last night i practiced touching my mattress to let the names fall out of my fingers, through the padding, past the frame to the wooden floor where i could see them scurry away.

during the day i felt a little off. remembered sitting in the sailboat with deb and having her say, you know everyone loves you. and the despair that followed even though i held her face while we were crying. because love didn't matter or make a difference or carry any meaning for me at that moment. not at all. not even a little.

people can empty out words sometimes, like they were a container.

and once i remembered the despair coupled with those words, i started crying even though i was waiting at the busstop. i was very startled to find myself crying. haven't done that for some time. i think it's just that wondering about when everyone leaves and i will miss them, but how much the missing will matter.

i never really recovered from that horrible time in my life three years ago. it took some foundation away from me, and i never replaced it but learned instead to hang up above the sky the space under grass between stars in a few brushing musical notes that make. and hear more thoroughly everyone else's language of body of loss of joy of family of care of learning of listening and of change and strange integrities. and if that sounds good, it's because it finally is.

but once i started crying, and once it startled me, i couldn't quite convince myself to stop. crying and feeling a bit sad was okay, maybe nice even, not horrifying not great, but strangely nice.

last night i practiced changing names into creatures, names into sounds that shuffle off into the night.

i've decided recently that checking in on the websites/blogs of folks i don't communicate with anymore is just a bad idea. the line between stalking, which yes, and trying to distance via a strange abstract and anonymous knowledge & kindness, well, it was a thought, and i think it helped for awhile, but i would like instead now to pay attention to people i can talk to. will talk to.

and if this decision wasn't enough, i today compounded my realization through lack of self-will and plenty of error. just read this on the blog of one of the girls i don't speak to: "if lk hadn't been so obnoxious those 12 or so months ago and subsequently quit speaking to me (hopefully out of shame for her ridiculousness?), i would tell her to read [some book], perhaps send her a copy."

now, can't say that i'm lk, because those aren't both of my initials. but can say that i subsequently quit speaking to this person 12 or so months ago. maybe it's another person who made the same decision as me at roughly the same time, can't say i blame her. such interesting interpretations of shame, ridiculousness, and obnoxiousness out there really.

but this highlights what i mean about the bad bad idea of checking in sometimes. because i want to argue or defend myself. i want to read into someone else's initials. i want this person to wake up, open her own fucking eyes or better yet imagination. but why?

one of the blessings of my life is that lately i've been able to understand that if it wasn't good for me, it's okay to say fuck off sometimes, or go away, or so on and etc, better in fact if you say it in person and out loud because nobody else is going to stand up for you, nobody else is going to value you enough or just the right amount, nobody else can be counted on to see your perspective, so it's up to you to defend it, stake it out, listen to others of course but never ever ever ever try to give up your own perspective simply because you can see someone else's.

and another of the blessings of my life is the desire for peace, not the i forgive you forgive me kind of peace, but the i won't takes jabs at you, judge you, or call you Evil peace because words have power whereas silence exists in the fifth and sixth dimensions.

but i also know beyond a doubt that what we don't know about other people's experiences of hell is what we don't know about ourselves.

i do believe i will stop being naked on my couch with smoothly shaven legs. i do believe the names are crawling away. i do believe that web stalking is for stupid people (namely myself), and i do believe that the sun comes soonly, and that chemicals will change as a result.