A Mindful Thanksgiving 2014

This is something I don't ever talk about, but since it is Thanksgiving here I want to express my gratefulness.  At sixteen I started cutting myself to deal with the trauma of being molested at twelve.  It took me about eight years, on and off, to truly stop self harming, and in between that time I grew into my feminist identity - a movement I credit for not only giving me my voice back, but saving me from the conflicted torment of growing up female in a patriarchal world.  

It wasn't until I understood that we live in a world of social constructs, for which the social norms we have are things we make up, including the definitions of masculinity and femininity, that I was able to let go of my pain.  I learned, as comprehensively as I could, why a man four times older than I would or could conceive the thought of molesting me.   I learned, through the avenues of an intersectional feminism, why society hypersexualizes a child's body and blames her for the violent acts done to her.  

At twenty-four I made the conscious decision to stop cutting because I no longer felt the loss of control over my body.  I was no longer the foreigner trapped within a sexualized form.  I learned, unconventionally, that what others say, what others do and believe of me is not the truth that defines me. I define me, and I don't have to carry the pain handed to me when I was twelve.  I don't have to carry the weight of the world that denies me my basic human rights.  I am complete as I am, and my scars are simply tangible evidence of my will to survive.  

This does not mean I don't struggle day to day with my experiences in life.  I believe that once you have been molested or raped or violated in some way, you are forever struggling to find peace in your own body.  It's just something you have to learn to manage.  For a long time I managed it in a not so good way, but I don't regret my choices.  I simply have forgiven myself.  I am, however, thankful that for the last two years I have not once self-injured. I am so thankful for the feminist movement, and the role it had in my healing process. It has made me proud of how far I have come, and for the things I have learned, and for giving me the agency to be unapologetically myself in a world that constantly wants me to be someone else.  

I just wanted to share a tiny blurb of my story because I'm just so happy to be so grateful.  that is all.  Happy Thanksgiving.  I hope you all have a good day full of good food and belly laughs.  

With Love,

Vivian 

Into the Wild

Last night I couldn't sleep because I was having a mild panic attack. I was worrying myself over my shortcomings and inability to get my life together in ways society deems appropriate, but this morning I realized the social conventions that we all are upheld are nothing more than someone else's lies. The most important thing in life is to cease the day and make it count. We feel, at times, our lives are just drudging on in a slow pace, but really we've made it to our 20's in a blink of an eye. I sometimes catch myself reminiscing about my childhood as if I'm a grandparent to my nostalgic reverie. At this point I can only recollect bits and pieces of my younger days - all without any vivid imagery. It's not like I can playback the film of my life and watch, from birth until now, all the details I missed while being an absentminded newbie. Yet, this is nothing to be upset about. I simply must take charge and be more proactive when making memories.

At 4 AM I preoccupied my mind with some reading, and as it often happens, the perfect timing for an epiphany occurred with the right book in hand. I was "Into the Wild" with the protagonist Alex McCandless as he wrote to a friend about making a shift from sedentary life to an adventurous one. He wrote, "So many people live within unhappy circumstances and yet will not take the initiative to change their situation because they are conditioned to a life of security, conformity, and conservatism, all of which may appear to give one peace of mind, but in reality nothing is more dangerous to the adventurous spirit than a secure future."

He goes on to say, "Don't hesitate or allow yourself to make excuses. Just go out and do it. Just go out and do it. You will be very, very glad you did."

These words suddenly were to me an aerial hope that filled my lungs with new life. We think we can't do something because it goes against the norm. We think we can't just sell our possessions and buy a sturdy car and travel the world, but I know of people who do that very thing. We feel we can't afford to live the adventures we read about, but we can. It is often said that where there is a will, there is a way, and if we accept that all of life is just a pastiche of beautifully assorted mess, then we can truly become the transformative artist that inspires a new generation.

"Saffron"

The sun bloomed of saffron light, 

Beaming of heat against the wall of plight,
A gloom eclipsing just beyond the border -
The shadow of a town once alive,
But in its sleepless pitch of dark repose,
lay the carcass of wilted fields,
A place untouched by the warm waves outside -

The wall encased a carnage left by impure hands
Where forevermore shall it see of only night;
The bed of undisturbed rainbow hues
Now resemble a battlefield of dying life,
Plucked too roughly, and left to grieve
In ashen skies where God has forsaken thee
by the grayish blight

"We Are Human"

"We Are Human"

Men colonize our bodies.  They split them into territories, they create highways and housing for their businesses and beliefs.  They erect monuments that celebrate their fleshy swords like false idols to their savior.  

They beat our bodies to drill our life source to fuel their systems of oppression and call it manifest destiny - a divine law.  They convince us that we are diseased, misbegotten men as they rape us into silence.  They command us to cover ourselves out of respect, but is it respect when they feed our bodies to the highest punter?

They traffic us to foreign countries with false hope of a better future.  They turn our bodies into unknown regions that we, women, must learn to assimilate.  We are assigned statuses like street names and billboard signs.  We become

Wives, 
Property, 
Whores,
Lovers, 
Temptations, 
Nymphs, 
Lolitas, 
But never their equals.

They dissect us into tits and ass and holes to fuck - we become tagged walls - "for a good time call...."

And we pump ourselves with drugs, drown ourselves in alcohol, pull out our hair, binge and purge, and cut into our flesh just to forget that our bodies are not our own.  Then, centuries after our internalized misogyny has set in, our borders are sealed and the anthems written that we, women dissect ourselves with the same pejorative language as we view our bodies through the gaze of men reflected back to us in our mirrors.  

We, women, birth their sons and daughters, and raise generation after generation just to watch history repeat itself rather than be made anew.  And I, wonder, do you want to see bruises on our flesh, like pulpy figs in smoldering heat, just to prove our lives are worth your consideration?  That our bodies, riddled in swollen welts, deserve the very basic of human rights?  That we deserve to feel safe in our own skin - to not feel like immigrants in these bodies you have now claimed as your 

States, 
Your churches, 
Your homes, 
And pulpits from which you speak of your moral truth,

Because the truth is we hare human, not districts to dominate.  We are human, not fields to plow.  We are human, not empires to build or provinces to own.  We are human, not neighborhood to gentrify.  We are human, not separate but equal.  We are human, and we deserve to be free of this toxic patriarchy. 
We.Are.Human.  

Defile - Thy Name is Woman

Much in the same way I convinced myself the molestation I endured at 12 was a “misunderstanding” because I was not brutalized violently or raped viciously in the manner that would leave physical bruises, I also convinced myself at 20 that the verbal and emotional abuse I was enduring was just another “misunderstanding.”  In both scenarios I minimized the situation in order to rationalize my abuse – to move forward because I thought that’s what one does.  Even later on in life when others molested me too I was paralyzed with insurmountable anxiety that if I did not move on I would have to confront what I was going through, and I was the least informed about abuse of any kind.  That’s the thing so hard to grasp; life doesn’t suddenly stop so that you can sort through your feelings.  So that you can understand what you don’t have words for. You can barely ask for help because the whole process is humiliating to even admit.  You just have to keep going.  I placed the responsibility of my abuse on myself because I thought I was overreacting – this is how I resolved it.  I truly thought that just because I was seemingly not being forced I must have had control, and if I had control I could have stopped it, but the reality was wrong; I had no control.    

In conversations I heard around me the general census was that one cannot force themselves on another without the person’s consent.  It seemed unfathomable to people that you could be raped, molested or even verbally abused without your permission. When one is physically assaulted the marks against the flesh – a purple pulp of a disfigured blemish – is an undeniable proof to an everyday reality.  It becomes easy for others to accept your abuse so long as they can see the scars across your face.  But even then the case is against you.   

“No one can make you feel inferior without your consent.” – Eleanor Roosevelt.  This sentiment, I believe, is a perpetual train of backwards thinking.  It permeates the collective minds of our society.  Women are often made complicit in their own abuse so that the world could rationalize the increasing violence and second class citizenship of over half of the population.  The world makes us women share in the responsibility of violence against ourselves to minimize the real problem and to deny the failure of human condition; that we have risen generation after generation of men who have made violence a mandatory trait of masculinity.  As much as feminists can raise the consciousness of people, of men on the subject of institutional violence against women the progress to a liberated society is drudgingly long.  The difficulty of living with forms of post-traumatic stress disorders suffocates any woman. 

Often we are lost inside our own skin feeling the revenant hands of our abusers crawl inside of us and rip out everything we were and everything we could have been.   Their words, though long forgotten by the years, become our daily church bells – reminders that the language our abusers used sewed us to our insecurities and buried us under their own filth and called it a compliment.  For me, and many like me, I believed invisibility was the answer.  I thought silence would keep me safe, but in this, I too was wrong.  We do what we can to survive; returning to normalcy begs a stage in which we feign shallow interest in a life that is not ours anymore.  The pain may lessen over time, but what was done will never be undone.  I learned that I will have good days and bad days in ways others will not.  I learned that one cannot simply move on; one can only manage to nurse the wounds until they become scar tissues.  I learned that I will have to live with this for the rest of my life.  

The Essence of Life: My Existential Mind

Too often with the human condition we pride ourselves on having a wealth of academic acumen where we forgo our emotions for stoic objectivity.  Such a thing does not exist, but we continue to weigh our intelligence in ways that alienates us. We measure a person's worth through letter grades, through IQ tests, money and superficial means like skin color; never, as it seems, by the content of character. We humiliate people and abuse them with our words if they fail to meet the standards we set.  We think of ourselves to be better, but sophistication in a falsely believed civil nation is a depthless guise of gaudy designer fashion we too proudly wear to show "solidarity." 

We detach ourselves from what makes us human - from what allows us to empathize.  We see people not as fellow beings, but as categories different from us.  By dissecting people's race, gender, and sexual orientation to define them in rigid and simplistic terms we condition our minds to view each other as objects, as things.   We have created a climate of superfluous privilege for too many power hungry individuals.  These individuals have become the foundation of an institutional system that oppresses those it has chosen to violate. 

 But the system is broken because we are broken.  Something inside of us craves to heal what is wounded, and rather learning to love we demoralize one another.  The sheer volume of which we venerate the love for greed, wrath, hatred, and total disregard for human life in search for existential dominance turns us into violent, brutish creatures.

Kindness, love, compassion, and generosity - these things cannot be measured on a point system or valued as an ascribed status.  They are proven through action and feeling.  One cannot smother people with intellectual prowess and expect that by having the ability to retain information like a computer, you are the smartest - most enlightened - person in the room because you are not.  To feel and express these sentiments does not require a university degree or a posh vernacular because they are part of a celestial existence, and we are the stardust that moves within its cosmos. 

I have always maintained the belief that love will heal us all if we can only see ourselves as one entity. We are of the same atoms, of the same matter and energy force that animates this life.  We are tiny molecules in a galaxy far reaching than our minds can go, and the ball of light that ignites inside of us when we are born is the flame that keeps us warm.  Do not extinguish that warmth, for love lives in the embers of our souls, and it is the only remnants of who we are as people.  We should strive to be better in relation to what we are  for the universe demands it so.  

Love and Abuse:My short version of Five years

It’s been said a million times that love is blind.  I never understood the meaning until love happened to me.  It’s been over three years (now five upon this update) and I can still remember the exact date and time.  January 5th, 2009; 2:30 pm; It was a Monday.  Most of us can’t recall the highlight of yesterday, but fall in love and you’ll remember every last detail.  Funny how that works; the most insignificant things a person normally forgets is etched inside the mind forever, and I?  Well, I wasn’t looking so I didn’t see it coming, but I tripped and I fell just like everyone else.  Why I thought I was beyond the recognition of first love and subsequently first heartache must have been a silly optimistic notion, because I wasn’t.  I met her when I was 19.  She was two years younger.  Barely out of high school and yet she carried herself much bigger than she was. I can’t help but chuckle, remembering how simple it was back then.  How sure I was and how this feeling conceived in my heart was ultimately my downfall.  For many years I carried a guilt that was not mine.  For many years I spent pouring out every inch of my heart like a running stream of endless love, and in return I was emotionally and verbally beaten to an unrecognizable pulp. 

At first, I didn’t think of myself as gay or straight; I didn’t think of myself as being in between.  There was no confusion or questions to answer; I was just me.  I didn’t even pause to think that my feelings were wrong.  The thing was they weren’t; this wasn’t a gay relationship or a heterosexual one. My heart didn’t know the difference. Love is such a mystery to people despite its simplicity.  We find a way to muddy it up with our labels and ideologies.  We want to find comfort in the unknown, and we are afraid of change; and love changes people.  Sometimes this change is for the better, but in my case it was for the worse.  As I have indicated, I was, for close to five years, in an abusive (almost) relationship.  I say almost because despite my closeness with this person, she always kept me as a “side dish” (it’s embarrassing and I hate to admit it, but it’s true).  She always had girlfriends she never loved, never cared for, and most often complained about to me.  She would always maintain a level of affinity towards me even when she said we could never be.  She knew how to feed me lines that would keep me close, and I believed every single one of them because I was in love.  You don’t realize the abuse like the one I was in because there was no physical altercation, no hitting or punching involved.  By the time I knew the things she was doing was abusive I was already four years in.  It took me another year after that first initial realization to truly be ready to put myself back.
And, it has taken every ounce of courage to glue myself back again.  Most people that know me now would never guess how broken I was or how lost I was.  I try not to talk about it anymore, but the problem never seems to go away.   There are few people who do know, and who have seen me break down over and over again. They know how particularly hard it has been for me over the years.  When I thought I was finally free from the grips of abuse I would find myself stalked on campus where a barrage of apologies for the abusive behavior would be displayed.  When I would maintain my distance despite the disingenuous apologies I would find my abuser at my front door.  There were floods of text messages begging me to come back, and so much more.  My heart was always uncertain of the proper course of action, and eventually I would relent.  Once I did that she had won.  A few weeks, maybe a month or two would go by (if I was lucky) and all was perfect, but then the abuse would start again.  It was always subtle at first, and never physical.  It would be one or two off handed comments about how I spoke, how I behaved or what I was doing wrong, and how my “logic was flawed”.  Then we’d make plans that she never kept, and in fact more than once she confirmed plans to which she never cancelled, that which left me to wonder if I had been abandoned, and I was.    She would pin me against all her girlfriends causing competition between us.  She would swear that she had changed and she’d never hurt me again, but I learned a very important lesson. Actions speak louder than words because she always did hurt me again.
Today, after five years, I still have to deal with her existence.  My abuser is still close by, though less keen on engulfing me in her former behavior.  She has learned better ways to abuse.  Better ways to pretend she’s a better person.  Often, I see her with mutual friends that have no idea the scope of her hallow self, the massive monster that bubbles beneath the cherubic face.  It makes me cringe.  She has never been a good person, and never will be one.  She has no heart, no sense of love.  She has not just hurt me, but many other women whose stories I know.  I am in constant reminder of my pain every time I see her face.  I remember how much she belittled me and made me feel worthless.  How one word or phrase curtailed into weeks and months of depression.  I fought my way through the cold, desolate trenches of hell just to recognize my own true worth, and though now, I am stronger than five years ago, I still find myself feeling worthless.  The emotional and verbal abuse will never shake from me, and all my personal relationships will be affected by it.  At 19 I tried to love for the first time.  That love turned me into nothing for a long time.
So here I am; the glare of the computer screen penetrating my moisten eyes; writing this in hopes that whoever you are, wherever you are reading this you’ll understand, in ways that I didn’t, that mutual love doesn’t hurt.  It is neither abusive or manipulate, and it never twists your words to make everything your fault.  Learn from my mistakes that forgiveness does not mean allowing your abuser back into your life expecting them to change.  They will never change no matter what they say.  Learn this one simple fact; (one I cannot repeat enough) it’s the actions of a person that reveals their true nature, not their words.  My abuser never loved me, and will never love me even when she told me on a regular basis that she did. Now, after everything, all I want is the chance to move on and find someone else to love.  I have opened my heart just enough to let one person in, and though it is hard, another lesson is, you cannot let love in unless you first love yourself.  Never compromise your well being for someone who never puts you first.  Love is not supposed to hurt, it is not abusive.  It does not mask itself, but builds you up and wraps its loving spirit around you like a warm hug.  Love does not hurt.  Always remember that.
-Vivian

Pyre: Poetry

Casting in claws the fortress of sickness and strain, 

I have risen from the pile of dust, 

copious with zeal; 

My body has lined itself with scars immense and real,

and my voice is weak,
but once more I must exchange my modest misgivings
for keen apathy, forgiveness will not atone;
There is no such serendipitous force
that will give me your heart
No such reverence in the same regard;
There is no such fortune that will bless my lips
with the kindness of yours,
No such honor that will grace my line of passage
by the stride of yours,
I have minded my own heart for fear of an ache
more terrifying than the one before,
but aloft the cavernous hole, where hell is a bitter winter,
A pyre inflames my once broken soul,
Perhaps there is my one and only hope

The Garden: Poetry

An iron curtain befalls the night, And heavy becomes the heart; In the Cimmerian shade where life goes onDaydreams are the lightThat which polish misgivings with a fool’s paradise;

I swim in Eden, the garden of Promised Land, Where the water glistens in endless draft, And hungry bellies fed to delight, Where beastly sins have no bedrock, And our essence never marred; 

I dream as if my eyes are wide, And my feet soreless; A reverie in which my grieving bosomIs nimble and scarless, And I am finally free, unrestrainedTo be, to love, to sleepIn hushed serenity;

But the hour is impolite, And the weight I unveiled recoils As the candle of waking life Kindles the morning dew, And my eyes sheepishly emerge once more from my starlit flight

The Five C's

Everyone has at least one deal breaker when it comes to relationships.  I have five; comprised of essential and realistically common sense expectations that I believe anyone can heed.  They are, in no particular order as follows:

Consent: if you're the type of motherfucker that likes to tell a bitch what to do because it makes you feel more of a "man" and or you refuse to make room for autonomy in our relationship then get the fuck out because it ain't working between us.
Cigarettes: If you're the type of motherfucker that likes to light up it won't matter how nice you are, if you don't quit then you and I are not a fit, so get the fuck out.
Children: if you're the type of motherfucker who does not foresee having kids in your future then I'm sorry to say my ovaries have no room for you. Plus, with the deal breaker above, you ain't smoking around my kids, so get the fuck out.
Cunnilingus: now, here's a major deal breaker, if you're the type of motherfucker that refuses to go down on your girl, or refuses to do it how she likes, then Certainly with a capital C we ain't ever gonna be, so get the fuuuuuuuuuuuuck out.
Cheating: If you're a dumbass motherfucker trying to play the field like you at the super bowl, bragging about how many women you can string up then you better believe I'll be shanking the shit out of you, so do me a favor and get the fuck out and make room for the non-cheating people.  Thank you!


failure to comply to these simple, and doable rule is grounds for automatic disqualification, this means whatever game you think you were playing, you ain't playing anymore, and don't try to play your cards with a bluff because poker faces only work for Lady Gaga, not you.  The five C's are reasonable and I'm sticking to them.  The ball is in your court now, if you're willing to play.


The End.

What it's like to be a Fangirl

Fangirling is a gradual process that you don't realize is happening until it's too late. It always starts off innocent; you like a show, get invested in a character or characters, then you develop a small crush on an actor/actress, and then before you know it you're writing fanfics in your head. What distinguishes fangirls from regular fans is an entity that has brought many, many fangirls together in one hub: Tumblr. Just one word and OMG, my fandom NEEDS me! Tumblr starts out just as innocently; one post about the show grows to a thousand, and several reblogs later you're following over 200 other blogs who post memes because of reasons. Eventually you spiral down to 20,000 likes and your collage of assorted living rooms and getaways transforms into a one stop shop for fangirls to indulge in their OTP's (one true paring).

To say, "LETS STRETCH, BITCHEEEEESSSS" is a prerequisite to the start of every fangirl moment lest your body be left unprepared for all the feels you will inevitability encounter as you navigate through all your tumblr tracks, especially if you haven’t been on in months.   And in order for a fangirl to survive a life-long battle of exploded ovaries and a million "I can't even with your face, sir" she needs at least one friend who is equally willing to suffer through a fandom with her. Without this friend the fangirl would surely be lost in a sea of mediocrity to which no amount of Johnlock porn would satisfy. When she dived in head first into the avengers fandom and things go all kinds of HAWKWARD the fangirl's best fangirl friend jumped in twirling her Wendystache while shouting "I AM THE BAD GUY." Feeling like such idiots, but unable to deter from this enabling it becomes a way of life, AND because in the end we all know we were LOKI'D. And when she couldn't get enough of one OTP the fangirl and her fangirl friend created a whole new set complete with their own intertwined names: Cumberstoned and benedicking; two nouns for the price of a verb. And suddenly, out of this masterful creation that involves all OTP's in a possible homoerotic bond script written on the back of movie stubs a business venture of a taco van with fandom names was conceived.

It's important to remember fangirling is an art of shipping all fandom feels into one; it's not enough to say you're JUST a Sherlockian, or JUST a Whovian. You can't say that the bromance between Dean Winchester and Castiel the angel isn't pulling tightly at your heart strings or that Daryl and that baby from The Walking Dead wasn't the cutest thing you've seen. All of these images we fangirls experience in this little hub combine our love of television with our love of a shared "I'm having a moment" with a dash of "let me love you" and a sprinkle of "what is life?" to become the greatest gifs the world has ever seen.

Ps. never underestimate the power a fangirl has to find shit out; we work hard for our OTP’s.

The Hands: A Short Erotica

Those strong hands powered by determination entered me one finger at a time, without malicious intent.  Gentle caressing gave way to rhythmic motivation and his husky, low hummed voice exhaled with an amused smile.  The pleading of my contorted face was difficult to conceal.  I had lost my ability to create structured sentences and was sounding in broken moans.  He, of course, knew how to pace his torture; with his vulgar words saved for a moment like this he whispered, “Your wet cunt is mine tonight, and I’m going to fuck you until you cum all over my dick.”

A tingling sensation penetrated my ear canal, and my already agonized sex vibrated to the sound of his words.  I could feel the tension rising in my body like a mid-summer heat wave, and I was desperate to hold onto it; not wanting to surrender so eagerly at his touch or give in to the surmountable release that would surely end this tryst, I closed my eyes.  I wanted to feel him close to me; to take in the scent of his unmistakable musk that enveloped the room.  Bourbon and cigarettes; a combination I abhorred, but couldn’t resist.  It personified a carnal sexuality that was carefully groomed and contained within an Armani suit.  He was the type of man that carried his swag like a cowboy carried his pistol; ready and set to be justifiably cocked. But this swag was busting at the seams and he was visibly hard.

I kept my eyes closed and thought of his hands; still inside of me, pleasuring me.  They were worker hands with fingers grooved from constructing houses.   His veins perforated from within his flesh as if they were tree branches sprouting to life; accentuating the strength they held.  They were hands that spent the day tearing then building all kinds of homes from top to bottom.  Creating and renovating the old to new so they had years of purpose already structured at the tips.  These same hands came home to a bottle of wine and a piano that beckoned a gentle tap; he never failed to please it.  I knew I loved his hands the most for this reason, a combination of jagged manhood and tender masculinity.  I let myself feel him deeper, guiding his hand with my own.  I could feel his attentive gaze soaking in the shift in pace as if a lesson was being taught, and it pleased me to know he was all too willing to learn.

With my own guidance we had found the right spot; sweet, and ripe that had been so greedily neglected.  My hips undulated close to a frenetic plunge and I could hear only muffled noise of a “not yet” as the blood began rushing to my head.  He must of spoke again, but my mind had been made I was reaching the lake in this heat-wave and quenching my thirst for better or worse.

He must have understood my intentions to defy his wish for a prolonged, anguished pleasure because his architectural hands grasped my face and brought me back to him.  My round adult face melted into that of a novice child with my innocence as real as my desire.  He ordered me, without any indication of malice, to look at him.  Willfully, my eyes met his, and I was confronted with a sea of blue as deep as the Seychelles.   I let out a barely audible gasp as he removed his fingers from me, and before I could plead a “no” his lips found mine.  The kiss was unfathomable and profound drawing me in one breath at a time.  I was helpless and craving more, but he was skilled in the art of harrowing time, and his idea of lengthening climax meant agony would be felt first from a distance.

He drew in one last kiss and released his grip.  All the air had depleted from my lungs and whatever sound had me moaning before had all together disappeared.  An impish grin floated to the corner of his lips wrinkling a deep satisfaction at my hankering body.  I had been spellbound at my spot, unable to will my muscles to move.  A master he was at this bestial scheme when he played a move that left me irrationally hungry to be filled.  He stepped back where the dim light conglomerated around him, and the rough edges of a rugged man at his primal age emerged.  He was older than he looked, which meant he knew better than most men the essence of a woman was in the way she tasted and he wasn’t afraid of the scent.  He brought his hand to his face and let the aroma envelop his senses.  At each draw of inhalation an unbearable tease; my wet sex began pulsating like a wild drum and I wanted to be satisfied right there and then in the muted room of the library.  But instead, he and his wicked devotion to timely orgasms left me to regain what little composure I had in a flustered mess of exasperation. 

Tuesday Morning

It's a calm Tuesday morning; the hours between the early birds and famished bellies. I am outside waiting for class where it’s eerily deserted except for my own famished belly roaring like a hungry lioness; I'm not much of an early bird in case you were wondering.  The mist of the fog, I notice, has draped over the campus like a shield, battling with the sun and its UV rays for dominance over the sky; looks like the fog is winning today.  A sudden chill lurking innocently behind the stillness of the trees prompts me to nuzzle my already frozen fingers in the warmth of my jean pockets.  As I let my hands find solace with the buried lint a lone skateboarder zooms past me suddenly.  The unmistakable sound of wheel and asphalt meeting in a vicious clash for speed cuts through the hushed campus like an ape on the loose. I can't help but jerk my head in its direction; I see a tall gangly freshman in a beanie happily resolute on his wooden board gliding effortlessly. "Take me with you, stranger; take me away from this monstrously silent emptiness." I say this telepathically, hoping he hears me; he doesn't.  He's long gone as fast as he appeared, and trailing behind him is the echo of his skateboard.  It hangs in the air like smog from a car exhaust then dissipates as if it never existed.  I unexpectedly feel alone. The feeling hovers over me for just a second, before it settles in between my soul and heart as if it too never existed.  I brush it off only when my seclusion is interrupted by a couple giggling on a nearby bench; by the way their lips passionately meet it looks like they're still on the honeymoon train; the phase in a relationship where silent glances hang in between like sweet little Clementine’s.  It's a tasteful mix of sweet and sour, and one bite is never enough.  Two years ago a sight like this would have me gagging on bitter resentment, but today I let myself vicariously indulge in their blossoming love; they seem cute. Aw, he just kissed her hand, and she's blushing; smooth move Mr. Operator, smooooth mooove! I fish for my phone and check the time;   only five minutes has lapsed since I dutifully took my post; a summersault of grumbling starts to coalesce at the pit of my stomach; ah, the day is young, and so is my appetite.  The tower bell emits galvanizing rings as a new hour starts.  The couple on the bench get up to leave, but I stand my ground as people begin to conglomerate out of their monotonous lectures.  All of them with their hands instinctively reaching for their phones probably to text furiously to God knows who.  The quiet that was, the one I took for granted, is no more.

My Writing

A friend had sent me an article---a piece on motivational writing---it contained eleven secrets, all of which are worth knowing. The pair that inspired me the most on the list was number two, 'decide to be a professional' and number seven, 'suit up.'  The first sounds like a no brainer, but mentally a writer is scattered all over building characters, settings, plot twists and dialogue that contemplating the level of professionalism seems minor, even trivial in comparison.  But when I took the time to read the simple paragraph it was like experiencing this elusive "aha moment" Oprah constantly interjects in her vocabulary. To add a cliché, a light bulb went off, and I realized that as much time I was spending theorizing the plight of my beloved characters I was heading nowhere.  I had to change my mind; rewire my brain and think like a professional.  Writing had to be less of a hobby and more like a 9 to 5; an eight hour shift if I want to be published before my thirties.  This meant no more excuses, no more wasting time and putting writing off like I had done so many times before. 

Once I had set my mind the correlation to number seven, 'suiting up' became the power tool needed to make my professionalism tangible.  The article called for a uniform to don everyday while writing.  This would motivate the brain as well as give my day a change of feels since I hardly get out much these days; essentially I had to trick my mind to believe that 'writers block' was not a block at all when I had my suit of armor on. The problem was I had no idea what the ideal 'suit' would be for me.  Did I want to go all out and dress as if I'm heading to a coffee shop?  Did I want to dress more formally?  Should I add heels, stockings, should I even go as far as wearing a bra all day at home?  None of these appealed to my visceral nature, so I found myself standing in the middle of my room looking around, though not really comprehending anything I was seeing.  Then, as if by chance, a lipstick I had placed on top of my dresser and left there for weeks like it was an afterthought of a previously unfinished notion caught my eye.  A deep, passionate red smiled seductively at me, and I, as if I had no will of my own, was beckoned like a royal subject of a charming king in parallel universe.

I let this king kiss my lips and paint them with his fiery affection knowing I had found the perfect ammunition: A literary war to be fought in a blood red smirk, and I a Helen of Troy would transform into a Joan of Arc and stand at the front of the battle lines complete and ready with a mighty pen and stationary at hand.  No more excuses, no more wasted time.
 A link to the article I mention if anyone is interested in reading:http://www.copyblogger.com/prolific-content-creation/

VivianwithanA: My Novel Blog and Future Note Written in the Present

I am a writer by nature, and I started this blog to share with you all the worlds I have created in either poetry or novel form.  I have many stories living in my mind that deserve to be known, and so come share in my journey: 

I grew up as an only child so I had nothing but my imagination to keep me company.  With a flair for the dramatics I developed the love of story.  The love of words soon followed after that, and a little girl with big ideas found autonomy in a world of her own creation.

This is how I want to be remembered: for my words.  Ideas are an everlasting form, and pen to paper have the ability to breathe new life in those who seek it.  If my words can inspire even just one person to love and be free-to laugh, cry and share then I have done all that I needed to do in this short span of life I was given. 

One day I will be bones; I will be dust and my voice will cease, as is the fate of everyone.  What will remain of me will be my possessions.  These things I cannot take with me when my heart gives out, but the curious will sift through and find pieces of me scattered about-I know, I am a mess, forgive me.  A writer can live too idly in her head and never find the opportune moment to de-clutter her real world space, but at least you will find everything.

Most of what you will discover is my books, and my notes, which is, in fact the very essence of me; my life after life you could say.  I haven’t written every last detail (thus far) of it in any specific journal, but there is enough to feel my personality so, forgive me one more time if it shall overwhelm you.  I tend to be abrasive when excited and my train of thought doesn’t seem to stop for anyone to catch up.  But I digress; what you should know is this: I’ve never been much of an athlete or a mathematical genius.  I won’t even be a scientist, but I am proud of what I am, which is, a reader, a writer, a feminist in love with the color pink, and a pugnacious, vociferous sass mouth with a healthy dose of curiosity.  Though, I can assure you, it is not what killed me.

My end, I have yet to face for I have a decent future ahead of me.  I have places yet to travel, people yet to meet, books to write and publish;  marriage, children, family pet, the whole nine yards. But I hope when this is read, either in the present or in the future it inspires you, as many writers have done for me, to take pen to paper and create your own world.