DEMONS

it's really just very frightening and depressing to love someone who has only got one foot in this world. well, it may be more than one foot but it's certainly, still, less than two solid feet. and it's not her fault, fault is irrelevant. i have not lost any respect for her, if anything, i have more. addiction is a disease. would you marry someone with HIV? i mean, if they were your true love! last summer, i began to look at it like that. there are times i think (and maybe i'm being melodramatic) that it's my fate only to suffer terrible loss and always be alone, and that i make choices in that direction. but more grounded people remind me that i don't know what the future holds, and must try to have hope and faith no matter what. basically, it's back to taking things day by day, and ignoring fear, and trying to live in the moment. but i do make some choices toward being alone, that much is true. i have lived alone here in NYC (Brooklyn) for almost 10 years! and my family lives in MN and PA. but i do not want to be without Michelle. i want her to live with me and to thrive. i want her to realize all her dreams and goals. and i know she wants the same for me.

i re-read The Master and Margarita last week, by Bulgakov. this week i've started DEMONS, by Dostoevsky, my favorite writer of all time.

what else have i have to say? not much, i guess. just wanted you to know that i did not (in this order) deny god's existence, kill myself, and go straight to hell in a hand basket. :)

ps. new coping strategy when feelings about landfills and pollution become overwhelming: imagine that in landfills, unbeknownst to humankind, plastic will serve a special chemical function where it will one day cause everything to explode and form new planets with life on them while ours (Earth) expires. also, sending mental messages to each component of my trash, like, "I'm sorry you carrot tops have to be encased in a plastic bag, but eventually you will become melded with the other kinds of trash in this bag and will, in total, be transformed into a solid nugget of bagged energy. However, i know you feel like you're choking on the plastic and that you would prefer to be in a garden compost, so I'm really, truly sorry. And you were such good carrots. And thank you for your nutrients and thank you for existing." these kind of thoughts and messages help me deal with my guilt and my distress over the ongoing and relatively rapid death of our planet Earth.

pps. the other day, i found this book online called, "The Mennonite Martyrs," and was immediately interested because those are my ancestors, and apparently they were martyred in Russia! the thing is, for many years i've been interested in Russia, Russian literature, exile, camps, (it started with an interest in the Holocaust), etc. - but i didn't know why i'm so interested, except for morbid reasons. (i read books about these subjects independently, not in school.) then last year, my dad told me that our own ancestors were among those persecuted during the Bolshevik Revolution, and that's why they came to America. i don't know why nobody really mentioned this to me before, or if i just wasn't paying attention. Anyways, I previewed the book on google and saw that there is even one martyr in the book with my last name, Wiens! and also one with my grandmother's maiden last name, Wall... i bought the book right away and it was delivered to me at work, yesterday.

my grandfather was named Henry Peter Wiens and his father was Peter Wiens. i think they were both ministers/pastors, at least my grandpa definitely was one, just like the martyrs in this book. he died in Mountain Lake, MN., about 20 years ago. finding out these connections between my interests and my actual ancestry makes me wonder about instincts... like, what and who we are instinctively attracted to...

most Americans have no idea about their ancestors. This is not just true for descedents of slaves, although that's the most obvious case, but for so-called white people too. You're lucky if you even know something basic like, "Well, I'm German, or Irish." I always thought I was German too, and apparently I am, but it's more complicated than that. I don't exactly understand. My mother's side is just *German*, that's all I know about it. I don't know when or why they came to America. My dad's side is the Mennonite side, and they were also German, at least they spoke German (my grandma still does) and eat German food. But it's a fact that for several generations, at least, they lived in Russia / The Ukraine / Siberia / somewhere around there... I guess no one can really explain the whole story to me. I'm sure my ancestors could not imagine a modern gal like me, although perhaps some great, great, great aunt or uncle looked just like me, or felt like I do. I wish I could continue the bloodline. Hopefully, I will bequeath something else to this world other than flesh and blood.