interlude: the good and the bad

The bad:

Lately life has been crazier than a shithouse rat. Remember that scene in Little House in the Prairie (shut up—you know you love it) where James and Cassandra Cooper’s parents were driving their wagon down a steep hill, and Pa Cooper ended up losing control over the wagon? It began violently bumping its way faster and faster down the hill, splintering apart in the process, until finally it smashed into a heap at the bottom—a charnel house of fractured wood—with Ma and Pa Cooper’s bloody limbs poking lifelessly out of the wreckage. Yeahhhh, that’s how I’ve been feeling lately. And remember that scene where Alice Garvey was trapped in the burning blind school, and she had to use Mary’s baby as a battering ram to smash a window in an attempt to escape, and she was shrieking and begging for help but she still couldn’t escape, so they both burned to death? That too. And remember that scene where Albert’s girlfriend Sylvia got stalked, terrorized, and raped by a mime (Walnut Grove’s blacksmith in disguise), and eventually, when he was chasing her, he caused her to fall off a rickety ladder to her death? Well, you get the point.

On top of that, my fucking condo association really pissed me off when they sent me a letter this past weekend saying that the board of directors has passed a resolution banning satellite dishes from being attached to people’s balconies/patios. Instead, all dishes are supposed to be attached to a tripod or a bucket (???) that is sitting on the balcony floor. And if having the dish on the floor means you can’t get a signal, then you’re shit out of luck—you’re not allowed to have a dish. What the hell! It’s not like these dishes are ’80s-era flying saucer-sized eyesores, and it’s not like they’re a new thing, either—people have had them for ages. Why are they just now suddenly realizing that they don’t like them? And doesn’t the board have better things to do with their time than target people’s satellite dishes? So now I have until September 30^th to get a technician to come to my place (and you know how that goes: “Sure, we’ll be there sometime between 9am and 5pm”—gee, thanks), and who knows how much it will cost, and if the new arrangement means I can’t get a signal, then I’ll have to get cable. Grr! Thankfully I face southwest, though, so my odds of getting a signal are pretty strong.

The good:

This past weekend was the first weekend in months where I had no freelancing to do. I actually used the time constructively, giving my car and condo much-needed cleanings, typing up more journal excerpts for the 25-year retrospective I’m running on this blog, reading (I finished Henry Miller’s Tropic of Cancer and began a collection of Rainer Maria Rilke’s poems and letters), adding more quotes to my website, catching up on Netflix discs, and, best of all, babysitting Olivia on Saturday. Now, here is where things got good. I knew in advance that we’d be swimming in her neighbor’s pool, so beforehand I went to the dollar store and bought a gaudy silver plastic purse with blue heart-shaped gems on it which came with matching clip-on earrings, and I also bought a blue gem necklace. Then I ripped a seashell from a wedding favor I got at a friend’s wedding back in the 1990s and put all the items in the purse, which got furrowed away in my swim trunks pocket.

On the way to the pool I told her that I’d read in the newspaper that the ocean was getting really crowded, so mermaids were moving to the suburbs and swimming in people’s pools at night. Once we began swimming, I dropped the purse to the bottom of the pool when she wasn’t looking. After 5-10 minutes, when she brought up the mermaid subject again, I pointed to the bottom of the pool and said, “Hey, what’s that?” and I dove to the bottom of the pool to retrieve the purse. I showed it to her and said, without cracking a smile, “I think a mermaid must have left this.”

Holy shit, she went berserkers over this thing, immediately becoming obsessed with it. She commanded me to search the entire pool for more treasure and mermaids, then sat at the edge of the pool, opening and closing the purse repeatedly and pulling out the items over and over and talking about it incessantly, asking a million questions about it and about the mermaid(s) who left it for her.

This set the stage for the rest of the day. After swimming I gave her a bath, and she took the purse into the tub with her. She held it the whole way through Annie (I Netflixed it because I wanted her to see that classic film, which I adored as a kid) and really only put it down when we went outside to play. At night she took it to bed with her, as she was really worried that someone was going to try to steal it unless she kept it beside her. She talked about it nonstop and kept asking, “Why did the mermaid leave this for me?” and “How did she know I would be in the pool and find it?” and “Ella’s going to be really jealous when she sees my treasure, won’t she? But she’s not allowed to have it. It’s mine.”

I do worry that she’ll now expect to find treasure every time she swims. She said several times that she hopes the mermaids leave her a purse with pink gemstones on it next time. The dollar store did have one like that, but I don’t think I’ll be doing a repeat performance. For one thing, I don’t want to give her a reason to expect treasure to materialize every time she swims. Also, magic gets lost when it becomes commonplace.

song heard most recently before posting:
Who Would You Have Me Love?—GMT w/ Hinda Hicks

25 years: a retrospective (part 2)

Another unseasonably beautiful weekend, only this time I’m spending it indoors, working on a stack of freelance manuscripts. But I wanted to take a quick break to post the next installment of my 25 years of journal-keeping retrospective:

30 November 1994

Suki just came in here and borrowed 2 condoms. Yesterday and today she urged me to get some for her next time I’m at the clinic. Next thing you know, I’m going to be lurking around dark alleyways, ripping open my seedy trenchcoat to revel condoms sewn inside, like a drug dealer. I’ll be a condom trafficker!

3 December 1994

At the concert I sat with Silvia and Manu. Afterwards, some lady offered to take us and Annida home in her funny little car. It would barely start and we were smashed in the back seat, unable to even get the doors closed at first. We couldn’t stop laughing. She only took us as far as the top of Church Street (not even on the side we needed to be on!) and then she dropped us off. We were like, oh shit, we’re gonna get raped. We hurried home through the cold, and Emanuella and I sang “Gloria, in excelsis, in excelsis deo!” in a high-pitched voice half the way back.

16 May 2002

Here’s an interesting thing. When Savvy, Louise, and I were touring the manor house at Ladew Gardens last week, Savvy asked our tour guide why the master of the house never got married. Well, I had sensed from the beginning that this guy was gay, and Louise thought the same thing. The guide, however, snipped, “Everybody thinks that marriage is the be-all, end-all to life. Why should he have gotten married? He was wealthy, educated, talented, creative, and free. He could go anywhere he wanted and do anything he wanted. He didn’t have to answer to anybody. Why would he want to ruin that? Besides, when you are of a certain artistic temperament, you want somebody who is on your level. Somebody who understands you and challenges you and invigorates you. And it is hard to find someone like that when you are of a certain artistic, intellectual, creative temperament.” I wanted to scream, “Hallelujah, sister!!!!” It made me feel better about being alone.

17 November 2000

It is absolutely crazy, but I have been feeling as though someone reached into me with a rusty fork and dug out some vibrant part of me and now I just throb and ache…I feel as if I’ve lost something crucial and now I’m mourning it, but how can that be, when I never had it in the first place?

18 May 1995

When I write to you, I hold a mirror up to my face, and I never like what I see. Beneath my crusty surface boils unimaginable hatred and anger. I am a cauldron in which I have thrown years’ worth of pent-up betrayals, annoyances, rage, and hurt. I can’t tell people how I feel, so I just throw it in the pot so it gets all mixed together. If someone pisses me off, what rises to the surface isn’t necessarily a response to what they did to me. It could be my reaction to something that was done to me five years ago. I guess that’s why I sometimes overreact to insignificant situations. … When I write, I create slices in my surface that let my rage trickle through. When I peer down into those slices, I see the cauldron bubbling out with a blackness so thick, it takes my breath away. And then I hastily seal over my cracks, lest any more of that awfulness come through. It’s all bottled up inside of me, from my toes to my ears, seething and waiting. It frightens me what I could be capable of [doing]. In the past, I always thought it was just depression living inside of me, but now I know there’s more.

7 June 1995

So it’s quarter past 12 in the morning, and I’m bawling like a fucking moron all over my Lollapalooza tee shirt. I had to leave Missy’s house because I was so deeply buried in misery. Every day brings the truths to light that I am so desperately trying to suffocate and drown…the truths that I am nothing, that I am constructed of nothing, and I shall return to nothing when I die. How pathetically I try to forget that I loathe myself, inside and out. I am incapable of feeling, loving, succeeding, writing, finding peace. The reason the future always appears so fuzzily out of focus is that I’m not going to live more than a year. Hopes of a terminal disease to destroy me have thus far eluded me; I am left with only my own hands to accomplish the deed. Ignoring it all these years has been pointless. Let’s face it—I am going to kill myself. I don’t know when, I don’t know how. But it will happen. I don’t understand how I could have lived so long with such a ravaged mind. I am so afraid of everything. My body, my heart, my head are all filled with blankness. I feel nothing but a cold numbness. God, how I hate myself. I want to cry whenever I look in the mirror or read old diaries. I can’t stop sobbing now. I can scarcely breathe. The only person capable of understanding is half a country away, and ever since she had her baby, she’s been healing. Perhaps she won’t be able to understand anymore. Anything that may have once been good inside of me is dead. I shoved it into a remote corner of myself and starved it to death, giving it no nourishment, not even light. I killed it, so I shouldn’t mourn it. I am so nauseous now. My wrists scream to be slashed. I want to take my stash of Inderol and die in the comfort of my dark, air-conditioned room. So many things are closing in on me. I hate myself, everything is a lie. It hurts that I can’t love or trust anymore. People keep taking from me. If I don’t die, my partially latent insanity will devour me, and I don’t want to rot alone in a mental hospital, when it’s bad enough rotting alone at home. I’m so tired, so terrified. I can’t go one much longer. … I’m okay to die now. I have my will, and my room is organized neatly. Everyone can take whatever the hell they want, as long as they don’t take my memory and idealize it, turn it into something it’s not. I am tainted, and I should be remembered for the vile, evil, disgusting monster I am. Not as someone good. There is no good anymore.

17 May 2001

…I explained how frustrated I’ve been lately with people trying to pigeonhole me. Everyone at work seems to think that I’m dark and gothy and a fountain of knowledge with anything to do with death, suicide, gore, etc…and nothing else. That irks me. I am more than just “the dark chick.” Yes, I am very much in touch with my dark, sardonic, cynical, bitter, misanthropic side, and I’m proud of it. But I am more than that. I have never liked being categorized, and throughout high school and college I managed to evade categorization successfully (probably the only descriptions people could agree on were “creepy” and “freaky”). I certainly don’t want to start being pigeonholed now. I don’t want to be a typical adult who becomes someone when she graduates from college and more or less stays that same person for the rest of her life.

19 November 2001

Oh, bloody hell. Why am I suddenly starting to feel the creakings and groanings of sadness? Thanksgiving is this week—I should be happy. Never mind that the holidays usually bring about a tinge of depression in me. Thanksgiving means that I have a five-day vacation. It means there is joy in the air. And, despite how shitty my year has been, I really have a lot to be thankful for. I think many people feel the same way this year. Those of us who didn’t lose anybody in the September 11th attacks, the subsequent anthrax attacks, and last week’s jetliner crash are thankful. We are thankful that there have been no more terrorist attacks, as feared. We are thankful that bioterrorism hasn’t engulfed us. We are thankful that the US hasn’t been hit by any nuclear weapons or EMPs. In spite of the war in Afghanistan, we are still alive and free. Who isn’t thankful at such things? I am thankful, and grateful that I’ll be home with most of my family (Kristen and Bryan will be in Erie). I’m thankful that we’ll be in Massachusetts this year, united for the first time since Papa’s 80th birthday three years ago. I’m thankful I didn’t lose my job when the Transfusion staff lost their jobs. I’m thankful the tornado didn’t destroy my new car or any of my possessions or—more importantly—my cats. I’m thankful my family has been kind enough to help me out financially, with a little money here and there.

But O, sadness! Gray little wings flapping soundlessly!

15 January 1992

…you realize how humiliating it is to start crying in the middle of psychology class? Today makes it the second time that I have felt tears rise and fall, while I prayed no one would see me as my brain got eaten up by black worms…all in the midst of class, usually in the mornings. Now I suppose Mr. Tuscano’s going to give us ten pages of notes that are illegible and then Pam’s going to start talking to me and she won’t shut up. They never shut up. I think all I ever want to do anymore is run away from all of this—all the crowds, the people. They are so goddamn loud. I am so tired of being submerged and dredged up from the depths of the well, which is claustrophobic and dark and so scary. I don’t think I can stand it anymore.

Oh God, God, God…I really, truly hate myself. I hate myself, my family, my friends, because they hate me. I pick up self-murder like a stone and smooth its cold comfort around and around in my moist palms, thoughtlessly caressing and loving it. When I think about killing myself, I ponder how frightening and lonely an act it is, and how ultimately beautiful. It loves me; I love it. What’s the point of being alone on this teeming, decaying planet anymore? I obviously can’t do anything right and it’s impossible for any person to like me, as all they ever do is talk about me behind my back. I can’t do anything. I’m so tired, and when I think of the shadows, the bastards around me won’t let me alone. They’re all tearing my silence to tatters, killing me…

For the millionth time since I was thirteen…I wish I was dead. The whole world would be better off.

25 December 1995

I’m so tired of crying. I’m tired of feeling so alone. I’m tired of slaying the Shadowman, only to find that he’s immortal. He has chased me since I was fourteen, and I’m growing hoarse from screaming “Be gone, be gone, be gone.” I used to exorcise him through stacks of shitty poems, but somewhere along the way since then I lost my will to write. That essentially signed my death warrant. My new year’s resolution? To kick the darkness until it bleeds daylight. But “even the sunlight burns if you get too much.” What then? Kill myself? Poison myself into a coma? Where do I go from here?

31 October 1994

Darkness creeps up on me again, both outside, amidst the torrential grey clouds, and inside. I have to learn to stabilize these fucking emotions of mine. Today, at breakfast, I was filled with a consuming rage towards Paula because I felt that she was laughing too much, and when she called me “Jenny,” I thought I’d go insane. “MY NAME’S NOT JENNY!!!” I wanted to shriek at her. “It’s JENNIFER! JENNIFER!!! JENNY IS DEAD!!!” Jenny is dead. She died when I grew up, grew away from my inner light, though it was always a bit tarnished. She made a brief appearance beneath a highway bridge in Scranton last spring, shaking and cold. Savvy’s sending me my diary from that time this week, and I’m beginning to think it might’ve been a mistake for me to ask her to do so. Time can cover up old wounds, but that doesn’t mean they’ve gone away. They’re still there, hovering beneath the surface. I’m afraid that by re-reading that diary, after a considerable amount of time has passed, will awaken all of the hurt, the anguish, and the betrayal I felt, clawing open the scars. It haunts me now: like a ghost, I sail through the chilly April night, along the railroad tracks, and I see myself huddled beneath that bridge. I see a child who is lost and has been stripped of all security and warmth. I see her banging her head methodically against the concrete, trying to drive those demons out. I see her weeping while curled up in a ball in her pajamas, terrified about what has just taken place, and what had yet to come. I will read about those times and my anger will resurface with all of its almighty strength … I buried it in my diary’s pages, in Heather’s ears, in the back of my mind, which only succeeded in preserving it in a freezer-like state. When I pull it out and defrost it, it’s as fresh and alive and preserved as ever.

13 February 1995

Jorge, Annida, and I cooked stir-fry in her kitchen, and shortly after we started, Deb, Manu, and Camilla came in so Manu could cook them some pasta. Soon the place was hopping with people—Maki, Simone, Beatrice, Suki, and Brigitte were all cooking their dinners. The five of them eventually left, and the remainder of us ate each other’s food and sang (very loudly, I may add) songs from musicals. We covered Grease, West Side Story, Les Mis (most of us were particularly bitter during “On My Own”), Phantom, Wizard of Oz, and I forget what else. We also sang that scales song, “Do, a deer, a female deer…” Annida, Jorge, and I went back to her room to hang out, and then Lucy came by to claim Jorge. Manu came over, and Lucy and Jorge returned. We danced around to Grease wildly, wrote on Annida’s fogged-up windows, and generally acted quite stupid.

28 February 1995

When it comes to my depression, I think of it as swimming in a tar pit. It’s a struggle, an exhausting struggle, especially since I never learned to swim properly. It’s thick and black, and even when I escape to solid ground, I have to scrub and scrub to remove all traces of the tar. But then I’m raw and sensitive and vulnerable, in so much pain that I must return to the tar to soothe myself. Scrubbing doesn’t remove all traces—it always sticks to my hair, my nails, my teeth. Little, secretive places that remind me that the darkness is always going to be a part of me.

21 March 2003

On Wednesday night, when I was driving to Debbie’s house, I glanced at one of those electronic signs over the Beltway that provides information about gridlock, accidents, slippery conditions ahead, etc. But instead of reporting on those conditions, it provided info about our heightened state of alert and gave a phone number to call to report suspicious activity. It was really kind of creepy. But the interesting thing about the sign was this: I was listening to the song “I Grieve” as I drove down the Beltway, and as I read the heightened alert sign, he was—at that exact moment—singing the line, “They say life carries on.” And that’s the bottom line. Life carries on, whether we want it to or not. Folks in the Middle East learned this lesson long ago. There is war, there is terrorism, there is danger lurking at every given turn, there are maniacs in charge (that includes Bush)…and there are also jobs that have to be done, groceries that have to be bought, classes that have to be attended, pets that have to be fed, laundry that needs to be washed, bills that have to be paid. Duty doesn’t stop and joy doesn’t stop. Amidst all this crap—amidst me stockpiling water and thinking about assembling a first aid and emergency kit—I am also working on my website, planning my trips to Scotland and Finland, dreaming about skydiving again, reading a new book, and thinking about a new Danish film I really want to see. I refuse to let [terror] rob me of the pleasure that comes from thinking about those things.

10 April 2000

This is what I was thinking about while sitting in typical weekday traffic along University Blvd. this morning: it amazes me how weeds and grass can push through the slimmest of cracks on the concrete barriers between the sides of a highway and on sidewalks. There, in the midst of a sea of concrete, is a lone dandelion or a tuft of grass. How can it survive? What makes it push up in such an unforgiving environment? What else lurks beneath the surface that one would think is impenetrable? Are weeds just bumping restlessly beneath the surface of the concrete and asphalt, waiting for the moment when they are able to burst through the narrowest of cracks? It just seemed like a metaphor for life in general, or maybe my life.

7 November 1994

This morning I went to Greenwich to get one hr. reprints from Emanuella’s film (I’m picking them up tomorrow, since it’s cheaper), and I decided to walk the footpath that goes beneath the Thames. It took me to the Isle of Dogs and the Docklands Light Railway. It was a very surreal, dream-like experience. The tunnel seemed to stretch on forever, and it was filled with dirty tiles, sickly yellow lighting, and grey-faced people who moved past me like ghosts. I was feeling sick all day long, so I was rather dizzy, light-headed, and hallucinogenic down there.

21 March 1995

Something alarming happened yesterday. After walking home from college with Jorge, Jim, and Annida, they stopped into my room to see my Stonehenge photos; Jim really wanted to see my wrist-slashing photos (but I kept one hidden). For some reason Jon B. came by and saw the blood photo, and he asked what it was, if I had gotten a nosebleed. I wouldn’t say, but Jorge kept saying, “Show him!”, so I reluctantly flashed my wrists and said that it was a wrist bleed. I didn’t care too much until I saw the expression on his face, and then I knew that it was a mistake, because of his being a holy roller. I mumbled embarrassed replies to his continuous questions. Jorge commanded Jon not to question it, to just let me do what I want. After that, I got really worried that he would tell Goldsmiths about it, or even worse, O’Grady. I emotionally cannot re-live last spring again!!! Jorge and Annida kept saying, “No, no, don’t worry, he won’t do anything.” When everyone left the dinner table but Annida and me, Jon plopped down and began making small talk. “Oh shit,” I thought, “I know what’s coming.” I shakily excused myself to go take my walk, and that’s when he hurriedly said that he wanted to ask me something. We ended up having a long religious talk—well, he talked, I semi-listened while trying not to laugh. It pissed me off, as I could tell his concern really wasn’t with me, it was with god getting angry because I’m damaging his property through self-mutilation. He just used it as a launching pad to babble on about how only Jesus can save me. In a way, I was even offended, because it sounded as if he was putting down my faith, just because I’m not a Christian. Annida said that wasn’t the case, but I feel it was. I may not believe in God, or even a god, but I believe in something (don’t know what yet…), and just because my faith doesn’t take on traditional forms, doesn’t mean that it isn’t valid. And I Didn’t like how he was almost trying to make me feel ashamed about my wrist-slashing, as if I’m a piteous heathen. Slashing is, in its own hideous way, strangely beautiful. It’s a part of me, and I won’t allow myself to see it as dirty or shameful. And if god did make me…hey, it’s my body now, and I can do with it what I damn well please. When an architect builds a house, he doesn’t expect subsequent owners to live in it exactly as he left it. No, they decorate it, build upon it, make it their own. Just like we pierce ourselves and cut our hair. Jon wouldn’t even listen to my saying that mutilation is the only way I harm myself—I don’t drink, smoke, or do drugs. He made it sound like mutilation’s worse than that! Asshole.

9 December 1995

After dinner, Dave and I went to the mall, where we got free knives in Boscovs, I stole the slashed wrists cover to the new Hole CD, I tried to buy insecticide (but Kara stopped me when she learned what it was for), and I bought my secret Santa gifts. I returned back to the dorm alone and worked on my paper. Later on, I went to Paragons with Dave and a dyke, Jen, who lives on my floor, but it was closed, probably because of all the snow and ice we got that day. We went back to Dave’s room to gather our bearings, and then we went to Farley’s for drinks. It was pretty fun. We stayed until after 1 a.m., talking and laughing, and staring in amazement when a man and a woman got into a fight right outside our window. It looked like he was trying to steal her purse. Dave and some jocks ran outside to help, with Dave wielding his free paring knife. It turns out that they were a couple, and while drunk, she decided to get back at him for all the times he beat her and treated her like shit, so she slapped him and tried to strangle him with her purse. Exciting. We went back to the dorm and pulled obnoxious pranks, like re-arranging the letters that said “The Crusades” so they said “The crude ass,” stealing Barb’s mistletoe and gluing the church pamphlet on her door shut, gluing “E”s next to the Ho Ho Ho on her wall, filling her mailbox with glitter, adding big lips from one person’s door onto another person’s name crab, etc. Kara had joined us for this merrymaking. Eaflier, Dave and I rubbed out part of the dry erase words on the Gunster calendar that said “Good luck on finals!” so it said “God lick on anals!” and we added crude things to the “All I want for Christmas” list and the “My family traditions are…” list hanging on my floor.

21 September 1998

I was thinking that this aloneness is like winter. It’s a season that is lonely, barren, cold. But it also has tremendous beauty that can’t be rivaled by any other season. What can replace the joy that comes from the season’s first snowfall? Or from the other treasures of winter? Playing in the snow, cuddling with a mug of hot chocolate in front of a fire, celebrating the holidays. Winter is a time when you eat what you want (because you wear bulky clothes that hide your body) and go for weeks without shaving your legs…just like when you’re not in a relationship! It’s a time for you to savor solitude and introspection. It’s a time for you to comfort yourself and take care of yourself. I can console myself by saying that being alone is all of those things, and that for all of the disadvantages of winter—shoveling snow, losing power, getting sick, being trapped indoors—there are so many advantages to consider. Shoveling snow is good exercise, and it usually gives you a chance to talk to neighbors normally ignored. You can moan about shoveling together, and laugh at how sweaty and disheveled you get. Losing power gives you the chance to light candles and huddle beneath blankets, reading a good book. Getting sick gives you a day or two off of work, and permits you to engage in a much-needed vegging session. Being trapped indoors gives you time to read more, or work on crafts that you would normally shove aside. I think that above all, I must remember that winter doesn’t last forever. It can seem interminable sometimes, but eventually it always collapses into spring. Yes, maybe this year spring is damp and cold and not worth much, but in another year, spring might be better. Warm, beautiful. Maybe relationships are like that. After my relationship ended, I found myself in the midst of winter that would not die, but spring will come someday. If it’s a chilly, wet, colorless spring, I can say, “Well, next time it will be better.” In the meanwhile, I should appreciate this winter and embrace it. I should be an optimist for once in my sorry life. I should say, “I need this time to grown and heal. Only when I truly surrender to winter will I be ready for spring to come.” Instead of looking at winter’s bare trees and thinking they are naked skeletons that would look so much better with leaves, I can admire the smooth curves of their bones, and the beautify of their lacework when I lie beneath them and stare at their crisscrossing, delicate branches, black against the gray sky that leaks through them. Instead of saying that the landscape is depressing, I can take haunting black and white photographs of it, capture its somber beauty in intense poems.

What my fear is, though, is that spring won’t come. Winter will rapidly lose its beauty if, because of some fluke, it goes on forever. Maybe spring doesn’t come for everybody…


song heard most recently before posting:
B.M.F.A.—Martha Wainwright

25 years: a retrospective (part 1)

Hi, I’d like a ticket to Nervous Breakdown Land, please. Oh, wait! I’m already there! And look, my passport even has a permanent residency visa in it. I’m good to go.

Hiding behind an old cliché, I’ll say that things have been a bit crazy lately. Most of it has been good: two action-packed trips home to Pennsylvania in three weeks, two concerts (George Michael and Neil Diamond) in one week, two days of an intensive substantive editing class in Silver Spring, and several overnight guests. Some of it has been not so good: lots of freelancing, a cold that left me with a persistent cough that wakes me up at night, and many stressful work upheavals. Now I’m finally able to sit down and write in this blog again.

This weekend is turning out to be one of those freakish anomalies when I actually have very little freelancing to do. Free time is an exotic creature to me these days—it’s almost worthy of being placed behind glass in a high-end zoo—and this weekend’s wealth of free time stunned me like a blow to the head with its beauty and elegance.

On top of that, the weather is absolutely stellar. I mean, you just don’t get days like yesterday and today in August. There’s no humidity, it’s warm but not hot, there’s a good breeze, and the sky is a dazzling shade of blue. I haven’t had to use the air-conditioner since Friday! Unbelievable!

So aside from working on six freelance manuscripts, I spent quite a bit of time sitting on my balcony, leisurely reading a library book. What a feeling! I also typed up a ton of quotes recently flagged in books I’ve been reading, then added them to my website; I caught up on my journal writing; I’m going to catch up on emails; I’m working on this blog entry; and I sifted through and selected old negatives that I want Ritz Camera to turn into slides (if they even do such a thing anymore), so I can make a lampshade out of them. I’m also going to scan more old high school and college photos for Facebook. And I fixed a problem with my toilet tank, by jerry-rigging this…well, one thing or another. I don’t even know what it’s called. But somehow it broke off and the toilet wouldn’t flush without it, so I fiddled with the broken piece until I was able to get it working again. Plus I finally figured out how to fix my broken filing cabinet. I wanted to hang my new slatted blinds, too, but after examining the instructions on Friday, I decided that it requires n engineering doctorate just to figure it out (I am so not mathematical), so I’ll wait until some math-minded person can help me in the future. Yeah, I ain’t too proud to beg.

Anyway, 2008 marks 25 years since I began keeping a journal. I’ve been wanting do something to commemorate it, but don’t have any mind-blowing ideas lined up, so to compromise, I’m going to publish (on my blog) a random assortment of journal entry chunks from over the years. This will cover journal entries up until the point I started keeping this blog in mid-2006. I didn’t stop keeping a journal at that time—it’s still alive and kicking—but all the experiences/thoughts that happened between mid-2006 and now, which I’m comfortable sharing with the public, are already in this blog. Everything else in my journal is private and will remain for my eyes only.

These journal fragments will have to be spread over numerous blog postings, since there’s a lot of stuff I feel like throwing out there, just for the hell of it. Maybe by the time my 50th journal-keeping anniversary rolls around, I’ll have a better plan for commemorating the occasion. If the world even still exists at that point, of course. Here’s the first lot:

4 January 2001

So there it is. This knowledge feels like a splinter wedged beneath my finger. I think: “How the hell did it get there?” and “How the hell am I going to get it out?” Sometimes I don’t feel it, but if I turn a certain way or brush my finger against something, the pain throbs and reminds me that the splinter is there. How do you make knowledge like this go away? How do you go back to how things were before? It becomes a whole separate entity: Before. A person’s whole life can be splintered into fractions by an event, and the biggest segment to emerge is Before. Before is when things made sense. My life was charmed Before. How much money would I pay to erase what I know and go back to the ignorance of Before? I want to clamp my hands together and pray. “O god, forgive me my trespasses and buy me a one way ticket back to Before. I don’t care if it’s a dirty old bus that hits every pothole in the road. I don’t need to travel First class. I just want to go back to Before.”

And of course there is that terrifying realization that every minute we live is a Before. Two days from now, my apartment could burn to the ground and I will be thinking, “Oh, god, what I wouldn’t do to go back to the ignorance of Thursday, when I still had all my possessions and a home.” I will be craving how I felt Before. Two years from now, someone I love could die and I will think back to now, when everything was still safe and sane and that person was in my life, and I will envy the me who existed in January 2001 and who knew nothing about grief and loss. I will envy the me who existed Before. It makes me want to embrace every second of my life, because I never know when my life will become one big After.

Is this even making any sense?

8 January 2002

I hate the fact that I could end up alone because I’m too weird, too complicated, for any man I meet. I hate it. But I have to accept it, because I don’t want to fucking apologize for who I am. I don’t want to feel ashamed. Life is complicated, it is a million layers, it is always changing, so why shouldn’t humans be the same way? Maybe guys want to “punish” me, so to speak, for being complicated and mercurial, and that’s not fucking fair, but I can’t do anything about it other than become a ditz or one-dimensional or a social butterfly, which I’m not willing to do, so I guess I’m stuck alone. If there is one thing I have learned during my 27 years of existence, it is that life is just too fucking short to be spent wondering why people don’t like you and why things don’t go as you want them to go. April 15, 1991 (Nanny’s death) taught me that. Dad’s bout with cancer last winter taught me that. June 26th (Shoah’s death) taught me that. September 11th taught me that. September 24th (the tornado) taught me that. Not to be too nihilistic or anything, but we’re all the walking dead, just waiting to drop. Life is an ever-ticking time bomb. It should be spent trying to find peace and joy, not verification of worthiness from other people. I don’t want to be alone for my entire life, but I’d rather be alone than settle for somebody who isn’t willing to accept me, scars and all. Fuck!

4 March 2003

I don’t want to settle. At all costs, I don’t want to settle. That’s part of why I’m so supremely picky. I’d rather die alone than settle. Too much emphasis is placed in our society on not being alone, not staying single, not staying childless.

16 September 1999

I have been feeling a little antisocial lately, a little scared. Like maybe a vast ocean of terror, horror, or despair is shifting inside of me, at the level where I can just barely feel it. When I was home this weekend, I thought of it in terms of wearing metal braces to keep my legs upright and moving (my Paxil equals those braces)… One day I look down and realize that my legs have rotted away and all that’s left are the braces, and so if I take off the braces, I’ll crash to the ground. It’s not a feeling that oh, if I stop my meds, I’ll become paralyzed with depression and uselessness again. It’s more a feeling that I will just cease to exist if I stop the meds. Or, I will wither up and die so quickly, it’ll be like ceasing to exist. Another analogy: I feel like my skin is strong and brave, but beneath my skin, my self is contracting into a tight little ball, knocking around the hallow insides of my body. Like a turtle that retreats into its shell when it is afraid. My outside, my skin, is my touch shell, but inside I’m quivering, hidden, withdrawing as far as possible from that skin. Hiding. I don’t know what I’m afraid of.

29 February 2000

In the meanwhile, a quote comes to mind:

All of us have two minds, a private one, which is usually strange, I guess, and symbolic, and a public one, a social one. Most of us stream back and forth between those two minds, drifting around in our private self and then coming forward into the public self whenever we need to. But sometimes you get a little slow making the transition, you drag out the private part of your life and people know you’re doing it. They almost always catch on, knowing that someone is standing before them thinking about things that can’t be shared, like the one monkey that knows where a freshwater pond is.

I think that’s kind of where I’m coming from. Like I’m standing there in the midst of this crowd, knowing I’m different, and knowing that they know I’m different, and it makes me uncomfortable. Like they look at me and just know that I’m not there with them…I’m closed off…and I’m bored, tired, thinking of other things that you’re not supposed to think about when you’re out and about on the town, like going home and pulling on the warm comfort of my pajamas, or sending emails, or completely nonsensical, random, dark things…they know that if they approach me, I won’t be chatty and giggly and interested in the banalities they’re saying…they know I’m not a part of the scene, but instead I’m standing back and watching it, in a clinical, disconnected way…I’m watching the way everybody moves the same way, stands around casually, yet prearranged in a way…the way everybody nurtures their drinks like little glass babies, taking comfort behind their careful, calculated swigs, their drawn-out exhaling of cigarette smoke…they know I think it’s a charade, and I don’t believe in it or belong…because I’m thinking of strange, stupid, crazy things that would never cross their minds in a million years…or maybe I’m thinking of normal things, like my crush, but all the same, it still means that I’m not there with them, that I’m thinking about kissing him and holding his hand instead of focusing on the bits of introductions and surface chat that are coming out of their mouths.

23 March 2000

In my email, I said that I had written an analogy-laden journal entry about my depression, and obviously that’s not true. The depression realization only hit me last night, and so I haven’t had time to write about it. But here goes (better late than never):

It’s like I was in this very black sea, with no islands in sight. Sometimes my head would be above the water, sometimes not. Then I started on my meds and got my depression under control and found myself on a little white island. I began to lose sight of the fact that the sea was still around me…all I saw was the gleaming white of my island. It blotted out everything else in my landscape. What I realized last night was that the sea does continue to surround me, and at high tide, the water laps up onto my island, getting my feet wet with its oily waters. For some reason, I didn’t notice that before. I thought that my periods of grayness and melancholy were somehow random flukes—little arrows of darkness somehow piercing my white island, then melting away. Now I see that those gray periods aren’t flukes at all, but a constant force that I am able to ignore most of the time. Just because I ignore them, though, doesn’t mean that they go away. That is the paramount idea behind last night’s realization: the idea that depression remains inside of me. Not dormant, like I thought, but quietly active. Although it is darkness, it colors my life. It is quite possibly the reason I hate waking up and facing the day, even after getting plenty of sleep. It is the reason I enjoy hibernating so much and dread going out, even with Angela. It is the reason I am perfectly content to not talk to anybody on the phone. In a nutshell, I realized that because of this thin membrane of depression inside of me, I am not living. I am merely surviving. I am crawling through each day without feeling it or living it, just trying to get through it, just trying to pull through to another night of sleep or another weekend of vegging alone. Just trying to trudge my way through another calendar year. I thought the Paxil and St. John’s Wort were enough…and maybe they were, for a while. I’m not seriously depressed; I’m functioning quite nicely, thank you very much. But even during the worst of it, I was still functioning. I was never completely crippled by depression. I was always a functioning depressive. But that doesn’t mean that it wasn’t crushing me. So if I stood here now and said, “I’m not really depressed right now, because I don’t feel depressed most of the time. More importantly, I’m functioning,” it doesn’t really cut it. The meds aren’t completely useless. They’re helping me a lot, but they are not completely obliterating the depression. Now I Finally understand all those depression articles that tell you that you can be depressed without realizing it. I never understood that! I thought, How can you not know that you’re depressed?! Before I started on meds, I knew I was depressed! Oh my god, the whole world knew! Even if my depression hadn’t been smashing me across the head with its gigantic hammer on a daily basis, I would still know I was depressed! Now, however, the meds seem to have sedated the depression enough to keep it at a flat, pale level that is barely noticeable. Now I’m identifying my depression by the checklist of symptoms those depression articles tout: sleeping too much, feeling numb, eating too much, antisocial… Oh god, what a dissipating feeling, to know it’s still active inside of me. To know I’m only surviving, not living. But at the same time, it’s kind of a relief to know this. If I don’t know about it, I can’t work on changing it. So now that I know, maybe I can work on getting it under control so I start living, and not just existing.

23 April 2001

I just wish someone would come along and surgically remove my heart (and my brain, while they’re at it), so I will maybe, for once know what it is like to feel peace. I hate crushes. I hate liking someone. I hate not being able to write. I hate getting my hopes up in vain. I hate feeling like the ugliest, stupidest, most undesirable monster alive. I hate wanting someone to want me. I hate being the only person in my immediate family who doesn’t have anyone. I hate that my family thinks I’m a lesbian freak because I am alone. I hate feeling like I’m not going to be worth anything until someone is in love with me. I hate that I’m sitting here wiping my fucking snot on a balled-up cheap paper towel, crying because [F.] won’t love me. I hate that I feel like I’m hanging on by a thread, and at age almost-27, I want more than that from life; I want more than feeling as though I am only hanging by a thread. I hate worrying that something is desperately wrong with me, that I am terrible beyond even my low-self-esteem-colored comprehension. I hate the fact that I’m sniveling and whining about stupid crap when I am actually quite blessed because my family and friends are healthy and alive and I have a job and a roof over my head. Jesus Christ, I sound like such a self-centered brat. I really am lucky in a lot of areas…I just wish that were enough for me right now.

22 February 2002

I can’t accurately describe how I feel these days. Hectic petsitting and proofreading duties aside, I still feel wrung out. ... I feel vaguely like a wash cloth that has been wrung out very strongly and roughly, and then tossed on a towel bar, wrinkled, damp, cold, withered. Nobody wants to touch it. As it dries, it dries stiffly and feels unpleasant to the touch.

2 October 2000

The other thing that has been preying on my mind lately is the idea of love/sex/passion/romance being more fulfilling and more important to me than religion. In fact, those things are my religion—when they are in my life, that is. What is sacred and divine to me isn’t a cross, or a bible, or a church—no matter how beautiful they may be. What is sacred and divine and holy is pure love between two people, and all the mechanics of that love: the tangling of limbs, fleeting kisses, comfort, love letters…I have the utmost respect for love and sex. … Sex with someone you don’t love is just an act, just a physical movement like walking or shitting or sleeping. Nothing wrong with that, I suppose, but it would be so devastatingly empty and ordinary to me, and I want no part of it… Sex with someone you love … is gorgeous, primeval, utterly holy. That is spirituality to me. The only thing that comes close to inspiring such spirituality in me is encountering a beautiful glimpse of nature, be it verdant and lush or barren and desolate. If I can have the spirituality of love in my life, I won’t ever be pining for organized religion or traditional spirituality. It helps that loving someone is supposed to make you a better person, and that brings about the strong ethics and morality that are normally associated with religion.

song heard most recently before posting:
This Voice—Ane Brun

still a wallflower at heart

I’m flustered by my sudden social life! What the hell is going on!

I had so much work to do last weekend, but I still broke away to make a last-minute trip home to Lebanon, even though I’ll be heading up there again next weekend for a farewell gathering for Kendra, who is moving to Hawaii next month. This particular visit was a tiny reunion of sorts with two old high school-era folks who I haven’t seen in well over a decade: Beck and Abby. A group of us went to a white trash karaoke bar until 2am, then terrorized a former pal by knocking repeatedly on his door and singing show tunes on his lawn (yes, it’s highly appropriate behavior for people in their thirties, thanks for asking, and yes, I was stone-cold sober, of course—I always am!), and then we went for dinner at an all-night restaurant, where Ang’s food had hair in it, Amelia’s dinner was paid for by an admirer, and a flea jumped around our table. I had such a blast all evening long, and it was one of the very few times when I actually wished I lived closer to Lebanon, so the evening could be recreated soon. Missy and I got back to her house at like 4:30am, which only gave me four hours to sleep before I had to meet my family for breakfast in Grantville. I couldn’t even nap after getting home, because I had so much work to do. Well, okay, I did sneak in a tiny nap later in the afternoon, but for the most part, my day was wholly devoted to working. I finally called a halt to it in the evening to spend some time gabbing with friends on Facebook, which is my latest addiction.

Today I went out to lunch with Deborah, tonight Melissa is staying over, tomorrow I’m taking Debbie out for a birthday dinner, and on Sunday I’m going to Antoinette’s house to finally meet her new baby. Next week I’ll have dinner and a therapeutic guts-spilling session with Julie, Cynthia, and Susan, and I’m going to squeeze in at least one Capital Fringe event (the Jerry Springer rock opera, if it’s not sold out). Then it’s back to Lebanon for a BBQ/white trash karaoke/sleazy gay bar/adult bookstore weekend.

Other than that, it’s work, work, work. The last thing I should be doing right now is socializing, because of how much work is heaped before me, but oh well. I need to act my age every once in a while, you know?



song heard most recently before posting:
November Rain—Guns n’ Roses

life in the margins

When my mom sold her house in 2002 (the house where I grew up), I was forced to clean out my gigantic stash of anything and everything from the attic. I hadn’t lived there in five years, but the attic was still totally my domain, rife with boxes and boxes and—oh, look!—more boxes of my nostalgic junk. I had to resign myself to tossing out much of it (I’m sniffing sadly at the loss of all those issues of Young Miss and Seventeen from the ’80s), but I refused to get rid of certain things. However, I also lived in a small basement apartment, so storing the bulk of those items at my place just wasn’t doable. I did squeeze certain things, like my huge box of school stuff from over the years, into one of my apartment’s closets; everything else got relegated to my dad’s attic and garage. And although I did retrieve my childhood books and some of my old toys from the mess when Olivia entered the picture, and I retrieved my Cabbage Patch Kids with all their fabulous outfits a few weeks ago, so Olivia would have more to play with when I babysit her, nearly everything else has been fossilizing in storage at Dad’s house. Until recently.

Finally I said, It’s time to bring those puppies home. So Dad loaded up his minivan and stopped by my condo on his way to Olivia’s birthday party. And lo! What riches did I find! Stuffed animals. (Aww, Papa Smurf, Pound Puppy, Hello Kitty, and pandas, it’s good to see you again!) High school t-shirts. (Won’t I impress my coworkers if I wear my Quiz Bowl ’90 t-shirt to work on Casual Friday? That’ll show ’em.) Books. (I now really have a craving to reread all those fucked up VC Andrews books that dominated my junior high days.) One of the books is a gem my parents used to teach me about the birds and the bees (click on the images below to enlarge them and read their text). They mutely shoved this and another churchy procreation book from the 1950s at me and that was the extent of my sexual education until 8th grade health class.



Yeah, seeing that, there’s really no doubt as to why I was cripplingly naïve.

Amidst my pile of attic treasures was a box groaning from the weight of every classroom notebook I kept throughout college (minus my notebooks from my year abroad, which had to get ditched when I returned home, due to lack of space in my luggage). They’re all there, from the Public Speaking course I was forced to take my first semester of freshman year to the Women’s Spiritual and Autobiographical writings course I took my final semester of senior year.

I’ve been plowing through them, trying to decide what should stay and what should get pitched, and it’s been a fun walk down memory lane—it gives me a glimpse of my life that’s completely separate from my journals.

I found an obituary I was forced to write for myself in my Newswriting course. It says:

Jennifer L. Boyer, 18, a student at the University of Scranton, died Tuesday on campus, of a coronary thrombosis.

She was born on June 4, 1974, in Lebanon, to Leo and Susan Eck Boyer.

She was a 1992 graduate of Lebanon High School, where she participated in numerous clubs and activities, including four musicals; three quiz bowl tournaments; the environmental club; the school newspaper; C.A.U.S.E., a Lancaster/Lebanon student organization for the environment; and Tri-Hi-Y, a community service club.

She is a former employee of Hersheypark and the Lebanon Daily News, where she worked as a columnist during the summer of 1992.

Surviving, in addition to her parents, is a sister, Kristen S. Boyer, a student at College Misericordia in Dallas, and her maternal grandfather, Herbert Eck, of Lebanon.

Calling hours will be from 2 to 4 and 7 to 9 p.m. on Wednesday at the Ficco and Son Mortuary, 1167 Lehman St.

Services will begin at 2 p.m. on Thursday at the funeral home. The Rev. [name of my then-obsessive crush] will officiate.

Burial will be in Greenwood Cemetery, Ebenezer.

That obit is so bland. I suppose we had to stick to strict newspaper style, and, as Shawn pointed out when I emailed this to him, it’s not like I had a lot of exciting experiences under my belt at age 18—at least nothing that could be printed in a newspaper. My life isn’t so exciting now, but at least my obit could offer something more than, "Well, she worked at Hersheypark. And, uh, competed in the Quiz Bowl. Where her team lost. Every. single. year."

I also found something that I must have written in class (either high school or college; there were some high school papers thrown in my college notebook box) when I was bored. It says:

When I grow up I’m going to move to England and become a journalist for an offbeat, alternative magazine. I’ll live in a loft in the slums of London at first, and then I’ll move to a cabin on a deserted stretch of grey coastline, by myself. My cabin will have lots of windows and skylights, and it will be filled with plants and books, posters and candles. I’ll have two dogs and two cats and lots of fish. There will be pillows and blankets everywhere, to make it seem homey. I will live a life of self-imposed isolation, being with people only when I am at work. When not in London, I will spend my days walking on the beach, writing, practicing photography, and fingerpainting. I will wear huge, extremely strange clothes, and I will talk to myself all the time. I will be a celibate asexual vegetarian pagan hermit.

My cabin will have a deck with a single swing on it, so that I can swing out over the ocean beneath a hundred million stars in the night. Every year on my birthday I will slash my wrists and run naked on the beach. My walls will be white, but all accessories will be forest green and black.

That’s where it abruptly ends. Hmm, didn’t exactly fulfill that destiny, did I? Although, I did live in a slum, and I do live a life of self-imposed isolation, and I do have two cats, and I am a celibate vegetarian hermit. So...yeah.

Anyway, back to the notebooks. Here are some observations from the margins of my notebooks and my life. Again, you can click on the pictures to view larger versions.

Earth Science. Proof that I missed my calling as an artist.

Ethics


Ethics

Ethics


Ethics

Intro to Poetry. Aside from surviving my butt-bone pains (presumably I
just didn’t know how to spell coccyx), I also enjoyed
writing backwards for some reason. In French!
(And yes, I know I misspelled fatigué.)


Intro to Poetry

Christian Spirituality. I love “Mr. Budweiser Jerk.”
Also? It should actually be “I wish I were dead” (to be grammatically correct).

Christian Spirituality. I hated my priest professor with the light
of a thousand suns. He really was a homophobic ass.


Christian Spirituality. Oh, that fucking corn. I had this
hideous corn on my toe during sophomore year that required
months of treatment with a podiatrist. Eeesh.

Christian Spirituality. Again with the priest hatred!

History of Film. Tread is slang in my hometown for a greasy burnout metalhead.

History of Film. God, I love this. I love that some dude’s bobbing head
filled me with such rage. I love that the worst insult I could produce
was marshmallow. I love that I misspelled marshmallow.
Way to go, Communications major/English minor.

Russian and Eastern European Studies

On the Road. Surprise, surprise, I did not care for
the city of Scranton one bit.

Intro to Philosophy. Writing backwards again.
It wasn’t Philosophy I hated; it was the professor. He was awful!

Public Speaking. Absolut(e) hell is right! Oh it was, it was!
This was during the height of my Absolut vodka ad collecting.

Responsibility in Communication. Do I put up with all this shit
or do I plunge a knife into my heart? Yeah, good question.
Fourteen years later, maybe I should revisit that.

Human Communication. A drawing of my Human Comm
and Intro to Philosophy professors.

Human Communication. That’s the Kissing Tower,
one of the rides I operated when I worked at Hersheypark.

Human Communication


Human Communication. A drawing of my professor, I guess.

Human Communication. The writing is so horrible because I was
writing with my left hand. I swear!

Human Communication. God, I can’t believe I misspelled seminarian.
Linda was a chick in my Theology class who I loathed.

Human Communication. Ouch. Such harsh words for my priest professor!
The Globe was a department store in Scranton.

Intro to Fiction

Mass Communication

Mass Communication

Communication Theory and Research

I found this notebook piece floating around in the box and
have no idea what class it pertains to. It’s pretty awesome, though.

Theology I

Theology I

Theology I. Why the hell was I so nervous?


Theology I. Seriously, why?

Theology I. Let’s just cut to the chase, shall we?

Theology I. I really detested the seminarians in my class.

Social Problems

song heard most recently before posting:
Time—Tori Amos

an update on the Fritzls

I first wrote about the Fritzl family’s ordeal a few weeks ago, and I’ve continued to keep tabs their recovery in Austria, which, happily, is going far better than I think anybody anticipated. And I continue to use their experience as a touchstone for reminding myself just how lucky I am in life.

Some updates:

The Fritzl family made a big poster for the town of Amstetten, to thank them for their love and support. It said: “We, the whole family, would like to take the opportunity to thank all of you for sympathy at our fate. Your compassion is helping us greatly to overcome these difficult times, and it shows us there also are good and honest people here who really care for us. We hope that soon there will be a time where we can find our way back into a normal life.” They traced their handprints on the poster and each person wrote a message in his or her handprint. The messages included:

Stefan: I miss my sister. Am enjoying freedom and my family. Like the sun, fresh air, and nature.

Alexander: I wish for freedom, power, and strength, and the sun. I miss fire brigade, school, and my sister Kerstin.

Grandma: I wish to live with my children in peace with the help of God. I miss my kind friends and my freedom.

Elisabeth: Wishes—my daughter Kerstin’s recovery, my children’s love, protection for my family, people with warm hearts and understanding.

Lisa: Wishes—health, that everything goes well, love, happiness. Misses—Kerstin, school, friends, fresh air, Class 1C.

Felix: Sleigh rides, driving in a car, playing ball, swimming. Playing with other children, friendship, running in the meadows.

Monika: Wishes—that Kerstin gets better, lots of love, that everything is soon past. Misses—fire brigade, music school, friends, school, Kerstin.

Meanwhile, Josef Fritzl has been sent hundreds of love letters from lonely women offering him romance. Some of the women have said that Fritzl is “good at heart” and misunderstood. Oy.

And in that vein, a scant two months after Elisabeth and her children were rescued, tourists have begun posing for photographs outside the Fritzl house. Two police officers are now permanently stationed at the house to deter tourists. One local resident told the press, “It is bad enough that journalists and TV crews have beleaguered our town, but now there is this ghoulish tourism with people coming to Amstetten just to see the house in Ybbstrasse. It is appalling, we just want to be left in peace.”

Backtracking a bit, it’s being reported that when Elisabeth saw her mother for the first time in April she broke down in tears and said: “I can’t believe I’m free—is it really you?” At their emotional reunion, Elisabeth said: “I can’t believe I’m out. I didn’t think I would ever see you again. It’s all too much for me. I don’t ever want to see him again.” She was also reunited with the children that were taken away from her while she was forced to living the tiny dungeon with her three other children. “My babies. You are so beautiful,” Elisabeth said as she held them close and stroked their faces.

Elisabeth’s sister Gabriele has said: “None of us can believe how normal Elisabeth seems. She is healthy and very chatty and doing very well. Every day she gets a bit stronger. I can’t say what the family is going through. It’s more than anyone can believe. It has devastated us. We are working together to support Elisabeth. She is overjoyed to see her children. She told them they were beautiful and she is spending all the time getting to know them.”

The family’s lawyer Christoph Herbst said: “Elisabeth is very happy to be re-discovering the world. She is very keen to go outside and feel the rain on her skin. But it is important for them to adjust slowly. For now they just talk to each other. But Elisabeth and her children who lived in the cellar have no concept of time and of the future. Some people who hear the story think Elisabeth is like something from a horror film. But rumors that she has no teeth and cannot talk are not true. If you met her you would not realize what she has been through, as she seems just like every normal person. She tells her family that all she longs for is a normal life—or as normal a life as they can get. That’s her only wish.”

Life is also difficult for the three children who were living upstairs because they are now in darkness at the clinic. Herbst said: “But they are all happy and there is a lot of laughter, which you might not expect. Felix makes everyone laugh. They are teaching him to run because inside the cellar he could not run. It is really brilliant how Elisabeth has reacted to the outside world. They are all rather fine. Elisabeth is really an impressive person. She is very strong. She’s happy now for the first time.”

In his first British TV interview, Herbst told how five-year-old Felix recently saw a thunderstorm for the first time. He said the family live a “more or less regular life” in the Austrian hospital they have lived in since the authorities discovered that Josef Fritzl had locked up his secret family in the cellar. He said: “They rise at about six or seven in the morning. Then they have breakfast together. They get the breakfast from the hospital... Then they sit together at a large table and talk, discuss and make jokes. Then everybody does their own thing. They play on the computer, they read books, do some drawings, whatever they want ... It’s very amazing to watch the family because they behave like a normal family.”

He said of the children: “Elisabeth tried to educate the children in the dungeon. They had lessons, they learned grammar, they learned the language, mathematics. So they have been raised very well, they are very well behaved....I think Elisabeth tried to give them a structure and a good life under the circumstances in the dungeon.”

Meanwhile, Felix was recently thrilled to discover McDonald’s was real—after being taken on a secret trip there. The six-year-old was told ads he saw on TV for the burger giant were fiction. A source said after the youngster tucked into his first Happy Meal: “He loved it.”

Stefan, Felix, and Elisabeth have now discarded the protective goggles doctors insisted they wear as their eyes adjusted to sunlight. The boys have also been given immunization shots normally received by newborn babies—but which their mother was unable to provide during their years of incarceration.

A source said: “It was wonderful. The light sensitivity they were suffering two weeks ago has almost disappeared. Doctors were concerned that the boys lacked immunization to everyday illnesses. But after the jabs, they’re happy that they now have enough resistance to mix with others.” This means that Stefan and Felix have taken their first-ever steps in the “magical” outside world. The brothers finally ventured out of the psychiatric clinic and they marveled at their surroundings as they wandered among trees, picked flowers, and gazed at the abundance of wildlife. They were especially fascinated by hundreds of goldfish swimming in a pond in the grounds of Austria’s Mauer Landesklinkum clinic. Before the dusk adventure, the lads had been allowed only to watch from their hospital apartment—staring open-mouthed at the sight of night turning to day.

The source added: “Elisabeth and Rosemarie enjoy cooking for the children and giving them new tastes. Stomaching new foods is no problem for Stefan and Felix—they are fascinated by every dish. The youngsters are allowed DVDs and computer games at night. The siblings have gelled incredibly well. It’s astounding to think how quickly they have all slotted into their new family roles.”

And the source denied reports that Elisabeth is now white-haired with stumps for teeth. He said: “She is attractive. Her hair’s a normal color, she still has her teeth and her figure is slim.”

But the freed family have been forced to start rigorous exercise routines to restore bodies crippled by lack of sunlight and movement in their 180 square feet prison. Stefan was practically bent double when police rescued him.

Orthopedic specialist Dr. Stefan Preis said: “Their cardiovascular systems, muscles, and joints have been severely diminished.”

Kerstin Fritzl is said to be recovering well after being woken up from her artificially induced coma on May 15.

“She opened her eyes and showed emotions for the first time, we laughed and she laughed,” said Amstetten hospital chief Dr. Albert Reiter, adding that he expected her to develop normally and suffer no lasting damage.

“I said “hi” to her and she replied with a “hallo.” It was an intensely dramatic moment. I am especially proud that Kerstin could walk the distance to her new residence and into her new life,” Reiter said.

Kerstin saw daylight for the first time in her life after she awoke in the intensive care ward. According to Reiter, the first wish she made to her carers was to go on a boat trip—and to visit a Robbie Williams concert. “Even immediately after she awoke she would listen to Robbie Williams until 3am. I then would have to intervene, for her to turn down the music and get some rest,” Reiter said. According to him, Kerstin is able to read and write, communicates easily, and is on the road to a full recovery.

“For all of us, Kerstin’s surprising recovery is a great relief,” said Berthold Kepplinger, director of the Mauer Landesklinkum clinic.

Kerstin’s mother Elisabeth visited her daughter regularly in the hospital but had to be transported in utmost secrecy in order to avoid the attention of the international press. Doctors also insisted on her presence for therapeutic reasons, and claim that her presence alongside Kerstin immediately after she woke had had an “immensely positive effect.”

Herbst described the successful family reunion as “miracle” and thanked the medical team for their achievement. He said: “It was a truly touching and happy moment. It was everyone’s—and especially Kerstin’s—great wish to be reunited. It was a miracle.”

In a recent report, Kepplinger said: “The tempo of the lives of the children who lived above ground is very different to those who were confined to the cellar. To them the simple movement of a cloud in the sky can be quite exciting. The others are more active and are being taught by teachers at the clinic. Those who lived below ground are discovering the world for the first time.”

Herbst said: “They all love to pay together and get along really well. They want to make a life together and now we are looking for a place they can start again. To be together is something very precious indeed.”

The family have been given a special area within the clinic where they are expected to stay for several months.

Reiter said: “It was an extraordinary moment when Kerstin, holding my arm, and I were able to walk through the door into a new home, crossing the threshold into a new life. The entire family is happy that they are all together for the first time.”

Felix is enjoying playing outside and also loves climbing stairs, having not been able to in the cellar.

But his brother Stefan is having more trouble adapting to the outside world.

A source at the clinic said: “Stefan is thin as a rake and very pale. For the first few weeks after he came out he only moved very slowly but his motor functions are getting better.”

Rosemarie, meanwhile, returned to the house last week for the first time to pack up personal items before going back to the psychiatric clinic.

This extraordinary family remains in my thoughts!


song heard most recently before posting:
Mad about You—Hooverphonic