that she was with a guy and as she gently put it to me, ‘she was sure they were more than just friends.’ I didn’t believe her and told her that she had to be wrong or misunderstood. We were no longer dating and hadn’t been for quite some time but I was still holding my breathe for the next moment I would get to spend with her and my sister was watching from a distance. At the time I had no idea. I couldn’t reference a time frame but it had to be within a few months of meeting her. By December, I had dug myself into an internet hole called craigslist and shot myself in the foot – but I learned a valuable lesson that day – well many. The first one is – Don’t get mad and leave work when your rebound tells you that you can’t be her side chick anymore. AND Don’t get overly excited when you see photos of someone that you are pining over and instantly message them without reading the actual post – because it might just surprise you. And you might wish you had just stayed at work with the other problem that you created. That was December 17, 2014. Next I will go see what I wrote about that.
Prior to that she was at Walmart buying a bike – and my little niece that loved her saw her and my sister started playing defense all around. Kid – don’t interrupt them right now. Sis – there’s something you need to know. At least the 5 year old listened. My dumb ass didn’t think twice about it and told said lady that they saw her at Walmart that day – excitedly – when she mentioned the bike… I may never learn.
Anyway – here is some damn song that made me think about that crap this morning.
It finally happened, somehow active shooter emergencies have made their way into my nightmares and to make it even worse, my grandma was involved. As far as I can remember – no one was hurt.
For some reason, there were several women from my family with me and we were sitting in bleachers that resembled a hockey stadium. We were pretty high up in the stadium and there was a barrier in front of us that was high enough to duck behind.
There was some sort of car theft involved and then someone came up to where we were and started shooting a semi automatic rifle into the stands. When we realized what was going on we got my grandma down and I braced myself on top of her, I clenched my teeth and held my breath and with every sound of the gun I expected to be hit.
I don’t remember the ending but as I ducked down there, I wondered when someone would come save us. Why didn’t anyone else have a gun? We were outside and could see where the car had been stolen from. In my dream, I knew the owner of the truck – maybe it was blue, but at this point, I can not recall.
To dream that someone is shooting you with a gun suggests that you are experiencing some confrontation in your waking life. You may be feeling victimized in some situation. If you dream that someone is shooting you in the back, then it means that you are involved with some questionable people who may be harmful to your well-being. It also implies that you are too trusting of others.
To dream that something of yours have been stolen indicates that you are experiencing an identity crisis or are suffering from some sort of loss in your life. Alternatively, the dream means that someone has stolen your success or has taken credit for something you did. Perhaps you feel that you have been treated unfairly.
To see your grandmother in your dream represents nurturance, protection, and unconditional love. Consider the qualities and characteristics that exist in your own grandmother. She may also be the archetypal symbol of the wise old woman.
