My friend was given a title and asked to write a short story with it. i thought it was a fun excercise and so i did it too. i am sharing mine with you now.

TITLE: She Whispers, Nudges, Mumbles Something

It was after a big weekend of make believe. The whole time they had been talking to people they should know better than anyone else, but always seem to be barely on the surface with. Selah and pete had been together for seven years now and their families knew this but wondered aloud why the two never married or have children, asking “so when are you two going to get hitched?” it took them four years before they admitted they were living together to all of them, those that knew sooner kept it secret knowing full well the arguments and assumptions that would be had between generations.

The truth was this year had been different for both of them. They knew things had gotten stale, the routines were wordless and dull but they were comfortable. They tended to do things on a schedule all the time now; groceries on Wednesday nights, laundry on sundays, they had chicken salad on Thursdays, etc. Even sex was standard choreography and the show played three nights a week, pete hasn’t made selah come in a long time now but she would say the sex was good if you asked. She read papers and he worked in the garage on Monday nights, unless it was football season when they went to Shoddy’s to watch with the familiars. Even then they had cheeseburgers made the same way as they had for years already, the cook starting them when they walked in. pete did not like anything but meat and cheese, selah liked swiss cheese and grilled onions. Everything they did felt like centuries in stone but comfortable. They talked about this wondering if they should change. Was this too easy? Was it the need for a next step, move into a new home, buy a new car, have a baby, get married? They bought a new car.

They began to drive for the hell of it, Saturday afternoons. They would go north, south or west. East was a bust, that’s where the family was and they knew the land well enough. On the drives they would talk about things between them, slowly at first. Should we do things differently? selah asked. Pete asked if she wanted more. I don’t think so. Pete didn’t either, he liked the comfort, but was at the same time feeling stunted. Neither knew what to do.

Six months ago pete disrupted the routine by going to a café to read on Sunday afternoons. It so alarmed selah that at first she found herself unable to read without pete in the next room also reading. she paced. She drew up scenarios in her head. She wondered what was happening. She bought sexy lingerie online (that she never really wore). When he returned she asked him how it went, as if to ask ‘how is the world outside‘? there was excitement at first, but she sensed a distance and wasn’t convinced it wasn’t herself. It became usual.

About a month ago they decided they were ready to get engaged, they were already acting like they were married. This was not an overnight decision, it was discussed and joked about. They played at calling each other “wife” or “husband” with stresses on the ends of the words with laughter. They decided to try the idea out on strangers, so at the store on Wednesday nights they would say things like, ‘my husband likes those cookies‘ or ‘my wife needs this bleach‘ many of the usual clerks thought they were married already and asked why she hadn’t changed her name.

Pete went looking for rings, selah tagging along whispering in his ear. They talked about the perfect engagement ring for selah. Pete wanted her to have a diamond, being raised by diamond wearing farmers, maybe something vintage. Selah wanted something simple, maybe made with rose gold, something unusual but usual. Her parents were now winemakers. They agreed they would have to have a ring before the dinner for pete’s mothers sixtieth birthday bash, even Selah’s parents would be coming. It was the perfect time to tell them and the deadline’s pressure made it so the rings seemed to never be right. They shopped for rings on Saturday mornings before the drives.

The week before they were to drive east they settled on something temporary just so they could announce it. It was a silver band with simulated diamonds in it. Pete put it on her finger with the receipt in the other hand. They laughed at their ruse. On the drive, selah began to feel sick to her stomach, usual family time nerves she figured, and she spun the ring on her finger without noticing. Pete also felt strange, like something wasn’t right. The weather had turned icy cold and the sun was setting. Selah never much liked driving in this weather so she occupied herself with a stack of papers from her students. She would tell pete about how misha made a real attempt this time to study and she could tell. He would say that was good.

When they arrived it was that familiar feeling of role play, ‘you look great! How are the students this year? Pete, are you still commuting to Turango?’ The first evening went smooth enough and they collapsed into their bed with relief. The next day was the big event, garish and homey as one would think pete’s mom wanted. It was also the day pete and selah dreaded being a focal point, it was time to announce. They decided last week that selah would call attention, and pete would, holding selah in his arms, tell the world as they knew it about their decision. Soon it was almost too late, the older folks were beginning to drop off and children to rustle, so selah nudges pete and gives him the eye. By now the rumor had already spread, some had noticed the ring and others, having asked that question, were told there was a big announcement tonite, so when selah got up to the mic to get attention she already had it. Pete held selah in his arms and said, “everyone, I have asked selah to be my wife and she has foolishly accepted.” Though they both knew it was more of a chat driving through molalla, mutual, not even stopping the car, low romance really. The crowd cheered! The rush was overwhelming and selah began to cry. She wasn’t exactly happy, not sad, just uncomfortable. The party resumed and after ten the band played funk. everyone danced in this eastern Oregon way with special attention paid to getting selah and pete to go on and on.

Overnight snow fell as pete’s mother told him she had a ring for selah. Selah went to bed heady from wine and attention eager to see the next morning. when she woke up she was glad to be leaving this big goof, but not looking forward to the drive. She had to go home, laundry needed to be done. As she and pete departed slowly waving to the family she sighed, ‘I am glad that is over‘. Pete said it was a nice time, her ring warm in his pocket. He planned to propose, properly, when they got home.

At about six thirty, on the pass, a truck just behind them lost control on black ice and slid sideways into their rear end sending their new car with its antilock brakes and all wheel drives spinning into the side of the mountain. Snow fell on top of them, dislodged by impact.

The airbags had gone off and soon there was silence. Snow covered silence. Pete reached toward selah, moaning ‘ baby, are you alright?’ trying to touch her beyond the bags. He felt something wet.. Selah had just sat back in her seat after reaching for his requested yogurt snack when the accident happened. She did not have her seat belt on yet. The impact of the mountain was on her side of the car and it jolted her one way while pinning her legs in the crunched metal, the airbag going off slammed her head backward. She felt dizzy. She felt pain. She tasted salt in her mouth. She smelled latex and raspberry yogurt. Something in her knew this was not going to end well. Something in her knew she was tired. She tried to say the words pete needed to hear, ‘I am fine, I love you, how are you?‘, but all she could get out was a muffled slur, “I am glad that’s over” and reached toward him. her arm didn’t actually move.

welp, i have been gone and here and gone again and here again. wait, no. i have not been here- here in flux flux land. but i ache to try again. so... just saying. do you remember me? did you miss me? this flux is back in northwest, the more usa of the places she's been in a while. she is portland, she is in reality checks. she is currently having her tires balanced.

the point of writing is merely to write really. so write then. write on. writing the wrongs is one way of telling it, right?

i saw the movie CONTROL the other day in a discount theater where you could eat on a table if you wanted. it was a matinee at first, winter dark when i left. dark thouhgtfulness memories was the mood inside me too. i wept. took heaving breaths. watching a story of love aching and not being received. of role playing the success stories of partner, parent, regular employee and dreamy rockstar, none of it really feeding or working out too well as it was really a hasty grab for some love's approval outside ian. of illness not going away and some kind of hopelessness when one makes choices that seem innocent enough, immature even. i cried. but not because of the obvious. to me that ache is familiar so i think i wept more for a version of myself. not the one to die from but more the one where you want to live so bad but can't seem to make it work out that way as you are dead somehow, cut off, because you think about everyone else mostly, selfish in the end. lost always. isolated in a crowd. it was shot in black and white and well done this way. see it if you want to hurt, or more know what hurt might look like. and look beyond the obvious.

as i might, i will be here again and write. telling it like it is, wants to be, was and peeking around the corner of what will be. but first i want to reread some of the stuff we have both, the fluxers, contributed in the days passed by.

birthdays are so odd. I start thinking of them weeks in advance. making plans. setting sights.
finishing up the year.
samhain is my new year in so many ways.

what ryhmnes with five?

I do feel older. every year, i feel it a little bit more. it is a slow sunset in orange and red.
gold and the most vivid cliche you ever saw.

for halloween i dressed up like the wind. sought to embody that energy of wind, placid and calming as a sweet breeze or
the wind of the terrors.
the wind of loss and letting go and losing control and keeping your faith and fearing not Oz or whatever else over the rainbow reality that is just waiting to unfold.



ripening
i m easily hoping for some of the pear's wisdom. the simple trust of rightness that we deserve.
we are connected to all of this, this vastness of potntial and promise.

growing older has nothing to do with what you look like.
chan ge is good i tell myself as i notice neck skin that touches places on my neck that i know are so unfamilair that they've never touched that silky neck like that before.

yep,
wisdom.

in blog land many people go through their mid life crisis' very publically. let's face it they seem to say, life's half over. you're on the downhill slide.
as though now we were really peaking. it is intriging. compelling. yet boring. i want greater things for our generation. maybe that is how the older plays for me. i really want to DO something. its interesting to vision my career. i love it. fucking love it. bt it is 9-5, M-F and the weekends are what feels like real time, my time, free time. olyland treats me right though. closes down the streets a few times a year and whoops it up. tonight's whooping had the usual cast of charecters. those i hug when i go out. it is fun to see them in one spot. lots of dancers here but less great dance MUSIC. tonight was better though. it was on the right path, anyways. the belly dancers here are often full bellied, ballarinas not necessarily perfect. you'll see some kick ass fire dancing though because people are unafraid to show themselves.
there are real gleams of brilliance in this authentic emblazened beauty. and i am more than greatful for them. us.

remember peaking on a higher than high experience? dashing into the deepest complexities of this planet & universe as though you really could grasp it. it was mind blowing. and that is how this time is. so, in a way it is a peak but in that riding it out, deeply satisfying way that the true high was. the part that mattered and changed us and even made us who we are. we can see the alternate realities because we already have.
this skill is goign to be useful, necessary to adapt to the chganges to come. yes, there may be mortgages and cars to pay and credit to cop but there is a more subtle flow at work that is the undercurrent that betrays all of these politics and culture and technology.

I have to beleive that something deeper is going on. I am not content being entertained.

I cannot sit on my ass while listening to music
not to say that I can't drive and listen to music
i can

just to say that even when driving,
my fingers drum
my head sings
if not by rote
than it is my voice with every note
singing along


live music has always affected me deeply. it is one of my most impressed sensations. written deeply into the bark of this here tree.
this here tree is me,
of course.
the first time that I left my body in a positive way was through the cellular presence of music. it was my first glimpse
&
belief that we really could all possibly be connected in some imminent
&
present way

i will never be too old to be yelled out by the security gurads afraid of my wild and dangerous hips
weapons of feminimity
and birth
corralled to dance on the sidelines
dancing as tho a crowd of people weren't watching

me at the zoo

i love swallow

the word

the concept

the meanings

swallow
would be my bands name

tonight

Happy Happy Happiness to my favorite fluxing fluxer in all of the fluxing world.

As always, I make a birthday wish for you, my love.

Truth is, one wish may not fully encompass all of the wishes tha I have for you...

This year,
May you find out more about who you truly are
more about what makes you truly happy
and create the joy that you wish to experience.

Because it is you.

When we first got to the city, everything seemed so sparkle-fresh, christmas tree-light dazzling.  We went to parks and gasped at trees taller than buildings.  We went to the center and gaped at buildings taller than trees.  It was all so fresh to our wind blown tumbleweed minds.  

Coffee came in flavors and styles that only Eurpeans could pronounce. Groceries had delis, flower stores, cafes, and firepalces inside. Drag queens ruled the nighttime streets.  Busy people went quickly into their busy lives and we learned from the music that we loved that to live was to sweat.  Dancing wasn't only a physical test of wills but acrobatic and diving.

It was a relief just to know that some place other than THAT place existed and that for so many people it was real.

It was a clear, perfect, full moon night at Gasworks park, drinking from paper bags in graffiti-painted little cubbies by the water.  The view from that spot really is postcard Seattle and the night was warm and seductive on bare skin.  We couldn't believe our luck.  We had finally freed ourselves from small minded, small town poverty skipping straight to big town, big mind poverty and life was nothing but a grand adventure waiting for us to create it.  
It wasn't long before we were naked and in the water.  Now, any of you who know where gas works park is located know that "the water "refers to Lake Union.  Gas works is a long abanonded industrial site.  We were kids from a not-yet abandoned radioactive site so why shoud a little pollution bother us?  Swimming towards the space needle in the water is as vivid and etched in my memory as though I could see the photo now.  It is framed and hangs above my head wherever I go.  The lighted needle shone on the water all magic and luminousity.  We swam in the lake for hours while our boyfriends held our clothes.  They couldn't beleive such small town girls would swim naked in our new bigger town. They were embarrased, asking us again and agin to get out, pointing us out to other people who came to those cubbies to smooch or drink.  We just laughed at their pleading, spalshed the people who came closer to see that yep, that really was two girls i the water where only sea gulls dared bathed.
We were giddy wih possibility, freedom, truth.
I still think of that night as irony.  We swm in water that I wouldn't let my dog swim in.  We were free from a small town to be bound by the tempations a big town had to offer but in thst moment nothing else was true.  Nothing other than us.  Two girls on the verge of growing up, seeds watered by the sheen of the shining water of a ship canal.

120 minutes

Pop will eat itself, there is no love between us -anymore. I am sitting in her car, she always drives while I  co pilot. We are usually high. Mostly bored. it works out well enough, except the time she drove her car into the river. I wasn’t in it, but she was, she had hypothermia, it was February. The song drones on and I am on highway 182 connecting two of three cities,  returning from something. Going nowhere. it is deep night. I could bet a ranch it was one of your tapes that played.

In She sells the sanctuary I am always dancing. No matter where or when I hear this song, by the end of the first bar I am moving. i am at a high school dance, I am dancing with myself  near a corner- in fringe. I am free. I don’t belong here and I celebrate that with a waver get down.

I am in front of her car on some lookout point listening to the tape playing. It is nighttime and the lights of the small town could be a great city teeming with excitement if you squint your eyes. When I look up it also looks like a big city. I am in the desert. This is one of my all time e-jam songs, right up there with how soon is now….

Love and rockets… I am now a teenager fully. by this time you may have crossed over.

Each of these have been love songs to my heart and soul ripe in memories ever soundtracked. may I never grow old.

i wake up sure of my instincts
i seek more than the obvious
we are warts and all
i have warts and all
but...
life is a hushed intimacy
sharing secrets a perversion
attachments are rationed
you've pulled me out of line
i am always a suspect
and i bend myself to get this straight
taking sides divides us
apology is romance
regret an affection
i wake up sure of my instincts
i seek more than the obvious
we are warts and all
i have warts and all
but..
the world is a starving gut
and i run to where i belong
in the small space of my soul
wholly untethered and at peice

yeah, it isn't real poetry but it is kinda cool. NOT FOR RESALE

The most incredible exhibit that I witnessed was created by women living with breast cancer. Torso casts done as a group. The casts were all decorated and some were missing breasts. Missing pieces of themselves with gaping holes or flat surfaces where there was once curve. One was made of rice paper, thin enough for the raised surfaces of scars to leave a mark. It was white without curves except for hips. No matter what, we all have our hips. It was called, Some days the veils are very thin.

One piece menioned that some women think of the cancer as a gift, helping them to see and love and open more completely into the beauty of their lives. This artist wasn't buying it. She said, the sun is not more brilliant, the sky more vivid than it is today. We all have a dagger over our heads. Look up and see yours now and appreciate this life. Appreciate this life. I said, fucking appreciate it, drink it and be grateful.

The display begged me to love my breasts even though I haven't really spent time loving them before. My breasts have mostly been another piece of the bullshit body image hate that I grew up with. Recently, I have seen how babies get round and healthy with the love of breasts and I have reconsidered my tolerance of them. I dream of fat healthy babies who love my breasts as life lines, teaching me...

I want to love them. So, I do. I want to rub them and kiss them and tell them how fucking grateful I am to be here and so I do and I also think of all of these women, all of us who dance so beautifully in the world. I am proud to be a woman and also a little bit scared of being a woman.
Woman have breasts and wombs and it seems sometimes as if all of life depends upon us. Our breasts, our wombs, our willingess to give and give and give. We love and nourish and hold together the whole world and also the whole world holds us together but we forget that sometimes, or I do.

I am grateful to brave women who exposed themsleves, shared themselves and created something stirring and beautiful and terrifying. It felt like what art is supposed to do, see yourself reflected in it and question how it came to be made so.