Blogging as Guising

I have become familiar with the practice of “guising” – assuming an identity other than that which one is commonly associated, for the purpose of exploring the inner workings of the mind and soul – through some of the work my daughter has been doing. I understand the concept, and am sometimes disturbed by the forms this may take. For instance, she is a sweet and gentle young woman, who engaged in an exercise in which she was a heinous creature that annoyed the people around her with snide comments, personal attacks (poking, teasing, intimidating expressions) and rude behavior. This was all carried out at a costume party, and her outfit was so effective and concealing that the only person who knew her identity was the conspirator who helped her dress. At the end of the party people went their ways, shaking their heads at the odd experience they had had, wondering where their sweet friend was and why she was not there. No one thought she had it in her to take on such a transformed persona, and those who found out her identity were astonished.

Several years ago I started a blog under an identity which was unlike my everyday face. I was a trashy, slutty girl in her late 20s who wrote of random encounters with strangers in bars, one night stands and drunken orgies. I described encounters with multiple partners (simultaneously), bisexual encounters, deviant practices and life on the edge. I developed quite a following of men who wanted to meet me, young studs anxious for a chance at the goods. I tormented them unmercifully with lewd suggestions and promises of wanton sexual abandon. I used the poor saps to make myself feel desirable and vital, while in my real life I was in turmoil. My marriage was ending, I was feeling useless and full of self-doubt, and I wanted to make someone, ANYONE want me. I didn’t care about the character of the men I attracted. I was desperate to prove to myself that I had some sexual attractiveness about me, and I didn’t care how I used anyone in order to achieve some level of self-gratification. I was a sad and pathetic middle-aged woman striving for her identity in a world that fostered anonymity. I am happy to report that I have since calmed the restless spirit within, due in large part to being loved by a wonderful man for a long enough period of time that it made me realize that it wasn’t all my failing that made my marriage crumble. There were enough roadblocks and timebombs in that union to make any rational person run screaming.

Blogging can become a vehicle for unmasking the psyche, for removing the curse of familiarity from communication and creating a space where the mind and will can run free. I have seen the comments posted by some people I have known for some time, and the freedom that they exhibit in their remarks is uncharacteristic. I have seen anger, aggression, lust, sorrow and depression in the words of my friends, expressed to the world in a medium which affords anonymity and safety. The things that are impossible for them to express in their daily lives are freely vented to the world in a forum that will neither judge nor criticize them for their weakness, their perversion, their humanity. I am surprised sometimes at the intensity of their emotion. The hostility and pent up frustration of one comes out as a cynical and biting wit, which tears the heads off of lesser individuals. Another has two blogs, one for family and friends in which he reports news of the family, the job, the weather, the house, and the other in which he describes his sexual fantasies and his longing to bed willing lovelies with huge breasts and throbbing genitalia. I wonder if my knowledge of their alter-egos has changed the tenor of their writing? Have they abridged their ranting because they are aware that there is someone about who is privy to their true identities? I sincerely hope not, as I have no intention of attenuating my growth through the self-discovery that this blog will allow me. It is entirely possible that through the use of words, lives may be changed permanently, and hopefully for the better.

Of course, some people who blog are simply perverts and egomaniacs. Go figure.

Loneliness

Being apart and lonely is like rain.
It climbs toward evening from the ocean plains;
from flat places, rolling and remote, it climbs
to heaven, which is its old abode.
And only when leaving heaven drops upon the city.

It rains down on us in those twittering
hours when the streets turn their faces to the dawn,
and when two bodies who have found nothing,
dissapointed and depressed, roll over;
and when two people who despise eachother
have to sleep together in one bed-

that is when loneliness receives the rivers...


- Rainer Maria Rilke
Translated by Robert Bly

Pain: the universal equalizer

I have just started to come down from my first identifiable sulfite reaction, and I must say that this has made me feel very humble, indeed. At first I thought it was an MSG reaction, and was about to blame the stuff my friend put on the garlic toast as the culprit. That was, until I spoke with her and she said "All it is is garlic powder". Hmmm......Garlic Powder (heavily preserved with sulfites to prevent discoloration). Shrimp Scampi (shrimp are soaked in a solution of sulfites to keep them from discoloring and to retard growth of micro-organisms). Yellowtail Shiraz - Australian red wine (very tasty. Red wine has natural sulfites from the grape skins, but they also add them as mold retardants to improve the yield).

I have a very dear friend and significant person in my life who is extremely sensitive to sulfites. I have seen him in pain frequently, and I have been able to identify and empathize with his pain because I have been very sensitive to monosodium glutamate for years, and it produces a violent headache accompanied by nausea and light sensitivity, much like a migraine. I have to say, though, that this has been a new one even to me. Not only do I have the pain and nausea, but I also have ringing in my ears, dizziness and cold chills to round out the experience. I don't believe I have ever diminished his suffering in my words or actions, and if I have, I apologize profusely and from deep within my viscera. Last night was hell, pure and simple. At about three this morning all I wanted to do was cut my head off. At the twelve hour mark or so, I noticed that there was a bit of improvement and it's been a steady slide down the pain mountain since. I am anticipating that by the time I hit the 24 hour mark that I will be feeling mostly like myself, at about 10:30 PM.

Many thanks to my friends aspirin and (unsulfured) honey. The aspirin takes the edge off the pain and the honey tends to cut the nausea. I don't know how I'd have gotten through without you. My thanks also go out to my dearest friend and sweet one for the knowledge he has given me regarding this malady, so I wouldn't have to think I was having a stroke. If I could take your pain away, I would. Nobody should have to feel like that ever.

*Sigh* Perhaps I will get over to my mother's house next weekend.......

More ramblings

I know a lot of people. I have been a collector of friends and acquaintances for as long as I can remember. I have some very special, very important friends in my life. When one of them hurts, I do what I can to help them out of their pain. I love my people.
Right now, I can think of at least four who are going through various sorts of anguish, from the woman suffering the mental distress of being insignificant to her spouse, to the son who is losing his father in his battle with cancer. In every one of these situations, the feeling is the same: helplessness. She can't make her husband see how his indifference to her hurts; that would mean that she would have to confront the possibility of acknowledging that her situation is hopeless and she would have to decide whether to accept his passive neglect or get out. Neither one is acceptable to her in her current state. She goes on in denial, trying her best to cope with a loveless marriage. The son has to watch his parents make their decisions on treatment options, knowing full well that the extent of the good may be simply to slow the progress of the disease and give the dad a few more months in which to get his affairs in order. He has to watch from the sidelines and hope for the best, hope for a miracle.
When do we decide when it's time to let go and keep moving forward with our lives? It is different for every human on the face of the earth. My mother still waits, after 43 years, for the doctor to say he was only kidding, that my sister is not really dead, that she was part of the witness protection program and that the gangster from whom she was being protected (and his entire family) is dead and she can come out of hiding. My mother is 88 and sometimes that is all that keeps her going. She had to face my father's death (she found him) and my brother's as well. Rather than resigning her to the fact that everyone dies, it has strengthened her resolve to fight death with every ounce of vigor she has left in her frail old body. She weeps at her insufficiencies when she can't keep a cat alive who has leukemia, or the dog that is ancient and white eyed and wants to be out of his pain. She tortures herself with the "knowledge" that she is not good enough, has not tried hard enough, has let them all down. I want to scream at her that she is not God. No one is. There is no God.

There is a time and a place to let go and resign yourself to the way of fate. I am my mother's daughter in more ways than I care to acknowledge at this particular moment.