Most of us have had bad things happen in our lives. I’ve seen bodies shattered by disease, corpses with their brains blown out… homeless people frozen to death in front of heated buildings. I seem to be able to deal with those things intellectually and emotionally, but I am powerless when facing my own demons.
Usually I can keep them in the background… hidden, leashed, but the other night they escaped my control, and I scared the Hell out of very good friend. Thank goodness Betts was there to drag me to the car and get me home. I’ve been a basket case since then, but I finally got the clue that I had been searching for: the “Dark Lord”.
That’s what the man who raped me for 8 hours 24 years ago called himself. He slipped me a mickey whilst we were watching a movie, and I woke up to being chained to eyebolts in a floor and laying on a filthy mattress. During all that time, outside of the pain he delivered, I was constantly wondering when and how he would kill me. Would my body be found in a dumpster or China Basin?
He let me go in the late morning. Congratulated me for entering the Gay lifestyle. All I could think of was that I’m not Gay. “Power over another”. I remained holed up in my apartment for a week crying, and then got the courage up to go back out into the World and try to live. (My rapist died four years later of AIDS, and though I visited and helped many of the boys who were dying of the same disease, I never entered his room. I couldn’t find it within me to show any form of kindness to him.) The power of forgiveness wasn’t coming through my soul.
I thought that I had dealt with this shit years ago, but I didn’t realize that this was riding piggy-back on the events of 50 years past. Genital mutilation, negation of beingness, all in the name of societal norms. I can still see them coming for me, to lay me on a cold stainless steel table and then they start carving my body apart so that I would fit their visions of normalcy. I couldn’t speak… had no power. All I could do is lay there and take the injustice that they did to my body.
The rape was a violation of my body, but this earlier event was a violation of my very being. Right now I’m feeling the physical and emotional pain of the first year of Life. Somehow I’ll get through this. Finally I’m not letting intellect to deal with this. I’m using my heart, and it really hurts.
I have many friends around the world that are victims of these treatments. I’ve watched them struggle with the same memories and then become themselves. I guess it’s my turn to face the demon and slay it. This isn’t going to be easy, but it must be done. The nightmare cannot eat my soul.
I refuse to live under the dictates of others. I will not let the bastards win. This is MY LIFE. My friends, my world. I see a Sun shining on the flowers in my garden, and I will again be the blythe spirit that I entered this incarnation as. My World will be filled with Light, Life and Love. Friends are around… there’s so much to do and learn.
This coming March I won’t be 51… it’s MY first B’Day. I’m reclaiming my life.
Brothers and sisters, “the Sleeper has awoken”. It’s a new day.
Wow … Welcome to the world. You’re going to be a miracle.
Comment by Glenn — January 19, 2008 @ 8:35 am
Glenn,
In my Spiritual Tradition, to be able to name a thing means one has power over it. I finally got the key words and tricky phrases… I understand what flashes within my soul instead of standing there saying “I don’t know what this poop is about”.
In understanding many of the triggers and the conditions I must be in for the demon to surface. I am now controlling the conditions, and I will watch the triggers. The Epiphany, the answer, will come on my terms now. I understand what has been going on, and it ain’t getting a clear shot at me again.
Now I’m on the offensive… my Life, my thoughts, my Reality. (Freakin’ power surge there.) The demon is now the prey… I’m now the Hunter, Orion, Menalvagar, and I will hunt this shit down and eradicate it.
Once that is done I’ll be fighting for my younger Brothers and Sisters, and I will be able to do more for those who are older. My goal is to change a Societal viewpoint. No mas for what has been done to me and mine in the Past.
My goal is to stop these monsterous practices… to allow the young ones to find themselves, to live their lives. I lost most of my life, but regaining power over my life is vital. If the kids don’t have to go through this Societal shit, I’ve done my fucking J.O.B.
Hopefully we’ll finally meet at St. Bride’s Ball. Look for the redhead in a white or green gown with a white cloak. I’ll also be holding my staff. Look for an Owl.
Look for the Phouka… look for the shape-changer… Look for the girl with keleidoscope eyes.
Namaste!
Comment by Morwen Madrigal — January 20, 2008 @ 12:00 am
Morwen,
I could really feel the power in your words at the end of this post. I’m sending you lots of love in this time of rebirth. Keep shining your light!
Comment by LIsaPal — January 20, 2008 @ 3:46 am
Your chronicles of late are so moving – and cathartic – it sounds like you are facing the demons and obtaining peace – bon voyage on your rebirth and the life and path ahead
Comment by swampwoman — January 20, 2008 @ 2:28 pm
Hey, u ok, and I can prove it. Just come over to my blog and look the mess that I call “me”.
Hang in there and always remember, no matter how stupid you think people are, you will find that your expectations were too high.
(In the case of my mother, she set her expectations of me as low as possible. So she thought. HA!)
Comment by D-BB — January 22, 2008 @ 5:10 pm
I salute your bravery, resilience, and honesty. Namaste!
Comment by Amorphous Funk — January 23, 2008 @ 1:24 am
Thanks everyone. This is the kind of poop many of us having running in background in our OS’s. It’s the kind of stuff we need to ferret out in order to become US. (Have no ferrets, but tons of catz, but they are useless in this query except for loving us as we are.)
Who stated: “Know thyself”? Oh yes… the Pythoness of Delphi. Socrates engraved it in stone, but it comes from the Old Mystery Tradition. “Know Thyself.”
(There is more to this, but I will only do it privately… not meant for the great unwashed.)
Interesting the connections and scenarios most of us can conjure up looking at that statement. How many of us cannot understand ourselves and why we do what we do?
So horrible, but how many of us can walk those final steps to the Abyss to be able to finally understand that phrase? I do know… been there, done that, but now I understand the voices.
The voices didn’t promise anything except to pull me from the brink, just as what I’m experiencing now. Been there and done that poop.
We have the power to become Transformative agents. Many of us see the dicotomies of culture and philosophy. We “see” the New World. We crave it, in fact.
It’s the freakin’ damn goal of being Human.
As much as I’d like to see a World with a majority of folks like me, endocrine disruptive chemicals and estrogens in the environment can and will make us the inheritors of the New World. Look at the sea-life based studies.
I don’t wish to be the majority. I wish to be considered Human, with a twist. I don’t wish to see children more conflicted as me.
Yes, I’m more than most, female and male, and a mentality that can encompass it all, but what I really wish for is children that do not have to fight my battles of the Past.
Maybe we have reached the tipping point on this shit. Maybe I’m too late. If I am too late, treat them kindly and accept what the Future many bring. I’m just the first of many.
Years ago I wrote about the possibilities of our chemical pollution of our planet. No one seemed to care, but the agents I referred to are still active, and they will continue to do their thing.
I can never change my chemical/biological/genetic past. I didn’t do it… it just happened. Though I can speak about the wonders, the epiphanies of being Intersexed/Trans I can’t wish my life upon any child. I’m not a fool… it’s a hard life to live
Yes I fight for my kind, but I pray for the day this doesn’t need to be: whether we are Trans or not, or there is no Trans really. Get me.
Now I’m back in the fray fighting for my sisters and brothers. I stand in a “Place” that has no judgement upon what I am, only who I am. I am myself.
I spent my life trying to live up to a dictum: “Prove who we are, and what we are not”.
One thing I have learned over the years: I am what I am, and fuck those who will refute that. I AM a woman, and fuck anyone who disputes that fact.
I take care of the folks around me. I hold them in my arms and thoughts. I am kind to others. I CARE.
I’m a woman, and that’s what women do: we take care of folks. We are what we are. This is biological destiny.
Anyone who wants to prove my words different, you come face-to-face with me, and we will hash it out.
Comment by Morwen Madrigal — January 23, 2008 @ 6:15 am
Morwen….
All we can do is teach them one at a time.
I have an 8 year old son who thinks absolutely nothing of gender or same sex relationships. (I hate to admit my weakness for Buffy reruns, but when he was little it was a great way to introduce them…”Aw sweet, they’re in love!”)
My husband’s cousin and best friend of his life and his partner we both lost to AIDs.
He was the only one Jim would let be with him in the end, and Mike did his port and iv’s every night.
So, as sbnn, I am committed to the fact every human is perfect and intended to be exactly as they are, and should only be subject to their OWN desires of who they want to be.
In other words, society doesn’t get to pick, only you do.
Fuck judgments, fuck mutilations, (sorry for the language, I cuss a lot) and fuck people who try and force people into boxes they create.
Right beside you in spirit.
Diane
Comment by Diane — February 5, 2008 @ 6:32 am