Oh my……..

Mickey, you said it was gonna be big, but I didn’t know it was….

This big!…..

Oh my, my…………

Today wasn’t the first day I thought about riding you, about holding
onto your shoulders and rocking until the moment turns from tenderly
sweet to passionately fierce.

Sometimes it’s the other way around and I can feel you creep up behind
me, surprising me with how ready you are, and the sensation barely
catches up to my lips before I sigh with complete release against you,
feeling your fingers rub the back of my neck, tangle in my long hair,
and you pull my head back just a little to slow my body down before it
reaches that stuttering precipice of nail scratching bliss.

Take me to Las Vegas.

Fly me over the strip when the sun has gone down and the streets light
up like a million jealous jewels. Fly me over the desert with the
lights out and we’re floating in the dark like zygotes in the womb and
flip off the sound of the engine and whisper in my ear that all I can
see is mine and that all I can feel at that moment, at that singular
blissful moment of solitude, is real. And I wouldn’t mind it at all,
being alone, pretending I was alone, and wondering if that would be
what it’s like to be dead, and maybe then I’d stop wondering all the
time – what it would be like to be dead, because then I’d know that
just because you can’t see or hear or feel anything it doesn’t mean
that you’re alone. Because you’d still be right there beside me, and
you’d still be my friend.

And I’d like to see what it’s like to be in a casino. To have my senses
assaulted on all sides until it becomes sharp and unbearable and to
feel like what it feels to be alive in the middle of hope and chaos.

And I’d like to see a show, eat at one of their famous all-you-can-eat
buffets, take a ride down the road or walk down the walk in a ball gown
pretending I’m a princess  -and it would be the most natural thing
on earth – to be strange and an outsider in a town full of strange
outsiders. And then maybe you could be there to toast Beau and I when
we decide to get married by an Elvis impersonator in a drive-through
chapel just because it would be such a great way to get married, in my
humble opinion.

I love sleeping in hotel rooms.

So the reason why we broke up? The truth?
Because the guy who raped me, well, you know what I did?

Anyway, it’s on video tape. At least, he had a video camera one night,
and I think I’m on the tape, and I thought you know what? You know, if
he ever saw this, he’d take it the wrong way.

That’s why I told you about the rape in the first place. Because I thought you might find out one day –
one day when we’re standing on the deck of a massive white cruise ship
someone will say something and you’ll have to see for yourself and then
that would be it – when we’ve said our vows already and made the down
payment on the house and the rings already bear the first scratches of
daily life.

So….    so that’s why I had to tell you. Because I was afraid.

Babe, I can honestly say
          i miss you
And that I thought of you today. It was
the least I could to,
to stay breathing.

And Dear, I can honestly say
          why bother
To be Superwoman
if it’s only in my head
and things happen outside that I don’t wanna know about-
no, I don’t wanna know about it.

And it doesn’t hurt anymore
And it doesn’t hurt any less

But still, I try to be their friend -
    – still, I sit so still and listen to them -
    – and it’s always a surprise to me -
How people rush to their self-destruction,
Leaving you trampled in their wake.
Every time

it doesn’t hurt anymore
       it doesn’t hurt any less.

There is an art to manipulating people; to getting what you want.

For men, I’ve observed a mental chess game, a war of wills, verbal fencing.

For women, it’s more subtle. The movement of a millimeter towards the
mark. The slight glance down, then up through long lashes. The
seemingly careless fall of a lock of hair.

Sometimes, the seduction takes place before a single word is spoken.

Amy,
I’m not ready to take yet.
But you are lovely for asking.

So, people, here’s the gritty, dirty, slimy truth behind the pet shop
industry. I’m talking about the big mega chains. Sit down, pull up a
chair, and get ready for some truthing.

The manager of my pet store allegedly started sleeping with one of my
coworkers, two positions below him. This information circulated around
the store for the better part of a year. When confronted, they of
course denied it, but she couldn’t keep from saying sexual things,
relating sexual stories while she cleaned out cages.
The new guy, thinking that he was privvy to some new info, or else just
observing the way the two interacted, related to me his findings one
night, and swore me to secrecy. Now, since this info was already public
knowledge and topic of many snide remarks, I thought it best not to say
anything to anyone about whatever.

One day, the assistant manager takes his overnight crew aside and tells
them, sternly, that the rumor mill must stop and that the next person
to speak about the alleged relationship would be terminated.
The next morning, I found a note on my car from the new guy, expressing
his thoughts on what a two-faced gossiper I was and how could I betray
his trust, etc, etc.
I told the other assistant manager about this note, and that she had to
“fix it” – because that’s what managers do, right? They “manage.” What
I wanted her to fix was his misconception that I was the one who told
them about the relationship.
This leads to the whole thing where I had to get a restraining order
against the guy, and he ended up in jail for threatening to kill me.

Act II:
The new assistant manager, Bob, has been spending an awful lot of time
with team lead Scarlett (who was having a secret lesbian relationship
with Laney). Bob has a girlfriend who lives with him, btw. Anyway, Bob,
Scarlett, and Laney go to bars, hang out at his house, become friends
of sorts. Suddenly, though, Laney tells me that Bob has started to
seriously date Scarlett. Bob tells me he kicked his girlfriend out and
now he’s single. Laney starts to go into a depression over Scarlett.
Phone calls are made.
Bob calls me at home one afternoon and tells me he’s worried about
Laney, how she’s hurting herself, and that she’s delusional and not to
believe anything she says about her and Scarlett’s lesbian relationship
- which was all in her head. Laney takes me aside and tells me that Bob
has threatened to “make her disappear so no one can find her.”
One week of near-normalcy.
Then Bob tells me Laney is mixing alcohol and drugs and becoming suicidal.
Laney tells me that Bob has threatened to call her parents and have her committed (she’s 30).
Laney goes to the manager of the store and reports this, and the
manager of the store doesn’t do anything but tell her he’ll look into
it.
All this happened withing the last 3 weeks. Today, Laney’s name has
been crossed off the schedule. Apparently, she’d been fired yesterday.

Tonight, I took her to dinner and introduced her to two friends who own
a private pet store. She took home an application, but she’ll get the
job because she’s my friend.

During dinner, though, I told her: if you’re going to do it, don’t use
a gun; don’t use a blade. It has to be a knife. A very sharp knife so
that it takes only 3 tries: The first two are hesitation cuts. You see
your blood, you feel the pain, and you can still turn back. But the
third cut: make it count.

So the truth behind the pet shop industry, folks, is that everyone is
so concerned with the animals – with laws and obeying the evil tide of
PETA and animal-rights bombardment – that people, PEOPLE!, are crushed
under the weight of public relations. I’m talking kids, I’m talking
innocent bystanders – someone’s daughter almost killed herself because
the mega-petstore’s management couldn’t get their fucking heads out of
their asses; someone’s sister almost died (will die?) at the end of a
gun fired by a troubled young man whose mistakes were dealt with
wrongly.

This chain store works their part-timers just under 40 hours a week to
avoid giving them any semblance of full medical benefits.
This chain store continues to buy animals from breeders that produce sick and inbred rodents.
The management of this chain store has said on occasion that they don’t
care about where the pets go, as long as the customers keep coming back
to the store for their supplies.
And a person can easily spend hundreds of dollars setting up a fish
tank, only to watch fish get sick, then spend hundreds more on fish
medication and fish food – and the management is willing to let fish go
to bad homes to insure that the customer comes back for medications and
supplies on an animal that is doomed to die anyway.

I loved my job. I quit tomorrow.

Sarah’s Saturday Keyboard Confession: Urly Edition

So the truth behind the smoking thing. I realized this myself as I was
driving down Evelyn towards Sunnyvale/Saratoga on my way to work.

Oh yeah, by the way, that black guy followed me a few blocks from my
apartment to the cross street in front of the pet store. Coulda been
coincidence, coulda been….

Anyway, the truth behind the smoking thing: I smoke when I write. I write when I Feel. And sometimes, i Feel a lot.
But the worse thing I realized is that it’s just another form of
self-annihilation. A slow suicide. Miguel said it’s “stepping out to
smoke another nail (in your coffin).” I laugh

Yeah. I smoke to punish myself.

“What is it that you’re repenting? What is it you’re doing penance for?” asks the doc.
“Failure.”
“What do you mean? Failure at what?”
“This is not where I planned to be. I ….. I believe I’ve failed. And
every time I remember that I’ve failed, I smoke. And lately, I’ve been
smoking more.”
“Does it give you relief?”
“In a way it does. In a
way…..         I feel like
I’m worthless, and smoking proves it.”

What gets Sarah off:

• Spanking.
• Explanations of historical events.
• Derivatives.
• Pickup trucks.
• Sports cars being driven very very fast.
• A masterfully weilded sword.
• Chemistry experiments.
• Cold water on nipples.
• Southern accents.
• Red wine and fur.
• Excellent Thai food.
• Motorcycles in the rain.
• Lab coats.
• Lab coats.
• Lab coats.
• Hiking in forests then swimming naked in a secluded lake.
• Jewelry swinging from my neck as I ride.
• Funny men.

You

are playing a dangerous game.

He

broke up with his girlfriend

because he thought you were free.

And then

it happens again – be careful, love. Be careful.