“We do not grow absolutely, chronologically. We grow sometimes in one dimension, and not in another; unevenly. We are mature in one realm, childish in another. The past, present, and future mingle and pull us backward, forward, or fix us in the present. We are made up of layers, cells, constellations.” - Anais Nin
It was 2007 and I was able to re-connect with college friends and former lovers on social media. People I thought I'd never see again. Suddenly I felt transported as though no time had passed. They hadn’t really disappeared ...they were still part of me. That’s when I realized I hadn’t grown as much as I thought. After 15 years the same feelings of reckless abandon and lust took hold. After 2 hours of mainlining Sara's blog-site ...my pupils were larger than dimes and my mind was a blast crater. I had to go back to California.
16 year-old Johnny enjoyed a 2-year relationship with his High School English teacher, Laura. She was pretty and young-looking and he was in love. He fathered her child and wanted to marry her when she got out of jail. Now they share an apartment and custody of a two-year old boy …and they’ve found means of support. Quite a feat for a fry-cook and an unemployed teacher. He successfully sued the school district for allowing this to happen. As twisted as this may sound, it does illustrate an example of healthy psychological development: 1) He successfully resolved the age-old conflict between sexual readiness and social/cultural prohibitions. 2) He overcame financial hardship posed by limited employment opportunities.
Bailey was born in Independence, Ohio. When she was six years old, her mother died in a car accident; Bailey entered the foster care system, staying in a succession of homes for the next five years until she was placed with a stable foster family that intended to adopt her. Bailey lived with them from age 12 to 16; but became a ward of the state again when her foster mother discovered she had been sexually active with both her foster father and sister since day one almost. Bailey identifies as fluid. She entered the sex trade drawn to the illusion of ‘family’ it projects. Although she’s well-paid, I’m not sure it’s the ‘stepping stone’ to bigger things that she thinks.
I walked along the strand until I felt the sun starting to fry my brain and passed out somewhere on the sand. I woke up in bed, alone and confused, because I don’t have a bed or even a room. Someone is knocking on a door. I feel the numb aftermath of marijuana and ’ludes. My mouth is dry, and my throat feels like a dusty staircase. My body is sticky and when I run my fingers through my pubes, they feel damp and clumpy. The air is stifling and reeks of warm beer, tequila and weed. There’s a bong and empty sleeping bags on the floor …the bong is empty too. Someone is knocking on a door and I expect to hear them yelling soon. The police in Newport aren’t too friendly, so I look for another door. I open the only one I find and there’s a guy standing there looking just as confused as me ...and I realize I forgot to put on clothes. He says he’s looking for Jacqueline, and asks me if this is 14-something Bay street. I tell him he’s got the wrong place and point him in a random direction. I close the door, listen to his footsteps go down the wooden stairs, then grab my jeans, a better-looking shirt, and head back toward the strand.
"We are ghosts of ourselves …and of other people … and all the ghosts appear perfectly real."
We are ephemeral images in my head ...reproductions that on the surface appear to be inseparable from what passes before my eyes. We are the ghosts standing over my shoulder as I write each line.
I subscribe to the theory that roughly two-thirds of what I experience is made-up – based on mixed memories triggered by what's in front of me. Since everyone arrives at this moment from a different past, we can each have a different take on what's happening now. Collaboration helps narrow things down a bit – but I suck at that, which places me somewhere on the fringe. I’ve learned to compensate by going along (biting my tongue, smiling and nodding at the appropriate times). I haven’t been committed yet. There’s a fine line between experience and delusion. Delusions take place when the gap between the present tense and the past events it triggers gets so wide that I have to start making shit up in order to bridge the two. And into that gap go the most frightening things. That’s when I start to mistake a rope for a snake or a smile for the mythical Wildebeest. Sometimes I see alligators in the bathroom. Those are the times I smile the most. Takes the edge off. But then my actions start to veer dangerously from what I think …and the errors compound daily.
Megan is credited with being the first person to make contact with extraterrestrials. She replied to a query on Tinder one night by saying: “Well, I’ve been told I look pretty ...for an alien.” Over the next hour and a half she received more than 260,000 requests from the constellation Centaurus alone.
Jay suffers from delusions and experiences frequent bursts of ecstatic energy. She also has hyper-erotic disorder that she deals with by working in the porn industry. There she is able to channel her ecstatic impulses into performances of the highest caliber. When not working she packs high-dose marijuana suppositories in her vagina. They help level the load between gigs ...provided she doesn’t wind up in a psychiatric ward again. She admits she’s not your typical ‘porn chick’ and I believe it. Though she cannot always tell the difference between what's real and what’s not ...a reliable supply of pummeling sex helps her stay grounded. Judge for yourself (video interview).
If anyone knew the truth about Beth Risk’s home life they’d send her mother to jail and seventeen-year-old Beth God knows where. She protects her mother at all cost because with her, she has the freedom to do whatever the fuck she pleases. (Mei Melancon as Beth Risk)
Somehow we feel the political party most dedicated to dealing with foreign invaders (the Republican party) … would also be the best party to handle the spread of infectious disease (Ebola). It’s a myth along the lines of the ‘association fallacy’ in logic (the one that goes: 'John’s a good physicist …so he must also be a good auto mechanic'). I saw this at work during the 2014 election when I noticed how quickly the Ebola outbreak disappeared after the Republican Congress came into power. Also after the election, I heard an overzealous Republican from Montecito proudly proclaim: ‘Now we outta’ drop an Ebola bomb on ISIS …straighten them out too.’
The floors where Terry lives slope either one way or the other ...and the doors don’t sit right … cold air rushes in at night. “It used to be a surfboard shed” she says “but I don’t complain, the rent is cheap and I can hear sea-lions barking.” We’re eating cereal and drinking licorice tea on the wooden porch in front of the house that's in front of the shed where she lives. I see surfers covered with tattoos staring at us from across the street. Terry tells me to ignore them ...they’re usually tweaked. Say’s her neighbor Julie’s probably been bad-mouthing her again. I ask about her mother. “She's relentless …keeps tellin’ me I dress in skid-row fashion …going out to dinner is slow torture …she keeps bitching ‘bout the way I eat …says I got absorption problems ...probably not getting enough lithium in my diet or something.” I laugh and say “You mean calcium?” She goes “Yeah, that could be it ...kinda’ hard to tell when I stop listening.” I tell her lithium is a mood-stabilizer. She goes: “It’s probably lithium then ...” and we laugh. Later we go see Juanita who makes killer quesadillas and appreciates it when Terry tutors her kids.
“The strangest thing about this is that a thought can go on and on circling your mind, that you can’t stop obsessing over it, that there are no brakes to apply to things you no longer want to think about. In normal life, you distract yourself — pick up a newspaper, go out for a walk, turn on the television, phone somebody up. You can throw your mind into a sop, trick yourself into thinking you’re all right, that the thing that’s been haunting you is resolved. It won’t work for long, of course — an hour, two hours if you’re lucky — because nobody’s that stupid and because these things always come back to you when you’re once more idle and distractionless. In the small, dark hours of the night, when you’re being rocked into blank-mindedness on a bus. The problem with being like this is that you are constant prey to these exhausting cycles of thought.” - Maggie O'Farrell
Psychopathy: patient exhibits complete disregard for what other members of the asylum think and feel ..including what she thinks and feels herself .
For a young adult/science fiction novel I found it a pretty satisfying read. Kali confronts challenges posed by her family, school and forces of the supernatural. It contains elements of Hinduism (Shiva), Greek Mythology (Ouroboros) and Shakespeare (tragedy). So I guess you can see what gets me off. It manages to do so with a shitload of humor and intrigue.
I'm surprised. I’m not usually interested in reading books about werewolves. This one fascinates me. Here, the wolves have the power to extend their perception by seeing and hearing out of the eyes and ears of the other members of the pack … as well as the ability to communicate telepathically ...an ability that Ethologists say helps coordinate the pack while running and hunting.Their behavior is guided by the ‘felt-presence’ of other pack members in the mind: dominant members occupy the foreground while fellow members reside on the periphery. ‘Resilience’ (the ability to recover quickly) … can also mean the ability to rebel and overcome these internalized ‘social hierarchies’. The main character Bronwyn can telepathically ‘rewire’ and form independent, non-hierarchical bonds in others. It enables her to recruit new loyalties at will … and form a breakaway state from the rest of the pack. A human quality not shared by members of the wolf pack. A supernatural psycho-social thriller … a rebellion against tyrannical power structures … a most excellent read!
“If you know the enemy and know yourself, you need not fear defeat. If you know yourself but not the enemy, for every victory gained you will also suffer a defeat. If you know neither the enemy nor yourself, you are assured defeat in every battle.” - Sun Tzu
The war in Iraq started with a misconception showing how little we knew the enemy. The outcome was unpredictable. ISIS is the result. Our response to ISIS has been divisive. We’ve attacked ourselves, accused the Commander in Chief of complicity and perpetuated myths instead of promoting unity and understanding. Trump is the result.
I started skateboarding when: I was 14. I was a super-tomboy. I would hang out with all the guys, and they would teach me tricks. I fell in love with it because: I got to be part of something, but it was still my own thing. I could do it when I was hanging out with my friends, or go home and mess around by myself. Goofy (right-foot forward) or regular (left-foot forward)? Both! I ride regular but do my tricks goofy. Most badass trick: I can kickflip a three stair, which is when you leap off three steps, flip the board, and then land. Other tricks: Ollie, nose slide, 180, 360, jump—in all combinations. I love making up tricks. After I got into the sport: I would notice chicks on skateboards, and I would be like, "Ah, they're so cool." Then I realized: I'm like them! Skateboard count: Five. Favorite board: The first one I completely designed myself—I bought the deck, the trucks, and the bearings. I wrote quotes and stuff on it, like the skateboarder in Clueless. I like to look at my old board and see what I was thinking then. When I ride: I can get my head right. You know how some people meditate? This is my version.
Donald Trump sounds awfully mean-spirited to me. A lot of people I know are pissed and identify with him though. They are generally hard-working people who barely make a middle-class living. They have a chip on their shoulder for those they consider responsible: educated people, immigrants and government. That makes them mean-spirited too. They identify government as the problem and believe bigger government is the solution, which hardly sounds Republican to me. However, Trump echoes these sentiments by promising higher walls and sweeping laws. He is an empire-builder with an autocratic leadership style. I’m reminded that corporations are not democracies ... they're managed more like dictatorships, which brings to mind martial law and re-education camps ... which are designed to make me behave more like a loyal employee.
