Living underground so much of the time

When I first moved to New York City, I did not like riding on the subway at all. Well, honestly I didn't really like the city at all. It did not feel exciting and invigorating to me, but absolutely overwhelming, bleak, depressing, and disorienting. Of course this was one month after 9/11, and I came knowing almost nothing and no one, but so do many people who move here. I had visited my older sister in the Bronx, so I was familiar with the Fordham area, and had been to a few gay bars in the city, and the most common neighborhoods once or twice (Greenwich village, Times Square, etc), also stayed with a friend in Brooklyn a couple times, so Park Slope not a totally new place either. I had one friend, who I broke up with very quickly and my older sister moved to Chicago, then I was really alone. Anyway, I was in a perpetual panic attack for the first year, alternating with crying fits. I was scared on the trains because I didn't know uptown from downtown or how to get anywhere, and felt like I stood out and everyone knew how green I was. For job interviews (I sent out resumes within three days of arrival, actually that's all I did for a while besides work a temporary catering job), I had to bust out my subway map and concentrate very hard on the gridlike nature of the city layout, which obviously doesn't work downtown. I realized right away that my clothes were all wrong, but I didn't have any money. I ate a lot of fried rice, nutella, pizza, or nothing at all, and I drank Olde English or Colt 45 to knock myself out at night. What I really wanted was a job at a record label and a place to sing. Eventually I did achieve these things (although the label fired me after two years), but at the time they seemed almost impossible, but I just had to try. I was calling every record label in the yellow pages, literally, and asking questions that people hang up on, and getting people who only spoke spanish, and fake interviews, and dead ends. I went to Universal and tried to give my resume to a security guard. All kinds of stupid shit. All wearing the wrong clothes. I felt very ashamed but I only once considered going home to my parents in Minnesota where I knew I would kill myself from boredom and a sense of defeat. Plus I couldn't afford the u-haul to get there after a week or two (I came with five hundred dollars). Anyway, the point is the subway. One night after working my job as an operator for a medical answering service, which was the 2nd shift (4:30 to 11:30pm), I dreamed that I was in a subway car that pulled into a station full of corpses, and I knew it was all the people who had died in the city during the night. They were laid out on the platform and hanging from the ceiling. I was horrified and closed my eyes, but the car stalled and just sat there.

THE GREATEST

Well hello, good morning and happy Monday. I just came back from the bathroom where I discovered my underwear are on inside-out. That's because I was taking the old sinky ones off and putting the clean but stained ones on as Misch was coming and going in the room, and I felt embarrassed. hehe. I didn't want her to get a look at my cellulitis thighs out of context. Isn't the above picture adorable? All the pictures of her are totally die-for cute, especially if they show the teeth.

The above picture is Misch having bad posture on the uncomfortable futon couch when she first arrived for the marathon-love weekend. I wish the first thing I said wasn't "you smell like an ashtray" but hopefully all the other things on the tip of my tongue, such as "sit down and hold still I'm going to smother you with pent-up angel-lust," and "I hope you don't mind if I lick your face" etc etc were evident in my desperate attempts to act normal especially with my roomate around to see the changes come over me (I begin to talk, make eye contact, laugh, etc).

Fortunately my roomate was a little distracted because she finally found someone!!! And he was coming over too. He is a very handsome, tall, young (24 to her 36 years old) black gentleman who wears nailpolish, eyeliner, and skirts, so in other words all her greatest dreams and fantasies come true, which is exactly how I feel. So our apartment went from being the doomsday smokers den to an actual happy place this weekend! There was music in every room, light, the kitties were happy, Tatiana was especially loving and not hiding under the bed or cutting or hissing at people, we cooked several times, just happy happy happy! Here's a picture of Mischa sitting down to the breakfast spread we put together. She made the chocolate chip banana pancakes (okay I supervised the flipping) and fruit salad and I made the chicken sausage omlets and guacamole.

The greatest contrast from our usual weekend mornings where my roomate and I don't speak or she bitches about everything that has offended her since I saw her last, we smoke weed and lay around feeling depressed or checking myspace and trying to get the energy to do laundry or at least get some food because we feel sick. Actually that way of life ended for me already, since Mischa saved me, but having the roomate happy too just brought the energy in the bachelorette, shotgun apartment to a whole new level. Here's Mischa sitting on the couch with Roxi and Tatiana. I think she's looking at notes for her little parenting class, I'm not sure.

Now I cannot stop fantasizing about the domestic bliss with Mischa, how we will both be good at cooking by then and only shop at Whole Foods and people will come over and also we have been doing yoga oh my god what if every weekend the gays came over for brunch after yoga?? Well we both have straight friends too but like I said to her you need a community because when you grow old you will not have your family in the same way other people do, even if they accept the gay factor or pretend to; you have to make a family with your friends.

See?? I got the vampire tooth in that one! That is my favorite. Probably Mischa and I will elope very quietly, but I do have fantasies about doing a Manson style wedding in a European castle just simply to see Misch dress up in tall boots and wearing some strict, black sort of ensemble (like the ones I pointed out in Vogue, Misch) and coming down a winding stair case and then bearing the vampire tooth for the cameras. I guess we don't have to get unioned to see this fantasy materialized, but if we did, it wouldn't even have to be in Europe - it could be on Halloween somewhere upstate, with winding, veiny tree branches and black cats and a full moon.

All have sin and fall short of the glory of God (Romans 3:23)

Oh yes Misch, I certainly read about the doh! decap - ahaha. Among so many ways to be executed by the state, hanging is a tried and true, but not without surprises, apparently. And like your typical politician, our president acts as if he's appalled. And in the newspaper certain writers also feign indignity, but it's fake. What if it was my body dropped to the fucking ground? Thump! I hate the idea personally. But objectively speaking, what is the difference what happens to your body once the spirit has been forcibly severed? Death, the great mystery. I also read that the executed men exhibited fear, unlike haughty Saddam. Would I exhibit fear? It's hard to say.

One question with regard to justice is always how severely a criminal (or sinner) deserves to be punished. "An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth" was actually devised as a way to make sure punishments were NOT too extreme, contrary to common understanding of that expression. But I wonder, if a man deserves to hang, why not decapitation also? If one deserves the death penalty, why not the most violent and painful one possible? Why do people care about how much a person suffers in that context? I often wonder this for convicts executed here in America also. If someone tortured, raped, and killed a family, or cops, prostitutes or teenages, children, whomever, don't they actually deserve to receive the same treatment? Why do they get the relaxing lethal injection? "Regular" people don't even usually get to die so peacefully.

Then the even greater question is whether anyone is completely innocent or guilty. Well that's not the question, because the answer is no. But most people think of themselves as fairly innocent, deserving good, nice things, and never deserving pain or brutality (in the worst case scenario). But consider this: obviously Saddam and company deserve death for killing Iraqi people (Kurds) with deadly gas aka "crimes against humanity". Then clearly the US government and all governments also deserve to suffer and die because they start and conduct wars that kill people, and also implement policies that hurt and indirectly kill people. And then the entire American people deserve it, simply for consistent, willfull blindness and selfishness and indifference with regard to treatment of the earth and entire contents of animal, plant, and human beings, plus financial advancement and benefit at the expense of everything and anyone, and for having depraved values (money and power). Then when I consider the "innocent people" killed in the twin towers, I think they were actually punished quite justly for crimes as accused by militant Muslims, who are right in their own way. Of course the "terrorists" and extreme religious "fanatics" aren't innocent either. So like the biblical quote in the title states, we all, including myself, deserve to die. On a rope? In a tower? On the street? While being robbed? .... no tears, no sympathy.

Sin lives in the heart and mind, and is manifest daily in actions and decisions made and not made. And the ten commandments actually do encompass every shade and gradation of sin, beginning with number one, God should come first in your life. If you consider God as including everyone and everything other than self, as the most detatched but inclusive form of LOVE, then this is the greatest definition of goodness and it is easy to see where each "regular" person falls short and deserves to be punished. Yes, the truth hurts. We all deserve to hang, and drop. Thump!

Christianity teaches that Jesus is/was God, born as a human being in order to die for our guilt, thereby absolving us of it. And he was executed by the state, of course, his death being the most famous historical example of the death penalty. Then by rising from the dead, he is said to have wiped the slate clean for each individual, and if we accept this truth we will be saved from the death sentence we deserve.

I'm not sure what to do with this information anymore. Sometimes I feel God uses me to punish other people, in very subtle ways, because I am relatively pure. Then I wish I was a real, technical virgin because I would have even more power of vengeance. Well, also because the sins I'm most interested in punishing in others are sexual sins. Then I think I should be like Jesus and accept punishment for others, and I allow myself to be abused. These are mostly fantasies.

I have to leave off on this subject for now. I have invoices to process, and other office tasks to complete. Here's a picture of Mischa, to cheer me up. My angel also has a divine sense of justice, even with no religious background, and that is one reason why I trust and respect her.

Number 1 Psycho Nurse, Mischita Karamasha: please tie me to my chair

Tonight the temperature drops to freezing. I haven't been outside of the office all day, but keep hearing reports about how cold it is getting. I have stayed inside, busy organizing files to perfection including all contained papers being folded into precise squares. Also, busy in my own mind, thinking of Nurse Karamasha making her rounds in the hospital.

I wish I was one of her patiens so that she would tie me to my chair and use the rubber gloves.

Oh and I think she will use them and do it eventually, in the room! But the mansion is years away. For now I have to content myself with pictures and stories in my mind, and tolerate the jealousy I feel that anyone else is even allowed to look at her or come into contact with her.

Jealousy: even of the drooling, wild, pee-their-pants geriatrics, or violent, turn-on-you, biting children. It isn't fair, that they should see her wearing (I'm guessing but uncertain, judging from the picture) the jeans that I got for her, and I cannot wrap my man-hands around the tiny thighs and scratch the fabric.

Anyway, enough about my obsession. (It's not really enough though, the desire is quite insatiable, which is a good ... no, a great thing, because where insatibility lurks, there lurks inspiration, my water).

Last night I dreamed that I was at Saddam Hussein's execution. First I was next to the hangman, and I was thinking about how he seemed pretty nice, and about all the people they said volunteered to do the job, and how he won. He was a very large, shirtless, white man, typical. Then I was in the small crowd facing the scaffold. There were three men on the platform, like Jesus' execution, although I learned today that my imagination was correct, and Saddam was not executed alone either. A line of guards stretched stage right, and I heard them chanting mumbai-something, just like I read in the paper, that they chanted the opposition group's name while he was hanged. I felt curious about the business at hand, but not appalled or happy or any other strong emotion. I was just surprised that anybody could watch, and I thought about how they used to televise electrocutions.

I'm not sure what my dream meant, well obviously a sense of peace with and observation of some judgement recently made. Although it has nothing to do with the dream, I will use this opportunity to note that the execution of Saddam Hussein was absolutely wrong and hypocritical, as are all implementations of any sort of death penalty by state. It made me sick. It's not that I felt sorry for him, I don't give two fucks about his happiness or any pain experienced. He deserved to suffer. But it would only have been justice if an innocent party had punished him, and there is no innocent government, certainly not ours, not the Iraqi government either, no one in a position of power or with something to gain from it.

MLK Day, a time to reflect

Ah yes, here is a photo of the man in action. It is something really special when a good man or woman speaks up and the people love them. Of course the people loved MLK! I get a similar feeling when I see people reading Barack Obama's book. His very face gives me the thrill and chill that great leaders do. So I think he will run, be elected, and totally get assasinated. They kill anyone good. Also, as I pointed out to Misch last weekend, isn't it crazy to think about 1.) people actually using drinking fountains, and 2.) using them so much that they had to agree to separate by race?? Of course they didn't really agree. But imagine now, "excuse me where's the Black water fountain?" Or, "get the hell away from our water fountain, use your own!" Everyone has bottled water now. (Take a moment to reflect on the constantly deepening landfills full of un-recycled bottles).

Also today people should be thinking about whether things are better or worse for the "Negro" people now that fourty years or so have passed. Actually, scratch that don't waste your time, I'll answer it for you. It's a combination. Some things better (you probably won't get hung by your balls for fucking a white girl if you're a man plus companies advertise to Blacks and they have a couple TV shows or whatever), some things the same (still probably end up in jail or dead if you're a man), and some things worse (crack, cancer, AIDS).

When a real tragedy occurs, such as MLK being killed, shouldn't the world just STOP?? When the worst happens, the totally unjust act, shouldn't God intervene? If it was a movie, something would have to make it turn into a happy ending. So when the tragedy happens, ye of little faith become atheists (because God SHOULD intervene).

We all have to admit that the worst has already happened. The innocent people have already been tortured and cut up in pieces and forgotten and won't be in the newspaper and it doesn't matter if they are in the newspaper because it's impossible to care about everyone, so no one really cares. The virgins are violently ruined; Nixzmary is dead; MLK is dead; Ghandi is dead; Bush the Evil Fuckwit from Hell was elected twice (and if not technically elected, too close for comfort, this is America, Americans did it); Nelson Mandela was put in jail and now he's dead. Of course Mandela was able to do a lot of good in his life too, it's not that good cannot be accomplished or does not exist. MLK also achieved great things out of love for the people. But basically it comes down to this: good never has and will never trump evil.













Soooo .... from the moment of this realization it's a smooth, easy slide into nihilism!! But unfortunately I was raised to believe in Jesus, and although I no longer believe his crucifixion and/or resurrection truly atone for all the wrong in the world I do see the strength of his self-sacrifice as a symbol, therefore I will never and can never stop trying to know God even so far as each religion contains one part of the whole truth, so Jesus is part of the answer that I must find to these questions: how do I, or how should I fill the time alotted to me? Is there any point in trying to be good and do good when the game is already over? Do things in the present matter at all compared with the past? For most people, the past doesn't matter, it doesn't even exist, but it seems the opposite to me: the present is just a charade (cave of shadows?) or residue (I've used that word before to describe this idea).

To reiterate, there are aleady so many past wrongs that cannot be set right, and tragedy occurring right now that will never and can never be made up for in the future. But I cannot do the slide into nihilism, because it's wrong and because I have felt love, and I still feel it. Probably I do not feel it as strongly for the things or people others seem to love, but I cry and my heart beats for silenced dead people including Nixzmary and bums and hookers, also babies that play and laugh, and my majestic feline pet who looks at me with an intense, jealous or adoring gaze, and finally my beautiful, magical, tricky, pretty and handsome, fun and funny, scary and soothing, wiry, scrappy and strong, hot and cold, and oh so sweet future wife who also happens to share initials with Martin Luther King, my angel MLK:

HOPEFULLY M.LEILA.K WILL NOT MAKE ME DELETE THIS ADORABLE PICTURE EITHER ..... xxx ..... and here's a picture of her brand new tattoo, twinship:

Fixated on your id

Yesterday I proposed to Mischa that from now on I act as her superego. I suggested this for several reasons. One reason is it really looks fun to me. And I think I'd be good at it. I enjoy berating myself quite a bit and I know exactly what her naughty little id needs to hear. Also, I think her superego needs a break every now and then. Who better to take over than me? Plus I just want to get as close as possible to her id, the most exciting one I have ever encountered, and what better way to get in there besides the pain and punishment? This will only be a temporary and intermittent exercise. And it can only happen in the special superego room. The room, we decided, will just have a treadmill, where I can scream at Mischa to walk faster and longer and call her fat when she gets tired and remind her of the junk food she ate especially cookies (bad). Also I'll have a notebook where I read off all the mistakes she made throughout the day or week, and mock her and ridicule her for them. I suppose I need to let her try being my superego every once in awhile, but I am afraid. I think she might be too good at it. Plus she would probably try to burn me or cut me or something, yikes. You can see in those eyes that she could be cruel, can't you?
But after spending time in the superego room, perhaps we will refresh in the yoga room, and chant ourselves out of all three parts of consciousness, and after that go swimming and pretend it's the womb and be reborn. Infinite possibilities, and infinite pink hearts for Mischa, the most beautiful mind ever trapped behind glowing, frantic black pupils and a trembling brow.

Eyes are not a window to the soul but I can see yours anyway