Choking

Sometimes I feel like I am choking on my own emotions... and to find the words to express those feelings, makes my throat feel even tighter.  It's a conundrum, though, because I know that without finding the words... I will become lost in my silence.

Introspective people are sometimes sad people.  That's what she told me today.  I agree.  I am introspective.  I am sometimes sad.  Am I sad because I am introspective or am I introspective because I am sad?  Maybe neither.  Maybe both.

Truth

The privilege of a lifetime is being who you are.

~ Joseph Campbell

Remember when we didn't care?

Recently I was with my very best friend and her daughter.  We were watching her little angel skip, hop, and jump through a splash pad in the middle of a shopping center.   It was in the middle of the morning, in the middle of the week.  Her daughter didn't care that her clothes were getting wet.  She didn't care that people might look at her funny.  She didn't care that she might look strange moving in such contortions.  No... all that the little girl cared about was the swift freedom that came from running wild and letting the wind blow through her hair.  She was focused on skipping across the sprinklers trying to beat the timing as to not get sprayed too much.  However, there was a secret delight heard in her squeals when she was a little too slow and the sprays caught up to her.

I asked my friend J, "Do you remember that?  Do you remember running free like that not caring about anything in the world?"  I don't think I have ever NOT CARED about anything and just let myself run free.  How sad is that?  Even as far back as I can remember, I can remember worrying.  Little girls should not worry.

So I got up and splashed.  I forced myself to be free from worry for just that moment.

The whole thing reminded me of this passage in this book I am reading "Stone Butch Blues" by Leslie Feinberg.

"God," she said, "by the time we're old enough to have sex, we're already too ashamed to be touched.  Ain't that a crime?" (p73)

Strength

I have always loved this photo of Marilyn Monroe.  She looks strong but yet still beautiful and gentle.

This is what I find with women... not just lovers, but my friends as well.  Women know what a "gentle strength" means.  With lovers it has meant that they have helped me to stay present in the moment... in a gentle way, and they knew what amount of strength was necessary to achieve this, gently.  With my friends, it has built us up a level of trust that I am very proud of today.  I wasn't so proud in the past.

But I've learned and I am growing and like my friends J and W told me last week, some amount of pain will come from that, like growing pains. 

My friends' gentle strength with me has helped me to surrender and begin to live my truth in the most authentic way I've ever lived. 

When I think of our Dear Marilyn... I wonder, did she feel as if she were living her truth?  Did she feel celebrated as her most authentic self?  I wonder. 

Tonight I feel stronger because I know that I am. 

What are you reading?

I cannot put down the book Stone Butch Blues by Leslie Feinberg.  It's heart wrenching to say the least and it makes me actually feel a little PROUD of where we are as far as our LGBTQ rights.  I know ... did you really ever think I would say that?  My friends only know me to complain.  After reading about the butches and femmes and queens and he-she's and whatever the fuck you want to call yourself... that came before me... after reading about what it was like for THEM, I cannot complain.  I feel ridiculous for my rants.

What Jess Goldberg endured as a young girl and then young woman I related to on so many levels.  I am not even half way through the book.  Already, my face has been wet with tears, AND I have laughed out loud in public while reading too.

So... tell me... what are you reading?

A Pony Ride (aka something gay that totally made Elle smile)

I found these two the other night and I was addicted to them from the first click! Julie and Brandy in Your Box Office.

Here's what I've figured out, from the few "episodes" I was able to watch on YouTube last night:

Brandy is the "hot - every man's dream lesbian", Julie is a self identified "man-hater" (see their PSA on No Homo Jokes), and Box Office is a metaphor for vagina.  These two lesbians go to movies, then make reviews of the movies in the form of YouTube videos.  They use the rating of 1, 2, 3, or 4 fingers "in the Box Office" and have even created another rating of a "fist in the Box Office."  It's funnier when they explain it.  Trust me.

What I haven't been able to decipher is if they are a "couple" or not. 

I don't care.

Here is the video I wanted to share with you all.  I watched this movie, so it was a review I could actually relate with.  And, not to spoil anything... but I totally agree with their rating.

Do I Love Myself?

Frozen.  Speechless.  Blank stare.  Tears sting my eyes.

My gut reaction is to respond, no.  I think because for so long I really didn't love myself.  I never felt that I was worthy of love from others and therefore not worthy of self love.  That was a lifetime ago.  I don't feel that I need love from others to feel self love.  But.... can I sit here, look in the rmirror, and say, I love you?  I'm going to try later.  I have never tried before.

When I look at my actions over the past year I can see that many of them, not all, but many of them reflect a level of self love.  If I hadn't been in the place where I had a certain amount of that, I couldn't have made certain steps and choices that I have.

I should remind myself of this more often.

Instead, I seem drawn to focusing on my faults and mistakes that I have made and/or continued to make.  It has held me in place, bound me tightly, and I need to break free from the guilt and shame or I think I may continue to repeat, or at the very least, not move forward.

In loving myself, I forgive myself.  In loving myself, I have faith in myself.  In loving myself, I trust myself.

Forgiveness.  Faith.  Trust.

Three elements that I am making a commitment today, to nurture, as I nurture myself.  Because until I can find those things in myself, no one else will.... and I won't find it in anyone else.

I love myself enough to make that commitment.