pdx: the REAL capital of oregon...

i caught this article over on Forbes.com about the 7 most sinful cities in america. they took the 7 deadly sins, then took the top ten cities per capita.

por exemplo, they took the murder rate for wrath, theft for envy, etc.

what rocks is that portland came out #2 in the category of Lust, second only to denver, CO. of course, before you panic, know that the criteria they used was condom and contraceptive purchase count. so it might not be that portland is the second most sexually active city in the country, but just the most consciencious about safe sex.

the other week i was in the mall with *sy*, and we passed by one of those clothing stores i usually scorn. but in the window display were retro-style shirts, and there was a brown baby doll shirt with pink writing that just made me think, "gods, i LOVE my city!" what did the shirt say? i'll tell you:

welcome to portland. recycle, or we'll kick your ass!

no great genius has ever existed without some touch of madness

so my transfer finally went through.

it's about freakin' time.

and the only thing i had to do was have a minor meltdown on easter sunday, and have a fight with a stupid cunt who calls herself a groomer. yup. total yayfunjoy. although now, when i went to call my new salon, they didn't have me on the books at all and the salon manager is on vacation until monday. so i spoke with the GM, and he said, "well, how 'bout sunday?"

impromptu vacation!!! shibby!

of course, it's unpaid vacation, but still. i've been needing BOTH a transfer and a vacation, so i've been taking advantage of it.

on saturday i'm going with *cc*, *ds*, *ks*, and a girl from my old salon to the vampire ball here in portland. it's an annual event and i promised myself last year that i'd be there for it this year, come hell or high water. there will be pictures. i swear to you, there will be pictures. not just because we'll be bringing cameras, but because Studio C here in portland will be hosting the photo booth. this might just become an annual family event, if we like what we see there. i'm sure we will...

also, last night something happened with *sy*'s daughter and she ended up in the hospital. she's okay, and of course *sy* being the wonderful daddy he is, rushed off to be with her. dropped our plans for the evening faster than a pair of pants on prom night, but that's the way it should be when it's the hatchling. grass is green, gravity works, and hatchlings come first.

...so why was i so upset?

it took me the rest of the evening to figure out it was because, in part, i was so insanely jealous of how he had the luxury to rush off to help his daughter, and i'm stranded and can't do anything if it were li'l *c*. i hate how, when i call to talk to him, i feel like such an inconvenience to big *c* and his mom. they never call; i always have to call. they used to send some of his artwork or schoolwork, in the beginning. i haven't seen anything in a few years now. and anyone who works in retail knows that it's just a bitch pain in the ass to get any time off to go anywhere without seniority. and when i could get time, i never had the money.

it just really, really bothered me...the pang of not having seen my only born in three years. and there's a very huge part of me that seriously fears the possibility that li'l *c* will be my only issue. the entire creation and birth of li'l *c* nearly cost me my life. *cc* thinks i'm an idiot for risking it again, and perhaps i am. there's still the very good chance that my next pregnancy will be the same --or worse-- than the last one. if it is, i don't know if i can face going through that again. it took me six years to get over that trauma.

and if he does end up my only child? talk about failing utterly as a mother. i haven't been his mother since he was two and a half. i haven't kissed his boo-boos, i missed his first day of school, i never helped him with his homework or made his lunch, nor have i been able to contribute in shaping him to be a decent member of society, respectful of women and instilled with a sense of honor. i was just his uterus.

when i was ripping away from *m*, he told me he wanted children but wasn't ready. at one point he said, very accusingly, that if i really wanted his children and loved him, then i'd wait. well, he was going on the arrogant assumption that a.) i loved him, and b.) i wouldn't be happy with any children but which came from his loins.

join me in laughing so hard we all snort our drinks up our noses.

like hell i'd wait, i said. i'm so ready, and i have no more time. the longer i wait, the worse it will be. the truth of the matter is that i am most likely facing a pregnancy every bit as devastating as my first one was. now, there are things i'm doing to get my body in the best shape possible. this was dubbed the year of preparation. i don't have time to be wasting on waiting around for some fucktard to grow up enough to be a good mate and male figure for my loinfruit.

and, knowing this, something in me was greatly upset knowing that i --and the iGoddess-child-- are not *sy*'s priority. i'm not complaining; his daughter should be his priority and it is only right it should be so. i think what kicked in was a more primal instinct, the primordial brain concerned about survival competition and the primacy of my progeny.

not to mention the dead keeps trying to raise itself, and some zombie form of careerlovemarriagechildren keeps trying to crawl out of the grave time and again. a couple weeks ago i confessed i wanted to commit myself to our relationship --after having drunk enough for liquid courage to turn into fluid stupidity-- but nothing was ever made concrete. i also have to force myself not to ask *sy* if he would consider being the sperm provider for the iGoddess-child, and lemme tell you, sometimes it's a struggle. i know he'd never agree to my terms, and i know i'd want to make an exception with him. which could have very stupid consequences. so there was more reminder that my (very stupid) lifelong dream of becoming a housewife is dead and supposed to stay that way.

i think what made me angriest was knowing that the psycho hose beast (aka. his ex) used to have exactly what i've always wanted and she not only threw it away, but continues to dump shit all over it every day. i've been working and praying so hard for how long, and someone like her has the luxury of crapping all over it? i gave it up out of necessity, and i think it just hit me really hard, watching *sy* give to someone else what i will never have. i pride myself on being realistic, though. it's just not to be, and i accept that. i know the problem is in no one else but myself, and i'll work through it.

but still.

ps. the blog title is a quote from aristotle, btw.

when breaking the pattern becomes the pattern, and capricorns

i don't know when it happened, but i swore i would never become my bio-mother.

ever.

to the point where i never brought home a mexican, or a catholic.

of course, ironically (and we all know how delena just loves irony), i ended up treated just as lowly as i watched her allow herself to be treated. however, i was so determined not to be so literally like her that i completely ignored the fact that, religion and skin color notwithstanding, i had only exchanged the outer trappings but inside my men were the same douchebags i was trying so hard to avoid.

it still kind of blows me away sometimes, being with a puerto rican. he's shared, or been the source of, dozens of new experiences with me. i'm still not used to being able to make jokes in spanglish, or being around someone with similar mannerisms and cultural background. sure, there are differences and we make fun of each other for them --like my tortilla passion and his silly puerto rican aversity to all things flatbread...the freak-- but while it still takes me by surprise, i enjoy it every time i notice those little things i never realized how much i missed.

i'm accustomed to being the darker complected one in the relationship, but compared to him i'm sickly pale. i'm the juerita here, and it's great! he touches me, and something in me just feels...at rest...to see a darker hand on my dark skin. he's not a witch, persay, but he's open to learning more about my belief structure.

i've never been with anything other than a white guy before i met *sy*. and i've never been treated better.

i thought i would break the pattern of my abused life by finding someone who wasn't my bio-dad. but i realized i was looking at the wrong things, and breaking the pattern became the pattern. ha! not anymore.

back before the manager lady transferred out of the salon of doom, she brought her sextrology book for me to read because she knew i'd love it. not only does it --quite accurately-- depict each of the zodiac personalities, but it explores every possible type of relationship pairing, homo- and heterosexual. it's pretty rockin'.

but what it had to say about capricorns utterly blew my mind. y'know, i'd always known that capricorns were the hippocampus, a noble and majestic creature stylized in quite an amazing amount of breathtaking fantasy art, i might add. cappys are also just called "goats," and we wear the name proudly, being stubborn and hard-working and down to earth as we are. but what i didn't know --and it's totally lame because i so should have put it together-- was that the capricorn is also represented by a mountain beside a lake.

a mountain...beside a lake.

energetically speaking, i've almost always known my element was where the earth met the water. i am the place where lines blur, a shifting doorway where the energies of water and earth meet. sure, the jokes about my energy being mud are numerous, but still. i've always been the place where the two meet.

i grew up in a desert. sure, it was the southern californian desert, but it's desert nonetheless! and yet, once i was mobile and independent enough, when things were horrible i'd run to the beach and just hang out there until i could get my head on straight again. i moved up here to the portland area kicking and screaming, hating it for three solid years because i could never get used to how fucking cold it is here --comparitively-- and how dark and wet and rainy and soggy it is year-round. especially compared to my desert paradise.

but this is paradise. i've always been a child of the earth, of nature, of being surrounded by green and growing things. i love it here. once i gave it a chance, i noticed my energy and my very personality thrived and relished it here.

right here.

the picture at the beginning of this blog entry? that's mt. hood, which i can see every day when i step outside. and that's the columbia river, water flowing at the base of that wonderful mountain that is exactly what i am.

a pillar of earth, and a mountain lake. a solid, strong woman with the depth and mystery of the deep waters. a woman who can break patterns, truly break them. a woman who can build a life from scratch, ditch the entire deck of cards she was dealt, and build a new family and new circle to suit her soul.

brezsny-on-the-blog

CAPRICORN (Dec 22-Jan 19): You would stir up exciting changes in your approach to life in you took time in the next few weeks to find out more about the crowning achievements of your most intriguing ancestors. It will also be a favorable time for you to engage in dreamy conversations with the historical figures you admire most, and to muse in luxurious detail on memories of events that were crucial in making you who you are. For extra credit, have fun imagining who you were in your last two incarnations. The past has gifts to give you, Capricorn. Go gather them up.


it's a thing, now, in the silverfox den, to read aloud mr. brezsny's horoscopes for ourselves when they come in each week. i read *ks*'s, after forgetting each week what astrological sign is actually his (oi...), and then *ds*'s, and then mine last.

after i read mine, the only thing i could say was, "...and why does this make absolutely no sense?"

then i began to really think about it. last week's horoscope was basically "you'll squeeze every drop of everything and every opportunity this week, capricorn, if you can learn to laugh at everything." however, to my detriment, the Stupid Work Thing has drained my sense of humor along with my energy. there was no laughing. there was lots of reflux, compulsive eating, and puking before my shift...but no laughter.

this week there is "the past is your hidden treasure trove, cappy. use it to change your approach to life and see things differently and in a more pronoiac way."

it didn't even really make sense until that email from greggo popped in my head:

but for you, in your life, you know what you need to do. don't let it get to you. don't let the stress ruin your health. don't let the anger destroy you. it took me a long time, honestly, to realize how angry you can get. and i'm not saying your anger is not legitimate, or even completely reasonable and understandable. but we both know that it's not healthy for YOU. ...that is how i see you letting your anger destroy you. you want vengeance, you want to fight back against the injustice and illogic of the fucktards who by some luck of the draw have managed to rise up to a position of management. but since you can't fight back without losing your job, you have to hold it in, and that makes it tear at your soul, at the center of your core, and THAT is what is causing you to bleed.

just be who you are, do your job in the kickass way you always have, and whatever happens is going to happen anyway. no matter what, you'll still be you, you'll still know the truth.

it's kinda funny. when the bio-dad would accuse me of something absolutely ludicrous and based on nothing more than his assumption that any female having achieved puberty was duplicitous, wilfully rebellious against him, and wanton to the point of filth, i used to just shrug and say, "that's okay, believe what you want. i know the truth." i'd finally given up trying to convince him i was a worthwhile and good human being, and while something in me had broken and i no longer cared about being punished (because it was going to happen either way), i used those words to goad him and also let him know there was some small core of me he would never, ever be able to touch.

greggo's echo of those very words were actually a comfort.

at the same time, he knows how violently i rail against injustice and how sick it makes me to watch the exploitation of the weak. i'm thankful someone out there understands that. actually, my whole adoptive family understands. even *cc*, though she doesn't understand why, and i can see why she wouldn't grasp it fully. she's a military medic, and her specialty is triage. if you can't personally deal with a situation --due to lack of supplies, manpower, or the realities of what it is in a person's power to actually do-- then you just don't worry about it and what will happen will happen.

i, on the other hand, rail against that inability.

the injustice and illogic of the situation in the salon, and the store in general, infuriates me. but, as greggo well knows and pointed out to me, it is my own helplessness and feeling of utter castration in this situation that's making me so sick. i didn't embrace my inner revolutionary freedom fighter just to sit and sweat in some egoist's hotbox and accept the realities of utter impotence.

fighting for a healthy, safe place to work and live is nothing more than fighting for my own health and happiness. the reality of my situation is that i have been, or am, in the course of my life an abused child, recovering SI'er, codependent, and bipolar. certain situations kick off that chemical imbalance in my brain. being the pronoiac and naturopathist i am, part of my ongoing treatment is fending off those situations that would tip me over into imbalance.

i simply want to be healthy, godsdammit.

the wholistic thing to do would be to participate in fixing the problem, leaving things a little cleaner and neater than i found them for those who come after me...in every situation. just "getting out" by transferring doesn't fix anything. of course, on the other hand, as in the situation with *m*, at some point i'm going to have to accept that the situation can never be fixed, and all i can do is get the hell outta dodge before the whole damn thing collapses under the weight of its own shit. let the karmic chips fall where they may, and get out with a whole skin.

i've let this thing affect me for too long. i haven't been to the gym in weeks. i've been eating dairy products and not giving a shit how they tear me up. i've been compulsive/comfort eating again: starches, salt, and sugar. taco bell, for cryin' out loud! freakin' ACK!! i've been drinking alcohol and soda, and smoking djarum blacks (clove cigarettes) looking for the buzz from alcohol, caffiene, and tobacco. i'm suppressing, again.

all of which not only makes me sicker in various ways, but impedes getting better. and no, they're not the same thing.

yeah, greggo, you're right. i wanna fight back against the lame, unjust illogic of it all and i know i can't. my anger is consuming me.

but not for long. i am a revolutionary freedom fighter for beauty, truth, and the Funk. i am a daughter of the Menstrual Temple, and scion of Lilith --Night Mother of Vengeance and Independence. i am a witch, i run with the silverfox pack, and am House Mother of the House of Dragons' Rest. i am pronoiac, i am woman, i am delena.

not for long. so the fuck mote it be.

lots to say, none which is interesting

...to say the least.

taking my shower earlier, there were actually quite a few topics rolling about in my head like marbles. but really, honestly, i'm so damn tired i really don't give a crap about any of them. i'm so tired i give these jaw-cracking yawns all day long, my brain is dead, and my body feels weak like it's getting sick.

and no, i'm not getting sick.

and yet i can't fall asleep, godsdammit. i dread sleeping, i don't want to do it, because when i wake up i'll have to go to work, and i fucking hate that fucking place right now. i've increasingly hated it over the past few months. and there seems no good way out. my only way out --quitting-- is just another version of an anal rape in the dark over a barrel with sand in the vaseline. indentured servants can't up and quit their jobs.

just fucking transfer me, assholes.

what, me stressed??

so yesterday i'm at work bathing my 3:30 appointment, a standard poodle mix named jacques. he's quite the sweetheart and perhaps is the exception to my rule to hate all doodles. he's a sweetheart, and he can't help it stupid people made him a mutt and are making themselves look stupid trying to make him an AKC standard breed.

(for those of you unfamiliar with the dog world or its lingo and nicknames, "doodles" is the unofficial nickname for any breed mixed with a poodle. e.g. labradoodles, goldendoodles, schnoodles, stupiddoodles... except for "yorkiepoos." UGH.)

and no shit, there i was, rinsing off his beautiful head with his warm hazel eyes, and suddenly i'm doubled over in piercing lower abdomen pain. i shut off the water --ever the desert creature, brainwashed at an early age to cringe at all waste of water-- and collapsed against the wall. this was, like, holy-shit-i'm-freaking-OUT kind of pain. i went into mild shock kinda pain.

i put jacques the doodle away in his kennel soaking wet, poor thing, and apologized profusely. but i was also sweating and shaking, the pain was so bad, and i hoped he'd understand. then i just headed for the back, because if i was gonna puke, dammit i was gonna puke in a toilet and not all over the floor.

i made a beeline for the door through the salon, doubled over, and the acting manager (since the manager lady got herself transferred due to Stupid Political Crap at work) and one of the other groomers asked if i was okay, what was the matter? i gasped out an, "i have no idea" and kept walking. i was fucking scared.

with no luck in the bathroom, with both of those groomers' help, i made it to the break room and just sat for a while until the world stopped spinning. i'd say i was sweating like a pig, but pigs don't sweat. my general manager and one of the floor managers were there, and they asked if i was okay. the GM left, but said he'd check on me later. being the stubborn bitch i am, the minute i could stand mostly upright, i went back to the bathroom.

what scared me even more than BAM!-out-of-the-blue, twist-me-into-a-pretzel pain was finding blood when it's nowhere near my time of the month. some girls have the occasional spotting, some have the occasional surprise early or irregular period.

NOT ME, DAMMIT!!!!

you could set your watch by me. i'm the chick everybody hates. no cramps, no spotting, no bloating, no soreness, and in three days i'm done. sometimes less than that. yeah, i'll get antsy a week before and crave spaghetti like nobody's business, but so what? so i get to make my fan-fucking-tastic delena spaghetti once a month and everybody benefits! this doesn't happen to me, dammit!!

of course, the only thing going through my head was when my grandma had cancer and this was how it started. she's years in the grave, and it was a fucking wad of fun watching the cancer just eat her up until she wasted away and died. i was slightly scared, to say the least.

i called up my doctor, but wasn't able to get a hold of anyone until this morning. i called in to work, but my GM had left a note for the other managers that i probably wouldn't be in today and it was okay. that was thoughtful. but anyway, i spoke to a nurse, and she said it was most likely a cyst, and the bleeding? stress.

BLOODY FUCKING ZIPPY YAY YUMMY FUN.

i've never had my body react to stress like this. usually i toe the edge of a mental breakdown, have another violent flare-up of IBS, and catch some type of bug that lasts for weeks. like the flu. it's cost me a job or two in the past, because it stressed me out until my health was on the midden heap. but bleeding? yeah, let's just go from zero to scare the crap out of me in 2.5 seconds.

of course, you could say it's really my body telling me something. and i know things have sucked at work lately. i haven't written about it --which makes me feel worse, actually-- because the wrong person could read those entries and take advantage of them, and then there goes my fantastic, perfect career. and there are a few people who read this blog who are dirty enough cunts to endanger my job. i know this. i don't change what i say because i couldn't care less about it. i value my honesty, and i love this blog too much to let them keep me from shining. but i'm also not stupid, either.

i just wasn't aware that work was stressing me out this badly. something seriously needs to be done, and i think i just need to be transferred ASAFP.

at least i got to take a nap today...

brezsny-on-the-blog

CAPRICORN (Dec. 22-Jan. 19) - San Francisco Chronicle columnist Jon Carroll says he's periodically asked about what it takes to be a writer. He has two pieces of advice: "Good writers read a lot, and good writers write a lot." I urge you to apply that approach to whatever skill it is you'd like to master, whether it's building a boat, traveling where the tourists don't go, satisfying a lover, or anything else. In other words, practice, practice, and practice some more as you study the work of those who are experts in the field. Now is an especially ripe time for you to identify what this skill is for you, and to sign a formal agreement with yourself in which you promise to steadily upgrade your mastery of it.


now, i'm a writer and yes, lately i haven't been writing a lot. my bad. actually, i've been feeling the absence of the writing muses, and i keep promising myself that i'll get back into it, but right now i'm just keeping up with life-in-general. not that i'm complaining! for the first time since *m* and i got together, i can finally say that i'm totally in love with my life again. i'm trying to dwell less on the fact that *m* grossly derailed my Funk and more on the fact that i've got my Funk back and it's Funkier than ever!

but i've been seriously thinking about my horoscopes the last few weeks. i've just not really known what to write about it, and last week...? i didn't really wanna come out with what i thought about it. it was about how this last week i should really be thinking about a truth that'll slowly manifest itself from the lies i'd wrapped it up in like protective coating. and really there's only been two truths that i've been protecting myself from because they hurt so much.

one is the simple fact that no man will ever love me enough to truly be a good-enough partner and companion for me, and for the family i wished to create. i feel like less-than, like a defect of a woman for not being what men want without sacrificing my soul. and sometimes i'm convinced that, obviously, i'm shit because men always end up treating me like shit. and oh goddess, it hurts. but okay, so i'm not good enough to be the fabulous wife i know i could be. i'm still going to be a fucking-fantabulous mother to the most...how did boho mom put it? "the most loved, anticipated, empowered, enlightened, cherished, magical child ever born." yeah. the iGoddess baby will be the first of what will eventually become a tightly-knit, loving, magical, formidable family spanning the world.

so the fuck mote it be.

the second truth is that i'm quite seriously falling in love with *sy*, the person who was simply supposed to be company on cold nights. but he's somehow worked himself past my defenses, past my coldness and my aloofness that *m* had forced me to conform into. he's worked himself past what i wanted and found what i really needed, and it's meshed so wonderfully with what he's wanted and needed that, despite myself, i find our rhythm ebbing and flowing like La Diosa Del Mar herself. it's a slow rhythm, beautiful and subtle and filled with those nameless Things which make the ancient magic powerful still. it's like making love with slow, passionate sighs amid the cozy, orange glow of candles, where the physical connection is more for closeness than pleasure...until climax comes out of nowhere and takes you deep inside a place you'd forgotten ever existed.

those revelations come like that, slow and rhythmic, and i discover belatedly that i've already descended to another level of intimacy despite myself. consciously i fight it, but sometimes i feel i'm being driven by something deeper.

i have yet to decide if i like it.

and this week? this skill i wish to master is, quite simply, love. i've been paying attention to the masters of quality, and the masters of speed in the grooming salon. i've made my weekly goal a permanent and now-commonplace accomplishment. and my quality of work hasn't suffered. i suppose i could still pay more attention and master this skill of pet grooming. and i have been, keeping ears and eyes open for more i could learn. once my transfer goes through, i'll be among other groomers and will learn even more.

but the skill i'm truly interested in mastering is Love. i'm living with *ds* and *ks* now, and i'm sure it's become apparent from my other entries that i hold them as my role models and ultimate example of what love can be for me. of course, to me they are so perfect that perhaps it's no wonder i'm so unlucky in love. for even as i am not fit to be a wife to someone, i doubt the poor bastard would ever be able to live up to the standard my brother and sister hold for me. not one couple in a million achieves what they've been blessed with, which makes it all the more sacred.

just as Love is sacred. as sex and marriage and life and all of existence is sacred. didn't Everything come from Love?

and so i will sit back, and i will pay attention, and i will learn. this ever-growing mastery of love will be showered upon the iGoddess-child. and in the sanctity of my bedchamber, i suppose *sy* will be the lucky recipient of my advancing lessons as i grow in my mastery.

*shrug* i guess...so the fuck mote it be.

the one where we fill in the blanks

last saturday i had "*m*" scribbled in my little pink personal calendar i keep in my purse, ever since my schedule got so hectic in my mission to remain at home as little as possible. hell, it go so that i could barely keep track of where i was supposed to be and when.

he apologized. not only did he apologize, but i was actually very pleasantly surprised that he sucked it up and admitted he had turned exactly into big *c*. his life had gone to shit and he was taking it out on me. he put me last. he pushed me away instead of letting me in. he ignored me, and i didn't deserve any of it. he treated me like absolute shit, and he was filled with remorse. he loved me, and oh god, did he miss me. it killed him every minute i wasn't home, and it killed him to know that he brought it on himself and, moreso, that he deserved all of it.

and so on and so forth.

he got really choked up and even teary-eyed for some of it. it's uncomfortable being around a grown man crying. we talked a bit. he was stone-cold sober...for once. lately he'd been drinking a lot, but as he'd ignored my own drinking binge previously, i made a point to ignore his. on his knees in front of me (i was sitting on the floor happily eating taco bell), he asked if there was any chance of us fixing this. any chance at all?

i shook my head. "it's too late," i said.

after a lot of crying and kicking himself, he left for a while. i thought maybe it was to drive around and think, but it was actually to buy more alcohol. however, by then i'd asked *ds* and *ks* over to watch more alias and to talk a bit.

sunday was another story. i'd come home after a fun night out with *ds* and *ks*. that was the "corset and cheese" night. oi vey...

but we talked more, *m* and i, because i was actually trying to be friendly and he wasn't speaking to me. "ah, so we're being rude now," i said. he gave me this schpiel about having just lost the best thing that ever happened to him and how he's having a hard time right now and just trying to kill his love. that's the phrase he used. "kill his love." every time he looks at me it reminds him of what he lost and it hurts too much.

fuck. like every time i set foot inside that apartment i was whacked upside the head with everything i'd lost --including how dead my lifelong dream was-- and with everything that made me so fucking miserable? everywhere i looked, there were *m*'s things, reminders i was in such close proximity to someone who had made me as miserable as big *c* and my bio-dad had.

(just for reference, my friendship with my bio-dad is really good now.)

so i had no pity. and *m* was well along in the drinking by that time. the argument escalated to the point where he lost his temper and was screaming at me. he slammed his drink on the table, which splashed in a fountain onto the carpet. he stood over me and was shouting at the top of his lungs. being that i will not tolerate being in any submissive position except at my choosing (and only with my lover), i calmly got to my feet and stood off with him. he ignored the gesture and continued to shout. he put his hands on me, still shouting, right around the scruff of my neck.

drunk, he put his hands on me in anger.

which is, of course, the unacceptable Point of No Return.

so the next day i told *mj* and *cc* about it. they were upset, needless to say. i told *ds* and *ks* as they sat on the couch with me and we watched across the universe (yay!). i called up my dad and told him, and he and i had a long conversation about it.

the thing of it is, i was still actually willing to pardon his behavior. compared to the really violent shit i've already lived through, putting hands on me while shouting in my face doesn't really register on my scale. i was more insulted and irritated than anything, and not once did it even occur to me to be frightened. in fact, he backed down first. but seriously, i've been beaten, raped, bludgeoned, had joints dislocated, and stared down the barrel of a gun someone else held up at me. all at the hands of men. a little drunken raging was nothing. pipsqueaky, even.

but then *ks* said something that simply decided it for me. he said the thought of his sister living in this kind of environment just made him twist up inside, and i knew it was that protective love for a member of his pack he was talking about. well, if living in that place --where i'd honestly had nothing but unhappiness anyway-- was going to do that to members of my family, then move out of it i shall.

and i did. monday night we packed up some of my stuff, then went to shari's and celebrated by stuffing ourselves like pigs. it was great. on tuesday we packed up the rest of it and hauled it out of there. on wednesday we moved my heavy stuff and that was that. i'm now posting to you live from my new apartment i share with *ds* and *ks*.

and on wednesday night, *sy* and i broke in my bed good and proper.

and it was Good.