A Swirling Mass of Memories and Longings by Linda Benskin

Social Media Break

2024-06-21T17:03:00.000-07:00

I took a spontaneous social media break on March 1st through today (June 21, 2024). I wasn’t sure exactly why I wanted to abstain, but once I did, I started to notice some changes within myself. My own thoughts and feelings became clearer to me and my intuition sharpened up even more than usual. It was a relief not to get lost in a turbulent sea of constant bombardment, with so many ideas, products, personalities and opinions rapidly firing at me like an automatic tennis ball machine set on high.

Things I realized:

I will not be able to change anyone else’s mind about politics and religion, and they certainly will not change mine!

I can still care about people in my life with different political and religious views, but it makes it harder to relate, as the stakes are pretty high, currently.

The personal is political, and sometimes it’s okay to step back and rest so I will have more energy at a later time. Even though I cannot change anyone else’s mind, the things that matter to me are worth fighting for, and social media can be utilized as a tool for change in the “real world”, even if it’s a small change…every little bit helps.

Media literacy should be taught to children early; before they get their first cell phone or venture online.

Some people notice when you’re not around, and some don’t (as in “real life”). Just as life is for the living, the algorithms are for the social media…the wheels keep spinning whether you’re on or off the ride.

“Real life” is more nuanced than screen life; you can explore it with all your senses, including your sixth sense.

I want to be creative because it feels good; art for art’s sake!

AI poetry stinks like a hollowed-out rotting pumpkin shell left on the curb for overdue trash pick-up…you can smell it a mile away.

I don’t want to sell anything, and I don’t want to buy anything; especially supplements from grifters.

I don’t want to sell myself, or buy anyone else, especially online grifters.

I don’t want to be “friends” with fake profiles (which also smell like hollowed-out rotting pumpkin shells).

Just as there is no place like home, I prefer being inside my own head more than being inside other people’s heads.

Dancing to music I love is a great way to get out of my own head; so is Yoga, meditation, playing the piano, writing poetry, and being creative on a daily basis.

Someone is always dying, and someone is always being born…it’s hard to keep up.

I don’t remember everyone’s birthday, and that’s okay.

Not everyone remembers my birthday, and that’s okay.

A little mystery is a good thing, generally speaking.

I fell in love with reading books again.

I went on a road-trip through California, Oregon, and Washington, spent time with family and friends, went to dinner parties and brunches, and didn’t photograph everything I did.

I ate delicious meals without photographing them.

Even though there is little documentation to prove otherwise, I still exist.

Some people may question whether I still actually exist.

Some relationships have a season…not every one needs to be maintained over a lifetime.

It’s okay to love some people from a distance; sometimes that’s the healthiest choice.

Synchronicity is real.

When I cut out all the noise, I can hear myself better: what I like, what I want, who I want to spend time with, what feels good, what doesn’t feel good.

Saying “no” is exhilarating; it feels like ditching high-school and spending the day at the beach.

I love visual imagery, and miss having some laughs and connecting with some people I don’t see in “real life” that often.

Being away from social media has felt like romping in a Spring meadow filled with butterflies, bunnies, and blooms…I feel myself dragging my feet as I come back.

Everyone is living in their own reality, seeing things from their own perspective.

We are simultaneously a collective school of fish in a vast internet ocean.

I’m grateful that my formative years were not lived online, because online didn’t exist.

Selfies bug me…they always have.

TikTok gives me a headache…like brain-freeze from eating Otter Pops too quickly.

I don’t have to do anything I don’t want to do.

Arguing with Ted Nugent fans is pointless; I have proven this to myself repeatedly.

Some people understand me better than others, online and in “real life”.

I understand some people better than others, online and in “real life”.

It’s okay to do social media really badly, scrappily, or not at all, although it’s a great place to find Twin Peaks memes, and this is very important to me.

I’m not fooling anyone, least of all myself.

You’re not fooling anyone either, though possibly fooling yourself.

None of this actually matters when all is said and done, so just keep scrolling. Or don’t.

Rancho Tarzanadu: "Puppets at the Magic Castle"

2023-12-29T15:50:00.000-08:00

Miss Linda experienced some surprising results from her dive into Chakra Balancing; the chakra that she originally assumed was permanently stuck didn’t appear to be blocked so badly after all, and the chakra she least suspected of being blocked was crying out for a little extra attention.

The chakra meditation series she utilized led her to start dancing (and even Miss Linda would tell you that she is not the most graceful of dancers, even though she studied ballet as a small child). Once she started dancing, she couldn’t stop. She called it “freestyle” dancing; some may call it “Ecstatic Dancing”…all she knew was that she lost herself in the music and the flow and really let her Freak Flag fly. As a doll, some of her movements were limited, but she did the best with what she had. She sometimes danced her way into a reverie, an altered state where everything was composed of music, and she was part of everything, and everything was part of her. She found it interesting that she could reach this state by the physical movement of dancing awkwardly to Depeche Mode and Tears for Fears in her bedroom. But there was something to it, and she now incorporated it into her daily routine.

Now that she had somewhat decent shoes (whereas before she had absolutely none), she thought it might be time to venture out into the world and mix things up a little bit, as she had definitely had her fill of digging DIRT on her hillside. She happened across the Los Angeles Guild of Puppetry’s event: Puppets, Donuts & Coffee at the Magic Castle. Miss Linda was sipping her afternoon coffee when she saw this event listing and nearly choked on her beverage; this event was created in a higher realm, and was calling her by name.

She scheduled an Access van pick-up, slid into her new Uggs and set off towards Hollywood the next Sunday morning, arriving breathlessly at the Magic Castle after engaging in a conversation about Drag Queen brunches, puppets, and which flavor donut was the very best of them all with a fellow Access passenger; they both concluded in unison that chocolate-chocolate-with-chocolate was the very best flavor of any and all donuts.

Miss Linda hopped out of the Access van, bid adieu to her new friend, and trudged up the hill toward the Magic Castle. She had been there a couple of times before as a human, but never as a doll. She hoped her attire (she only had one outfit that fit her) was acceptable for the dress code. She was suddenly greeted warmly be a seemingly gay man who sized her up and asked, “Are you here for Puppets & Donuts?” She smiled enthusiastically while nodding her head, and he ushered her in to what he called “The Inner Sanctum”.

She walked in slowly, taking things in…there were so many bookshelves filled with books, and lots of dark wood and red velvet and a bar that resembled the one in The Shining. There was also a small stage at the front of the room, but mostly people were milling about the individual cocktail tables with their donuts and coffee and talking animatedly; Miss Linda never knew puppeteers could be so loud, but they were a deafening bunch, albeit friendly.

There were hardly any puppets there (she had been hoping for puppets galore). She was hoping she might blend in more easily if there were lots of puppets surrounding her. There were puppeteers and puppet dancers and stage-tech people and benefactors, but only one puppet, and he was in obvious developmental stages at the moment (he didn’t have any eyes). As her own eyesight was bad, she felt for him. She silently laughed to herself when she realized he was made of felt, so she was feeling for felt, although she herself was currently made of rubber so maybe things came full circle regarding empathy.

One puppeteer showed her a photo of his puppet, and Miss Linda made the mistake of complimenting his “simplicity”. The puppeteer choked back a piece of his donut, and said he needed more coffee and quickly walked away. She later overheard one of the more advanced puppeteers compliment the same puppet photo, saying: “I really like him for his…simplicity.” The creator responded, “Oh, thank you! I quite agree!” Miss Linda rolled her eyes, and started to feel her Marijuana tincture kick in.

The meeting began to wind down, and Miss Linda inquired if she might be allowed to explore other parts of the Magic Castle. One of the women said, “Yes…if you go through that black curtain by the stage, you will be officially inside the Castle.” She gave Miss Linda a glance up and down: “I think what you’re wearing will be okay.” Miss Linda was not sure how to interpret that last statement, but she was happy to go through a secret black curtain on her own and leave these congenial (for the most part) puppeteers to their enthusiastic loudness.

Hopped-up on sugar from a chocolate donut with chocolate icing and multi-colored sprinkles and a coffee, Miss Linda lightly skipped down the hallway of the Magic Castle almost ending up in a broom closet, but was soon accosted by a large female security guard, who looked her up and down in more ways than one. Miss Linda stammered, “I’m with the Puppets & Donuts crowd…they said it would be okay to explore the Castle.”

“Yeah, those puppet people were wrong, Miss; you’re going to have to exit the Castle and stand in line and pay the entrance fee like everyone else.”

Miss Linda sighed, and said she would go back the way she came, and do what was required of her (she knew security guards yearned for respect above all else, having encountered one or two of them in her day). But the security guard suddenly said (playing into Miss Linda’s hand), “You know…you’re already halfway there, so you can just go to the front entrance from inside here and pay that way instead.”

“That’s so sweet of you, officer!” Miss Linda replied, batting her eyelashes at the woman. “I will go straight to the front entrance and pay right now!”

“Alright there, little Missie!” the guard said. “You have a good time at the Magic Castle!”

“Oh, I will!” Miss Linda said, thinking to herself: Pay?!

She scrambled quickly away and conveniently got lost in the brunch crowd, ending up sitting with a family that included six children, so she inconspicuously blended in while she ate Eggs Benedict, pan-roasted potatoes, and a side of vegetarian sausage, then slipped down to the haunted piano bar afterward. One little girl kept staring at her as she ate her breakfast and made her feel more than a little uncomfortable, so she was relieved for the excuse to have an early afternoon cocktail.

Getting situated on the bar stool wasn’t easy, but the puppeteer with the simply-styled puppet noticed her struggling and unexpectedly offered to help her up onto the red vinyl swivel stool. He apparently had followed the rules, and gone to the front of the Castle to pay in order to get back inside.

Miss Linda complimented herself in her own mind for her ingenious frugality, then ordered a $20.00 cocktail, entitled a Mystical Margarita (which, unfortunately was mostly crushed ice, but still delicious).

The simple puppeteer left to go wandering aimlessly about, and Miss Linda decided to stay and listen to the haunted piano play itself while screwing with people’s heads (its specialty…it possessed a wry sense of humor).

Miss Linda swung her legs from the bar stool and sipped her drink wistfully. The piano played Elton John’s “Tiny Dancer”, and she was pretty sure that it was directed towards her. Several children poured into the room and started requesting really dumb children’s songs, and Miss Linda suggested they might want to tip the piano jar if they wanted the piano to play for them (she personally had no cash on her for tipping). The piano slammed on its keys, like it was angry, and then started playing one of the children’s requests. Miss Linda thought: even the piano is temperamental here!

She took a quick selfie in the parking lot while she waited for the Access van to take her back home to Rancho Tarzanadu…her refuge. She may have shoes now, but the outside world, even the Magic Castle, was nice to visit, but she wouldn’t want to live there. She looked forward to turning her disco ball light on, and dancing with wild abandon in her own bedroom, where she was free to be whatever it was she was.

At least for the time being, as the Republican party was trying to strip people of their rights and bodily freedom, especially in their own bedrooms, but that is just an FYI, on a long list of FYI’s going on in the background and spinning as the world turns and Miss Linda dances. She wondered if she could spiral-dance herself back into a person, in spite of all the global tragedy, and if that was what she actually wanted. She wondered if being a doll was just a convenient excuse to escape the outside world…a world of puppets and puppeteers, in a constant battle-dance amongst themselves.

Rancho Tarzanadu: "Miss Linda's Got a New Pair of Shoes"

2023-10-26T20:12:00.000-07:00

Miss Linda was feeling much better since she immersed herself in DIRT (Dramatic Intense Relief Today, hashtag: Soil Yourself), but was honestly finding the hard physical labor aspect of the business exhausting. It might have been easier to dig up her hillside if she wasn’t still a doll (she was), but she didn’t think so.

It wasn’t so bad at first…her mind wandered, and she got lost in meditation as she shoveled spoonful after spoonful of dirt into a small bucket she could reasonably lug up the hill, but it took several trips up that hill to fill even one cardboard box of dirt, and after a few months of that the novelty of it had most certainly worn off. Plus, she’d been doing this barefoot during the Spring and Summer months, but it was October now and she needed some actual shoes.

She discovered that trying to find the right doll shoe was nearly impossible, especially since she had turned into a doll from the 1960s for some reason (this was just a guess…she’d never seen a doll like herself before). She had a medium arch for moderate heels, but she was much larger than a Barbie doll, and did not have flat feet like these “American Dolls” (whatever they were). She finally found a three-pair package of small Ugg boots at Amazon, and snapped them up not only for their obvious practicality, but because they were literally the only shoes/boots that might remotely fit her. They would have to do.

Obviously, she would much prefer Mary-Janes, but that seemed like too much to ask without quite a bit of prolonged research, so she settled on the Uggs and called it a day.

Originally she was thinking of hill-climbing when she made the purchase, but Madame Stratus had unexpectedly left town, reuniting with an old college “friend” reincarnated into a romantic partner in Colorado, so Miss Linda was left shoveling (spooning) dirt by herself, while Madame Stratus was still collecting half the profits since it was her idea in the first place. Miss Linda was starting to feel like she got the rough end of the spoon. Additionally, the New-Age Hipsters who had been the most ardent consumers of DIRT had started to question the origins of it, and when Miss Linda tried to explain that it was coming from a hillside emanating a magical Vortex, of course they wanted proof of this.

If she had been able to provide proof of the Vortex she would, but she’d been trying to find the entrance to it for years now, to no avail…all she had was her word, which was growing less and less acceptable to the New-Age Hipsters, which she found ironic, since they literally believed the Earth was flat, the moon-landing was a fake, and that Overlord L’Orange’s election was stolen out from underneath him by a Deep-State Pedophilic Cabal. They believed all that crap, but were skeptical about a magical Vortex on her hillside? They confounded her.

Anyway, sales had been slowing down, and with the colder (for Los Angeles) months approaching, she thought she might just coast for a little while on her disability money and utilize the modest profits of DIRT until they ran out. She was also down one renter now, as Madame Stratus was posting romantic photos with her new lover on Facebook and Instagram, and it appeared as though she was there to stay.

She decided to focus her energy on her two online Witch programs, and on healing her Chakras through a series of meditations that required a daily practice of a three-week commitment, removing any blockages she stumbled across. Miss Linda was as skeptical about Chakra Balancing as those New-Age Hipsters were about her DIRT origins, but she figured, what the Hell? Might as well give it a try…what could un-blocking herself hurt in the grand scheme of things?

Miss Linda timed her morning marijuana edible to sync perfectly with a late-afternoon meditation session, and got a new notebook for the purpose of recording her results.

As she dove into her meditations, she realized almost immediately that DIRT was composed of very first-Chakra stuff, and deciding to leave it in the dust almost instantly raised her vibrational level.

The day she realized this, her Ugg boots arrived by carrier.

Rancho Tarzanadu: "DIRT"

2023-01-29T19:12:00.000-08:00

Miss Linda lost one of her long-time cat familiars, Tigre, to cancer, and was attempting to snap out of her bleak mood. She would prefer to wear black berets, turtlenecks, and enormous black sunglasses indefinitely, but also realized this was not the best plan for long-term health or peace of mind.

She begrudgingly researched local Meet-up groups to widen her social circle, but could not find any of the following: Magicians and Magicians’ Assistants Mixers, Puppetry for Adults (non-pornographic), Witches High Tea (literal and figurative), Magical Realism Book Club (co-ed), Roller-Skating for Adults (non-pornographic), Existential Philosophy Wine-and-Cheese gatherings or Intermediate Levitation groups. Starting her own Meet-Up group sounded exhausting (not to mention the start-up fee), so she decided to remain in black mourning attire for a while longer, languishing on her balcony at night while smoking the occasional cigarette.

Everything at Rancho Tarzanadu decided to break down at the same time she lost her beloved Tigre (during the first two weeks of January amidst a Mercury retrograde): the refrigerator, the house thermostat, the pool pump, the oven…all amidst a strange and intense Los Angeles monsoon, which climate experts predicted would only intensify over time; hence the need for black attire, the occasional cigarette, and Leonard Cohen records set to repeat on Spotify.

Miss Linda wandered aimlessly around the house, taking notes on what needed fixing next; there were rumors of tree-rat invasion (again!) from the film editor, who heard scratching inside the walls…Miss Linda sighed loudly, and jotted it down. The Mime mimed that the cos-playing Klingon neighbors’ palm trees were scraping the roof at night in the agitated winds, causing him to lose sleep, and possibly damaging the roof tiles…Miss Linda rolled her eyes and wrote it down. The German Dog Trainer complained that the drains weren’t draining properly in the backyard, leading to possible flooding and potential chicken-evacuation from their coop, and everyone was moaning about the new refrigerator not arriving until the end of the month, due to supply-chain issues stemming from the Pandemic.

Fortunately Miss Linda was living on disability (originally due to legal blindness, then turning into a doll), but she definitely needed some more money under-the-table to fix this endless string of home repairs. As she didn’t want to lose any of her annoying tenants at this time due to raising their rent – every penny was already spent on previous repairs such as house-painting, tree-trimming, and taxes – she actually thought of trying to find some kind of job, but thankfully Madame Stratus, the Cloud-Reader, talked her out of it: “Oh, honey…there’s got to be another way!” The two of them put their heads together over an oversized bottle of inexpensive Pinot Noir.

“Look, honey…you’re a doll right now – keep your Disability money! There’s no telling how long you’re going to remain a doll, so don’t do anything crazy like getting a job, which could jeopardize your reliable stream of government cheese!” Madame Stratus advised, and Miss Linda nodded emphatically in agreement, after taking a large gulp of her wine. After all, who in their right mind would hire a doll with a hereditary eye disease?

“What you need is a side-hustle, a cash-based business that’s easy to run from home, and I have the perfect idea, that we could work on together; it’s called “DIRT”: Dramatic Intense Relief Today, obtained by a grounding technique of placing bare feet on…dirt. It’s supposed to suck all the impurities out of your body like a magnet, and we have plenty of dirt to package up around here. All we’d need is a simple cardboard box, big enough to fit someone’s feet in, and we can fill it with dirt off the hillside for free. I’m willing to split things with you 50-50; it’s my idea, but it’s your dirt.”

Miss Linda contemplated this while sipping her wine…the hillside was where Little Johnny and the FBI agents had disappeared a few years ago, but she had seen hide nor hair of the Vortex since it had sucked them in, so hopefully digging around on the hillside would be relatively safe; she thought that Madame Stratus, as a Cloud-Reader, would be aware of any doom-filled implications ahead of time.

Additionally, the Republicans were making a huge fuss lately about cutting Social Security benefits so they could increase the National Defense budget, so it would be prudent for Miss Linda to have a cash-based home business to fall back on, just in case her Disability benefits got pulled out from underneath her due to QAnon infiltrating the government or nuclear war.

“Selling…dirt?” Miss Linda mused.

“No, honey…selling ‘DIRT: Dramatic Intense Relief Today!’”

Dramatic Intense Relief Today sounded fantastic to Miss Linda; “Let’s do it! Let’s be dirt-sellers!”

Madame Stratus raised her wine glass, “To selling dirt!”

Tigre...goodbye.

2023-01-14T17:18:00.004-08:00

My sweet, sweet boy…Big Boy, Tiger-Stripes, Akaar (your first name which did not suit you), Nestle-Toll-House-Chocolate-Chip-Cookie-Dough-Paws, Big Mitts, Scaredy-Cat, Three-Breakfast-Eater, Food-Stealer, Cat-Fight-Instigator, Female-Cats’-“Ladies-Man”, Big Bellios, Tom, My Darling, My Angel...goodbye.

I adopted you as a teeny-tiny kitten almost thirteen years ago; you were found in an alley, and neutered “too soon” said the Veterinarian who took you in. You were screaming bloody murder in your cage, isolated from the other cats because of your vocal stamina. You were the last kitten they introduced me to; I took one look at you and said “That’s the one for me!” You were highly sensitive, and misunderstood…you had a rough start, Alley-Cat, Trash-Cat, my Beloved, Handsome Boy.

You were always vocal…I could have entire conversations with you, and you would respond, give me your thoughts on a matter, or demand your food; you grew into a sixteen-pound gorgeous boy with luminous tiger-stripes and golden eyes…Tiger Eyes. Tigre.

You have been with me through romantic heartbreak, my diagnosis of legal blindness, my mother’s death, her husband’s death, my sister’s husband’s death, the Pandemic, the Drumpf Presidency and its aftermath, job losses and successes, collage stress (!), the drifting-away of some old friendships, and my artistic pursuits put on the back burner because of so much loss, so quickly all I could do was muster up the courage to cope. You played the piano for me, when I was too despondent to lift my hands to the keys, let alone sing out loud.

I will look for you in many places, in expected and unexpected places…in the bathroom sink, in the bathtub, on the kitchen table (“Bad cat!” – my response, purely performative for my house-mates’ sake), on my piano and keyboard, in the window, on “your chair”, on my bed, in my arms.

Thank you for loving me unconditionally, and for being here as long as you could, through thick and thin, for not judging me or pointing out my many flaws, because I am, after all, just a human being learning as I go.

To dismiss your passing as “just a cat” would be a gigantic understatement; you were/are an Angel sent here to teach me that love is the only thing that matters in this world. It is a painful lesson to learn (and re-learn), but all I can do is thank you for it, for making me more aware of what really matters in life.

You are greatly missed, my sweet Tigre, Tiger-Boy, and you will always be loved.

Rancho Tarzanadu: "Godforsaken!"

2022-12-11T23:10:00.005-08:00

Typically, all four dogs at Rancho Tarzanadu would roam about the backyard freely, but on this rare front-of-the-house- expedition, one of Miss Linda’s housemates, Gracon (the film editor Miss Linda regularly calls Garcon) was walking one of the German Dog Trainer’s dogs in front of the house while she was at work, due to the house-painter (the mysteriously wise and kindly Mr. On) working in the backyard.

One of Miss Linda’s neighbors, Mrs. Dwight (the Republican) came barreling toward Gracon, who held up one hand and shouted, “Don’t approach me!” as the extraordinarily handsome dog barked his freaking head off while the determined Mrs. Dwight continued to storm full speed ahead.

“What is wrong with you?” Gracon shouted.

“Can you puh-lease not have your dog pee in my yard?” Mrs. Dwight insisted. “It stains my grass!” This was literally the first time Mrs. Dwight had ever said one word to anyone at Rancho Tarzanadu since they had all moved in…several years ago! (The Dwights, by the way, watered their grass every single day in the middle of a Los Angeles drought; they felt the water-restrictions did not apply to them, as they applied to everyone else, because they were somehow elevated in status in their own minds.)

“Okay, okay!” Gracon exclaimed, backing away from her and turning to high-tail it back to safe ground; he was not fond of ranting pear-shaped women with helmet-hairdos on a good day.

“Oh, and another thing – that color is Godforsaken!” Mrs. Dwight retorted, referring to Miss Linda’s house.

“Super!” Gracon yelled (he had never used that word before in his life, but Mrs. Dwight inspired it). “Take it up with Miss Linda!”

Now we all know that Mrs. Dwight didn’t want to take anything up with Miss Linda, so she walked briskly away in a huff.

Garcon told Miss Linda about the exchange soon afterward, and Miss Linda was furious at first, at the gall, at the nerve, at the pettiness, at the Busy-body-ness, at the rudeness of proclaiming the color of Rancho Tarzanadu Godforsaken! How dare she!

Miss Linda had dreamed of painting her house this color combo for years, and at just the right time, Mr. On showed up out of the blue and offered her a price she couldn’t refuse. He set to work immediately, painting the body of the house “Mid-century Gem” (aquamarine green), the majority of the trim white, and the piece-de-resistance: the shutters “Sangria” (which, let’s face it – is magenta). People had strong reactions, one way or another, except for the German Dog Trainer, Astrid, who didn’t react at all, which made Miss Linda think that she may be hiding something.

Most of the residents at Rancho Tarzanadu liked it, with compliments like, “It’s really bright! I can easily find my way home now!” and “It reminds me of Miami…gaudy like that!” and “It looks like a giant birthday cake!” and the Amazon delivery man said, “Cool house! It looks very 1970s!”. Miss Linda soon realized that Mrs. Dwight’s bland taste was all in her mouth, and set about plans for a drought-resistant blooming garden consisting of bright pink, red, and purple flowers bursting from all the window-boxes and the front yard. She carefully placed a sign that read “For Wonder” as a centerpiece, that one of her friends had brought back from Burning Man.

Mrs. Dwight responded in kind, and placed not one, but two signs in her yard (she had her maid construct them); one read: “Dwight Lives Matter!” and the other, “Dwight Power!” (with a sketched upraised fist). The surrounding neighbors gradually became much more skeptical of the Dwights’ signs than Miss Linda’s wonder-inspiring one, and people also took note that the Dwight’s were always complaining…about everything!

Miss Linda longed to plant high hedges between their houses, to block out their negative energy, but that would be expensive, and she had just shelled-out for painting the house. Manuel was the one who suggested (the only words he had spoken since returning from Guantanamo Bay: “Add more color.”

Miss Linda contemplated this…more color?

She decided to add a Malibu light collection, in varying shades of purple, red, and green, and also added some Christmas lights that would never come down; Garcon did the stringing and setting up.

Soon afterward, Miss Linda awoke one rainy Sunday morning to the Dwight’s gardeners feverishly planting fairly large hedge-trees in a tight row that would soon block all view and any unwanted eye contact or communication from either party. Miss Linda sighed with relief, and gave the hard-working gardeners a thumbs-up from her alcove window.

Manuel silently calculated with pencil and paper the cost of the tree-shrubs, and Miss Linda’s relative savings in choosing such vibrant paint colors: thousands of dollars!

Mr. On walked by them as they sipped coffee in the garden and said, “You know…at first I wasn’t sure about these colors, but you have a good eye for color, Miss Linda! It blends in with all the nature.” He swooped his hand around the beautiful, freshly-painted paradise of Rancho Tarzanadu, and said with wonder, “It is a beautiful place, here…so secluded and peaceful.”

Miss Linda thanked him, and also agreed that it blended well with “all the nature”, especially with the magenta Bougainvillea…and what was “Godforsaken” about that? And now, with the energy shield of the free hedge-trees, it would be even more beautiful, peaceful and private, with the Dwights’ negativity enveloped by the force of Nature.

"Godforsaken" (or "The Busybody's Lament"); Red Felt Heart Song Lyrics

2022-12-06T16:19:00.013-08:00

Don’t approach me, Karen;

your energy is wearing!

Your beige and grays are barren;

what is wrong with you, Karen?

Do my colors bother you, Karen?

All my greens and sparkly blues — like a Harem!

All my pink-magenta hues — blaring!

Do my colors bother you, Karen?

Your house is brown and beige and gray, resembling doggie poo;

and it contains an even beige-er person — you!

Your taste is bland and limp and dry, like that of a rotting root;

and if you charge at me again, you’ll get my boot!

I’m casting spells...

Godforsaken spells;

they’re heading at you, now...

you better watch the f*ck out!

I’m casting spells...

Godforsaken spells;

my glaring colors shining bright,

throughout the pitch-black dead of night.

Don’t approach me, Karen;

your energy is wearing!

Your beige and grays are barren;

what is wrong with you, Karen?

Do my colors bother you, Karen?

All my greens and sparkly blues — like a Harem!

All my pink-magenta hues — blaring!

Do my colors bother you, Karen?

Your house is brown and beige and gray, resembling doggie poo;

and it contains an even beige-er person — you!

Your taste is bland and limp and dry, like that of a rotting root;

and if you charge at me again, you’ll get my boot!

I’m casting spells...

Godforsaken spells;

sidewinding toward you, now —

fluorescent-green snakes with pink eyes.

I’m casting spells...

Godforsaken spells;

so scurry back to your gray house,

you little busybody mouse!

Esme Hadn't Been Outdoors in a Long Time

2022-10-01T18:15:00.000-07:00

Esme hadn’t been outdoors in a long time; she had been trapped inside her own head, cooped-up in her designer-bohemian garret, eating from silver serving trays and having afternoon tea at precisely 4:00 PM every day for what seemed an eternity.

She was so bored!

She ventured out one day due to unmitigated boredom, and randomly picked up the gleaming gardening shears abandoned on the grass (the gardener was taking an afternoon nap).

She noticed that a section of topiary was not completely aligned and immediately began chopping and shaping.

She worked all afternoon, into the twilight hours, and dismissed the confused but grateful gardener for the remainder of the season (with pay).

She had finally discovered her true calling, after decades of ennui.

She became fixated and laser-focused in her work (some might say obsessed) — no one in her sphere understood, but that was nothing new.

She held the entire shape of the world in her fingertips, in the sharpness of her blade, which spread out enticingly before her; green, verdant, and endless.

Rancho Tarzanadu: "Dollhouse"

2022-09-13T17:11:00.004-07:00

Miss Linda was informed today that Manual was finally being sent home from Guantanamo Bay. She felt overjoyed, and also overwhelmed…he had been gone for so long, and been through so much, she felt certain that he must be a completely different person. When she was notified of his arrival, it was also revealed that he was now a “little person”. She inquired: “What do you mean…’little person’?”

It appeared that Manual (along with several of his guards and their commanding officers) had somehow been transformed into a doll, also – even smaller than Miss Linda herself. She was curious to find out how this had come about, but she didn’t want to overwhelm him with questions immediately (like she normally would have). She set about getting her old Victorian Dollhouse out of the garage, and with the help of her gardener she had it placed in a safe-ish place in the backyard after the spiderwebs were blown out with the leaf-blower, situated next to the pool, overlooking the golf course. She imagined that Manual would want his privacy in order to…recover.

Miss Linda took a step back and examined the state of her Dollhouse; it needed many repairs but it would have to do temporarily, as she wasn’t expecting anyone physically living inside of it. It needed a new roof, and new bannisters, and definitely a paint job, but at least it would house Manual safe-ishly, and might actually look pretty good after residing at Guantanamo Bay for so long.

Fortunately the blistering heatwave inspired by Hurricane Kay was subsiding, and the end of Summer was approaching. As much as she loved Rancho Tarzanadu, she was growing more concerned about the effects of climate change on her beautiful California state. She was worn down from the constant fires, and the insistent news updates, and other people’s opinions and expectations and wants and desires, and her own opinions and expectations and wants and desires. Life seemed to be a spinning Ferris Wheel of perpetual details and minutiae, and up-keep, and feeding times, and cat-poop-scooping, and raised temperatures, and emails that needed responding to, and advertisements, and products, and deliveries, and bills to be paid, and Politicians, and Dentist appointments, and recycling that wasn’t really recycling but just gave the impression of recycling, and water restrictions, and fines, and looming drought, and energy-control, and black and white, and red and blue, and deadlines, and paperwork, and corruption, and criminals, and judges and juries, and jury duty, truth and lies, money, money, money, and on and on and on.

Miss Linda attempted to relax in the pool the way her therapist advised her, floating on a raft while listening to guided meditations on her AirPods, but her mind was continually racing from one thing to another which she blamed on her consumer-driven-instant-gratification culture. She made a note to herself to look into Psilocybin Mushroom Therapy as she drifted off to sleep on her gently bouncing raft, and dreamed. When she woke up, she scribbled in her Dream Journal:

I dreamed that I was in a small rowboat with myself (my “higher self”?).

I was telling myself that the only way back to dry land was by making art (we were in the middle of the ocean).

We were working on little miniature paintings that were detailed and pretty, and myself told me to keep at it, and it would lead me where I needed to be.

I didn’t quite understand, but it also made perfect sense to me.

When I realized it made sense, I woke up.

Miss Linda stared in the direction of the swollen setting sun, and watched it drop down behind the hills; it was exhausted too.

Buried Alive

2022-07-12T16:20:00.003-07:00

You asked me:

“How can you live like this?”

with piles upon piles

of stuff

that I have to step over,

trip over,

climb over,

growing exponentially:

The Blob,

expanding and mutating of its own accord.

I responded:

“I don’t have time.”

which is a lie,

because time is all I’ve got.

The truth

is:

the piles contain my heart,

swollen, bruised and buried;

broken

for years;

useless,

unreachable.

The excavation,

the landslide would bring me down.

So I avoid, pretend,

and step over;

if I don’t unearth it

I can imagine

it’s not so bad –

my broken heart

is just a heart,

beneath…down deep;

not so bad.

Not so bad.

If you try to find me

I disappear,

slip under,

out of sight,

like I never existed

in the first place;

nothing to find,

nothing to fix,

nothing to love,

nothing lost.

Just piles

upon piles;

a richness,

a bounty.

Remains

of a life

I once lived,

that now lives me.

Rancho Tarzanadu: "Witch Academy?"

2022-06-29T19:01:00.001-07:00

After graduating, Miss Linda floated in the pool exactly one time – there was so much going on in the world that there didn’t seem like enough time to float in the pool. Her online meditation instructor would say that that was the exact reason why she should be floating in the pool with ear buds in, listening to Chakra-healing meditations and micro-dosing psychedelic mushrooms.

She thought about what her “Nation and Empire, Law and Government” Professor had asked her at graduation: “What are you going to do now?”

She had recently been unpacking the last of her mother’s things, brought home from her 94-year-old boyfriend’s house; very personal items like journals and small paintings and notes, leaving Miss Linda’s heart swollen like a gigantic purple cabbage, effectively temporarily immobilizing her. She wandered through the house like a ghost herself, feeling melancholy more often than not, and caught herself sighing loudly. She didn’t want to drive off the tenants who survived the Pandemic with her – the Mime (hardly anyone noticed he was still there), the German Dog-Trainer (whose pack of dogs made up for the Mime’s muteness), and the computer-graphics editor (no one really knew what he did for certain), so she knew she needed to snap out of her ennui. She incorporated deep breathing techniques, creative expression, and more exercise as remedies.

The Pandemic had scattered people far and wide, blown them across the states and the world as if transported by a raging tornado, and the emotional gaps and chasms left in its wake felt ocean-sized sometimes; she was also searching for a remedy for that, and wished she could conjure a potion of “Emotional-Gaps-and-Chasms-Elixir”.

Her diagnosis of Stargardt Eye Disease left her with a monthly government stipend, and miraculously free health care (something everyone should have). She actually had time now to change the world for the better – although she had gotten a pesky call from the government that morning (she let it go to voicemail), reminding her that they could still find work for her, no matter her disability, which made her feel immediately nauseous, envisioning herself working inside a sooty factory, or a coal-mine, or breaking rocks apart with a sledgehammer while wearing iron ankle shackles, getting paid with a small pouch of coins and some cold porridge.

There had to be a better way!

She had been writing protest songs on the piano, and was learning how to record them, although it was a slow process considering not only her eyesight issue, but the fact that she was still a doll (which she had actually gotten used to by now).

She had also been writing tragic Sylvia Plath-inspired poetry, and working on a magical-realism novel, but she doubted that the Government would view either of those pursuits as “valid” work.

The world was spiraling voraciously around her, eating up women’s rights, gnawing on them and spitting them back out, while “religious” zealots ruled the Supreme Court, and a criminal ex-President was throwing plates of Ketchup at walls, smashing dishes, and attempting to strangle Secret Service agents, while truck-loads of people were dying from heat-stroke trying to cross the border, the war in Ukraine roared on, the pandemic continued, the lunatic white nationalists stocked up on even more guns, and the emotional gaps and chasms were far and wide, all around, even between people living in the same cities. On top of all of that, the government was now hinting that they wanted her to work in a coal-mine in spite of her disability and get paid in cold porridge?

Miss Linda had to say, “No thank you…I’d rather remain a State-sponsored Artist.”

Although she had to admit that even though writing protest songs and tragic poetry felt really good and filled some of the emotional gaps and chasms, she wondered if she should be doing something more – like fighting in the Resistance or volunteering for the Progressive “agenda”. One of her friends (the Psychic Cloud-Reader) had decided to open her home to wayward girls and women whose bodies were so tightly regulated by their states that they had to seek refuge in California for certain matters.

The Supreme Court had just ruled that private religious schools could get funding by the State, so now might be the perfect time to open a Witch Academy; she might get even more funding because of her impaired vision…maybe she could get a grant for a non-profit organization? Maybe that Master’s degree in Humanities would come in handy after all?

Miss Linda wondered if the State funds for religious schools only went towards certain religions, or to only one religion?

Because “Freedom of Religion” sounded like it would apply to all religions, but she also knew that not everything is always what it appears to be, and that words can be twisted to confuse the average citizen – hence the need for a good lawyer at certain times.

Something to meditate on…maybe while floating in the pool with a Bloody Mary, while there was still enough water in the City of Angels to keep it filled.

Rancho Tarzanadu: "With Distinction"

2022-06-17T18:18:00.006-07:00

Miss Linda graduated “with distinction” from her Humanities MA program, and noticed that it irritated some people around her in mysterious ways. She did her best not to brag about it too much, but she was honestly really proud of herself for accomplishing it, especially considering her rocky academic past, when she was running around Los Angeles ditching High School, smoking pot, having sex, and singing in Motley Crue cover bands. To be honest, she felt it was worth it to postpone her academic career, considering the life experience she gained while not in school. But some people don’t necessarily like it when other people do things in a manner they are not “supposed” to do them in.

Some of Miss Linda’s friends and family had snarky comments about her educational goals later in life, like: “What do ya wanna do that for?!” and: “What’s the point?!” One friend literally said: “School? You’re too old for school!” (and that was when she was still in Community College!). Some family members ignored her graduation completely, as if it was non-existent. Some thought it was the “Devil’s Work” and that she was being indoctrinated into the Elite Intellectual Globalist Cabal attempting to create the New World Order. Some said “Congratulations” through gritted teeth, as if saying the words made them feel sick to their stomachs.

Of course, many more supported her endeavors than not, but she found the silent and begrudging ones especially interesting, and liked to dissect their motives and emotional states late into the night when the world was still and silent; she thought she might be able to use them as characters for something later on. So many characters. She also wondered if they thought she wouldn’t notice their pronounced silence or snarkiness? (Miss Linda noticed everything; hence her high GPA.)

She was also baffled by the fact that not one of her professors (all of whom possessed PhDs) had noticed that she was a doll throughout the entire program! These were people who were supposed to be smart! She realized that she probably got away without being noticed because the classes were done on Zoom, but even when the cohort met in person for their convocation, no one mentioned it. Maybe they were trying to be more “inclusive”? She herself was surprised at how short one of her classmates was in person, when she had expected this person to be much taller, and was impressed with the height of one her professors, as she had expected him to be much shorter (he was also handsome and charming…and married). But to not notice she was a doll…that was stretching things a little far.

But maybe they were just doing the same thing some of her friends and family had done regarding her graduation – not mentioning it because it made them feel…uncomfortable? Sick to their stomachs? Angry? Resentful? Dismissive? Maybe they were shocked that a doll could actually earn a Master’s Degree (even though it was “only at a State college, and not even the best of State colleges” as her faux step-sister reminded her, sneering). Her professors may have thought, “If a doll with a hereditary eye disease can get an overall 4.0 and graduate “with distinction”, how valid is this degree, anyway? How valid are any of my degrees?”

Everyone kept asking her: “What are you going to do now?” She told her tall, handsome professor that she was going to get stoned and float in the pool all day, like in The Graduate, but he didn’t like that answer, and kept pressing her. She told him she was going “to write poetry, record songs, and make art” (after all, that’s why she got this degree in the first place – to “validate” her artistic pursuits), but he seemed a little on the skeptical side about that answer too, even though she was dead serious.

“What are you going to do now?”

She knew that everyone wanted to hear something practical, but how practical did they expect her to be, getting a Master’s Degree in Humanities in the first place?

One of her professors spoke at her Hooding ceremony, and said that this was probably the only Master’s program that left students with more questions after graduating than any other program (except maybe for philosophy). Miss Linda certainly had lots of questions, and wondered about all kinds of things: the different ways humans interact, the way they can support each other or tear each other down, the way love can be given generously or withheld for various reasons, the way money rules the world, and the idea that getting an education for the sake of expanding oneself can be viewed as a complete waste of time by some, the way some people stumble through life never contemplating anything, while taking comfort in their smug “superior” position, only seeing things through their own myopic lens, and judging others harshly for doing things “differently” without ever walking in their shoes.

Miss Linda knew what she was going to do right now: decorate a frame to hold her freshly-delivered diploma; probably something in pink and green, adorned with flowers, glitter, and bluebirds (the echoes of her faux step-sister hissing “Princess!” fading into the ether). Then she was going to smoke a big fattie, and smell the actual roses on this glorious June day, which was mild with cool breezes and little puffy clouds in the blue-blue sky. She was going to enjoy the fruits of her labor, and pursue her creative endeavors, even though to some, she would always be “just a doll”.

Doll or not, Miss Linda knew who she was.

She wondered if some others knew who they were?

Queen of the Mundane

2022-06-14T15:24:00.000-07:00

You

crave control like an addict.

You

know-it-all-nothing.

You:

Ego fragile as tissue paper.

I see you

(even with my blind eyes).

I see right through you;

my Third Eye developed over time.

I stared at people as a baby; I read their minds...

they all ran away screaming.

I only smiled for my mother

(which secretly pleased her).

Now I bite my own tongue –

otherwise all Hell would break loose;

black bats and ravens

would darken the sky.

Sometimes

I even scare me, myself, and I.

Witch.

You

wouldn’t know what hit you.

You

wouldn’t even see it coming

until it was too late;

my words would eviscerate –

it’s in everyone’s best interest

that I bite down (hard) on my tongue,

feed on my own blood

(loose lips sink ships);

remain, not only blind,

but mute as well.

You

think you know me.

You

haven’t a clue.

You – fixated

on controlling the mundane.

Bitch,

it’s better for both of us

that way.

Miss Linda's Humanities MA Final Comprehensive Timed Essay #2

2022-05-26T14:54:00.001-07:00

There are so many examples of freedom versus rights happening currently in the United States, but I will focus on abortion rights (or lack thereof) for women. The Pledge of Allegiance to our country’s flag states: “…with liberty and justice for all”, but it seems as though liberty and justice are only available to straight, white men and not provided to women, or provided differently to women, who must ask for permission from men to do what they want with their own bodies. Gloria Steinem says: “The definition of patriarchy is to be able to control reproduction, and that means you have to control women’s bodies” (Kelly). Presently Roe v. Wade hangs by a thread while the conservative Supreme Court justices appointed by the Trump administration decide the fate for every woman in the United States.

Carolina Cuellar at NPR writes: “In South Texas, 26-year-old Lizelle Herrera is being charged with murder because of a, quote, ‘self-induced abortion’” (Cuellar). Women’s rights to sovereignty over their own bodies are being rapidly chipped away by men in mostly Southern states, using their own religious beliefs as a basis for “judgment”, and continually mixing religion into politics to appease their right-wing base. They are wielding this weapon of religion to force women into a “guilty” role, criminalizing them for wanting bodily autonomy, which these men themselves are able to enjoy without question.

The inequality of women in our country is ingrained in all of us from a very early age. Lori Baker-Sperry writes in “The Pervasiveness and Persistence of the Feminine Beauty Ideal in Children’s Fairy Tales”: “The feminine beauty ideal can be seen as a normative means of social control whereby social control is accomplished through the internalization of values and norms that serve to restrict women’s lives” (Baker-Sperry). We all grow up as children learning that women are subordinate to men through cultural examples that are set for us: men take action while women react, men make decisions while women “stand by their men”, men have adventures while women keep the home fires burning.

An example of this early indoctrination can be found in Kazuo Ishiguro’s Never Let Me Go, in which human clones are raised in a State-funded institution, and told from a very early age that they will be donating their body parts in service to others (real human beings). Miss Emily (one of their Guardians) lectures them at their daily assemblies that they are “Unworthy of privilege” (Ishiguro 43); this can also be seen reflected today in the United States that women are “unworthy” of basic human rights in autonomy over their own bodies – they are seen as “less than”, they are not the Norm. Men making the rules are the Norm.

Margaret Sanger said: “No woman can call herself free who does not own and control her own body, no woman can call herself free until she can choose consciously whether she will or will not be a mother” (Sanger, 1920). Women have been fighting this uphill battle for over a century, and now after almost fifty years possessing the right to choose what happens with their own bodies, the Supreme Court is teetering on the brink of repossessing those rights. Our governing systems are still run mainly by what my Professor Claire White calls “the Old Weirdy-Beardies”; old white men who are stuck in the past and want to keep all of us stuck there with them, because it caters to their own needs above everyone else’s.

Michel Foucault describes biopower as a regularization process of humanity, in order to gain the most production from it. Whereas the previous sovereign powers utilized the threat of death, biopower uses the regularization of life: “Power is decreasingly the power of the right to take life, and increasingly the right to intervene to make live” (Foucault, 248). Biopower seems to me to be reflected today in the current fight over abortion rights for women in various states such as Texas, Missouri, and Michigan among others. The regularization of women’s bodies is moving from the private, individual level to the public, collective level. The lines of the “right to life” are being blurred: who is deserving of the right to life? The fetus? Or the woman carrying it?

Regularization has steadily increased back in to track, monitor, and vilify women for decisions they should be able to make over their own bodies and the state of their bodies (in my opinion, as a woman). This time, biopolitics has gone one step further in incorporating the random citizen in Texas to create a bounty on a woman’s head for attempting to get an abortion, or for even thinking of getting an abortion. Women can potentially be tracked over state lines, if they flee their own state to obtain an abortion in a neighboring state; their doctors, families, and even their cab drivers could be potentially implicated in this bounty hunt.

This is a horrible regression of women’s rights, and places women in the position of second-class citizens, in which men are making the decisions for them – and now not just politicians, but random citizens endorsed by the politicians. Judith Butler asks in “Violence, Mourning, Politics” who counts as human? In a world dominated by power, violence exploits certain people and cultures who are outside the “norm” of white male heterosexuality, and we have become accustomed to accepting these inequalities because they are constantly being force-fed to us by the people in positions of control and the media machine. There is a general idea of the “normative body”; those that fall outside of that are often seen as less than human, and become invisible and unrecognized. Butler writes that violence against these people doesn’t really count as violence because it is expected to happen and is normalized. These people are viewed as “unreal” – not really existing in the first place: “If violence is done against those who are unreal, then from the perspective of violence, it fails to injure or negate those lives since those lives are already negated” (Butler 2002, 33). Stripping women of the right to govern their own bodies is a form of violence, persecution, and oppression. If women are viewed as “earthen vessels” (as North Carolina Republican Congressman Madison Cawthorn recently stated in the House of Representatives) or inanimate objects, they are non-human entities, only existing to serve the needs of the “humans”; straight, white males in power.

Where could this end? Could these “normative bodies” as bounty hunters track women down like animals, and even kill them if they felt they were entitled to do so? If women do not have control over their own bodies, they are seemingly the slaves of men, and slaves of the system in which they fully live, contribute, and participate. If biopower is indeed there to encourage life, shouldn’t it be protecting the lives of women? Women, it seems, have morphed (or returned) into non-entities or objects to be manipulated and controlled more than men, and by men, and for men.

Women are living beings, contributing to the ecosystem of biopower, working and being productive as well as reproductive, producing the babies that they want to produce. It appears that biopower is not satisfied with this, and wants to extract even more from them, while taking away their basic human rights to control their own bodies in exchange. Biopower seems to favor the masculine, while placing an ever-tightening rein on the feminine, which feels, from a female perspective, more and more like a noose.

Baker-Sperry. 2003. “The Pervasiveness and Persistence of the Feminine Beauty Ideal in Children’s Fairy Tales.” Gender & Society, October 1, 2003.

Brechtel, Evan. 2021. “Cawthorn Calls Women ‘Earthen Vessels’ in Bonkers Anti-Abortion Rant on House Floor.” Second Nexus, December 3, 2021.

Butler, Judith. 2002. “Violence, Mourning, Politics.”

Cuellar, Carolina. 2022. “A Texas woman has been charged with murder after a so-called ‘self-induced abortion.’” NPR, April 10, 2022.

Foucault, Michel. 1976. “17 March 1976.” ‘Society Must be Defended’: Lectures at the College de France 1976-1976. Translated by David Macey, Picador 2003.

Ishiguro, Kazuo. 2005. Never Let Me Go. Vintage International, 2006.

Kelly, Mary Louise. 2022. “Gloria Steinem’s calls to protect bodily autonomy live on as Roe faces reversal.” NPR, May 6, 2022.

Sanger, Margaret. 1920.

Miss Linda's Humanities MA Final Comprehensive Timed Essay #1

2022-05-26T14:49:00.000-07:00

Carl O. Sauer writes in “The Morphology of Landscape”: “We select those qualities of landscape in particular that are or may be of use to us” (Sauer 1925, 325). Selecting good fertile land (space and place) is a privilege that is not available to everyone in the world due to social and economic inequalities. The rich and powerful are able to choose where they want to be, and claim by force where they will reside. In our current landscape, Russia is attempting to overtake Ukrainian land by force in order to obtain their rich land resources and become more powerful in the process, which would enable them to obtain even more spaces and places in the future. The acquisition of this land gives them the power to make decisions, laws, and give rights to their people, or take rights away. Living in a particular space and place may seem like a simple thing, but it is more complicated than it might first appear.

Carl O. Sauer writes in “The Morphology of Landscape” about various ways to observe and document landscape, and tells us that attempting to pin down an accurate term for Geography is tricky, because it involves so many factors, which have fluctuated over time. He speaks about the need for a systematic approach, which would also incorporate the nuances of humankind’s influence on the environment, and the environment’s influence on humankind. He emphasizes the need to bring different aspects of study together such as history, the relation of phenomena, the migration of people and their effect on the land, and cause and effect (with an emphasis on climate) as a cohesive unit to portray a broader perspective of what Geography encompasses. The rich and powerful are able to live in the most hospitable regions of our planet, while the poor are left with the “unchosen” places, the leftovers, the spaces and places with the harshest weather conditions, which will only get worse with climate change. The wealthy are able to live in places with the greatest chance of human survival when the going gets tough; the poorest people will not have the same choices of livable land that the wealthy will have.

“Introducing Cultural Geography” and “The Tradition of Cultural Geography” by William Norton speaks on different groups of people, identifying landscapes, dominant cultural identities, nature, social sciences, the history of Geography, and the Landscape School created by Carl O. Sauer: “The landscape school developed on the premise that culture, operating on physical landscapes through time, was responsible for the transformation of those landscapes into cultural landscapes” (Norton 2014, 11). As people live and inhabit a particular landscape, they build their cultural and social identity there, and leave their own particular imprint on the space and place itself. Using the example of Russia overtaking land and resources from Ukraine, not only are the Russians displacing the Ukrainian people from their space and place, they are changing and destroying the cultural and social imprint of the Ukrainians and attempting to replace it with their own; the Russians believe they have the right to do this because of their power and domination tactics, and the belief that their own cultural identity is more important or valuable than the Ukrainian people.

Wilbur Zelinsky’s “Process” from The Cultural Geography of the United States speaks on the ways culture affects landscape. Culture separates human beings from the rest of the “natural world” and is most dominant in creating change. Objectivity is a necessary element in observing culture as a science. The United States is a specific culture region with a unique identity, as Russia and Ukraine also possess their own unique identities.

National identity is bigger than the sum of its individual local parts. Raymond Williams’ “Culture” from Keywords: A Vocabulary of Culture and Society speaks on the shared meanings of English culture, the relationship between words and social and cultural change, and the dynamic quality of meaning. Culture and society are constantly changing, and this is reflected in language. Old meanings linger; the overlap of meanings flows through space and place as one culture transitions from one thing into something else, like Russia into Ukraine, potentially back into Russia.

The Battle of Algiers, directed by Gillo Pontecorvo in 1966 portrays the uprising of the Algerian people against their French Colonizers from 1954 to 1962. The film reveals how painful it was to be overtaken and colonized by a foreign government, stripping the Algerians of their sovereignty and forcing them to live in certain areas of their own country while the French reigned supreme. This resembles what is currently happening in Ukraine, although the space and place are different, it is still the more powerful insinuating itself on the less powerful in order to overtake and gain more power and control.

John Hutchinson writes in “The Question of Definition” in Nationalism regarding a nation experiencing a common suffering: “National sorrows are more significant than triumphs because they impose obligations and demand a common effort” (17). The people of Algeria do just that, secretly forming the FLN (National Liberation Front), communicating through the passing of notes on the street, and incorporating everyone’s help including women and children to fight the common enemy, the French occupiers. The Algerian people are bound together by the love of their country, and their fear is overcome by their anger and their will to be free. I see commonalities in Ukraine, with women taking up arms to protect their country, and the sheer will of the people to fight off the Russian army to protect the land that they love, which is more than just a space and a place; it contains their identity, their family, their roots, and their home.

The Ukrainian people are definitely experiencing “national sorrows” right now, which are reverberating outside of their country into other spaces and places; the world is with them, and rooting for them, to fight off the dominant overlord who wants to tear them away not only from their land, the place they inhabit, but from their cultural identity and who they are at their core. Hopefully, with the help of other dominant powers aiming for justice, they will win their fight to retain their place in the world.

Hutchinson, John. 1994. “The Question of Definition.” Nationalism. Fontana Press, 1994.

Norton, William. 2013. “Introducing Cultural Geography” and “The Tradition of Cultural Geography”. Cultural Geography: Environments, Landscapes, Identities, Inequalities. Oxford University Press, 2013.

Pontecorvo, Gillo. 1966. The Battle of Algiers.

Sauer, Carl O. 1925. “The Morphology of Landscape”. 1925.

Williams, Raymond. 2014. “Culture.” Keywords: A Vocabulary of Culture and Society. Oxford University Press, 2014.

Zelinsky, Wilbur. 1992. “Process.” The Cultural Geography of the United States. Pearson, 1992.

Claire Fisher -- a Peach of a Girl

2022-05-11T17:55:00.000-07:00

Claire Fisher —

a peach of a girl.

Dreamy-eyed Pisces,

flame-haired

Spitfire.

Psychedelic

Marijuana-saturated

Bohemian Artiste;

her pink satin bedding

almost as smooth

as she.

Porcelain skin

tough as nails.

Dead Daddy’s Little Girl;

Mother’s living nightmare.

Locomotive

emotion.

Heartbroken

Heartbreaker.

Looking for love

in all the wrong places.

Shutterbug eye

(her Superpower).

Mistakes aplenty;

no regrets.

Always up for the challenge;

Carpe Diem.

“Promise me you’ll be who you want to be”

(Ruth Fisher to Claire).

She did,

and she was.

I Am the Open Source

2022-05-04T23:59:00.000-07:00

I am the Open Source;

I don’t have to go anywhere,

or do anything.

I don’t have to cleanse my space with incense,

or sleep with a sigil under my pillow.

I don’t have to doll myself up

with false eyelashes and perfume.

I don’t have to get down on my knees

and pray for a sign.

“You’re so uppity!”

“Have some humility!”

I don’t have time for that;

none of us do.

I want to be flooded

with the blue-greens,

and burned

by the red-hots,

carried away with gusts

of swirling windstorms,

pinned to the Earth by the gravitational pull — all

available to me,

at my beck

and call.

Inside of me

(not outside);

all the rituals

simply flourishes

like icing roses

on a cake.

I am the cake;

I am the open source.

Not a Cake-Walk

2022-05-01T20:12:00.004-07:00

“It’s not a cake-walk,” she said,

“getting to the root of the problem.”

Digging bare-hands in the ground,

breaking open the hardened layer of dirt

similar to cement,

containing petrified things

and creepy-crawlers

all squiggling around

for attention

or escape.

It’s been so long;

some have starved to death,

some have transformed into

other things, other beings,

some long-forgotten

and forsaken,

some random treasures uncovered,

rediscovered.

Two observing doves mindlessly coo,

emotionally uninvolved.

Each person’s non-cake-walk

so personal, so precious,

so potent.

The hardened dirt swallows

it all

in the end.

Meat Box

2022-04-30T17:44:00.005-07:00

One of your sponsors

sells boxes of meat.

You tell your audience:

“You can customize your box any way you want.”

Images flood my mind –

no escape.

Custom boxes

of meat.

Purchased dead flesh

delivered by postal express.

You choose the parts;

“humanely” butchered.

Drawling in your Southern accent:

“Mouth-wateringly delicious!”

This is normal;

little meat coffins.

Distanced from the knife,

easily-accessible.

Life-to-death,

flash-frozen, pre-packaged;

endless boxes

of meat.

The First Day of the Rest of My Life

2022-04-23T18:23:00.003-07:00

If only

I could get up early

my entire life would change,

the self-help Gurus tell me.

Night-Owl

to Early-Bird

when all the worms are squirming,

dying to be caught.

Overthrow

my natural rhythms

to conquer the world;

the dark of night is fantastical,

smoke and mirrors.

Daylight hours

ruled by the Sun,

getting-things-done,

the Go-Getters,

High-Achievers.

Late-night hours

ruled by the Moon,

Intuitives,

Day-Dreamers,

lounging around in kimonos

spending time ill-advisedly.

“All you need to do

is rise by 5:00 AM

to turn the world upside-down

and make all your dreams

a reality” they say.

I listen to my motivational audiobooks

late into the night,

studying them in the wee hours,

falling asleep from exhaustion

just before Sunrise,

and dream

about the first day of the rest of my life.

Moon Images

2022-04-17T23:33:00.003-07:00

I post Moon images

every two weeks...

it’s the least

and the most

I could do

for the last year-and-four-and-a-half-months

that you’ve been gone.

No songwriting,

no jewelry-making,

no poems or short stories,

no novels or piano,

no schemes or grand ideas...

just Moon images.

They were enough,

and almost too much.

Marking the time in two-week intervals.

Cloistered away

from Covid-19

in my newly inherited house;

the perfect retreat for my grief

to settle in, make itself at home.

The Moon has always been reliable;

it waxes and wanes

and doesn’t ask any questions

or make any demands

or seek reasons why...

it just is.

The familiar owl

hoots outside my window

at 4:30 AM,

ushering the full Moon’s rise

again.

You died on a full Moon;

I sat next to you under its spotlight,

alone.

I feel the Moon ties us together,

but that could just be

the mute poet in me, searching for meaning

in the natural

ebbs-and-flows.

Regardless,

the Moon rises

gracefully,

effortlessly,

purposefully,

without explanation.

Ensconced in a black cloak,

fully supported.

Finally,

naturally,

I break my self-imposed silence.

Omicron Cyber Monday!

2022-04-14T17:27:00.001-07:00

Omicron Cyber Monday!

The Omicron variant is spreading fast!

Don’t wait — get your Cyber Monday deals while you still can!

Hurry — before the economy collapses, or before you die!

Get great deals on clothing, electronics, beauty products, self-help courses, vacuum cleaners — before Omicron

sucks the life right out of you!

Don’t delay; time is running out!

It’s later than you think...much, much later.

Buy now, while deals last, and you’re still alive!

Don’t get left behind like Travel-banned countries!

Act now, before Omicron comes for you!

Witching Hour

2022-04-13T17:27:00.007-07:00

The night is shattered into pieces

by Mocking Birds

and sirens,

daemons past and future.

My tinnitus rings in the same key as the crickets

warbled song.

3:00 AM: so many sounds competing for my attention

behind closed eyes.

The Witching Hour.

It’s both too late and too early.

The dead of night is bustling,

like the inside of my head.

Dancing rapid-fire

in black petticoats;

Whiling Dervishes.

Noises and thoughts bleed into one another

while slowly dying down,

painstakingly

transforming into a weighted blanket

flattening and blacking everything out.

Why Are There so Many 'Life Coaches'?

2022-04-08T17:04:00.000-07:00

Why

are there so many “Life Coaches”?

Scrambling over each other like crabs in a pot.

How

can your Botoxed lips inform my life?

I want to look away, but it’s nearly impossible;

transfixed by your train wreck.

You’re always here,

creeping around corners and sticking your head where it doesn’t belong.

You didn’t even go to an accredited university;

licensed from the back pages of a New Age Magazine.

Cry yourself to sleep — just leave me alone!

I have an actual therapist with a PhD,

and I don’t want to buy any of your crap “Masterclass” courses

even at discounted rates.

Get a real job!

Or be a legitimate out-of-work artist.

Just stop claiming that you can “fix” my life

when you obviously know nothing about anything.

Stop senselessly backflipping.

I almost feel sorry for you,

until I remember who you are:

Charlatan-huckster.

Grifting off other people’s pain.

Vampire-Zombies

in hoards, en masse.

Fix yourselves!

The Infinite Sadness of the World

2022-04-07T18:16:00.003-07:00

The infinite sadness of the world fills me with a warm glow;

an enormous fire inside me

surrounded by snow.

The flames don’t leap out — I’m a self-contained oven,

like all the other ovens,

minding their own hot coals.

The snow feels thick,

like marshmallows,

heavy damp clouds,

hugging in the warmth,

buffering the edges,

maintaining and containing.

The dichotomy of this hotness/coldness

creates its own atmosphere,

something neither hot or cold,

encompassing all the feelings,

beyond feeling.

Feeling everything at once,

feeling loses its meaning,

like freezing to death while going up in flames simultaneously.