literary landmark

okay, so recently i jumped back into the writing gig. and aside from a little snag --y'know, not really having 'that writing feeling'-- things are going pretty well. there's a scene in the heartbreaking work of staggering genius that apparently needs a lot of work. it's a necessary scene for more than one reason, but when the writer of said scene is actually bored out of her mind writing it, then there's a problem.

i mean, what reader is gonna be interested in a scene that the freakin' writer was bored with? c'mon...

anyway, so...landmark!

okay, back in the blueprinting stages of construction, i was developing characters, discovering their life stories, what made them tick, what their motivations and secrets and flaws and abilities were. this was actually kind of fun, figuring out who these people were and how they were all affecting one another, and why it was these particular people who were now shaping the world. why now? why these people?

discovering this was a wonderful and thrilling, heady experience. they didn't reveal everything to me all at once, and most of the time they were deceiving me with one thing while concealing something else that was closer to the truth...and they didn't even know they were doing it. they'd lied to themselves so well, they believed something else for truth. others just plain didn't want me to know what they were doing, furtive and plotting and ambitious, or protective and noble and yet guarding their secrets no less fiercely.

i love writing. have i mentioned how much i love writing?

so, there is this one character, and he was so furtive he didn't even want me to know his name. for the longest time he kept me in the dark, well after i'd already had most everyone else's stories pretty much sorted out. so i was left with no choice but to refer to him as "the toad-sucking boot licker" because, well, that's what he is for most of the story. well, not most of it, but for long enough that you really, really just despise him. or, at least, i hope that's the effect he'll have on my readers.

naturally, i couldn't let this go on forever, but it went on for a good four months or so. he was the toad-sucking boot licker. eventually i got his name out of him. well, one of them.... actually, come to think of it, i still don't know his real name...

oh, *shakes a finger* that's good. he's good, i tell you.

so, being in the 1st draft stage of construction, i've finally gotten to the scene where my heroine calls him "toad-sucking boot licker" for the first time and it's...well...it's just magic, i tell you. magic! i feel i should be breaking out champagne or something, except i hate champagne. maybe sushi.

of course, in writing this scene, a few snags have come up that i never foresaw in the flesh-out stage but i suppose i should have. i mean, two people can't have a murder and a noisy bowfight in the middle of a plaza at dawn and not have the city guard come and crash the party, right? i just...didn't see the fight getting so noisy and emotional, y'know?

gods above, have i mentioned how much i just fucking love writing?

duh

i've known this for a while, but i had to put it out there:

every man i've ever been attracted to has been either emotionally absent and made me feel like shit, or been incredibly needy in a sad, small, pathetic way and made me feel guilty and selfish.

i'm changing this as of, um, a while ago.

and before you post me comments like, "well duh!" or "i could have told you that," or "it's about time," or some stupid shit like that, look again at the title of this entry and then read the first line again.

certificate of exemption from enlightenment

This document certifies that

Delena

is immune to the lust for enlightenment and is exempt from the need to
seek enlightenment.


This document also certifies that

Delena

has seen through the fraud of the enlightenment con game and is
excused from further clawing and scraping to own a piece of that
specious reward.


This document further certifies that

Delena

is free from the temptation to be consecrated as enlightened by any
guru, saint, holy person, or religious organization that claims the right to
do so.


Finally, this document certifies that

Delena

has already been enlightened a million times in a million different ways
anyway, and that seeking even further enlightenments would be
redundant and even greedy.


To ensure the continued validity of this document,

Delena

vows to regularly renew these three understandings: that it is impossible
to ever reach a complete and permanent state of enlightenment; that
there is no single state of awareness that constitutes enlightenment; and
that since the nature of reality keeps changing, the nature of
enlightenment keeps changing as well.

do you think...

......that iGoddess is like poetry. The words and thoughts are meant to be read, felt, reacted to, then re-read... and really thought about.

~greggo

methinks i've been given too much credit, but then again, maybe not. and like poetry, iGoddess is not for everyone.

brezsny-on-the-blog

CAPRICORN (Dec 22-Jan 19): The bumper sticker I saw today said, "Having abandoned my search for the truth, I'm now looking for a good fantasy." Though it's meant to be sarcastic, it's actually a perfectly useful piece of advice for you right now. Consider this: The truth is overrated. It's so complicated and ever-shifting that it's impossible to pin down. To earnestly persue it is often a waste of your valuable time and energy. Besides, why bother to "understand" the nature of reality when it's more important and productive to aggressively "shape" the nature of reality? Another bumper sticker says, "Life isn't about finding yourself; it's about creating yourself." In light of these meditations, Capricorn, I suggest you drum up some fresh, fun, fabulous fantasies.

again with the, "well..." reaction.

thank you for your patience while iGoddess took a much-needed break. i've just been so tired lately. even now, i'm fucking tired, but i'm posting because i've been thinking about it for a few days.

it's kinda funny that mr. brezsny would tell me this today. last week, i was to be the paint, not the painter. let myself be shaped, created, influenced into a masterpiece. and i did. i sought knowledge, information, advice, painful and fun truths. i did exercises and meditations of the painfully psycho-therapudic variety.

they were tough. i did them anyway. it was actually rather purging and satisfying to be so painfully honest with myself, like once i got it on paper i didn't have to keep the nasty secrets anymore. things i've never even dared to consider saying out loud before. secrets i either minimized or completely kept from myself. i let myself be molded...or, rather, de-molded.

i was the paint.

this week, now, i am to create myself and find myself a damn good fantasy. and believing as i do that the spiritual creates the physical (thought creates reality), those fantasies are going to turn into reality. maybe not soon, but they'll be created at some point. sooner rather than later, because i believe it, dammit.

brezsny says it so much better than i do. truth is like a parfait, yeah. truth is like an ogre (hehe). "truth is so complicated and ever-shifting that it's impossible to pin down." i like that a lot. the truth is also open to interpretation, and everyone's truth is true. some are more true than others, i.e. when someone says it's truth that it's okay to do murder.

yeah, that's just wrong, but for them it's true. of course, then it becomes true for us to have to incarcerate people for whom truth like that is real. it's all true.

wow, it's too late at night and i'm too tired to keep up that train of thought.

for some reason, the words of tyler durden play in my head when i think of some fresh, fun, fabulous fantasies: in the world i see -- you are stalking elk through the damp canyon forests around the ruins of rockefeller center. you'll wear leather clothes that will last you the rest of your life. you'll climb the wrist-thick kudzu vines that wrap the sears tower. and when you look down, you'll see tiny figures pounding corn, laying strips of venison on the empty car pool lane of some abandoned superhighway...

i remember the dream i once had of the megillah breaking the world, of scouting a family who abandoned their beautiful baby son and bringing him back with me to the enclave where one more mouth would be a trial on the provisions already spread thin.

i remember the dreams i've been having lately, of taking the throne rightfully mine in a kingdom that has been awaiting my return. the procession of my royal cousins heralds my entrance in a grand hall where the vast royal family, nobles, and my subjects rise to watch me take my place as their queen, every single one of them joyful beyond words. or the dreams of me finding abandoned children, infants who can't even lift their heads yet when i find them, yet when the mother in me responds and i pick them up, suddenly they're grown and don't need me, and there's an ache inside so terrible i have to wake up from the dream in order to get away from it. i dream of lovers who want someone else or who are oblivious to my love, and i say "fuck it" and leave them, because running free and hurting is better than staying and compromising the dignity and self respect of the queen on her throne, if that makes any sense. i dream of trying to get somewhere but having the wrong bus ticket.

no wonder i haven't been sleeping lately. no wonder i avoid sleep until i pass out from exhaustion. seemingly contradictory dreams. i know they mean something. they're not the fantasy-reality i want, though.

bah. who wants to understand the nature of reality, anyway, when it's much more important and productive to aggressively "shape" the nature of it? lots of things happening, though. i think i'm still in "be the paint" mode.

the dark side of Funk

forgive the lack of new material here at iGoddess lately. however, judging from the complete lack of comments or blog-generated emails, and the fact that my site meter shows 85% of viewers staying for two seconds or less in the last, oh...two months, lack of new material will not be so painfully missed, i think.

i can only plead a low spirit lately, and mental exhaustion. ever since my last post --and, indeed, even before it-- my mind has been in overdrive. considering the memories it's bringing up, my heart is a bit tired, as well.

a huge difference between former delena and Delena of the Divine Wow is that, after a week like this, i'd have been up to my eyeballs in depression and emo-fucktardism.

yes, jesus said blessed are the fucktards, but still. doesn't mean i want to be one of them.

i'm just tired, and really don't feel like writing.

i forgave the bio-dad the other day. well, not forgave, forgave. but i did let go of my resentment and hatred. i'm not angry about it anymore. i figured out where fits the Funk. there was gonna be this beautifully and funkily inspiring post about it in brezsny-on-the-blog, but i'm just...tired. there may not be forgiveness yet, but there's understanding (which i believe is more important and imminently leads to forgiveness) and...sympathy. and sadness. he couldn't have helped how he treated us, not really. not without a lot of intervention which, naturally and not entirely his own fault, he would have mightily resisted.

as i resisted. without even knowing i was resisting.

and, honestly, there's no other way i could have been raised. honesty is a painful thing, but i've always strived to be honest.

honesty is like an ogre, which is like an onion, and if you haven't seen shrek you so totally won't get my joke. but anyway, honesty's like an onion. you peel away one layer which is true, only to find a layer beneath which is even more true than the layer in your hand. that doesn't make the peeled-away layer any less true. it's just...the truth beneath is a more distilled version of the truth in your hand. they're both true, even if one contradicts the other.

"make a vessel of the self where the self is not," and...

"power lies in yielding, to spring back upright, eternal, having let all cruelties of the world pass over you. having marred the vessel, perhaps, but not the self."

one of these quotes is mine, one is not. and all of them have to do with why i'm just so damn tired. mayhap iGoddess will be back next week, fresh and funky as ever.

where fits the Funk

i've given up trying to understand my own, peculiar delena grammar. i used to be such a grammar queen. then i was promoted to "grammar nazi," which was then shortened to "grammazi." all lower j's dotted, all p's and q's minded, capital letters at the beginning of sentences, "for which," and "for whom," where it was proper, and no dangling participles. then i saw maganda.org, created by someone i grew up with, made paper dolls with her and the clothes that went on them, swum in her pool, fell in everlasting love with dried mangoes in her house (mmm, dried mangoes...), and where i learned about somewhere that wasn't the catholic church or mexico-americo: the filipines.

she wrote, back then, in all lower case. since she's always been more creative and intellectual than me by miles and miles, i thought it was just so chic and smart-looking, so i did it, too.

now i resent having to press the SHIFT key. kind of like when i moved to oregon. now i get indignant whenever i'm expected to pay sales tax.

go figure.

wow, what a tangent... what made me think of it was because i wrote this title, where fits the Funk, and had to go back and capitalize the "f" in Funk. Funk's just one of those that has a permanent capital letter here at iGoddess. some capitals come and go, but Funk is Forever.

for all of today and most of yesterday, the Funk has been somewhat un-Funkalicious in me. oh, it's still there, believe me. but my letter of obligation has gotten me seriously thinking. the pain of what i lost in the Summer of Funky Kali Love is like an old injury that flares up now and again. i really want to write that letter. i do. i just don't want them to think the horrible things i know they think about me.

i'm a good person. i am. i feel guilty swatting flies inside the house of dragons' rest. i detest spiders, and i still escort them outside to continue on their merry, eight-legged way. i go out of my way not to offend someone, and will endure years of agony and mental and/or emotional hurt to keep someone else from hurting. all without even really giving it a thought.

i know. most of it was conditioning, programming. as erica jong says in the poem i love so much --the one that inflamed me to be a revolutionary freedom fighter for beauty, truth, and Funk-- years of training are required to be the best slave. in my reading, i'm noticing something that the authors don't mention, but i'm seeing to be true across the board.

and yet, there is something to be said for simply possessing a kind, truly empathic nature.

codependents are not cruel people. most of them don't possess a malicious or conniving bone in their body. they're all highly empathic people who wouldn't dream of hurting anyone, and who were so hurt as children they do naught but live each day trying to protect themselves from ever being hurt like that again. they live in fear so ingrained, it's etched in their bones. they only want to protect themselves from that fear, to ensure they never again feel the overwhelming, out-of-control terror against which they were powerless to protect themselves.

i feel no animosity toward them, no enmity. i feel aught but compassion for them, much as i've been accused of lacking in it. compassion, however, only goes so far when i sense i am once more being placed into the house of oppression and someone is my self-appointed bio-father.

i imagine it must sting painfully, receiving love like i wholly give it, trusting with abandon in the beginning, only to be pushed away and not know why. i used to be very private and somber as a child and teenager, except i was accused of reprehensible things. who calls their twelve year-old daughter a slut, accuses her of being a drug addict? backstabbed, again and again, by family and best friends, all because i kept my own counsel. my own bio-father had taught me trust was poisonous. but after the years of accusations and suddenly losing friends because of something someone else had accused me of --and me lacking any proof other than my word-- i promised my life would be an open book henceforth.

everyone would know everything about me, so no one could sling mud. i aired my family's dirty laundry to our church groups. i flaunted my abusive relationships at school. i was a right hellion at home, butting heads with my bio-father and saying, "fuck you all," right in my bio-mother's face.

i uttered other words, moved in other fashions, but all the same i was screaming at the top of my lungs for someone to get me out of there and help me, because i was sinking fast.

story of my life: no one heard. not for almost thirty years.

i was superbly trained for it, conditioned from a right early age. as soon as i came of age, i began my codependence in earnest...without knowing that's what i was doing. and i didn't know that i didn't know. y'know, in my heart of hearts, i wish i were born in the 1500's where i could have led the life of a courtesan in italy. i've actually studied a lot of the artful subjects they studied back then, and when i'm comfortable, i engage in them. things like debate, art, writing (duh), dance, music, voice, poetry, logic... i thought they would make me desirable as a female. in truth, there are quite a few people who still remember me so powerfully they remain in contact, or try to, anyway. only one, *ws* i've kept as a friend.

where was i going with this? only here: i've tried to be good, but the profession to which i was conditioned was far different from what i would have chosen for myself, had i been taught i was worthy of the power of choice. i've tried to make myself good, and desirable, and approved, even unto educating myself with archaic professions late into the night. i used to be a compulsive liar in high school...a good one. i stopped that habit cold turkey when i realized the truth was far more powerful.

but the fear... the terror and hatred and revulsion, knowing down to my soul that i was so corrupted every breath i took was a crime against nature... all anyone had to do was just look at me with even an ounce of authority, and i knew my place was so far below them. when i felt myself being discounted, disenfranchised, treated carelessly, i did the only thing that was in my meager power: i hid. and those people who hate me now, they accuse me of using people, of creating a pattern of lies, of abusing trust.

an old injury that complains now and again.

all they knew was that, over a long period of time --in some cases two years-- i had pushed them away, little by little, and they did not see it until they were so distantly left out that what they thought i was about did not coincide with events transpiring around them. all they saw were lies, and as my greggo has said, it's easier to blame someone else rather than see fault in your own self. to me, they simply were no longer trustworthy to keep close in my heart, so they had no clue what was going on, how long it had been going on, or how deeply it terrified me.

living in the house of oppression had taught me many things, especially how to keep secrets and a straight poker face, even in the midst of bodily violation. they had no way of knowing i had pulled away. i loved them. they loved me. my distrust of them, while earned, hurt them. i feel remorse for hurting them, and wish to rectify it.

i don't want to leave myself open to further pain, however. and while i know my intent is to deliver my letter of ownership, nothing more, anything other than gladness and willingness to forgive would pain me. the abused child in me is afraid they would use this new strength of mine, find the shadow side --the vulnerability-- and use it as a weapon.

i don't wish forgiveness, honestly. i don't wish for compassion, or friendship, open discourse, or any of it. i only want understanding, as i've grown to understand myself, codependence, and addiction. actually, for my entire life, i could never forgive myself for my life...until i understood it. and myself. for the first time ever, i can forgive myself, and i'm ready to learn what love really means. i wish i could make a double of me, so that i could hold my head in my lap, stroke my hair the way the bio-mom used to do when i was young and ill with flu or bronchitis, and just hold me while i cry.

the past couple weeks, i've felt this sudden, powerful upsurge of tears. it starts somewere in my womb, or maybe even deeper, and shoots like a geyser up my body and thunders against the backside of my face. my throat clenches up so tight i can't breathe, and my vision blurs.

i want to cry so badly, and it's almost there. all those tears i knew were there and wanted to finally get out but never could... through the power of loving my family, my mom and dad's love and patience, my new understanding of codependence, my newfound self-forgiveness, and the Supremely Funky Jive of the Cosmos, the tropical floodgates have opened upon the barren wasteland of my soul. but i still can't cry. i don't know if it's just long-standing habit --for a single tear was punishable by the belt, with generous helpings of shame-- or if i'm just not there yet.

all i know is, i'm left wondering where fits the Funk in all this. the Funk permeates all: our daily lives, our love, our little daily deaths, and our melancholy. aside from a not-so-little death, i don't know yet where to place this in the song of Funk.

barkeep, make mine a flaming narcissist

apologies for the lack of posting lately. i've been *gasp!* doing things. actually, it's been so long since i went out and enjoyed life that it's all a little heady. a few weeks ago i went out with my cousin and some friends. the other night another friend called me up and invited me to go with her to the bagdad to see "office space," since she'd won tickets on the radio to their midnight movie madness. it was a blast.

and i'm learning to crochet! somewhat in the spirit of satori in the name of spaghetti, i decided to just say fuck it, and eat. i've been wanting to learn how to crochet for years and years. once upon a time, my bio-mom bought me a crochet needle and expected me to just know how, or to pick it up elsewhere. over the years, there's either been no time, opportunity, or sometimes people just flaked when they said we'd sit down one afternoon and show me how. so, while at jo-ann's with *cc*, we picked up a cute little kit in the kid's crafts section and i just followed the instructions. i'm a very visual learner, so unless things are spelled out for me in complete detail, i have the damndest time with things. i have to read them over and over, too, to make sure i get what's being said. kids' books, i've found, describe things in a way that i can actually envision things and duplicate them, unlike adult beginner instructional books. sometimes it makes me feel stupid, learning from kids' books and needing as much demonstration as i do, but that's just how i learn.

ironic, i think, since every test in the world says i'm a phenominal word warrior. ah well.

but aside from my normal everyday, and being "crochety," i've been thinking. for the past week or so i've been thinking about composing a letter of...not apology, but ownership. i would address it to those individuals formerly known as the fucktards of the world. unfortunately, fun as that phrase is, continuing to call them that only promotes resentment and hatred, and that goes against the grain of the Funk.

here at iGoddess, we're about rocking into oneness with the Surpreme Funk, not holding onto petty human failings.

anyway, so i would address my letter of ownership to those individuals who had supporting roles last year in my Summer of Funky Kali Love (Who destroys the old so the new may live, remember), simply owning my disease and taking responsibility for my behavior resulting from my codependence. i would apologize for any soul-ache that it may have caused. part of conquering this fucking disease is no longer accepting/believing i am powerless (not just choosing to be powerless, but "knowing" i am as powerless to be autonomous as i am to fly around the room under my own power), and even though i was powerless Then, i am not powerless Now. therefore i will take the power of my destiny and individuality into my own hands, however with power comes responsibility.

part of me is very afraid. even just typing this entry, i have this roiling, sick feeling in my stomach and i'm actually getting liver pains just thinking about it. well, not thinking about the letter, persay, but thinking of their possible reactions. i don't want this to seem like i'm taking responsibility for everything that happened, even unto what other people did, and apologizing for it all. i'll take responsibility for my part, but i also know --being the apocalypticians they are-- they've gone around convinced there's nothing wrong with them and the inner apocalypse is all inside me, that i'm the only one with the problem and they're all fine, dandy, healthy, functional, and not nearly as fallible as i am.

but then...i have to fight and resist the urge to justify myself, to explain, to seek understanding. it's my flaming narcissism that cares about what they think, how they'll react, what they'll believe about me whether it's the truth or not. we here at iGoddess (ha! meaning "me") are firm believers in everyone owning their own truths and creating their own realities. maybe in their reality i'm nothing more than a selfish, conniving, malicious, doomed little pissant, and that truth is as concrete for them as water being wet. it may pain me to know this --it may really pain me-- but i must make a curtsy in respect for their reality and let it be. i know it's an aspect of my codependence to want to control everyone's opinions about me, therefore i must face that part of my inner apocalypse and slay it with love. transform it into a creative expression of the Divine Wow.

but oh, it's hard.

i've spent the better part of this last week composing bits of it in my head. if i write this letter, they're going to think i'm crawling back and kissing their feet and saying i was all wrong and oh, how horrible i was and everything they did to me was justified. nothing could be further from the truth. my flaming narcissism is worried and afraid that's exactly what they'll think, though. the only reason i haven't written that letter yet isn't because of my fear, but because i've been trying to examine what my true feelings are about writing and sending that letter. it's been difficult. my flaming narcissist has been clamoring quite distractingly about it.

it's kind of funny, actually. it's been using every trick in the book: upset stomach, sinking feelings in the solar plexus, headaches, extreme worry, insomnia, chronic heartburn, nightmares... i can almost feel the terror as a palpable thing. silly flaming narcissism... i feel kind of bad for it, though. i mean, where would it be without me to feed it?

yesterday i went with *cc* and my mom to pick up our new dining room table (yay, table!), and mom's jacket smelled just like willow. i caught this whiff of sweet spring and comfortable country home, cozy and comforting. i was filled with missing her. one difference between the delena of my former life and Delena of the Divine Wow is that, before, i would have been filled with remorse and guilt and shame and self-pity and oh, what a horrible person i was, down to the core, to have made such a good friend hate me so terribly.

my poor, mistaken, diseased former self. she can't help who she is. she's been programmed at such an early age, there's just no helping her. she's not a bad person, really, or malicious. it's just that, growing up, fear and extreme levels of emotional and psychological discomfort were her norm and became, in essence, her comfort zone. she's not comfortable unless she's uncomfortable and filled with self-hatred, if that makes any sense. so i pat her on the head and send her off with a hug to go sit in her corner. i slay her with love.

but not Delena of the Funky Ya-Ya. yes, i missed willow. and with each whiff of that carried that willow-scent, i breathed deep and remembered how much i love her...

ah well. spilled milk and all that.

but i think that moment helped me learn a little bit more of how i really feel about things. i've gone my whole life shut off, not knowing how i felt or what i thought about anything. like dizzy told me once, i reminded her of a squirrel because i'd been going through my life, gathering things that might help me get through life the way a squirrel gathers nuts. she's right, though. i've also been gathering people's opinions and feelings and philosophies and fundamental beliefs, trying to graft them onto myself because i didn't know who i was. i was shamed and abused any time i tried, until i finally just shut down inside.

one day here soon i'll find out how i feel, and if writing that letter of ownership is really and truly the right thing to do. i still got some wrestling with my flaming narcissist, though.

maybe i'll make it fun, make it a jello wrestling match. hmm?