and that's way too sad and weird to contemplate, so here's my attempt at writing a short and sweet blog.
ok, not sweet. nothing about my life has been particularly sweet lately.
my last post was jan 2010. i was still married then, but not for much longer. i was in the kitchen putzing around. i can't remember that exact day, but i do remember the feel. we lived in a mobile home, and the kitchen was kinda dark and kinda pokey, but it had a nice window and the table was comfy, and i could have my coffee and a piece of toast and sit at the kitchen table and blog.
which is not what's happening today, but i don't feel like going into all the details. short and sweet, my husband and i grew apart, as people do, and went our separate ways. i'm living in my travel trailer on a property in morgan hill, and trying to get rid of most of the crap i own. my life has winnowed down to this moment (you know, winnowing? that process where you toss the chaff in the air and the wind blows it away and you're left with just the wheat bits? no? ok, look at this...) and the sad bit is, it hasn't finished winnowing yet.
this is not going to be a funny post. please do not look for humor here. i'm aware that angst is boring, but i'm writing this possibly as much for me as for you. read or not. i like you and i want you here, but these are the words that need to be said, and you may not find yourself entertained.
here's the basic issue: i was functional. i had my problems, but they were hidden away. i struggled, and generally succeeded, in maintaining the look of someone a lot more mainstream than i ever actually was.
i'm weird. i don't fit anywhere. i talk too loud, i laugh too loud, my conversation is usually about stuff that doesn't make sense to most people, and i don't want to drive a new car and/or live in a new house. i'm 48, i'm an intensely sexual being, i have multiple piercings, i want tattoos, or at least more henna, and i think everything has a soul. i even talk to my truck like he's alive. well, he is, but that's another story.
i'm reminded of hasan elahi, who was harrased after his name was accidentally added to the us watch list. his response? since they were so interested in where he was going and what he was doing, he took pictures of everything. yes. EVERYTHING. (well, not THAT, but he does take pictures of every bathroom he visits, every meal he eats, every airport...) his website is here. his ted speech is here. brilliant. just brilliant.
his thought: if you don't define yourself, others will do it for you. he called it "being forced to take my identity into my own hands".
so my problem was, and remains, that i don't really know who i am. trite, yes, i know, and a vastly over-scrutinized theme. take the words literally. i don't know who i am.
i have many different definitions i can apply, but none of them fit. like my religion, i don't have a name for who i am. i'm not even sure why i need to define myself.
another point i like about hasan's blitz of personal information - you can spend all day going through his website, and still only have a rudimentary knowledge of who he is and what his life is like.
wow. not short and sweet at all.
ok, i'm going to end this here for today, as i need to go eat something and get ready for work.
who am i? i'm not someone who fits within the parameters of "normal american woman". i get tension from family and friends as a result of this. i am in a constant state of tension now, as i attempt to reduce the components of my life down to a bare minimum, and to redefine myself in a way that allows me to live a simple, peaceful life. this desire is earning me resistance, sometimes very derogatory resistance, from family and friends, in a way i can't understand, and i need to understand it.
'nuff said for now. toodles, y'all...
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