A LIFE LESS WRITTEN ... Who Lives?

A LIFE LESS WRITTEN
Who Lives?
Joy A. Sters
January 22, 2018

Woke up with thoughts of Weale, which is a first. It still doesn’t seem real, probably a blessing. It’s the same thing about “Him.” Both are ghosts. They vaguely show up and then disappear and show up and disappear. Weaving in and out of what I call “my life,” weaving a web; a ghostly one, not an actual presence; just the sense of one. The last five years of this life have been nothing but ghosts. 

                                                  Halloween everyday.


                                                                ***


The following was started back in September of last year and has been pecked at over the last few months in incremental writing spurts but was finally finished tonight:


                            WRITING PRACTICE/DISCIPLINE #46
                            Joy A. Sters
                            Title: IT’S ALWAYS GOING TO COME
                                       BACK TO WHO?
                            Part: 1B (3 PAGES EDITED)
                            Date Started: September 29, 2017      
                            Time Started: 2:03am
                                  Edited: January 22, 2017
                                  Time: 4:31am
                            

No matter what; it is always going to come back to “Who?” No matter what you have read, learned, taught, believed, lived … it is always going to come back to:


                                        “Who?” 


Who has done it? This is the most important to See, because the mind is always going to answer:


                                        “I do.”


And it is up to the one that sees that thought, whether to either accept it or see through it. It doesn’t matter if you tire of the question, avoid the question, don’t believe the answer, run from the answer, attempt to hide or distract yourself from the answer, it is always going to come back to:

         “Who?” 
         “Who” is it happening to?
         “Who” lives?
        “Who” dies?
        “Who” perceives?

You are not going to escape this; that you would even want to is the funny joke. The Cosmic Joke. It is what you are searching for in everything and yet run from at the first sign of discovery. You run from it by looking for a distraction. You run from it by searching for tangible answers. You run from it in attempts at making a “better” ego. Never looking to see “who” is doing all of this? You just blindly continue along with:

                                     “I do.” 

However, it doesn’t change the fact, the absolute fact, that there is no:

                                      “I.” 

You are not capable of doing anything. Who you “think” you are is not capable of doing anything, because a “thought” isn’t real and has no power to act. It doesn’t matter how many times you avoid this, it still remains the same and is always waiting to be re-discovered. Every time you re-discover it; it comes alive in you. 

                                    It is re-awakened in you. 

Once you have a firm commitment to Truth, “who?” shows up with greater frequency. When you start to go crazy or enraged, if you are lucky it will show up … like a breeze or a wind in the air of calamity:

                                             "Whooo?”

And you will begin to see that you are following a story over the Truth. You won’t always want to give up the story, but you will see what you are doing. 
              
                                            “Who?”

Is the tool of Emptiness; which opens one to Stillness. 

                                           “Who?”

Is the only True Answer; all other answers are lies, distractions from what is True. It requires no belief. It is not a theory, concept or idea. It is only a theory, concept or idea when one hasn’t directly discovered it. It is only a theory, concept, belief or idea, when one only reads about it, such as you are doing now and does not go on to discover it for themselves. 

                               There is no in-between. 

You either investigate or you don’t. One leads to Truth and the latter to lies. In the beginning, the ego hears “Who?” as a preverbal slap across the face. Immediately it stakes the only claim of truth it has with the phrase:

                                        “I do.”

This phrase is so deeply ingrained in one’s person that it is rarely, if ever questioned. Even after years of interrogation you will be surprised to find that it still remains as the same accepted answer. It is heard and accepted as true even after years of investigating:


                                          “The Lie of the I.” 

Which is why you are reading this now, because you have seen through the Lie and yet still accept the answer:

                                              “I do.”

It is still accepted as a valid response to an unanswerable question. However, it is not valid, yet serves one well if used as a trigger. It can be maddening how often the trigger is overlooked, yet if you just stop, when you do see, those stoppings are enough to start placing large amounts of Space between you and thought. You won’t see this right away. It will be, possibly after years of vigilance, that one begins to see with enough Space that it is a lie. Then, even when there is acceptance of the thought “I do,” there is enough space there that one “Knows” that it is not so. Knows without doubt that one is not the thought: 

                                                    “I.”

Anything that starts with “I” or ends in “I” is simply not true. Slowly but surely, as doubt in the “I” ensues, dependency on all thought begins to lessen. You start to find that you don’t really give much credence to what you once claimed as your own thoughts or anyone else’s. The mind starts to naturally drop down and away, because it has nothing to offer or contribute and even when it “thinks” it does there is Space enough to accept or reject whatever thought appears:

                                              Impersonally. 

The best practice for this comes when you are not distraught and caught up in emotional windstorms. Just close the eyes and ask:

                                               “Who?”

To whom do these thoughts come? Who Sees the thought … “Who?” Who is aware of the stories running through the mind? Who claims them as their own? And do not accept the thought “I” as a valid answer. Just simply see it as not true. Don’t try to accept or reject it, just see through it as you would any liar that comes to your doorstep. You know when someone else is lying, but you almost never see the one’s you accept as your own. 

                                        All thoughts are lies.


You are aware of it. You acknowledge it as true, but rarely do you see it. Become Committed with a capital “C” to knowing that the “I” is a lie, not even a liar, because even in that one gives validity to what is not true. 

                             “I” is simply a lie; simply unTrue.

This is what you become Committed to Knowing. This is what becomes one’s True Life’s Work. Keep the head bowed to Emptiness. When the head is currently raised, it is raised to the allegiance to the lie. When it is bowed, it is in submission to the Truth. The Truth of who you Truly Are. When the head bows, it bows to itSelf: 

                                   To One’s True Nature.

You will not escape this question, not this lifetime, this very Lucky Lifetime. Namaste.


                                                               ***

Here it is whittled down to one page:


                            WRITING PRACTICE/DISCIPLINE #46
                            Joy A. Sters
                            Title: IT’S ALWAYS GOING TO BOIL
                                     DOWN TO WHO?
                            Part: 1a (1 PAGE EDITED)
                            Date Started: September 29, 2017      
                            Time Started: 2:03am
                                Finished: January 22, 2017
                                       Time: 4:38am
                            
No matter what; it is always going to come back to “Who?” No matter what you have read, learned, taught, believed, lived … it is always going to come back to:

                                             “Who?” 

Who has done it? This is the most important to See, because the mind is always going to answer:

                                              “I do.”

And it is up to the one that sees that thought, whether to either accept it or see through it. It doesn’t matter if you tire of the question, avoid the question, don’t believe the answer, run from the answer, attempt to hide or distract yourself from the answer, it is always going to come back to:


     “Who?” 
     “Who” is it happening to?
     “Who” lives?
     “Who” dies?
     “Who” perceives?

You are not going to escape this; that you would even is The Cosmic Joke. It is what you are searching for in everything and yet run from at the first sign of discovery. You run from it by looking for a distraction. You run from it by searching for tangible answers. You run from it in attempts at making a “better” ego. Never looking to see “who” is doing all of this? You just blindly continue along with the thought; “I do.” However, it doesn’t change the fact, the absolute fact, that there is no “I.”  You are not capable of doing anything. Who you “think” you are is not capable of doing anything, because a “thought” isn’t real and has no power to act. It doesn’t matter how many times you avoid this, it still remains the same and is always waiting to be re-discovered. Every time you re-discover it; it comes alive in you. It is re-awakened in you. 

Become Committed with a capital “C” to knowing that the “I” is a lie. Become Committed to Knowing that is True and as you do it becomes one’s True Life’s Work. Keep the head bowed to Emptiness. When the head is currently raised, it is raised to the allegiance to the lie. When it is bowed, it is in submission to the Truth. The Truth of who you Truly Are. When the head bows, it bows to itSelf, to One’s True Nature. You will not escape this question, not this lifetime, this very Lucky Lifetime. Namaste.


                                                                ***


Here it is whittled down to one sentence:


                            WRITING PRACTICE/DISCIPLINE #46
                            Joy A. Sters
                            Title: IT’S ALWAYS GOING TO COME
                                     BACK TO WHO?
                            Part: 1a (1 SENTENCE EDITED)
                            Date Started: September 29, 2017      
                            Time Started: 2:03am
                                Finished: January 22, 2017
                                       Time: 4:43am
                            
No matter what you have read, learned, taught, believed, lived … it is always going to come back to “Who?” who has done it?


                                                               ***


It’s been a few daze and am just now reading on STEINBECK: A LIFE IN LETTERS … which I’ve been reading on sort like sipping on a cup of coffee for the last month or so while being immersed in ANNE SEXTON’s bio … but now am getting fully sucked in. 

He is so different in so many ways from ANNE but very similar as well … he just processes life differently but some of the foundation of their life seems very similar … however, he is very calm and she was very animated. He drinks people in and then can write about people so very well or at least it seems … she more or less could only write of herself as that is all she knew … but she knew herself well. 

I have only read TRAVELS WITH CHARLIE so far but am thinking I will pick up OF MICE AND MEN soon … not sure … I have already seen the movie but imagine the book is very different. I loved the movie. Of course John is another author that WAYNEJI turned me on to.

I am going to write all of letter in because I just read it and it has come up to repeat here. It is a description of a girl from MICE AND MEN that he is explaining to an actress who is going to play her on the stage version and wants to know more about the character but the character sounds so much like my character and maybe most women in general that it seems worth repeating here … most women I meet are this guarded … in fact I just had a conversation with a woman like this just the other day … she connected with me over Weale’s Death … we had all been very close at one time as close as our cemented over hearts would allow and at the end of the conversation she cut off all ties with me (again) because I wouldn’t promise that I wouldn’t share what she shares with me … with Wayneji … I said I could promise that I would let her know if I did but that I couldn’t promise that I wouldn’t do it and this made her mad but not for the reasons she claims which is that it is a break in trust and confidentiality because we always shared everything with Wayneji and nothing ever happened to her because of it her fears have nothing to do with me or Wayneji. The things that came about for our sharing were not anything we wouldn’t have desperately wanted. In many ways I think she said it just to get me to do it … to have the Light of Wayneji shone in her direction … but as of right now nothing has come of any of it … at least not to the naked eye. 

So here is the writing … I sort of wish I had the Kindle version because it is a bit long but I bought a used printed copy … a very old one that smells delicious. I stick my nose in it quite often and now know why people say:


                                       “Get your nose out of that book!”


Because they smell so good. It is rather sad that dead trees smell good. Live ones smell best. Ok here we go:

Los Gatos, 1938

Dear Miss Luce:

Annie Laurie says you are worried about your playing of the part of Curley’s wife although from the reviews it appears that you are playing it marvelously. I am deeply grateful to you and to the others in the cast for your feeling about the play. You have surely made it much more than it was by such a feeling.

About the girl—I don’t know of course what you think about her, but perhaps if I should tell you a little about her as I know her, it might clear your feeling about her.

She grew up in an atmosphere of fighting and suspicion. Quite early she learned that she must never trust any one but she was never able to carry out what she learned. A natural trustfulness broke through  constantly and every time it did, she got hurt. Her moral training was most rigid. She was told over and over that she must remain a virgin because that was the only way she could get a husband. This was harped on so often that it became a fixation. It would have been impossible to seduce her. She had only that one thing to sell and she knew it.

Now, she was trained by threat not only at home but by other kids. And any show of fear or weakness Brough an instant persecution. She learned she had to be hard to cover her fright. And automatically she became hardest when she was most frightened. She is a nice, kind girl and not a floozy. No man has ever considered her as anything except a girl to try to make. She has never talked to a man except in a sexual fencing conversation. She is not highly sexed particularly, but knows instinctively that if she is to be noticed at all, it will be because someone finds her sexually desirable. 

As to her actual sexual life—she has had none except with Curley and there has probably been no consummation there since Curley would not consider her gratification and would probably be suspicious if she had any. Consequently she is a little starved. She knows utterly nothing about sex except the mass of misinformation girls tell one another. If anyone—a man or a woman—ever gave her a break—treated her like a person—she would be a slave to that person. Her craving for contact is immense but she, with her background, is incapable of conceiving any contact without some sexual context. With all of this—if you knew her, if you could ever break down the thousand little defenses she has built up, you would find a nice person, an honest person, and you would end up by loving her. But such a thing can never happen.

I hope you won’t think I’m preaching. I’ve known this girl and I’m just trying to tell you what she is like. She is afraid of everyone in the world. You’ve known girls like that, haven’t you? You can see them in Central Park on a hot night. They travel in groups for protection. They pretend to be wise and hard and voluptuous.

I have a feeling that you know all of this and that you are doing all of this. Please forgive me if I seem to intrude on your job. I don’t intend to and I am only writing this because Annie Laurie said you wondered about the girl. It’s a devil of a hard part. I am very happy that you have it.

Sincerely,
 ~John Steinbeck (p. 154-155, Life in Letters)



It’s not that the story is the exact match with my life, Rebz life or this woman he writes above … but it is like most humans, isn’t it? The stories are different; the end result the same. Most humans are not very trusting, want to be, but aren’t. It’s not even gender specific. We are all so guarded; even when we think the guard is down. But life is a funny and miraculous thing and opens us when we least expect it.


                                                               ***


Another quote from JOHN, it is such a good book on being a Writer … especially when you Know, but don’t know you are one. Sort of like Heart and mind. The Heart Knows; the mind is clueless:


“I’ve been writing on the novel (about vigilantes) but I’ve had to destroy it several times.” He wrote Elizabeth Otis shortly afterwards. “I don’t seem to know any more about writing a novel than I did ten years ago. You’d think I would learn. I suppose I could dash it off, but I want this one to be a pretty good one. There’s another difficulty too. I’m trying to write history while it is happening and I don’t want to be wrong.” (p. 162)


If you ever read this book … read that letter about what LIFE magazine did or actually didn’t do … there are always so many fuct up things that happen in life. But also you never really see the whole picture and since everything unfolds perfectly there are really no bad guys, but it sure can seem like it. Anyway I put that paragraph in because one time a History teacher at SOU asked me what I was going to write about in regard to History and I was surprised to hear myself say: 


                                          I am writing History right now!


I am in history and writing about it right now. However there also had been the idea at the time to write about Psychedelics and Spiritual Teachers in the 20th Century. However, since that time … I have seen that so much has already been written it’s rather pointless. Yet I still write!


                               JOHN comes through as such a Classy Man.


                                                                     ***


It’s been a few daze … but you don’t know that unless I tell you … because I have stopped using dates … for the most part. Not for any particular reason … it used to be because it felt as if these writings are stalked … as if there are eyes/I’s peering in on it … but that has subsided and the dates haven’t come back. So it’s been a few daze and tonight am once again reading on STEINBECK and am just so impressed with him as a man … as a human … as a fellow writer … even though I am not nearly his league I am still in The Calling. 


Reading him makes for the realization that I have been raised in a very different generation … I hear it in the way he is able to stand his ground and in a sense has a firm foundation in what he Sees or how he Sees something coming into fruition. Well, let me let his words say it to you and then you can assess if it comes through that way for you:


“One other thing—I am not writing a satisfying story. I‘ve done my damndest to rip a reader’s nerves to rags, I don’t want him satisfied. And still one more thing—I tried to write this book the way lives are being lived not the way books are written.” (p. 179, Letters)


He is speaking about GRAPES OF WRATH which I have not read but have seen the movie and sort of wish I hadn’t. Hopefully there will be time in this life to finally get to read this work. There are so few people like him anymore. Not stubborn people … there are tons of them … that is not what I am talking about … I am talking about people who have Vision and are not willing to compromise. The world I currently live in is built on people that will compromise what they “think” they believe in … at a drop of a dime. But this is also the big difference … for STEINBECK … it is not a belief … it is his Character … it is the make of of his Character … it wouldn’t be the compromise of an idea but of himself.


Unrelated to the above … he also knows his work so well … his intention … what he attempts to get across to the reader:


“I know that books lead to a strong deep climax. This one doesn’t except by implication and the reader must bring the implication to it. If he doesn’t, it wasn’t a book for him to read. Throughout I’ve tried to make the reader participate in the actuality, what he takes from it will be scaled entirely on his own depth or hollowness. There are five layers in this book, a reader will find as many as he can and he won’t find more than he has in himself.” (p. 178-179)


                                                                     ***


Thoughts of Him have still had me going a bit mad, loopy, looney. It’s the Happy Time … although starting to fade … so it is to be expected. There was a bit of snow also this morning, which of course, is a reminder of Him, though I no longer remember how these two things linked … Him and Snow? But they have … they have linked together in the mind’s eye and today when it started to snow … the Joy of first seeing it was torn in half … there was still some of the Joy of seeing the First Flakes but a sadness was also upon my Heart … it felt Heavy and lessened the want to go outside and play in it. In fact it was so Heavy I wondered if it had actually made the snow stop or if He had Heard it and stopped it Himself. Because it stopped. It looked as if it were going to be a big ole storm and then it just trickled down to nothing and the sun came out and then it rained on and off the rest of the day.



                                                                     ***


“The dead sleep with their eyes open my grandfather would say. They are watching you from the past.”
                                                      -President Frank Underwood
                                                         (House of Cards)

And:


“You know people, you know them for years and then suddenly they are like strangers in your own kitchen. Familiar can turn foreign on a dime.”
                                                                               -President Underwood
                                                                                 (House of Cards)


And:


                                            “Oh, let it go. It’s done.”
                                                                   -Former President Underwood 
                                                                     (House of Cards)


Genius. In so many ways this show is Genius. Thank you DAVE CHAPPELLE for turning me on to it. I think SPACEY did most of the writing, acting, directing as well? Some of the scenes are so very well done and visually, cinematically, the actors! OMG it is so good! So very good.


I used to think that Netflix only created crap shows but they have won me over since OITNB, THE CROWN and now HOUSE OF CARDS … each one has really just been mind opening and at times blowing and some of them that I have seen could stand alone as motion picture. I have seen some episodes of THE CROWN that I thought could have been Movies for the big screen they were done so well.


I don’t know anything about Kevin Spacey’s personal life … but he is a fucking GENIUS of an Actor. I am not saying he doesn’t have some things in his past he needs to correct … but isn’t ruining his career just making two wrongs? Wouldn’t it be more helpful to have the two or however many people are involved work it out. I don’t mean with monetary reward either … I mean really clearing the air out. Going to the person(s) you have caused trauma/drama too and working it out somehow to make amends? Destroying two lives does make sense, does not serve anyone.


SPACEY has done for me what no one has done since JAMES GANDOLFINI in THE SOPRANOS … he has made me Love the Bad Guy.


                                                               ***

                      Just found out “Dan” in Spanish means “Give.”

                                                             ***


         “The Vacuum can only be a Vacuum; when there is nothing there.”
                                                              -Wayneji (June 5, 2003)


                                                               ***


Human is a very strange creature. It does some very strange things … hence the WRITING PRACTICE:


        DON’T HAVE A PROBLEM WITH ANYTHING THE EGO DOES.


John Steinbeck seems to really have been tested in this regard:

     Many years later he wrote to his friend Chase Horton:


“Let me tell you a story. When The Grapes of Wrath got loose, a lot of people were pretty mad at me. The undersheriff of Santa Clara County was a friend of mine and he told me as follows—‘Don’t you go into any hotel room alone. Keep records of every minute and when you are off the ranch travel with one or two friends but particularly, don’t stay in a hotel alone.’ ‘Why?’ I asked. He said, ‘Maybe I’m sticking my neck out but the boys got a rape case set up for you. You get alone in a hotel and a dame will come in, tear off her clothes, scratch her face and scream and you try to talk yourself out of that one. They won’t touch your book but there’s easier ways.” (p. 187)

Geez! This was in 1939! It is a strange and awful world at times. People will do awful things. For what? He does go on to say that all the meddling only sold more books.


“The two most important [things], I suppose—at least they seem so to me — are freedom from respectability and most important — freedom from the necessity of being consistent.” (p. 193, Letters)


This book of Letters is like a Treasure Chest falling in ones lap … I’ve completely forgotten about Kerouac and Sextons Letters as they pale so in comparison with Steinbeck but please do not hold this against them … the books are so different … such completely different characters and John is just much needed at this time. He is a much needed Force of energy because things have been so low for so long and here is a man where the whole world is attacking him and he rises up. You really have to read between the lines but he is such a Great Man of Character and yet it is his lack of Character that makes him so Great!


                 “I want this book to be itself with no history and no writer.” 
                                                               (p. 181, Letters)


He is saying what has been coming up so clearly in here for years … the Writer is not the Author. He knows, he Knows it too! Do most Writers?


Also, he is a writer who is on the precipice of war and is beginning to sense its coming. The sensitive often do. I suppose. I don’t like to “think” that war is coming … but sometimes it is felt. Like a march almost. 


                                                         A Heart Vibration. 


This will be the first World War with women actively fighting in it. Speaking of Marching, just this past weekend there was a women’s march … maybe this is a woman’s war? Always something. Always something to fight about. We live in heaven and constantly create hell. For what? To be right. People think happiness is being right … I am or have been one among them. But that is just a momentary happiness … not true and lasting happiness. It is like the momentary peace between wars. It is not really peace … it is just the momentary contentment of being right. But people never keep whatever popular idea of what “right” is for very long and as soon as the tides sway … and the next thing to be “right” about flares up and the next war appears. It’s the children who always suffer war. Never the men and women who are too busy blood-lusting for it. 


It is the Children … Earth’s Children who sacrifice the most.
The Ageless, Timeless Child.


                                                                      ***


“I was washed up and now I’m alive again, with work to be done and worth doing.”
                                                         -John Steinbeck (p. 197, Letters)


                                                                     ***


John would use cocaine to relax plants before killing them … although he says it is quite expensive to do so, even back then:


“I’m doing (to me) fascinating work trying to relax anemones before killing them. They are terribly retractile and must be thoroughly anesthetized before the formalin is introduced. Cocaine will do it but that is expensive.” (p. 197, Letters)


I already know that it is just as horrible for a plant to be killed as it is an other living species and animal … they are no different from human. I don’t like knowing this. I don’t like killing and yet am nearly maniacal about eating.


Strange what he does find to work:


“It is — heavy mixture of oxygen in the water which gets them very drunk, then a weak solution of aspirin (believe it or not). When they are deeply inert—a shot of epsom salts, fairly strong solution and after six hours a formalin wick. I foozled it last week with too much aspirin, but I think it will work when I get the amounts worked out and that takes many tries. Sound silly?” -John (p. 198, Letters)


Wayneji suggested always that we put aspirin in the vase with cut flowers. He also would share with us to blow air with the mouth into the bottom of the cut stem. When I would do this I would always get the utter sense of the complete futility of the attempt to breath back in what had been so callously (in most cases) cut off.


Steinbeck saw a Manta Ray 60 Feet Across!!!! Sixty Feet! OMG God! I wonder if humans allow such a specimen to exist anymore or if they have killed them all by now. Steinbeck is also a hunter … but just mentioned they went Bighorn Sheep hunting and he was happy to have found no sheep. :o)


“The people we meet on the shore have never heard of Europe and they seem to be better for it. This whole trip is doing what we had hoped it might, given us a world picture not dominated by Hitler and Moscow but something more vital and surviving than either. From the simple good Indians on the shore to the invertebrates there is a Truer thing than ideologies.” (p. 201, Letters)


                                                                ***


The energy started up but then there were distractions and it fizzled a bit but there was a push to keep going with whatever would come. It was going to be titled Beautiful … but then after the distraction the whole thing morphed.


BEAUTY 
(Previously titled Beautiful)
Joy A. Sters
January 26, 2018, 2am
(Written in The Sacred Space)


Beauty, they say …
“Is in the eye of
The Beholder.”
Beheld and beholden
        in the one that Sees … 
        
Light in another.

The Dreamer; Dreams
The Seer; Sees
Beauty Reins;
Entwined in these.
Light Burst Forth
    What Darkness Hides.
What is Reached for is Lost 
    In Rising Tides.

A Moment Shared
A Lingering On.
A Passing of Night.
A Raging Storm.

The Rising Dawn …

These Mysteries
Surface
Time and Again
Allowing the Beauty
To be Discovered
From withIN.

Well, it’s not anywhere near what it seemed it would be.



                                                              ***

Recently there was a Glimpse or a Flash of Seeing everything out of the eyes as The Mind. No separation. Simply Mind … which included everything about what I think I am … this body (i.e. mind). It was quite pleasant but didn’t last very long. Sort of similar to putting on Virtual Realty goggles except that the body itself is the Goggles.


                                                             ***


                                                             Ha!



                                                             ***


                                Someone bought my house. :o(

                   I know it wasn’t my fucking house but still. :o(

                                                 Sore Loser! 

                                                   Yes I am.


                                                               ***


                      “I halfway believe that I dreamed you.”
                                               -John Steinbeck (1943-48)


                                                              ***


Some of the reporters over here are viciously resentful of me and some are very kind. But every once in a while one of them goes out of his way to tell me how much my stuff stinks. I think they are probably right. I get very tired of it.                                  -John (Letters p.259)


                                                          ***


Interesting:


“Also I have a symptom or two that you will probably recognize. Sudden blank brain—nit knowing who or what I am. They only last for a few seconds and are followed by a blinding headache which lasts a few seconds and then alright.”
                                                                           -John (Letters p. 265) 
                     

                                                              ***


“And I do want to go sit out on the rocks and fish and not catch anything.”
-John (Letters, p. 271)

                                                             ***


“Among other unpleasant things, modern war is the most dishonest thing imaginable.”      -John (Letters, p. 273)


                                                            ***
               
What a surprise to just read the following:


“I have been planting cypress trees to fill in some of the old ones that have died. They seem to belong here. The Monterey Cypress is unique in the world except for one part of China, and the myth is that the Chinese explorers planted them here. It is known that the Chinese planted trees instead of flags as a token of discovery.”     -John (Letters, p. 276)


It is only interesting because i have never heard anyone that I can recall ever mentioning Cypress trees.


                                                              ***


It’s taken a while but I finally was able to sit down and write Tony back:


Hey T ... for weeks you have been on the mind and I have wanted to write but just have not been able, until just now to get myself to do it. Your email about "getting out soon" sort of set something off inside of me ... like a trigger ... I was flooded ... inundated with the past ... I had no idea I was holding on to so much about and in many ways against you. Maybe it was similar to those times that you have sent letters out to people sharing that you saw what you did and apologizing ... I was seeing it like that ... as if I were writing you a letter I wasn't going to send ... because I saw that when you would send those letters ... it really left no room for the person to say ... Hey, wait a minute ... this doesn't exactly get you off the hook! But because you sent the letter and never really connected with the person (i.e. my mom in this instance I am thinking about) it sort of cleared the air for you and left a pile of shit on her/our doorstep. Now I am not saying that what you sent to my mom all those years ago and to the many others you sent them to was crap but it came through a few weeks ago as a rather crappy thing to do to a person, because I had thought of sending a letter to you and spilling out all the things that I was finding still hard on my heart about you and the trigger to all of it was you getting out of jail because we have done this on a few occasions now and the person that gets out is not often the person that wrote the letters or in this case emails all those years, months or whatever length of time. The "you" that is in prison is only one aspect of you and in many ways, it is the humblest and easiest aspect to interact with ... the one that gets out of prison not so much and usually after a very short time just disappears off the radar, but that was then and this is now. However, I was surprised to see how much anger I still had coming up around your person ... there were just so many things I was seeing that I wanted some "better" aspect of yourself to do something about ... but you see it is all in the past ... there is nothing that can be any other way ... things just went how they went ... but it has taken me weeks to even get to the point where I could write you anything at all without it being in an attacking way and maybe even this is ... I don't know but I don't mean it to be. Most of what came up is around Mikel but not all of it and so there is probably much of the Grieving processes still being gone through. On top of that ... just last week my ex-husband died. It was unexpected and has been a rather crushing blow unfolding upon my person and there has been a great sense of failing him ... the things that you see after someone you love dies are very different from what you experience of them when they are alive and it is very saddening to see how great the contrast is. He was/is a good man and am lucky to have known him. We were together a long time and I always sort of thought we would be hanging around each other to the very end ... but the very end came way quicker for him than I would have imagined and now all chance of anything imagined is just fantasy. So it's been a challenging couple of weeks, to say the least.


One of the things that came up while I was going through whatever that was I went through in regards to you .... is that your children will probably have similar feelings toward you and it came up to share with you ... though completely up to you whether you heed what is shared ... that you face them defenseless ... don't have excuses for any of your behavior ... just stand there and let them say it how they see it because that is how it is for them ... whether true or not ... it is how they see it and if you can stand there ... sort of with your hands down and just willing to be seen as something you would rather not be seen as ... and just Listen to what they have had to go through ... what they feel they have lost in their life around you or whatever it is that they have coming up for them ... if you can allow them to have that ... you will give them a Gift that is Huge beyond what most can imagine. 


You see in the end ... no one is really right ... we just have ways we wish things would have been ... but never were ... and we just want to be heard and accepted which is why you wrote to my mom and me asking for forgiveness all those many times ... well, you have it now ... you are forgiven for anything that has transpired between you and I and I know it is the same for my mother ... but it has been time, in a sense that has healed these things and of course you and I coming back together time and again and sort of hashing it out. 


Now I am not saying to let your children, should anything ever come about, to treat you like shit ... I am not saying that at all ... I am just saying to Hear them and for a short time ... bare the weight of blame without defending yourself against it and not belittling yourself for it either ... just be neutral if you can ... like a Tree ... sometimes when I am very distraught I will go up into the forest and sob to a Tree and hold onto it and then I give it a big old hug and sometimes a kiss and thank it for Hearing me ... and there is always a great relief and often times release in me ... in fact it happened with what I was going through with you ... the real Healing came one day when I went up into the Forest and I just broke down and was basically insane with anger and frustration and then found myself holding on to a Tree and sobbing and then the air cleared and some pretty deep and profound insights appeared. So if you can be that Tree for a time ... especially if you ever go to have a relationship that is anything more than superficial with your children ... this may be helpful in that regard and I am Hearing it for myself as well. If you think I have escaped the anger of my children because I actually was there in their lives you would be wrong ... whether a parent stays or leaves there is always stuff to process out with one's children because we all see the world and our parts in it so differently ... but none of us are correct ... we are all wrong in the way we see things ... it's not about trying to become right ... it's about allowing the space to be heard ... whether we believe it right or wrong or anything in between. 


I often wish I could Hear more clearly than I can type because the words flow out but aren't taken in as easily or completely. Through the years of sharing with you ... everything that I have ever said/written has also been processed in my person ... you may have thought that you were going through some of it alone but I was and am always going through it with you.


I will close now and let you process some of this through. 


 ~JoySters


                                                               ***


I know that time didn’t create the forgiveness … but I didn’t want to preach or sound like this is about teaching him anything … it’s been coming up since Wayneji mentioned the tendency in my person to do so … but once you see that things cannot be any other way than how they are it takes the edge off the concept of “forgiveness” and eventually wipes the concept away completely … but it can be a slow and gradual process. It certainly has been and is here … I still so often forget that things are how they are not how you want them to be … the obvious is not often obvious. It also doesn’t make life any easier … but it does make you more Aware of how you lie to yourself about it.


                                                            ***


First dream in over a month and the first remembered, recalled or written down of the year:


DANWEALE - E - AND THE T
(Dream)
Sunday, January 28, 2018 
8-10am


Had  a dream about Weale. Don’t remember all that much about it now but we were living in a house somewhere with Tman and Pete. I was working at a place I didn’t like very much … and had come home for lunch and Dan was there and Tman and Pete too. Dan had snagged some E and we decided to take some before going back to work. He breaks them in half … they are Pure White … we take it and he leaves and I can’t find my keys to the car. Tman is not interested in helping find them and is playing with Pete … he is young … maybe 5 to 8 years old … it’s hard to say. I find a set and go out to the back yard … it is a beautiful back yard and I feel more at home in it than in the house … two neighbors are out there and they want something from me that I can no longer recall what as the dream is fading fast … it was a long one with sexual undertones. I get to a car … can’t tell what kind and get in and try to start it but it’s the wrong keys and I realize I am not going to get back to work. But then I do … it’s an office a bunch of stories high and made mostly of glass but not colored it is very clear and it makes it very bright inside. There are cubicles but you can’t see the walls. I am “high” but no one can seem to tell. I feel very good and barely mind being there.


That is all that is remembered. It wasn’t remembered at all … until it just popped into the mind’s eye a few minutes ago which was hours after having the dream. It was nice to see Weale and not be angry with him. I wasn’t angry in the dream at all … we were getting on quite well. He was kind and being what I would call his basic normal self. When he is just chill and not stressed and worried about anything … that Dan was nice to be around and I enjoyed that Dan a lot and if we were both in that space at the same time it was super awesome … which basically was how this dream was. We were both sort of in “chill” space.


You don’t know this, very few do, but Dan and I got married on E. I started to get cold feet, but not for the reasons one might think. I felt too ugly to get married. How strange huh? I looked in the mirror and all I could see was this really ugly person and I didn’t want to leave the hotel room. I was panicked. This is one of the greatest things in my relationship with Dan is that he sort of understood the mental illness or what I go through because he had taken so many psychedelics. If he hadn’t he wouldn’t understand the insanity that arises. I mean he brought E with him to our Wedding … that is a bit out the norm … but he did and there was no intention to take any before the ceremony … until this happened … there was no way I would have gone. It is very hard for me to recall now because we took it and had such a good time and a very good ceremony … but I wouldn’t have budged out of that room without E. 


                              I had never seen myself so ugly before. 


I have seen this face morph many, many times but this was a very different kind of ugly and I couldn’t shake it. You could say I wasn’t supposed to but here’s what happened. Dan showed up and I took some E … as did he …  we decided to do it together and the rest is history. I spent a long time after that feeling that ugly though. Not as intensely as that day but for the next few years I just felt ugly. It’s shifted … sometimes I see it but now it is just an aspect of this character that sometimes but not with much frequency shows up. There is so much that shows up in  my person you don’t get too attached to any one of them. Now there is a bit of tension arising but that dream had actually been nice and even relaxing. 


I felt lucky for a long time to be with Weale. He was usually pretty easy going. If he was tired or grumbly … look out … but I didn’t know that for a long time and we had many ugly fights before I did and would just avoid him when he was in that space. However we eventually started to avoid each other all the time to the point we were living together alone. And we had so many fights about things that were so very dumb … but those dumb things ruined our marriage. I didn’t like him very much by the time we split up and I was madly for him when we met. 


I was inside out upside down madly. 


But you get to know someone like you know yourself and sometimes you know them more than you know you because you are watching them so much and not yourself. I blamed him for a lot of things that really changed him from the man I fell in love with. Because he was willing to change and then I liked the change even less than what I had wanted to change in the first place. But this was not seen until long after we had split up. That was very hard. I didn’t see a life without him. It just wasn’t a concept that we wouldn’t be together but we weren’t and he was pulling further and further away all the time and it wasn’t long after he left that I started falling for someone else and that was all very strange. I was super surprised when Dan moved away. I was scared and disappointed and surprised. In retro anyway. It all looks so different looking back. Dan even said to me that I or he one of us would spend our days reflecting. I didn’t know what he was implying at the time but it “Rang” as something profound when he said it. Sort of like it was echoing throughout the mind.


I miss him every time he goes away. I have missed him and had to go through some pain with each move he has made over the last couple of years. We were so close. I would say there was nothing we didn’t know about one another. 


                                       I thought he had balls to leave me. 


I was proud to see them. But then I was pissed he had them. He could be so cocky and arrogant. Really and truly like princely kind of shit. I’d think I was married to royalty sometimes … but that aspect of him didn’t stay too long either … it was like facing his three year old self and that kid was a brat. When he came around I would have Tman and Weale to reckon with. Boy they both knew how to push my buttons. But sometimes it would go too far and they often would feel badly, but it would be too late and a certain kind of damage was done. You can only be a punching bag for so long before you just get smooshy … you can’t take a punch anymore. Nothing firm about you. 


                                            I was a squishy sqooshy mess. 


I feel a bit frightened without Dan in the world with me. I felt the same when Mark left but in a much more devastating kind of way. There is something you kind of take for granted where you have someone in the world you can touch base with if the floor falls out and I don’t even know what I actually mean by that, but I know that if anything major ever happened they would be there. I feel it now like I have lost another one of my men. My Boys. Two of myBoys this year. Mikel would have had my back too. I don’t know if they thought that about me but I hope so. Anytime Mikel had reached out in a sort of desperation I had been there … this last time he didn’t really reach out … not like he would if he wanted me to intervene. I am just trying to understand something. Just letting it go now.


                                                                   ***


PIG POT PIE
(Dream)
Sunday, January 28, 2018 
8-11pm


Had another dream … don’t remember much about this one except being in a house in the kitchen with a man who was cooking … he was fat and grubby looking in appearance and had me keep checking on the pigs that were in the oven. It was disgusting … there were all kinds of pig body parts … especially heads and I had to keep turning them in this massive pan and blood and puss was splattering everywhere. 


Wouldn’t even have put the above dream in here as it is/was rather disturbing, except that the first thing that was read this evening is about pigs:


“The letter is unsigned. Instead it is stamped with a drawing of “Pigasus,” the flying pig which Steinbeck used throughout his life as a symbol of himself, either-bound but aspiring. Sometimes the pun is spelled with Greek letters and often it is accompanied by the motto “Ad Astra Per Alia Porci” (“To the stars on the wings of a pig”): “a lumbering soul but trying to fly,” he once explained it and another time, “not enough wingspread but plenty of intention.” (p.296, Letters Steinbeck)


It was the first thing the eyes laid on after that dream so it seems(ed) ironically strange.