When I Thought I Was...

...Then I really wasn't!
(Go, go, Pethuel! You can squish those words in there!)

Reminiscing on the strange days of my strange life, wondering who it was I wanted to be, exactly--what it was I was trying to achieve, exactly--what it was I thought, exactly--
God knows.
I can't remember. And that's a good thing.

And here's something to see you deeper.

Black and white resolve
One foot in your heart and another
In fishnet stockings.

Purple cords wound around
Us, and pulled us together
And then I electrocuted us
Just once.

She astounded you,
I expressed your astonishment
And painted in acroamatic whispers
Everything dishonest
That you believed...
Some of it mine, and some of it
Hers.

My hand gripping
Your hand gripping
Mine.
Like grabbing onto
Each other's souls.
Telling each other, "Go,
And I'll rip your heart out."

Separated by clay
Permeating distance
Restrained by ourselves.

We were very much the same
Once upon a time
Until desire drove us apart
Method carried us
From front to back
And founded us in the epilogue.

We were too acute
To have been taken in by this.
We were too clever
To have not forseen this.

I had no reason to make you feel
Completely and totally
In need of me.
It wasn't uncertainty.
You never had enough (all) of me,
That's all.
(c) 2005 Florence McNair "The Games We Played" (unedited)

UPDATE: I got an e-mail from a "concerned" anonymous reader of my blog who told me this poem was "out of it" and that I was "thinking too much". To clarify, I would like to say that the above poem was written a year and a half ago, and does not necessarily reflect any real sentiments I had then--and certainly not now. I realize that there was a time in my life when I did think "too much" and was a little too...full of...things... but this post serves the purpose of humorously reminiscing on those days. I am over them now. Hopefully.
Thank you for being concerned. I only hope that I can return the favor someday, when you are as "messed up" as I am.

Today I Lived

Yesterday was a little bit of a fun day for me, despite the fact that it's usually one of my least favorite days of the week (Friday).
I woke up to the glad tidings of Arakawa and gold for Japan. HURRAH! Sasuga, nippon! We watched the reruns tonight, everyone in Steve and Rick's room after we finished Mito Komon, and I gave a running commentary on things ranging from costume design to skater psychology. Is it just me or does Fumie Suguri always look really sad? Even when she's happy? How does anyone get along with her if they cant tell what she's thinking?
"Honey, I brought you flowers! Honey...are you happy?"
"Yes, Satoshi, I'm happy."
"Okay good. Just checking."
Anyway enough of that. She's pretty. They all are. It's ironic to me, though, how the Japanese figure skaters are above average height for Japanese--because skaters are generally supposed to be short. Well whatever.
They recorded the Expo before we went on outreach today. YEEEEAH!
And I get this comment from Jeremy in passing last night. "Florence, I had no idea you were so into Figure skating!"
Yeah I enjoy it, okay. I like artistic expression...especially when it requires talent--and MUSIC! Its all so wonderful.
And Alternative Man is FUN! I like lots of songs! And wow, there's this new female singer on one of Andrew Vee's songs! (I don't know where to find credits for these things, but I "somehow" knew it was an Andrew song.) Nice stuff. And it's good to hear Extraordinary Days on a CD. I talked to Gabe on the phone today and in a tired laugh he told me that there was some mistake with the lead vocal credits somehow having gone to Jesse Pritchard. Wow. I think they fixed it. Hahahahaha...we had a good laugh. It totally sounds like something that would happen to Gabe. Funny thing about the song is the credits got changed in the "lyrics by" and "music by" place so many times that they ended up just a little screwed up. Oh well. I don't mind having all the lyrics pinned on me. But I feel terrible that the melody is blamed on Jesse. That was almost entirely my fault. Hahahahahahaha...life's little ironies.
Skipping off to watch some people make love to music on ice...

Wow

It's not as if I think I rival Oprah with my "recommend it and they will read it" powers. This post serves the purpose of releasing personal feelings (the kind that make you want to tap your finger or shake your leg). Otherwise known as a RANT.
I haven't read something this good in a long time. I was floored.

They are watching the TV. They are always watching the TV. It is an inviolable right that neither mom nor dad question.
Question? I would usually sit there and wallow with them, but not today. I have a fire burning in my soul that will not let me sit.
“Kids, turn that off.”
I don’t mean it but I feel obliged to toss something over my shoulder on my way to the kitchen. The evolved way of saying, I’m home. Welcome to the new millenium. There is no answer from the kids, but I wasn’t expecting one. Gone are the days of sitting around the dinner table exchanging pleasantries and, how was your day. I do miss those days but life must go on, and who does that nowadays anyway? The dinner table went out of date with the log cabin.
Nothing in the refrigerator looks appealing. Cold wing, cold pizza, cold everything. That will be the second night in a row that I don’t eat. I am sure not eating is good for you anyway, and the fire inside won’t let me eat. I feel like dropping and doing twenty pushups, or running up and down the stairs a hundred times. Carol would think I am crazy.
Maybe that is what the fire inside is. A touch of mental imbalance creeping up your shoulders like frost on a cold day.
No. What really gives me the shivers is the global tendency that I am picking up on, to consider any fire at all insanity. This burgeoning paranoia for the abnormal that drains the life out of life. The comparison-that is what is really insanity. I am comparing fire to frost, look at me. At best a bad metaphor and at worst a paranoiac complex. There’s the big insanity again.

That, my friends, is a portion of The Taming, by Joe Johnston. It is the story of a man who is so unlike the average man in wealth and intelligence, but cannot escape the thoughts of the average human--cannot escape the fear of mediocrity...the fear of time...the fear of death. It inspires the thoughts that men were made to think.
I secured a printed copy and smuggled it in to nap with me. I read it straight through.
(In other news: It staggers a bit through the beginning portion but finds its legs. The second half is some of the best stuff I've ever seen written.)

The imagery:

I see the sun. It is smiling cheerily at me, its arms stretched towards the earth to gather up the floodwater. The ground dries and is quickly parched. My walls are searing black from the heat as the sun grabs my brain in a pudgy fist and scalds it in its stifling grasp and its surface begins to blister. The sun smiles and says, “It is your fault.”

I love the violin. I love the way it expresses itself, it climbs its way out of your speakers and burrows and claws its way into your heart. You could say it speaks to me. I feel it connects me to its source, the frantic, fervid vehemence of the authour. I can feel his hands around his enemy’s neck as I am strangling my steering wheel. A thousand insects gnaw into my ears as the fiend pleads for his life futilely. I can hear in my brain the pitiful snap of the spinal cord, and it echoes salaciously, yet emptily, in my head as he moves on to his next victim.

The brevity:

You think of the silliest things in a crisis situation. And then you think of thinking of them, and it complicates things.

The truth:

My life used to be boring. It’s funny how we as humans only find amusement and challenges when reality perverts itself, when we have to try to find it within ourselves to ‘rise above’ our circumstances. It’s not within there, I know it. The ability to transcend my circumstances is not within myself. I don’t know what I am going to do. Right now I am only existing. Everything else has been taken and I am existing on instincts. Facing immediate challenges, and closing my eyes to the future.

Just little pieces.
The ending was amazing.
I haven't read anything this spectacular in years. I took a break with the CGO handbook--but still, years. It's the kind of Wow that makes you want to take off and run and run.

Just for the record, I am not doing publicity for the author, and I don't know him personally. I would do the same for Lord of the Rings or Memoirs of Geisha, only, this impressed me more.

A Happy Song

I don't like being grinchy about Valentines.
And not liking chocolate (THAT'S ME!) is not a good excuse for not liking Valentines. Chocolate is sweet, gooey and sticky. Valentines is warm, soft and heavy--like a blanket.
And Valentines' day isn't all about taking love either. If no one gave love, where would the love come from? Giving love is a fun, fun habit.
Even if I never got a single gift of chocolates until I was 15 (when I got like...5), it's a day for love, and love is a responsibility that cannot be shirked. And if you forget to love most days...may as well love on the one that reminds you.

We preserve it between
Clasped fingers
And force it deeper
Into each other...

So as not to freeze in cold
So as not to melt in heat.

I love you, even though Valentines is gone. (Valentines made me start, I won't let it make me stop, lest it cancel itself out and disappear. I want it again next year. You know who you are!!!)

G-O-N-E GONE like Uncle Zeb sang

My fever (I owned it, okay, not vice versa.) which was my companion the past three days, which dragged me by the internals like an overenthusiastic alien up up and away to 41 C and the woozies, my fever which had me perched in a compromised position over our japanese toilet with a muscle cramp in my thigh and the convulsies* all over *like the shakes during transition, only less scary and more funny. The cramp was like a cramp, case you were wondering. my yucky yucky fever has gone back to where Jesus makes all bad things go when they've run their course. And oh, it feels so good.
Like a good run-on sentence with no regrets.
Sure, I still have a nagging cough, leukemia lips, and a feeling not unlike that of one who has been squished by a slow train, but it still feels so good.
If you did, thank you so much for praying for me.
Michelle pounced on me when she woke up, and when Mark admonished her about mommy being sick she snuggled up and told me, "Don't worry, Mommy, I hold you." Worth every ache for moments like that, and all the awesome Word I got to read. Can't get enough, it is impossible. I may have just had my first ever week long feast! Yeeehaw!

Stars

Masterpiece (C) Florence McNair (thanks Paint)

You are the star that gravity inclines me toward,
I revolve around, I worship, I find my way by you
You are the light when life runs out of batteries
You help me with my Japanese

I am now
You are forever
And time can't hold me down
I am here
And you are everywhere
I am in love with your many faces
Light and air and fire burns as one
In essence you la da la la la

You are the shortest poem every written
Your fingers play the music of the rain
You make me feel like walking upside down
I drop my hands in praise to you

You blow me kisses in the wind
You blow me away
You make every day my day, hey hey

(C) Florence McNair and Tomo Sakamoto "In Essence You"

I'm Sorry

I think I've only just begun to realize these past few days how badly in need of Jesus' forgiveness I am. The weight of everything bad and yucky that I've done in my short, short life, is already way too much for me to come to grips with. I can't--I struggle with the fear that everyone will know how much of a failure I am; how proud I am; how terrible I am.
This is hard to write.
THANK GOD for my sins. Really. Without these sleepless nights and these terrible fears of failure, I would never need Jesus in the measure that I do now. I know I need him every day...every minute. I want him, and every second I spend away from the Word and away from Him I can literally feel the life draining out of me, the fears creeping back in. I've gotten to the point where I truly run to his arms. I run.
Jesus told me the night before our feast started, that because I had tried to do better, he wanted to forgive me for everything I had done, but that I was holding back and continuing to disobey in small areas, preventing him from wrapping his arms around me and letting me feel his full forgiveness. I finally gave in, and what a wonderful feeling it was. I told Jesus out loud that I didn't know how I could ever have the courage or faith to live for him with the nagging memory of all my sins behind me. And he told me:

"The memory of your sins will only serve to pull us closer together, as you realize how frail you are on your own, and how in need of Me you are. The memory of your sins is my gift to you."

And I felt like I could hold onto him forever.

1. I've been proud. Very proud. Maybe I haven't shown it, but I have been. I've been proud about so many things...and I realize now that my pride reduced me to nothing, because I haven't been using the talents I've been given because of my pride. To anyone that's felt, seen, or otherwise experienced an effect of my pride...please forgive me.
2. I've been selfish. Self-absorbed and self-centered. I haven't given you the love you need, the love you deserve. I hurt you many times--I ignored you--I didn't help you-- I'm sorry.
3. I've been a liar. I don't think I've hurt you, but I've used you. May God grant me the grace to admit and apologize. I hope you can forgive me.
4. I've been self-righteous. I've tried to make you better--I tried to fix you and I tried to make you feel like you weren't the disciple you should be. I've been legalistic and tried to pull the standard of the Word on my own. But you are beautiful...and I need you.

AND I SLEEP DURING WORD TIME!!! (I just thought you should know that.) Not all the time...but sometimes!

Lord help me. And you...please help me too.

And everyone read and laugh at the testimony accreditted to me in the Grapevine. It makes me sound terribly proud and horribly deluded, but GOD KNOWS IT'S TRUE. I deserve it...I need it.

Elaina, your toast would've made me cry. If only we weren't sitting in a roomful of people. Thank you for your forgiveness. You've known me through the most twisted portion of my life...but somehow I've always felt that you understood me. You're God's best gift to me right now. I don't know what I'd do without you.

8 things I want in a perfect partner

This, not to discourage takers, was implored of me by someone who couldn't think of 8 people to tag and added me to the list as a last resort. In any case, I'm giddy with gladness--my first tag!
But this is one of those topics that I just need to make a long and stuffy disclaimer about before I continue. It is somewhat a point of dignity (ha...you bought it for a second, anyway) in my small life that I have an opinion of "love" and "in-love-feelings" (a term that makes me laugh) and "the perfect partner" that is very lack luster. On the other hand, I am secretly a dreadfully romantic person--or maybe I just haven't grown up. In any case, here is the list:

1. The ability to reason and accept reasoning. (To keep perspective; to be objective)
2. A big, charming smile.
3. A sense of humor that is pathetic but realizes it. (They make me feel cuddly)
4. Moderation and self-discipline for life and the wisdom to curb my extreme tendencies in a nice nice way.
5. A happy fella--someone who doesn't like being angry, doesn't like it when people are angry, and does something about it.
6. The talent to be easy-going and SPACY enough to be quick to forgive, to laugh at his own mistakes, to be easily surprised, satisfied and forgiven.
7. Ambitions.
8. The humility to try things he's not good at.

(I have no reason to require number 8 of any human being, because I haven't mastered it yet. Maybe that's why I admire it so...)

That being said, don't hold this against me when I marry an uncouth, scowly fella--because God only knows where (as florecita says) my Karma lies.

---and I tag (it seems that there are no more people left on this earth to tag, maybe these are the last left standing) : Lil'Ninars, Elaina, Sparti, Santiago, Aich
And everyone else I thought of has already been tagged or does not have a blog. Hmeh.

Me and Books

I have been sick. (So sick that...)
I have NOT been calling my friends for their birthdays. (The Aquarian ones) I feel terrible.
I have been reading.
I have been reading a lot.

I was thinking of making one of those "Books I am Currently Reading" things, but then I realized that every blog has one of those. And who cares about what I'm reading anyway? Am I so cool that people will go out and read any book I've read? I'm no connoisseur of literature, I promise you. And I have no foreknowledge of what I'm reading, mostly. I just read whatever's on hand. (if the blurb looks like it's compensating for what's INSIDE the book, or if it has a title like "Darkest Africa", then I usually don't read it.) (Ironically, I have a book about darkest Africa next to my bed right now. We'll just see how bored I get.)
Well I conjured one up anyway, and I was so ashamed of my taste that I decided to post it here for all to see.







The only of the above that I am actually glad that I happened upon are Return From Tomorrow by George G. Ritchie, which is a splendidly written book about stuff that is usually pretty boring to read; Rilla of Ingleside which is a classic, regardless of the rest of the Green Gables stories; and the Japanese Bible (which, yes, is that book with the rainbow stripes on it.) Ironically it's the exact copy that I possess, and am now struggling through. I'm learning a lot of new kanjis. Hurray!
Anyway. This concludes the most self-centered post ever.