Reporting

We survived Diva's visit. The whole thing was slightly surreal.

Since she's been gone we got an Xbox. She was excited about that, and Sproing taught her how to use the controller to play a couple of his games. He was very patient with her. They got along very well, as I mentioned in my previous post.

When it was time for dinner everyone came into the kitchen to eat. We had two tables set up, one of them a door set on saw horses. That's always fun! It means Thanksgiving to me. Anyway, we all came into the kitchen, got plates and served ourselves. Except Diva. She sat in front of the TV in the living room. We had to call her again, then she came in and sat down at the last available spot at the table. She just sat in front of the empty plate with a creepy blank look on her face. I said "Honey, take your plate over and get some food." She stared at me for probably 30 seconds before getting up. She got one thing then came back to the table. I suggested she go back and get some more stuff, and Superman helped guide her through the decision making process. She ate what she got, and expressed a liking for the sweet potato casserole when Sproing put up a fight about eating the 2 tablespoons of sweet potato I gave him.

I napped for an hour after dinner, then got up to go with Superman to return Diva to her rightful place. 70 miles 4 times in one day is a pain in the ass. He and I had a very nice time together on the way home, and an even nicer time once we got home.

Diva is crazy. She often does not show emotion, or if she does it's inappropriate to the situation. She has what psychologists call flat affect (a'-fect; n). It is one symptom of schizophrenia, as is command auditory hallucinations, which she's had. That's when she hears voices telling her to do things (like kill us in our sleep). She's not been diagnosed with schizophrenia, and she may be too young (will be 13 next Saturday) to qualify for that diagnosis. I won't be at all surprised if we hear that she is schizophrenic.

It was stressful having her here, and I think we won't do that again. C and N both recommend that she not ever come back here. They went out after dinner in order to get away from her presence, as both of them were very uncomfortable with her in the house. I locked the doors to my bedroom and office while she was here, and asked the charge nurse at the facility to check her for contraband when we took her back. After we left her, Superman visibly relaxed. He didn't realize how guarded he was until he no longer had to be.

In other news, N wanted to hit the Black Friday sales today. C, who isn't a big fan of that sort of thing anyway, had to go into work and make donuts to keep the citizens of Greenwood fueled up for their power shopping. Since N doesn't have his drivers' license yet, I got up early and took him shopping. We left the house shortly after 6:00 and were gone for 2.5 hours. We hit Wal-Mart first, then went to what passes for our mall. I got a couple of Christmas gifts for Sproing and N bought himself a few garments. I got up really early. I can feel a nap approaching rapidly.

Mid Thanksgiving report

So far so good.

C's boyfriend N accompanied me to pick up Diva. He and I have never had a lot of time alone to just talk. The trip to the loony bin is 1.5 hours, which we spent in enjoyable conversation. I find that conversations in the car seem to be most productive.

We retrieved the girl child and came home. She's grown recently. I nearly didn't recognize her when she came out of her dorm, a new hair-do being part of the camouflage. She looks pretty good, though the poor thing has a terrible acne outbreak. Her 13th birthday is in 9 days. Welcome to teenage-hood.

As soon as we got home I locked the doors to my bedroom and my office. Light locked the door to her room. And yes, we're keeping a close eye on her. She and Sproing are getting along famously! This makes my life easier.

Light is doing most of the cooking. Superman managed the pork loin. I helped cut up the bread for the stuffing. I wrote out the recipe for the stuffing for Light. It's a good thing she and I think so much alike, else she might not be able to use it at all. The recipe I wrote is more of a guideline, really. There are practically no measurements, and the spice list is open source, so to speak.

I am very tired. And hungry. It's 3:15 and I had no lunch. Neither did anyone else, of course. Dinner should be ready soon. That's been the response for the past hour, but from the sounds of things I think it really will be soon. After we eat and I make a half-hearted attempt to help clean up, my plan is to take a nap. Superman and someone will take Diva back to the loony bin.

That's about all I have for now, and Superman just came in to tell me that dinner is almost served.

Merry Thanksgiving to one and all, even the beloved Canadians who had their Thanksgiving weeks ago.

I had a good day... and drunk blogging

I've had a spate of bad days over the past couple of weeks, but have felt pretty good most of this week. I had 2.5 glasses of wine and some spiked coffee this evening, and my head is floating about half a head above my head now. Feelin' groovy.

Superman left here Sunday to visit his parents. I may have mentioned before that his father is in poor health. Today (24 Nov) is his 79th birthday, and Superman wanted to visit and be there on his dad's birthday. He had a good visit with the folks. He left their place around noon and drove to the city where Twitch attends school to retrieve the boy. They got here at 9:17 this evening (he notices stuff like that). Superman is compressed, and has been attempting to decompress since he got home, having spotty success. I'm glad he's back home. Things went pretty well while he was gone, but it is very good to have him back where he belongs.

So Twitch is home now, and Light got home yesterday (Tues.). Tomorrow morning I will drive to Columbia to retrieve the Diva. She'll come home for Thanksgiving dinner, then go right back to the loony bin. I'm a bit uncomfortable about her being here, but I feel obligated to include her in the holiday observance. I think I'd feel more uncomfortable (read: guilty) if we excluded her. The plan is to keep a wary eye on her at all times, and no one will be alone with her. It's a tricky thing. Yes, there's some resentment being served with our holiday meal.

Speaking of the meal, Superman and Light will be doing the majority of the cooking. I'll go get Diva, and hopefully he will drive her back in the afternoon. After being on the road for 9 hours today he might not be thrilled about another 3 or so. Eh. It's what we do.

Twitch is home. He can be an annoying pain in the arse. Sproing is having some trouble settling down tonight, and Light is in the room that Twitch and Sproing share, singing to her little brother. Sproing loves that. They developed that habit last summer and it was a good way for them to build on their relationship. Twitch was at school through the summer and missed that fun. Well, he's trying to go to sleep now and is entirely put out about all this melodic sweetness. Oh, get over yourself, young'un!

I mixed up a batch of ginger snap cookies this evening, and the batter is currently in the refrigerator acquiring the necessary firmness for shaping and baking. Shape and Bake, not the same as Shake and Bake. I also baked two pumpkin and one pecan pie. That's about the extent of my contribution to dinner. When I get back with Diva tomorrow (probably close to noon) I'll do some further consultation and perhaps pitch in with some real work. We'll see what needs to be done.

This post is boring me. There is some other stuff I want to talk about but tonight is not the time to do so. I need to discuss art and psychology and uncertainty and internal conflict and that sort of thing. Hopefully I'll get back here to do that before next week. I have a bunch of homework to do this weekend, too. Right now, though, it's time to go to bed.

I hope everyone has a lovely weekend, a happy Thanksgiving if you live in a place where that applies, and peace and security within your life.

(From my perspective this post seems fairly coherent, as if I weren't under the alcofluence of incohol at all. I'll have to check back tomorrow for a different perspective.)

The story of my transformation from homophobe to homophile

I had this assignment for my ceramic sculpture class:

Students will write a 2-4 page (typed, double spaced) true narrative and then design a ceramic environment to illustrate the narrative. The narrative should be about an event or experience you witnessed.

So yeah, I have to depict the story in clay. Artistically. The most significant experience I've had in recent years is learning to embrace The Gay. Here is the story I submitted to my art professor this morning.

Until about five years ago I had my life mostly figured out. I was in my early 40s with four children, the youngest having recently started elementary school. After being a stay-at-home mom most of my adult life, I decided to pursue my dream of driving a truck and became a school bus driver. I finally had a job, was making a little bit of money, and my work schedule coincided with the children’s days off from school.

The other important element of my life aside from my family was the church. We were members of a conservative protestant denomination, and my husband and I were actively involved in various ministries within the church. Our church taught a strong Bible based theology, and there were very few points with which I disagreed. Being curious and intelligent, I had given a lot of thought to many social issues from the perspective of what I learned in church.

In the winter of 2006 I met a young man whose existence challenged my beliefs. C was a 17 year old high school senior who had lived with an inner conflict since early adolescence. He also was a faithful Christian but he was romantically attracted to guys, which the church says is wrong. He kept his same sex attraction a secret until age 17 when he realized that the conflict was not going to solve itself. As he began to accept his homosexuality he slowly shared his secret with close friends. My daughter Light was one of those friends.

Light introduced me to C in December. Although I had strong suspicions, I did not know for sure that he was gay until later in January. By then most everybody at school knew of his homosexuality, and many of those classmates also attended the church where he and his mother worshiped. He had not come out to his mother and was afraid she would find out through the grapevine. The child was full of angst typical of a high-strung teenager under stress. He needed to talk and I was willing to listen. I found him to be a charming, intelligent, sensitive young man who in no way fit the image of a homosexual that I’d learned from the church. I had a conundrum.

Not long after I started talking to C he found an opportunity to tell his mother that he is gay. She did not take it well. She and C’s step-father gave him 30 days to move out of their house. I was livid! I understand her attitude about homosexuality since I held a similar view, but I do not understand how she could banish her son from her home. Because it is in my nature and typical of what I do, I invited him to move in with us. I had grown to love C.

As I got to know and love him, I began to seriously question the church’s teaching about homosexuality. The church taught me that gays were cursed and homosexuality was a lifestyle choice. C’s story didn’t reflect that, and I did not believe that God could curse someone as wonderful as C. I had a lot of questions. It was time to research the issues.

I visited a lot of websites and read some dense books. Initially my curiosity focused on the cause of homosexuality and how and why the church condemned it. What does the Bible really say about homosexuality? Who interpreted it into what my church taught? How has the church’s position changed through history? My attitudes and beliefs changed fast. Within two weeks of beginning my research I realized that homosexuality is a normal, natural variation of sexual orientation, not a choice and not inherently wrong.

My research led to more questions about the nature of gay people. The only gay people I knew were C and his boyfriend, and I was well aware that these two crazy gay boys from Greenwood, South Carolina were not typical of gays everywhere. I went online to meet other gay men who were older and more mature than these two kids. There are a lot of gay men who have their own blogs and that’s where I met some wonderful, interesting people. Many of them have since become my good friends.

This is a good place to end this narrative, but there is more of the story that I want to tell, at least in this essay if not with a clay sculpture.

I questioned the teaching of my church. After careful consideration I determined that the church was wrong. If the church was wrong about that, what else is it wrong about? It’s a domino effect. One of the pillars on the foundation of my belief crumbled, causing the walls to crack. Other clichés happened, which are easy to sculpt but not particularly creative. I radically changed my beliefs over a period of approximately six months. Not only did the walls of my faith crack, but my nerves cracked. I ended up having a nervous breakdown in late April or early May, about two and a half months after Cory moved in with us. The search for meaningful expression of my spirituality continues to this day. I know a lot more than I did five years ago, but I am less sure of where I’m going or what I should do with my life.

So there you have it. And I have no idea how to put any of that into a sculpture.

I would post a new entry but there's a cat on my arms

It's been a while, and I've missed you. I say that often, and I mean it every time.

I'm getting tired of school. It's tedious. Perhaps I'm bored with it. This is probably normal. I'm not going to fret about it just now.

The leaves are finally turning. It's the middle of November, for cryin' out loud! Don't we usually see fall colors earlier than this around here? I don't remember. Sad, I've lived at this latitude for close to two decades and I can't remember what fall looks like. We've had some cool days and a couple of light frosts. Today and yesterday were overcast with some rain, which I enjoy in moderation. Sometimes the clear bright days of fall are too bright for my tired old eyes. The rain is restful.

I'm currently procrastinating. I've got two important assignments that need attention, one that's due tomorrow morning. That's what I've come to tell you about. I'm having a hard time putting this mess into words, much less figuring out what to do with it once it's written. Let me explain.

Art. The assignment is to sculpt a narrative, to tell a story of something from my life. First of all I need to write the story. That's the part that's due tomorrow. I've decided (and the professor strongly encouraged me) to tell the story of my transformation from homophobic right wing religious goody-two-shoes to the more open, affirming GLBT advocate I am today. Those of you who have followed this blog for a while know the story. It's a story of abstract concepts without many concrete nouns that are easy to depict with clay. I've been struggling since last Friday to figure out what parts of the story to tell and how to tell it. Right now I'm rambling here on the blog, tossing around ideas in hopes that things will coalesce.

the church - religion - belief and conviction - cognitive dissonance - evidence to the contrary - change, radical change - reexamination - love - acceptance - curiosity - emotional upheaval - nervous breakdown - [have you identified any concrete nouns yet?] - rejection/acceptance - questioning fundamental assumptions - personal growth -

That's about it, as far as I can think now. I'm now going to take my ramblings to the document and make the mess there, then hopefully sort it into a coherent narrative. If it works I'll post it here later.

More art

"Think for a minute about what makes you fabulous and how you can celebrate it."-- Laura Mercier

This is the other fertility figure I made for ceramics class. It's a complicated piece, not easy to see in photographs. And for some reason I missed taking a shot from one other important perspective. This side, for instance,
only shows the hollow side of the female part. If the camera were behind it looking toward where the camera is now, you'd see better the mound of the pregnant belly. So, the pregnant belly of course represents life.

But lower the view slightly and you see under the belly (you can't see it well in this shot) at the ribs in the hollow, at a representation of death. That's the idea, anyway. And those things to the right of the belly are supposed to be a woman's breasts, though some have said they look like something else.
Flip the whole thing over, and here we see the male side of the figure. I had lots of fun doing this side.
If I were to do it again I would change a few things, but this is what we got. And I like it.

The fertility figures were our first assignment. I just finished the third assignment. I have pictures of 66% of the second assignment. We made 3 vessels, and two of them are finished. This evening the class will fire the third pot using the raku technique. If I have the gumption I will take some photos of the process and my finished third pot.

I have a hard time posting pictures on here. The damn things don't format the way I want them to. I want to show you my vessels, particularly the ginkgo pot. I'll do that in another post, though, hopefully soon.

So, about the quote leading this post:
"Think for a minute about what makes you fabulous and how you can celebrate it."
-- Laura Mercier
It was in my daily email quote. I suppose my art could be said to be part of what makes me fabulous. Celebration, though, is tricky. I don't like to do it. Perhaps showing you this piece of art is a way to celebrate.

So there you have it.

Yeah, whatever

Saw my therapist today. She says this is probably as much about hormones as anything else. We had a good talk. She said I don't necessarily need to go into the crazy. On some level, the past is the past, and as Pumba says, "put your behind in the past."

I am sad. There are tears. But it wants to be anger. Anger isn't safe for me. I'm not allowed to get angry. I don't know why, but it would be bad for me to be angry. Maybe I'll figure it out, maybe I'll let it slide for a while longer. My therapist says if I go ahead and do the angry thing most of this will clear up. Right now I just can't do angry. Maybe later. I'll pencil it in for the 35th of Juvember.

I have developed a pocket of infection just inside my right ear. This happened a couple of months ago, too. Hurts like the dickens. Tried to get in to see my doctor today, but the only available appointments conflicted with my therapy appointment, and today therapy was more important than a sore ear. I can go to the urgent care doc-in-a-box this evening or tomorrow morning.

That's all I've got for now.

so, you see, it's complicated

Insanity - a perfectly rational adjustment to an insane world. -RD Laing, psychiatrist and author (1927-1989)

Been feeling a bit crazy this week. I have been getting so much better over the past 6 to 9 months. There for a while I was functioning on a relatively high level of sanity.

Something slipped.

I'm not sure what happened exactly. I know when. I described/explained it here. But there's more than that. It's opened up the dark places. In some of my classes I'm being exposed to concepts and information that are bringing up some unresolved issues, or some such psychobabble.

And I wonder, do I need to go into the crazy to fix this? Is it even fixable, first of all? Can I act like a reasonably intelligent adult as I explore these uncomfortable events from my past? Or must I dredge through the mucky emotions, too?

Here's a possible connection. I recently bought some CDs of music that was significant in my life during one particular phase of adolescence. There was some shit happening with me then. It's possible that the tunes have reached something subliminal.

I'm rambling. I'm lost. Don't know how to proceed. I see my therapist tomorrow afternoon, and that is a very good thing. Maybe she can suggest some guidelines for this crock of shit.

Tired. Have no idea whether this mess makes any sense at all. Don't have enough gumption to care right now. I'll apologize later. In the meantime carry on with your lives, citizens.

Request for book recommendation and a sexy baseball player

No, I'm not requesting this sexy baseball player. I'm sharing my appreciation of his gorgeousness. May I present Tim Lincecum, pitcher on the World* Champion San Francisco Giants team. Tim Lince-yum!

Now, on to business. The third big assignment in my sexual deviance class involves reading a book in which some kind of sexually deviant behavior figures prominently. I have chosen "Lolita" by Vladimir Nabokov. The professor suggested "The Story of O" by Anne Desclos. We're trying to think of other novels that deal with some kind of paraphilia or sexual deviance, novels that are a bit more academic than the steamy romance novels a la Harlequin. Any suggestions?

*By "world" I mean the United States of America plus Toronto, Canada. It's an egocentric thing on the part of my fellow countrymen. On behalf of them, I apologize to the rest of the baseball-playing world. While I'm at it, I apologize for American Football usurping the name "football" for something that is clearly not so much about feet and the ball.

But I digress.