Cigarette #4

Damn that little white girl! Damn her to hell! Her clear skin with soft taupe cheeks; I cannot stand the bitch; delicate and tapered alabaster white fingers; every portion of skin unblemished and taut. The notion of early eighteenth century manly desire still lingers in the pickup joints, sex shops, and public libraries. Even outside of those haunts, the demands on womanhood to be attractive are all insane and unreal. It is a class thing. It must be; that and a sheer evidence of prejudice. I am educated enough to receive entry into the King’s Ball broadcast at a sub annex of the palace. I don’t need the ball gown with hoop skirt attached. Jeans and t-shirt with valid id are enough to get me in the door. But, for me. You know me? Not the pencil and paper pusher but it is the persona of the hand laborer during the day that bars me from their reality or desires for romance. Know that I am no pristine specimen. It is not tattoos that yoke the back of my neck or piercings that intimate that I have far more experience than my age belies. It is the peeling skin from needle cuts on the pads of my fingers. It is the strawberries embedded in skin that turn brown before the fullness of the moon. (I wonder if liver spots now belie the experience of my age.) It is the keloi patterns scattered across my knees and feet that reveal my aggressions and happenstance before I can speak. All these make me damaged goods. What man would want a working portend to an ivory tower? I am called confused for intelligence should elevate my stature above a working class whore for simpler living.

 I have held these tears for years walking through mental doors and being barred from others. After recoiling for a short age, I’ve narrowed down my crucifixion to one thing. It is the thing that kills my mind everyday to the point that I dream of deranging it. I can no more draw in permanent black Sumi ink over it, nor can cut it out with toe nail clippers without suffering a grand demise of blood. It is my mark and I am coming to a head with it. It is one reason I am forced in to the lower castes of American romantic society. Yes, I do think well and high of myself. This outing is another false muse and I wonder the help it gives me to make it through the day. Still, princesses do not have marks like this. Rather they do not court burns in the slightest fashion.

First I blamed, then, I chose to forget. Thinking back, I have had horrible events with babysitters. To get to this one you walk to the top of the street, and then you take a right and walk about six or eight houses down. Babysitter, Mrs. Such ‘n’ such, lived in the house to the right. I was welcomed in her home as a second daughter several times a month. Her daughter and I played in the pool and shared a bed over long weekends. One afternoon Mrs. Such ‘n’ such helped me into my clothes after a shower. Time in the pool had consumed the afternoon. That afternoon there was both of us standing in the middle of the room. My babysitter passed the dress over my head while balancing a lit cigarette between hands to avoid burning me. As she bent down to help me lift my feet through the dress opening, I suddenly smelled burning meat. Next I felt sharp prickling on my calf. I jumped back and shouted at the same time. She apologized, but I was confused, feeling assaulted. I dressed, got my things and walked back to my grandfather’s house down the street and around the corner. Buy the time I got there the burn was numb. I thought nothing of it for years. Now there is something else to remember.

Deacon’s wife gave me a ride home after Mass. Another Deacon’s wife sat with me in the back of the van.

“Father told me to ask you something.”

“Oh! Go ahead, I’m listening.”

“Do you make pottery?”

“I have in the past. I am trying to build a kiln in the back yard.”

“Oh, alright. He wanted to know if you knew about burning clay pots so they can no longer be used again. It has something to do with Jesus.”

At that point I was dumbfounded. I shut my mouth and listened. Later I mused fighting understanding, about Aboriginal creation stories that tell of God creating mankind out of clay and breathing life into the vessel to give life to man. I learned that the greater portion of us is made of water, but the rest is mostly the same minerals and dirt we walk on with our feet. All this is accounted for except the existence of the soul and spirit. Surviving by the breath of wind we go, indeed.

From there, that night, I could not but jump into metaphysical conversation. I came to think that with this burn on my body, and having bided by the only death in Christ, my vessel cannot be used again. Not that in my ignorance I am endorsing being a zombie or living of the dead. I am still not able to wrap my brain around eternity with or without a body. Old wine in new vessels seems an appropriate way to look at longevity.

Closure dictates it is time to construct a hymn of my temple- to forgive and to relive by each mark. Dare me so, I could probably tell a tale about each scar as well as each limb and part of my body. That is a lazy tale for a book to tell that sits on the shelf between the Kama Sutra and yoga for the mind.

Cigarettes #3

“Put yure shit dawn and shut up! Dis de only time I’m tellin’ you and if you miss ‘ear me youl miss it foreva. I’ll wait. I’ll wait. I’ll be kwaet firs, then use. I’m to cited to tell, but ya must mind. Ya, it sumtin ya need no. Fur da fers time maybe, but neber the last. Ya here? Pay tenshun. I seen it. I saw it walk on Gots gren ert. Nose ya dat Godt ert is fum ere tad ere an ever. Ise seen ‘em alright. Da monsher e is. I took is tower and is nose. For me a buried ‘em deep. Use. Use all. Eber one use got to free use from ‘em. I’d mi fight. Use ya own.”

I may be a super hero now, but in all honesty I was only a drop of consideration in a bucket that melted by the autumn bonfire before here. Though all that matter is here, I am compelled to tell you of then. I do not mean to make the landscape so intimate, but know me for this: You’ll never understand the impact on earth when falling from heaven. My back is broke still. My spine healed in pieces. My arms gave birth to the activity of two pair and now my reach is as lengthy as it is weighty.

As a tween I bore hunger in my hips and cheeks. Walking home so far, so many times caused a tendency in my neck to look down. I became more fascinated with the cracks between planks of cement than clouds in the sky or oncoming traffic. It was a risk that I preferred to take even during rainstorms and pelting hail. For me I had lost interest in the common world. Depression took its toll physically. As a result, I took my position on earth lower than a dog. While walking, what caught in the loops of my mind was not just leaves and branches, but also the detritus of human life: bottle caps, McDonald’s napkins, empty cans of Coke, bubble gum, and cigarettes. With home training nothing would grace my lips from this used bounty. Still, in my hunger as a growing child, I became aware of oral attractions over each piece of garbage. Despite that, I never gave in to bending over, scouring the ground, and chewing old smoked tobacco drowned in automobile exhaust and acid rain. My God, the draw was unbearable.

The places I could turn my head without seeing ashtrays, human or otherwise, must have resulted in attracting a strong demon. Not long after acknowledging my unGodly appetites, I had unbearable visions of cigarettes being forced down my throat. Night after night upon going to my bedroom I could fight, but the force became stronger. Finally I gave in, but on being clever, I let the imagery pass through and out of me as my only counter. This way I did not bear through the visualizations of physical burn and acrid taste. The energy behind the encounter seemed satisfied with this victory. My counter to his spite was that my senses were edified in never wanting to smoke.

Eyes open. I saw him walk to the right. The landscape was more like an Atari video game than the backyard of the house. The yellow earth supported the cigarette monster well. Meanwhile, I remained still until I could find a place to gain higher ground. In a video game from the 1980’s that would be difficult. Cigarette Monster saw me watching him and the chase began. He was seven feet tall and verdant green with spikes running down his back. Fore and aft he began throwing cigarettes everywhere as he scurried after me. Panicking, I ran left to right. Straight runners have trouble chasing after side winding prey. Back and forth, back and forth across the landscape I ran trying to keep a distance. If he caught me I knew I would start smoking as a kid and it would continue for the rest of my life. Tiring him out through the run was not working. I had to think of something, anything. What would defeat a monster? I barely remembered my notes on killing a hydra, Cigarette Monster’s ancient cousin. At that moment there were no near misses, but the next run I would have to be on the kill. That would bring me closer to him than I cared to walk. Flashes. Flashes of brilliance happen and I am a firm believer in clairsentience. Without a sword or stick how would I fight? Lucid dreaming brought me blessings once and on the moment I woke and asked, there a few feet before me plugged in the ground was a hole of dead babies. Out of the corner of my eye, monster started the pursuit from the left. I ran toward the hold, jumped, then kept running. At a distance I heard him hit the edge and fall into the pit. One step less and I turned around. Apparently he fell deep into the well. Dead white babies covered in a bright green film where heaped at the top of the pit. I heard no sound. There was no movement. The demon must have dissolved on contact with early innocence. A whining sound formed in the distance. It was my alarm. I woke moments later.

Killing the monster set me free from addiction for years. I did not learn until a few years ago that it is a tradition in some metaphysical schools that you can ask for your present from the monster after its defeat. I am tempted to ask, so tempted to ask now. I wonder if the present’s power swelled in potency for over thirty years. What reality can I make for myself with that?

©N.A. Jones 2017

Writing

>16<

Blood debts in Familial Guise

From my first few steps across the kitchen floor, the three of us had no separation.  Even through the years that followed, others could not help but group our likenesses.  I am older now; one of us passed on through tears, and her daughter is living longer than she did. I am the last, it seems, until I bear child and God only knows when that time will be.

I remember when young, all the banter of our similarities in countenance and dress. The comparison was so overwhelming that I lost my balance and identity those early years.  As I fell down, I grieved for not having my own distinctions and joys to celebrate myself.  What I remember of the end of my independent will is happiness wandering about Grandad’s house while playing the social butterfly to family friends. After forgetting my obligations to act “the little host”, I chose to play hide and seek alone in the back hallway. Remembering home base towered behind the kitchen table; I rounded the closet wall, dashed into the dining room, and landed at the feet of my mother and grandmother. Side by side, they leaned over gazing into my face. In the two, looking as one, I saw the years place themselves side by side.

Similarities became more profound as I grew older. Through high school, I looked at photographs from old albums. I stared at mom, Granma, and me from different joys and family passions. It took years well after college, but I finally saw the wells beneath eyes and curves of hips that would form into what I would look like come age thirty, forty, and eventually fifty-something.

I must tell you, some curves came from my father’s mother. Every time I saw her, once every five to ten years, the curve was her insistence that I looked like her aunt and sister.  The cheekbones were telling. The first time I remember grandmother pinching my cheek and creating a curve with of her palm to bounce beneath the short curls of my hair. That afternoon she claimed me into that side of the family.  That defense of a blood claim became the glue that kept her close in my mind even when the physical distance of family became reality. This was long after my mother’s divorce from my biological father. Truly, when mom and dad where done, someone may have symbolically offered me into the cracks of the judicial system. However, the chill of a filing, divorce does not end the heat of blood relations; it just means a regular switch-up come Easter, Thanksgiving and Christmas. It meant I might forget who I am in the milieu. It may mean some topics are silent until long after their divorce or after resolving struggles well into my sixtieth year. Still, know my father’s family speaks my name aloud and claim me as their own. This claiming is as comfortable to my soul as Saturday night homily.

Thanks to grandmother, I know that I did not hatch from an egg. I also know that I am not an orphan. Even the small absurdities and fears from pre-pubescent childhood hold weight and shape. Conquering my lingering fears from then is worthy of a knight’s tale to begin. Still, carving swords and minding the poor calls for a bravery that I just cannot sense in my bones just yet.

II.

What I know now is that belonging comes from blood. Even though DNA is the determination in the science of it all, it cannot be the whole reason behind building our clans around foreign fires. Blood sings of itself in every droplet. Family spirits and distant ancestors dwell there as well. Blood sins make us all libel to an older word and sound of guidance.  For now, knowing blood means not just having my grandfather’s button nose, my father’s hair, or my mother’s gait that shows me I have a place at a larger table. That hum I hear with every cut and bruise calls me to sit and listen to memory.

A problem for me is that mom does not hear it. I wonder if some days I depend too much on her judgment. How do I know? Her reactions upon being questioning for an explanation resonate deep. What I have received is a strange look out of the corner of her eyes. Another issue to consider is that her mother is not alive to ask. As for other relatives, I am staid in the fact that if I have to explain and defend blood song then they are truly without a clue. To correct that failing, I will practice by explaining to you.

A former mentor and I sat on the floor of the living room at her temporary residence.  Conversation was born mostly from her mouth and with every turn of phrase, I was learning new concepts.  After lunch, the casting sunlight in the living room shifted past artwork in reflecting glass and she said looking directly in my face, that blood rings out in sound not just for tonality, but musically.  If the telling starts there, then you know the aroma of blood tells a story of its own.  The story is so distinct that it tells nuances that genealogist could never flesh out with as much accuracy. Mentor said there are those that read blood for histories, heritage, strength, and temperament. Understanding her, she intimated that if we listen with intent and respect we can hear clearly, what graveyards only whisper. However my curiosities, she did not prick my finger, but looked into my flushed face to tell me who my people were and from whence they travelled. After listening intently, I, over 2,000 miles away from my heritage home, became dumbfounded. Doubt faded and I finally conceded to open my ears to let every word fall on my head and heart. Humming is all I remember hearing as I left the house that late afternoon. All the whispers about “the store” doubting mentor’s talent and integrity quickly left my mind.  The time for defending her was over.  Now I knew that her reserve and distance from me in public heeded swells of emotion, knowledge, and wisdom that could only be shared in quiet seclusion.  There was no need of a proving ground or repeated challenges; she moved within her power and no amount of reason could deny that.

As for blood, every drop is important.

Since mentor, I know it is nothing that I can waste.

In my mouth now, are faint tastes of salt.

III.

Jehovah’s witnesses forbid blood transfusions. Mormons may speak of blood sin, blood debt, and blood poisonings and for me they are all too elusive to expand upon.  I thought I read once that the spirit in the blood is unique to us all; it is cannot spilled on the ground or be left for waste. I remained in fear during my youth about having to die because I would have to refuse a blood transfusion. Eventually I took my confusion to task and walked away from that faith out of practicality and survival. Up to the point of leaving, the fear had swelled in my bone. Fleeting visions from memory say I came to hate my blood shortly after the call to womanhood. To me, menses was my enemy. It was not until college where I became determined to subdue the pain, frustration, and burgeoning self-hatred for being female.

The doctor came back into the waiting room to talk to me. The Pap smear was painful and I was not very receptive to anything she had to say. I wanted out- out of the room, out of the office, out of this unsaid contract of being female. Sitting across from the doctor, I hunched over in the chair and began to wring my fingers around my wrists. It was one last attempt for help: so I answered her questions and waited to ask my own. The opening came and I asked her about blood.  I wanted so badly to know why the smell was so bad.  I wanted to know why there was so much blood some nights. Lastly, I cried, “why, oh why won’t the pain leave?” I finally told her that I could not stand the sight of my blood and she backed off. The doctor-patient conversation suddenly ended.  The room turned cold and I drew back into the chair and became quiet. After that, the memory ends.

Years went by before I understood the blessing of blood flow. Cleansing, tuning senses, and childbirth, are but a few of the many accomplishments of womanhood.  In that growth, I carry on that visage of mother, Grandma, and me.  If I ever bear, I know my current and distant histories will read in the blood.  My child will know the reasons for self-rejection and have counseling to meet the rigor of life passages.  I can say with honesty and won reserve that the terrors of youth and their shadows end at the acceptance of a physical body, a dedication to preserve life, and living a bloodline commensurate with its wisdom.

©N.A. Jones      2016       All Rights Reserved

Writing: Genus Species II

Genus Species II

If I write about men, my relationships over the years must come into question. The argument stems from the presumption that male relatives, teachers, and icons have more than influenced me.  They have left an indelible mark. As a result, my observations do not completely lay in boyfriends, lovers, and one-night stands.  So, for now, I write an analysis from memories of my stepfather.  If my relationship with men ever took root beyond a greeting, he is the disciplined reason.  He is the first man I lived with and experienced the boundaries of anger, jealousy, and ignorance. For this discussion, the tales revolve round him.

This is the man I screamed for my mother not wed. I spoke just s the Justice began the pronouncement of vows. Great auntie pulled my arm while clasping her hand shut over my mouth. “Quiet,” she insisted into my left ear. I did not cry. I sat still and sulked. The clarity of the moment had gone and I knew that marrying him would change everything. In hindsight, this change would rank in significance with my fears of menopause. For both occasions, it would be the end of life passage.

 “A woman’s body is laden with secrets only their mothers could experience first and later feel obligated to explain.”

She stood at the counter by the sink seasoning a plump fryer. As she turned, I opened the door to the oven while sniffing the air for aromas of salt and herbs. Our conversation about the mundane had not changed, so I thought.  When she commented her first marriage was for love, while the second was of convenience, I tried not to cough over the chicken, as it lay open on the stainless steel roasting pan. It was as if the curse lifted off my head.  Every bit of anger I harbored since the wedding validated itself while my stepfather gazed into the false depths of the television screen downstairs. The Steelers made the first score of the night while everything else in our house went strangely quiet.

I cannot argue against the care and cost it takes to adopt. I felt I lost my name when my father stopped calling by the time I turned six.  I cannot argue against blessings of food, shelter, clothing, and water even into my early thirties.  All of these were blessings that I am not soon able to forget. Still, where was the point of change when I became thankful from hateful? I know when it was and telling may be my undoing.

Knowing when a boy has overcome his petty jealousies and childhood obsessions, may be the growing edge of manhood.  Seeing the change in my stepfather in front of my eyes forced my guard down for several years. His cheeks softened around his facial muscles. His hard jaw released underneath his mustache. What happened? I asked him for a hug. My motivation did not come from previous conversations. Neither was it request born out of emotional manipulation. I was in dire need of support and reaching out came at cost; fifteen plus years of anger had to be released and forgotten.  I became willing to forgive my childhood anger of him replacing me in my mother’s eyes.  As his arms closed round my back, decades of frost and salt building freezing emotional temperatures finally stop from my stiffening my spine.

“I don’t hug,” said mother long go. “My mother and father never hugged. It is not that they did not love me or your uncle, it is just I never understood it as need.”  In the seventeen years they were married I never saw them hug or kiss. It was barely so on their wedding day. On the other hand, I am an emotionally driven person who appreciates physical reinforcement.  Too quickly, other’s love for me is something I too easily forget.  The thought is abstract and distant.  Hugs are demonstrative and reassuring no matter the verbal cues or reminders.  A hug also means a man is not embarrassed to claim me as a close friend in public. It means I stand by you and respect you. That spring after I came home changed the household.  I asked for a hug and the man of the house approved.

I met my stepfather before the marriage. We got along very well. He was patient, yet distracted around me. His draw was for my mother and television. So our play tended to last for a few moments. We had moved into the new house when I met his two children from his first marriage. One early evening, the thereof us stood in the hallway arguing over where we were sleeping. My egging on the situation resulted in his daughter casually whispering that he was not my dad anyway. I shut up, but the others kept screaming until my mother told us all to go to bed. Come eight o’clock that night, I laid in my bedroom alone trying to ignore the slight.  Then, I could not understand what the hidden meaning of her words meant. What I understood was that I had no father. Come morning all I could do is fight everybody.

Growing up I heard men tend to be cold emotionally. Tightly embraced hugs, kisses on the forehead, and holding hands are for little girls. I can hear, “They need that stuff. You are older than that. Toughen up.” Mom’s accusations frequently fell this way, “You are too emotional. Quit taking things so hard.” College friends saw when I ignored emotional dialogue the friendship would tax me to the core.  Even after I felt comfortable reaching out, many would walk away or laugh in my face. Men go without for the sake of being tough and hard. They yield to accumulating reputations to maintain a dominant position in their home and immediate communities. To me, hugging stepfather means he was already yielding. Over that rainy spring, his world must have been changing as quickly as my own.  That afternoon in the kitchen is one of the few points I yield about men and emotions. I have gotten to an age where I want to see that men have intrinsic worth besides providing financial support to live. There must be more to relationships then bragging about financial status and possessions. Forgive me, they must be there, but I just have not met many men who testify to being competent of emotional languages.

Lastly, I can also yield on this point; Men can redeem themselves if they choose to. In hindsight, I am relieved he gave me distance and did not reject my outreach in the end. Because of it, my heart is more forgiving of others than it used to be. One never knows what besets another. So take care to tread another’s earth lightly. I recognize fruit of the lesson. Now partaking, I can walk the ground with care and more confidence in my gait.

©N.A. Jones      2016       All Rights Reserved