I came to understand that my dad was never going to have a serious deep conversation with me where he cried and confessed and told me he always loved me no matter what. Perhaps if I got into serious trouble, an emotional outburst he might warrant but by then I knew I’d be too far gone to care at him trying. Over the next 20 years we might have small conversations in which I got to gather all those bits I desperately yearned for. He might utter the smallest regret at a missed birthday card and I could see it with gladness instead of the usual rage commingled with decades of sadness. When your father leaves you, it gets carried around — even if you know it wasn’t about you. I once told my father of a plan to sell my eggs to a high bidder or give them to a needy gay couple and he started to shake with untold emotion, he said “Don’t you ever give a child away, you’ll never know what that is like”. Shaken but bemused I smiled at him still. I knew he meant for me to relish his words and understand that he would take it all back.

“And here my troubles began”, the opening lines of Maus II my favorite Holocaust graphic novel. As a child I read every WWII book and as obsessed with the camps: the stories of heroines, heroics, humble people who did what they could against every odd evil had at it’s disposal. No matter how bad humans can be to each other, there can still be good in this world; of that I am undeniably thankful to have learned. Of course, I still have a hard time writing. Extremely hard, as one shoulder sits my hyper self-critical self, and on the other my mother. Admonishing the things I write, the way I write them, and the sin of it all. I look to and fro, to and fro until my head spins off into the nothingness that is self-awareness. So I’ve resolved to write something each day, something that takes the pain of memory off my shoulders and away from my hate.

The story of my eyes The stories of my peace

“Who R U?” the caterpillar asked Alice on that weird trip that was Wonderland. What would I have answered if it had been me? Dressed up in my best pinafore, chasing after a white rabbit, I might have replied…crazy! For the most part Alice in Wonderland, and other favorite childhood stories, question that never distinct truth: who are you? And more importantly who should you be? The daily self-flagellation induced by this all-important question has decreased the infamous self-esteem to undetectable levels at times. Fortunately, there is still something left to write. There are no real rules that define my life, and that in itself could be its most central theme. Instead, survival and freedom encompass everything I’ve ever wanted. The main dilemma for me would be the precarious nature of each. Is one possible without the other, or must they co-exist? Some strange equilibrium, which I run to and from, simply trying to stay alive. So this is I: the contradiction, goddess, and whore, all wrapped up in one twisted dissymmetrical package. Tied with brown paper string, these are definitely some of my favorite things. To be all things and remain nothing, to possess brilliance and be trapped by the bottle of ambition. I must not have been rubbed the right way.

I had learned to read and was perusing my baby book, where a foreign name popped up under Father. It was totally weird now that I think about it, because I learned to read very early (at 4), so I must have read it before (I was always way into my baby book for some reason…). I guess I kept thinking my mom had messed up the book, or perhaps I even fantasized that my stepfather had changed his name and was on the run from someone that would very much like to know where he was. It wasn’t till I was 6 that I asked my bastard of a stepdad. He sat me down and said something like, “Well, when your mother was young, she made a horrible mistake and had sex with another man. I married her so you could have a father”.

I look up from inside cracked sidewalks

My mother spoke to herself. Not just little bits to remind or cajole, but long drawn out conversations. She remained lost in arguments and discussions with another self as she muttered around the house picking up after an entire family of sloth like creatures. “That’s what they told me, I know. You said”.

And there went the plate, cake and all. First it stuck to the wall, then slowly slipped and fell. Glass shattered and I was stunned. The wall remained tinged with green and I don’t think the smell went away, the whole time we lived there. For all I know, it might remain as the ghost of childhood trauma. And of course, have I ever liked pistachio ice cream? That was my mother, she very rarely ever cried from anger. Instead she hit what she could. She suppressed all the rage and fears, until it was too much and it poured out of her like a black light.

Ok, so I grew up in a strange family. My brother likes to say we put the “fun” in dysfunctional, but instead I just like to think of it as extremely fucked up. By the time I was 6, I was babysitting my infant brother for hours at a time. By the time I was 7, I was babysitting another an infant and my brother now a toddler. I usually cooked dinner to help my mom out since she came home late from work and my step-father would be holed up in his bedroom reading or watching Kung Fu: The Legend continues. My uncle was staying with us around this time, as he had recently kicked crack and was trying desperately to find his own way. I knew nothing of the harshness of adulthood with all its bills, follies and fools. Instead, I only understood the direct cruelties of childhood. Growing up in a poor family like mine afforded such delicacies as fried chicken, hamburger helper and Mac & Cheese, which were just another extension of sadness to me. I, who enjoyed food, was always slightly disappointed at what was on the table. This disappointment was only amplified by the fact that often it was I who cooked it. That might have increased everyone at the table’s discontent indeed. On this hot summer day, I might have been thinking on this dreadful state of affairs as I filled the heavy pot with hot water and put it on the stove. I watched it begin to bubble and boil, and stood on tiptoe to grab the salt from the cupboard. Only a little bit, I was supposed to put in. Usually, I liked to watch it dissolve and flutter around the edges of the pot. I would imagine myself as one little molecule slowly building until like the water, I was boiling with heat and rage.

I’d like to think of my journal as a microcosm of who i am; the voice is mine, but it’s still just fractions, pieces of me that somewhat reflect a soul. The basics: smart, funny, fucked up. I write what I’m feeling when I’m feeling it and often journaling is part of the process of sifting and delving, mining and drilling–not just to pick a long padlocked heart, but to ensure it’s never shuttered as such again. Uh-oh. it strikes again. I AM THE WORST WRITER IN THE WORLD. And there is no one who could possibly assuage your belief that your story is weak, characters undeveloped, writing stilted, and run-on sentences unbearable. And then you get over it, because you’re laughing your ass off…Wheeee, said the little pig, all the way home. I just really detest commas sometimes, I mean who the frick thought of those…sometimes I wish I had been paying attention in elementary school, instead of polishing off the library on the sly. Makes me think of my evil second grade teacher, Mrs. P. who forbid me from reading in the classroom. It’s funny because I remember her being quite exasperated by my deviousness to do what I wished instead of paying attention to her and class. I really liked reading, and did it all the time. I just didn’t understand why I had to pay attention to anything in class if I could pass the tests and turn in the homework from time to time. She was a bitch tho, that Mrs. Pax, a total hata as they say. When she lost control of the class, the main instigator, me, went into the classroom closet to sit and reflect.