72

City Keds washed. Walking into town for an ice cream wearing three different shades of what's technically still white. No undies on to dare my late cycle to come. I wear anything around here. That's how I know I'm Home. Within me. Out here. And then there’s my teeth. Shade four. Missed my cleaning on Wilshire, a short walk from Los Angeles home #4: Nest. Boy was the receptionist saucy about it all. Sorry I live in Maryland man. Have referred so many patients to you and it's okay, I’ll find a cleaning over on this coast. Take a big bite. HQ in all the ways. First mammogram in October. Umpteenth pap. Saw a dermatologist today. Systems. Gotta mix in a pedicure. Veggies for the juicer when I pick up a rare Rx. Eggs and english muffins, my staples. Get up and work and then that 11am breakfast sandwich hits the spot. I’ll eat and drink anything but don’t often do prescriptions. Messy violent doctor and nurse ruled the roost but honestly I am over all of that. This year was the year. My year of feeling all my feelings. There will be more and they will be new. Mom and Dad are moving a town over from Easton. New construction on the water. Dad asked me to go take a look at the place, give him my read. I like it. Have ideas. A good house for a dog and a nice neighborhood to start biking again. Work on his gut. Dad's getting a bike and a dog. We'll have this talk, but if he ever hurts that dog, I'll raise a ruckus. Forgive and forget, forgetting just enough not to be an idiot. Our poor dog growing up. All of us, but me and that dog took it hard. Terrified me when I had to take Adley on his walk, b a d Adley, short for Adirondack. He grew more unhinged over the years, and of course he did. When Dad had to put him down, he buried his ashes under a tree in the backyard and drank a bottle of vodka sobbing. Wouldn't come in for dinner. Love is a confounding force of nature that I'll never stop wanting to know more about. An engineer wants to know how everything works. So here. My left hip* has been sore for quite some time. During what’s left of this alchemical sabbatical, I’m aiming to reverse all bodily habits to the other side. The patterns I catch. Hold the phone in my right hand, so holding it in my left. Put the phone in my right back pocket, so in my left. Cross one leg over the other. Wait, no, the other. Things like that. Criss cross apple sauce reversed for eyes closed. That’s how it goes but balance isn’t harmony even though seeking said balance promotes harmonic calibration. Until I loose it days back into the Los Angeles school year. Or I won't. Hand rolls and new ideas. The radio<3 Art theaters with cocktails<3 Spiritual rewrites.

In town to order one scoop of Mocha Toffee Crunch in a cup. Not what I thought I would get. Tricky to not pick the yet unscooped flavor, such a freak like that. Try to look away when they shake the water off the scooper. Sit in the square and write the above. Stroll home to edit my world’s longest manuscript. Class ended a few weeks ago. I was a good gIRL mess and transcribed 19 lectures (2 x 9 + 1 bonus car class) + other odds and ends that I have to deal with now. I’m not awesome at finishing, anything. AND change promotes, provokes, devotes change! This blog made it thru a whole year, most deserving of an imaginary holiday. I roasted beets this afternoon, red and golden with four cloves of smashed garlic and tonight had some of them over good pasta with lots of parsley and a little bit of grated honey gouda. The local grocery store put out all these little tastes of cheese, packaged for sale, portioned for single shoppers. Nice cheeses, imported slivers wrapped for a dollar or two. Precious, so a bit of a random dinner with that cheese, or better yet, cheese with that dinner, but worked. But. I bit the inside of my lip bad. Left some crunch in those roasted beets and walking home I keep sucking on the bite mark. The cold ice cream made it feel better and now I'm sucking the salty blood in my sticky mouth. Makes me conjure dirty thoughts 2. and others, like how honestly amazing it is that anything heals. You’ll have this persistent ache or pain and 1. day you forget about it because it’s not there anymore. The forgetting — or the gone? Chicken or the egg SANDWICH? I'm not yet famous for my breakfast sandwiches. This not yet patented technique of melting salted butter in the cast iron skillet. Split the muffin and crack an egg in between. Cooking create an accordion primed for inserts. Leftover roasted beets, still with some crunch, chew careful. Parsley, avocado, and carrot kimchi. No sheep's milk honey gouda this morning after milk in my twin cappuccinos. And ice cream tonight. I'm a farmer.

Home. Bins in. Hands washed. Pitcher of lemon water. I’m bleeding so it worked. Mom, I'm so sorry, but magic is real. It's hard to be a human and impossible to be a woman (proof: watch Barbie) but I do like my cycle. I like the compassion circles create. I hang up all the clothes that are down after the coming and going from the city. I gambled, washing a dry clean only piece only to loose the bet. I'll still wear it. It being a jacket covered with fish with button eyes. The hot pink trim was the red herring. Scoop of magnesium into the bottom of a fresh glass, pour over the lemon water and chug. Refill. Chug. Refill 4. bedside. Shitter. Have the second tv perched in my bedroom for summer movie nights with the boys and right now realize my go-to hang out position is semi-reclined with my left hip splayed. Jupiter's expansion, legs making the number 4, but shit that's the source of the pain. Le Pendu. Gotta knock that off because this left hip needs a breather or it shall keep shooting pain waves down my left leg. A nuisance on trains and planes. I wake up throughout the night realizing I sleep all left hip open. Have I done this since I was a baby? A declared intent of mine is to partner with a badass body worker when back in Los Angeles. Survival vs. HQ. My body needs way more body work than I give to her. I've been keeping her juiced up though. Another hot party trick is to buy a real watermelon and scoop all the flesh from the rind and blend it with a few ice cubes. Pretty, tasty. sets you right. 

Los Angeles is my faithful friend.

Los Angeles is my faithful friend.

Los Angeles is my faithful friend.

Los Angeles is my faithful friend.

Los Angeles is my faithful friend.

Los Angeles is my faithful friend.

Los Angeles is my faithful friend.

Los Angeles is my faithful friend.

Los Angeles is my faithful friend.

My body luvs life in Los Angeles!

My body luvs life in Los Angeles!

My body luvs life in Los Angeles!

My body luvs life in Los Angeles!

My body luvs life in Los Angeles!

My body luvs life in Los Angeles!

My body luvs life in Los Angeles!

My body luvs life in Los Angeles!

My body luvs life in Los Angeles!

Serious Synchronicity Smoothes

Shit. I write with my left foot perched up on the chair. Learning to write during pandemic homeschooling all my jeans split under the left cheek and I wasn't sure why just that side when both sides of my bum look proportionate in the mirror. It's so not the same on the other side.

lick

Mobile Wallpaper
4
U

64

from
The Ashes of Drafts
exactly 1 month ago
👣

Old Sole Sandwich of Emotional Sobriety

b-read

meet

le pain

Ro is ten and about to graduate from the 5th grade. Our feet are the same size. I looked it up, and a youth size 5 is the same length as a women's size 7. I have worn a size 7 shoe since the 7th grade. Seventh grade is the last time I grew in height as well. I was and am 5 foot, 4 and a half inches tall, although I say five-five 4 ease. Ro is 4 foot 11.

Ro is a tense, in many ways, young man. I have rubbed his feet and body since he was small; his brother's too. Ro is loudly dramatic, emotes all sorts of sounds during, then after curls in my lap where I stroke his ears like he's a kitten-boy. He's my baby. And he has always been a serious guy.

On the rub above ⌃ I used a little jar of Dragon Balm, picked up when I last saw my NYC herbalist. The packaging is way chic. Ro said his heels were what really hurt, and they often do, he'll walk on tippy toes, though I felt the knot stemming from the ball of his foot. Up and under the ball, most inside there. I massaged with icy-hot as much as he would allow before tucking him into his makeshift bed on the floor. No cots available here. Shea will do anything to sleep beside me whereas his brother likes his space. So I washed my hands to play with Ro's hair and be gentle-gentle on his ears before a night next to Shea, super kitten-like.

FOOT PROBLEMS

Fear of the future
and of not stepping forward in life.

"I move forward in life,
with joy and with ease."

You Can Heal Your Life

by Louise Hay

The night I snapped these shots ⌃ we were in Los Angeles, at a SureStayⓇ close to the boys' baseball practice park. Ro said it's called SureStayⓇ because people leave the park and say, with some sense of defeat, "Sure, I'll stay here." We stayed there to test locational convenience > all else — testing a theory for my inevitable (part-time?) return. Would-We-Could-We rent a dumpy Dingbat Apartment within walking distance of their private school in The Valley? Morning smoothies 2go and A Regular Mom wearing stretch pants? This Mom would meditate at the school chapel before the student (parents welcome) morning service. A quick power walk home carrying three dirty 2go cups. The Dingbat would have to have a pool to combat roasting alive. One thing might lead to another and maybe I would submit to being who their father thinks he wants me to be when I am being A Los Angeles Mom. Antidepressants and a desk job is doable, or it's not. I could spend my entire salary on childcare thanks to asinine school and baseball schedules.
C☸G-M☸M-I-Am.

The writer's strike was and is still going on. A group of striking writers marched outside of Television CityⓇ holding signs asking all the cars to "HONK IN SUPPORT". Much honking, next to the park and across from the SureStayⓇ, ceasing at 5:00 PM on the ⏺

HooooonK H00000nK just like the geese I saw as my first heroic dose of mushrooms kicked in. I heard these geese before I saw them in the sky. I prayed, show me you, please let me see you, as some sign "I GOT THIS". Yes, spied in a clearing through the trees, thank you. And when I looked down again I spotted a real marigold who had sprouted up inside the enclosed garden. The ⁕ had not been there in the morning. A day of the dead converging with a night flight home is pretty cool stuff.

I share energy karma with Ro. Hypervigilance like a crazy person that I forget about until it stares back at me. This is how your son feels. This is his tightness. You must work harder to absolve the root pain. The shape-shifting fire seems to jump onto the Eastern European thrifted (long) frock I wore as ceremonial garb. Real ticks climbed aboard my sinking ship (pooling).


"Am I on fire?"

"Only on the inside," answered Luar. He was night flight tripping with me as a guide. Gunshots and dog barks freaking as the light faded in the country.

We sat in a circle on his partner Lydia's land. Daughter & Father & Mother per design of the set & setting. "Lydia, do you have a fire extinguisher?" She laughs, "I'm a run with scissors gal." Grip less and surrender more to the apocalypse only after Spirit reminds me I bought menopausal Iris her first automobile fire extinguisher for any please-no hot flashes — and Iris is dutifully parked close by, at my back. "Go off," she nudges. Chemical-glazed, bug-laden. All of me and everywhere putrid. All the bugs killed from pesticides. My embroidered hemline smoking. They said I held myself as still and quiet as anything.


I scheduled 🍄🍄🍄🍄🍄 before my last boy-time visit in Los Angeles and imbibed after, a weepy heap exhausted with carrying panic everywhere I go and back and forth all year. Feeling poisoned by 1 place and seeking the antidote in the other, but that cannot be right or is it? Put it down, for Ro. Sabbatical midterms in the Virginian backwoods. I passed and get to go for 126 more days.

2 Sandwiches I Enjoyed A Lot

On My Latest Boy-Time Visit in Los Angeles

despite the heavy backpack labeled PANIC

1.

Cold Meatloaf Sandwich

@ Clementine

cheesy meatloaf

sliced and topped with caramelized onions

iceberg lettuce

and our special 10,000 lakes dressing

on country white bread

$17.25

2.

Spiced Tofu Banh Oui

@ BANH OUI

crispy marinated tofu

chickpea spread

pickled carrot

daikon

cucumber

cilantro

mint

scallion

kewpie

pickled Fresno chili

served on a French roll

$13.00

P.S. Ro graduated wearing a beautiful medium blue suit with a pale blue shirt that we picked out together, and navy Vans size 6! purchased with dad. He said Vans run small, so they're the size equivalent to Nike's size 5 1/2, and his dad got him a fresh pair of those too. Ro has already packed them for his summer with me and Shea in Maryland. Gorgeous barn cat-boys.

u can heel ur life

45

,

I went out to the farm today with my third cousin who's kind of like an uncle figure, which is sweet, being that I inherited the farm from an uncle. And, it's pouring rain. My car is at the shop attempting to pass a Maryland inspection, which I thought, well, of course she would pass, then failed for three reasons. But I didn't know that then. And we're out at the farm, and we're driving, and he's like: I'm worried we're gonna get stuck. It's really rainy. And I'm like: We're not going to get stuck. And then, right as we said that, we realized we were stuck. So he calls his son, who happens to be in town, and I call the neighbor. I have neighbors on both sides. I know the one neighbor better than the other, and he's a landscaper, so I figure he has something, as we're not that stuck. And he comes over with his tractor. [A cigarette between his lips.] It's so funny — the men — they don't say anything to each other. They don't even make eye contact. My neighbor has a tow rope thing. It's not a rope, but I don't know what it is. It's like a band. Not a bungee — a canvas tow band? Hands it to my cousin, who just buckles it up. And they just, they just do this thing. And I'm watching them and I'm videotaping it because I'm still so tickled that it's a Tuesday and this is what I'm doing. So he just gives a tug and the car comes and they're not talking and they're not saying anything.

I don't know where it came from... old programming, most likely... but I say to my neighbor: Well, now I'm going to have to cook you dinner. And he says: And I don't have a problem with that. And he gets back in the tractor and we get back in the car and we go on with our day.

l
a
t  o  d  a  y
e
r  e  p  o  r  t  I N g

Hey,

I guess I'm just really, I'll say the word realizing, but what I really mean, is settling into — accepting — the fact that I'm always going to love you. I always have and I have to accept that I always will. Until, maybe, I won't? But that love — there's nothing to do with It. I'm a doer, and there's nothing to do. It's not broken. It doesn't need to be fixed. And It doesn't need to be experienced. There's nothing to do with It. It just Is. It's almost like Its own entity. It's just being It, and accepting that is pretty fascinating. 

And I find myself wanting to tell you: I love you. And then I say: Why do you need to say that? You know that. And I don't need to hear 'I love you' back, because, I know that. And so there's this big thing that just Is. And it doesn't mean anything. It doesn't mean anything. It doesn't mean that we're supposed to be together. It doesn't... It doesn't mean anything. It's just being what It IS. !

I think that's pretty cool. Cool, as in, actually * what * is * happening * It doesn't matter what I think of It, It just is being what It Is. Isn't that wild?

caretaking

 vs.

stewardship

 4

land

 &

men

Detaching the It from you, reignition, sparking alive, remembering. Worn into acceptance when striking It from my To Do List, ticking off my previous belief that I am the one who needs to fix big things previously perceived as unworking — when clearly they work because they Really R Real. Three. How do you react, what happens, when you believe that thought?

I want to make love for days, like Four (in-a-row). Who would you be without that thought? But I don't care to deal with the before or after. There is nothing I need / want / care to say, besides sometimes this feeling of (heart-felt (feels)) expression: I love you. Meaning, I love Love. Allowing, Love.

This really is true: As of today, I have no desire to make two cappuccinos tomorrow morning, unless they're both for me, spaced about ten minutes apart. Without that thought, I might be like my client, who checked-in after farm-stuck and car-fail. We talked about land * illness * ♡ * embryos. She desires nothing more than to make a second cappuccino, or a sandwich (a bottle). I don't think it's a *grass is always greener* thing. It's about energy, excess energetic reserves, and over on the other end — depletion.

1. Conventional vs. not ?

2. Is my soil depleted ? 

3. Is my nervous system ? 

4. 5th grader, pinkie-nursing babies, drinking drip coffees. I think I've told you this before, but a mom up the street would french braid my hair before the school bus came. Almost every morning. I would trade her mother's helper time after school 4 my fix. It's the ritualized aesthetic that gets you through trials (of being your mother's live-in helper?).

   

whoremoans
+  
lived experience

36

1/2 cord of firewood
delivered to your home
will run you $120

1. Is it true?

2. Can you absolutely know that it's true?

3. How do you react,
    what happens,
    when you believe that thought?

4. Who would you be without that thought?

☉

I am helping a client make space for a four-day-fuck-trance later today. Her words, not mine, and how inspiring? Strong numerology ;0 Light the path, lead your horse to water, and baby, let them drink. This will be our fourth session, not including a little treat to bridge her office with her home, and we will be harnessing the cultivated erotic power of embodied storytelling.

1. SPACE: Is it true? 

    Light the path,

2. STYLE: Can you absolutely know that it's true?

    lead your horse to water,

3. SEX: How do you react,
    what happens,
    when you believe that thought?

    and baby,

4. STORY: Who would you be without that thought? 

    let them drink.

🎠

hostess

with the mostest

serves her higher good

@}-,-‘–

FRESH START

USE WHAT U GOT*

1SUNRISE DRIVE
@}-,-‘–

LOOK1@}-,-‘–

vintage suede fringe jacket

vintage babydoll nightie

vintage overdyed sweats via SCOUT

KHAITE boots

LOOK2@}-,-‘–

vintage JNY trench w/ wool liner zipped out

Tibetan pashmina as top

x's thrifted denim tailored to my form

5y.o. strappy Manolos

LOOK3@}-,-‘–

vintage yellow skirt suit would steam & will tailor

vintage top

5y.o. strappy Manolos

LOOK4@}-,-‘–

vintage striped tee

gifted vintage tuxedo trousers

KHAITE boots

LOOK5@}-,-‘–

vintage ribbon sweater

vintage 30's dress chopped into a top (not pictured) & skirt

vintage belt

KHAITE boots

LOOK6@}-,-‘–

vintage Anne Klein blazer

Victoria's Secret asymmetrical bodysuit

black Gold Toe dress socks

way old YSL ankle boots w/ semi-fresh laces

LOOK7@}-,-‘–

vintage jacket (u cannot see the cool frog closures)

thrifted fast fashion pants

KHAITE boots (into brown + black)

LOOK8@}-,-‘–

vintage nightie

-over a-

sex shop fishnet catsuit

(2 head out would pair w/ those strappy Manolos + JNY trench)

LOOK9@}-,-‘–

vintage 90's embossed suede blazer

thrifted Morgane Le Fay dress ($8!) 

(not to be confused w/ Morgan le Fay)  

KHAITE boots (so would <3 The Dallas in 3 colorways)

LOOK10@}-,-‘–

vintage fur hat

vintage 80's leather jacket

vintage 501s

KHAITE boots againª

11GOES@}-,-‘–

vintage metal clutch that fits both keys & cell (clutch) 

 

shot by my girl Natalie Stark

against a Laura Ashley sheet 

in my (4 now) courtyard

 

I styled these looks from my closet for an immediate art project (energy mover) and as part of a broader life art project (cycle ender). These were the fit pics for a scheduled studio shoot, but often in getting ready, you are already doing the thing.

Remember that you are deprived of nothing except by your own decisions, and then decide otherwise. 

🂱 A COURSE IN MIRACLES 🃁

26

A bunch of my art was in his storage unit. It wasn't there long, but the art not on our walls was locked in his storage unit. His storage unit is really important to him.

Last Friday morning, I drove my sons to school and when I got home, I felt this last loose string being snipped. So I did what I do out front. I finished by picking as many oranges as I could hold. I came in, washed the oranges, and juiced them with carrots, ginger and turmeric. I've had this juicer for years now but only started using it again last Monday. I rinsed the components in the moment and brought the two large cups of juice to my desk. Maybe twenty minutes later, I heard a car door slam, electing not to look or see. His PA dropped off my art from his storage unit because he doesn't have a driver's license (n)or a car and therefore cannot drive. He says he cannot get his license because he doesn't have an address. He doesn't have an address because he stays in other musicians' homes while they're touring. He can drive but does not drive. My art was in his storage unit and I put it there. I find these sorts of things interesting.

One of the last times we had sex was on a Friday afternoon at the place he was staying. He said he was about to cum and then these four bright pops happened * POP POP POP POP * sounding really bright and up high. Was that a gun? I was saying as he was cumming. Then we heard a helicopter, then sirens. Right away a helicopter was overhead and sirens were outside. By the time we got dressed and peeked out, there was crime scene tape cordoning off the intersection a block away. My station wagon was perched on the edge, yellow tape to her back. My startle response, already high after my car accident, went even higher. This annoyed him. My therapist thinks that my history plus my age means that my body is out of juice at the moment

☀︎♞

and that's exactly what I'm working out / on.

GUA SHA 4 YOUR 3RD EYE

JUST

GUA SHA 

ALL AROUND 

YOUR THIRD EYE

THEN 

GO OVER IT

IS IT TIGHT / TENSE?

23

 

What if your whole life you strived to make the inappropriate appropriately easy? What if you normalized unreasonable expectations until Soul cries out to you, crying while drowning in a sea of never ending _______ (chores 4 maintaining broken systems). Pleading for openness — an expanse of experimental time and space — S u p p o r t m e w h i l e t h e w o r l d s t i l l s p i n s ✩ she criessss

Any systems
you're bold enough
to fix before _______?

Cranky not getting attention soul crossing the mind-body barrier: Hair falls out clumpy, eyes going fuzzy, and nervous system the bad kind of buzzy --- each together demanding you hold still and honestly account for where you've been and where you're going (bumpy)

Would you answer?

Could you not? 

But because *we are where we are until we aren't* the sole question really boils down to:

What does it cost to listen to your soul? 

Remember

Your soul like a child allowed to be a child — I need something, not this. I don't know what, but help me because I'm overwhelmed and crying for you. Change me, feed me, hold me, figure it out for me, with me. P r i o r i t i z e 4 m e ✩

I was born into my pattern. I married it, procreated with it and co-parent with it 👅👅👅👅👅👅 then I push it further, falling farther in love with it, fuck it so good from any-every angle 👅👅👅👅👅👅👅👅 Then there's me. Me as in Us. And I want to be a baller baby dadi beholden to Soul — my long abandoned daughter — and my sons — my living, breathing, fascinating true family who show me more grace, more patient L O V E than I have ever known.

You're doing the same. You're propagating your pattern. Did you follow the rules and put your mask on first? Or is the role you play the mask you're drowning behind? (The Rules.) Trick questions.

And your patterned babies are lovable and deserving of love, as they do what they're designed to do, eating up resources ∴ demanding you self resource like you've never known how.

T

i

m

e

2

p

u

t

P

a

t

t

e

r

n

d  o  w  n

Is that why we are here? To live the immersed pattern until we can identify the pattern, see it separate from Self, see ourself putting it down, Pattern down on the ground, gently backing away from maintaining the broken ∴ moving towards  fulfilling Soul's callings, with all the precious babies strapped to your chest, your breasts, your back, sat up on your shoulders. Responsibilities stemming from iteration after iteration, held close, arms free for the labor required to live the alchemical transformation:

N U R T U R I N G w e