Happenstance

I was wandering through a neighbourhood not my own, yesterday.

It was a bit affluent (I have always feared getting that word mixed up with effluent)
 and in my jeans and black top, I didn’t feel I could walk into any of the dress shops that so tempted me.  

They were all empty, the dress shops, and appeared cool and dark inside.  In each, at the end of the rows of gorgeous dresses stood a woman well coiffed, well dressed and manicured, waiting for “real” customers;  customers with money to burn:  not me.  I just did not feel rights to step in and browse.  

So I was outside, on the streets, in the balmy lovely sunshine.

The reason I was in that suburb is because Daniel had an appointment.  The thing is, that place is notorious for keeping you waiting, waiting, waiting (and that professional is worth waiting for).  As Daniel was fine to sit texting his friends back and forth, I went for a wander.

I ambled down one street without entering any shops, crossed the road, went up the other side.  I was aimless, idling time.  There was an intersection up ahead, so I crossed the lights and went down another street.  I heard jazz music flowing through the open windows of a cafe/bar.  I looked in:  again, I didn’t belong.

Then I smelt incense.  I followed it.  I came upon a new age shop.  Comfortable at last, I went in.  Jade, crystals, books, essences… and a sign:  the palm and tarot reader is available.  I thought, hmmm, it’s been a while since I did something spontaneous…  

When I first met Daniel’s father, it was all chance – well, fate. I had decided to try the hairdresser on the ground level of the building where I worked as a court reporter.  That random day the hairdresser chatted, saying she’d met a feng shui practitioner who did a reading, and her life had improved.  I said I’d never thought about feng shui. She said give it a go. Why not, I thought, as I took the number she gave me.  Later arrived Chris at my bed sitter, pony-tailed, vibrant, Eastern wisdom to offer (I thought).

So I asked the attendant how much a palm reading was, and tarot reading, and then – though I had gone out that day for Daniel’s appointment, I decided to give it a go.  I rang Daniel, asked if he had been seen yet, and did he mind me taking half an hour for a reading?  He said, ‘Go for it’.

Wow.

So so much was said, brought into perspective, resonated.  How can this be?  She even became curious at Daniel and drew some cards relating to him.  Again, what she said was entirely credible/related/happening.

Rather than bore you with a self-indulgent post on what the reader said of me, I’m letting you know I have decided to video my recall of the reading.  In a year’s time, I will look at that video and report on what she said that actually happened.  Things are meant to be changing this very year upcoming, so I will “look again” in a year’s time…

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Subbers:  thank you again, for being there.  Thank you for what healing is occurring to me in the writing of Daniel and my story, which you receive – and sometimes comment upon:  I thank you, we connect.   

For a bit of ‘entertainment’, the below video is a poem I wrote and had nowhere to place – about a year after Daniel and me arrived in Melbourne, 4000 kilometres from Perth in Western Australia (where his father is).  The year that followed this became very dark indeed, and the one after that…

but today the sun shines, and this is prosperity.

Sincere best All.

Copyright, Noeleen

Belong

The Indian Ocean breathed upon Daniel and me.  We sat on its shore, at its edge.  It whispered to my consciousness.  I felt so present upon Earth.  Small, but real.

I was conscious of my mortality, conscious of the salt in the breeze, could almost feel salty specks get caught in my nose hairs as I breathed in.  I was conscious of the sun warming us; a mighty heater in the heavens.

Daniel was giggling and interacting with another toddler.  But I stayed very close, so deeply, deeply afraid he might do something wrong like throw sand or hit the boy or frighten him or be loud.  I was ready to swoop in and remove us, excuse us, retreat.  I did not feel comfortable in society.  I was taut with anxiety.  Not even the radiance from the heavens could melt my anxieties.  All of the other mothers, I saw, were capable and confident.  If their child cried it would be normal, accepted, a part of life – but if Daniel cried, I would be guilty of disturbing the peace, guilty of having a child unrestrained of emotion, guilty of being noticeable.

I hated my low self esteem.  I was conscious that the way I was, was not normal.  Yet I did not know how to change how I naturally felt.  How do you naturally feel you have a place in society?  How does an ape sitting in a tree amongst the others feel surely it belongs?  How do you feel you have a right to be, to take up space, to plot yourself on the beach and actually spread out? Where does this sureness of being a valid human come from?

Invalid.  A burden to a mother who must kill herself to escape you; to a father who drank himself into stupor enough to not see you. And now Daniel’s mother.

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A seagull landed nearby me, joined by another, and cocked its head with a knowing.  It eyeballed me, cocked its head the other way.  Yes yes, I had food.   I remembered my hunger, teens.

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The other mother smiled blithely at Daniel and her young.  She looked so relaxed.  Was she actually enjoying being here?  What would she do if… if… I don’t know.  I wasn’t fully sure what I feared, but the unpredictability of Daniel growing and forming alongside me petrified me.

I wanted to put my feet in the ocean, to walk away for a few moments – submerge fully.  I remembered my days before Daniel when I went to the nudie beach, Swanbourne, and bathed without inhibition in the blessing which is the ocean, that chopped about wildly at my feet. As I stepped into the ocean, it drank me into its depths as much as I drank it.

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I could not let it be with Chris.  If I did not establish a foundation of support for Daniel now, there would never be a marker of expectation.  My expectation from Chris was to step up and be a man.  I had to find the balls to face the every day of having Daniel, and he needed to find the balls to support that in the absence of him self.  I decided I would respond to Chris’ argument.  I would write to the Child Support Agency and state what I saw to be just and right from my perspective.  He had given his perspective:  I would give mine.  The Deciders of round 4 would make their decision and we would all live with it (I hoped).

But I would not surrender to Chris’ bark now because to do so would be like cutting cloth painstakingly through the months, leaning over my purpose, stitching the insignia of Daniel and me through stress and fatigue; it would be like hemming that symbol of rights and raising it up a flag pole in statement:  you have engendered karmic debt by your human actions in the throes of pleasure and here we stand to ask you to pay – it would be like that flag being caught by the wind and billowing wide and loud, but being shot down.  It would be like, then, not raising it again.

I had to raise our flag again, shot down by words in opposition, because though Daniel and me were small upon this Earth: we were small, but real.
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Copyright  Noeleen&Daniel 50/50

History in the making

There was two letters in my letterbox, the local newspaper, plus a flyer from a tradesman offering a free quote to have your house painted. 

It remained too difficult to me to get rid of someone who has given me something for “free” – first lesson free, first hour free, free quote.  I seem to be incapable of extricating myself from such lures without buying a course, pack or service.  I loathe this of myself.  It was just as well I didn’t have a house, to quote.

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Holding the letters, I noticed one was from the Office of Births, Deaths & Marriages and the other was from the government.  I felt cold fear at the letter from the government. 

“Would you carry the newspaper for mum please, sweetheart?” I asked Daniel.  He proudly took to the task.  As we walked down the driveway to our flat, I opened the letter from the Office of Births, Deaths & Marriages.  It was confirmation that my request to amend the records of registration of Daniel’s birth had been obliged:  Chris was now recorded as Daniel’s father.

“Tell them I’m a student who went back to China,” I recalled his words, fearing being named, accountable.  “You’re lucky in Australia – the government takes care of it.”  

So easy is fun; infinitely personally challenging, consequences.

I sat at the end of the driveway, the opened letter in my hands.  It was sunny, Perth.  Daniel sat with me.  How could I express to him his father was now written in history because of me:  named as his father.  Chris was not recorded anywhere as the father of his daughter, but because of me he was declared, inked, recorded as Daniel’s father.  

I wondered if Daniel would ever be allowed to know his half sister, or would want to.  For now, it was clear Chris didn’t want me in touch with “the other mother”.  I sensed he feared I would tell this Asian woman that in Australia, she didn’t have to alone bear all the costs of her union with Chris.

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History can be written, and it can be not written, I reflected, watching Daniel spread the newspaper on the ground, and open it out as if we were going to have a reading session there at the end of the driveway. 

As we each live, impacting other lives, how so much is lost to memory – unless crumbs of those lives, their moments, are swept up and collected by someone inclined.  When all players centre stage have exited and the lights are turned off, those inclined creep back in to collect from the floorboards accidentally kicked to the edges to be forgotten, or trampled during violence or passion of living, or swept under some rug: the facts.  Fact collectors cannot help but take record, photographs, and write the drama as it pierced their life.  Anne Frank and countless others caught history because they could not help but record their existence.  They could not help but say. 

And so, I had written history – or recorded it true.  Still I knew, written in history is not the same as written in heart.

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Copyright Noeleen&Daniel 50/50

Life, sex, depression.

Greetings, Subbers

To those keen, curious and those just hangin’, here is a The James Diary update.

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The best of LIFE, to you all.

Noeleen

To lead some kind of a Way

To be touched against your will leaves an imprint, ugly.  I think it is not simple pleasure to the perpetrator.  I think it is a sinister ego which seeks to leave an imprint on another person.  Ugly.

Chris was still touching me when I went to collect Daniel from him after my work at the Police Academy.  It is that which I had instant recall of when I heard his voice on the phone:  his hand sliding down my buttock cheek, patting me, his exploded chest proud and manly, feeling good about it all – and in front of his girlfriend who accepted him sleeping around “because he’s been hurt by love”, as she told me.

When I resign from the job, I would be leaving having to collect Daniel from Chris (largely).  For this I felt better inside. I didn’t want to leave the job.  It was a magnificent break into acting, but it was not sustainable in my life.  Still, I wished upon the natural outrage that some women have at being touched without invitation; I wished I could shout at Chris, “Get your hands off me!” and glare at him, rather than shrink deeper into myself when he does it, as I do.  Childhoods are so accountable.

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“What do you mean I’ve won tattslotto?” I asked Chris on the other end of the phone.  It was a strange way to start a conversation.

“Dada”, Daniel said.  I nodded, and stroked the top of his head, my fingertips feeling softly his silken locks.  Chris was quiet.  I was quiet.

“Huh,” he said. “You don’t got a letter?”

“No, what letter?” I was really beginning to wonder now – especially as I hadn’t entered tattslotto lately.

“I have to pay.”  Oh.

He must have received notice from the Child Support Agency that he is not only liable for Daniel’s life, being his parent, but for having stalled the proceedings so long that he now owed backpay.  I wondered how much.  Chris laughed again, but a snide, unkind laugh.

“There – there – you got your way.  You happy now?”

“Chris, I didn’t get ‘my way’,” I said gently, trying to help him understand.  “You’re Daniel’s father. You are responsible for Daniel.  He’s going to cost money as he grows.  We all did.  We are his parents.”  I paused, then couldn’t help myself, “You’re responsible for your daughter too, you realize?”

“Not the daughter!  Not the daughter!  I told you not go to the courts!”  There was true nastiness in his voice.  I felt deeply bad inside.  I felt guilty.  How cruel of me, to have forced Chris to face his responsibility to our beautiful son, I felt, but conflictingly I also felt the opposite:  not cruel:  normal:  it’s called consequence of actions.

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I cannot forget that night I lay back on his bed and allowed his plunge into me;  allowed because I felt sorry for him and he kept asking and pushing.  Pushing, pushing…‘allowed’.  I didn’t want to live, I was fine to die:  sure, use my body.  Have fun.  Getting pregnant was not possible, me having premature menopause.  Sure, I thought when he said he could hold back his semen – had mastery over his semen.  Yeah, sure, don’t wear a condom – don’t let me spoil your pleasure of my body.  And laying back thus, surrendering to the will of man more powerful than me, my boy Daniel came into being.  What, this life.

“Chris, whatever it is you have to pay, it’s because you avoided it so long.  If you faced – “

“Got your way! Got your way!,” he cut in, and then hung up.

I looked at Daniel at my feet, looking up at me.  No-one had ever looked up at me before in my life.  It was frightening having to lead some kind of a way.

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I began to unpack the pram, place the groceries in the kitchen, wash out Daniel’s bottle.  All the while, thinking.  Perhaps I had got ‘my way’ without even knowing my way this lifetime:  I “got” a baby boy, to become a man.  I got love.  I loved Daniel with all the rays of my heart.  I could not have guessed as a little girl that one day my heart would explode but remain together, and would amplify a love from me so overwhelming that even I was left to wonder in near disbelief, how amazing was its enormity, my love for my boy.

I didn’t have a child with my husband over our nine years of togetherness.  I did not want to.  I couldn’t.  I wouldn’t.  Then I left the marriage – and here is Daniel.  Was that ‘my way’ this life?  Without meaning to – for life itself meant to – had I ‘got my way’:  the way to learn to love, which I had not ever felt through childhood – either loved, or loving to any person in my life.  Closed about age six, I did.  Was this ‘my way’, this love I had discovered through the human being descended to my womb?

I did not know my way this life, but absolutely certain nor did Chris.

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“Meoooooowwwwwww”, called sleek black Pathos at our front wire door.  Us having arrived home from our walk to the shops and our venture with the Firemen, meant to Pathos some cool white milk was due.  He willed his way too.

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Copyright Noeleen&Daniel 50/50

A lock-out, a Fetish, Alfie and the Cats of Conil

On the 30^th of September in 2009, Colleen in the U.S. of A., after having been locked out of her own house, turned on her computer, set up a blog and wrote her first post, I Want in My House.  There is no suggestion that the lock-out caused Colleen to set up a blog, but what is clear is that it was on her mind that first post.

Similarly, no one can really know but Bryan Hemming himself, why on the 3^rd of December 2010 – just over one year following Colleen’s lock-out in the ‘burbs of U.S.A. – started a blog and depicted in his first post his beautiful village, Conil, Andalucia.  The pictures are lovely.  The cats to me, stole the show.

I have a fetish:  it is visiting first posts. 

When I cruise the cyber-highways, usually weekends, and find a blog I like, I cannot “move on” until I’ve read their first post.  Why did they start blogging?  And what did they branch into, or discover of themselves from whence they started?  I really, really enjoy it.

“Twenty-one months of cloistered silence later, Nelle gets over her muteness,” wrote Nelle on the 20^th of March in 2011.    Not exactly 21 months after Colleen found herself locked out, but near enough to – and they don’t even know each other.  That’s just the beauty of it – over cyberspace we can say, Colleen:  meet Nelle; Nelle, this is Colleen. Then what follows, are very human exchanges:  lives, thoughts, feelings, experiences. 

What was that 21 months of cloistered silence endured by Nelle, and why did she start the blog?  That first post flows through to today, where to visit Nelle’s blog is to see she has established herself as a powerful voice for feminism, the core of women’s rights (aka human rights).

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Someone commented to me recently that my life is an open book because I blog.  This isn’t so.  One facet – well, perhaps a few – are open for humanity to view, relate to, be comforted if not strengthened if not inspired by.  But not the whole of my life is open.  Yes, just when you thought it couldn’t get any “worse” – there IS more (to me)!!!!

To read my first post, you know I started this blog because I am a writer offering the first drafting of my novel real raw and true to view, because I was writing inroads for years and etching ache into myself in the recall. 

I wanted to write it away from me, put it out there, let it go.  And you, the sometimes flinching audience to my heart told, relieve me simply by taking the story into your own hearts like any book read, giving feedback and encouraging me to believe I may have something to give in this world. 

“…for whatever reason”, the person then continued.  I write my life for the reason anyone writes an autobiography of spirit, endurance, beauty and ache:  because I must. 

People see an autobiography in a book store and the author, published, is excused – even lauded.  But tell it first round in a blog, and you’re just an office worker with a weird inclination to speak from the soul to the world at large, from your computer in your bedroom, the cat purring at your feet.  Every novel starts somewhere, and this new cyber age enables readers to see authors on the very first steps of their journey (if the author is so inclined).

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“There is an excitement there right now of really being on the cusp of something new,” wrote Jordan Clary on the 9^th of July in 2011.   It was the first post of a new blog launched into cyberspace – she was on the verge of a scholarship adventure, and continued that she will heed advice received while living in China, and “walk slowly”.   By contrast, Amy on 21 June 2011, set up her blog and wrote in her first post that she was packing, heading to Italy.  At that, personally, I’d be moving quickly – throwing all at-hand into my suitcase and singing out the door.

I reckon first posts are too overlooked.  They might have been read on the day they were established, by a handful of people, and then become forgotten as posts tumble one after the other and, in some blogs, snowball into a snowman of specific identity, style and humour… but where did they start at, I always wonder?  I truly cannot resist hitting that first post.

“These Klaxons are just fractions to me”

said Patrick Fennessey on 31 August back in 2011,

“The negativity

That’s entered my life; birth since three.”

I was interested in Patrick when I first ever read his words, but that first post totally nailed it for me.  I’m hooked.

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First posts are part of my delight of blogging.  If you wish to leave a link to your first post in my comments, feel free.  It may take me time, but I will get there.  I’ll have to unjam the photocopier, pretend not to hear the lowered voices of secretaries in the hallways gossiping, and fight peak hour traffic first, but I will get there.

And just in case you ever wondered whether Johnny Bollox’ blog is about Alfie:

“Alfie?

Nothing to do with Alfie at all.”

he wrote on day one 26 March 2012.

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What wrote from black ink darkness

rendered blue to purple sorrow

as lips red told true;

seeped words to bridge the morrow.

 

Shimmers golden life with promise

of healing and resolve

the words dark in trauma

by lighter hues dissolve.

 

The people they embraced

the telling as it told

the universal experience

of life what we behold.

 

A journey it is happening

as all we are so destined

and other souls they harkened

as openly I lesson’d.

 

Why does a writer write?

some of society ask

only us,  fellow bloggers,

know words reveal the task.

 

Why does a writer right?

the unknowing they do query

only us, fellow bloggers,

we find life;  know the theory.

 Copyright, Noeleen

Every day is different

Good morning, Subbers!

Cheers, love, *hugs* and all those beautiful energies you send my way:  back at YOU!   I wish you all, each, this day:  beauty, bliss and the ability to appreciate it.  

Thank you as ever, for being there as I unfold this hell; for coming with, on this journey trekking back as I am but forward, our lives.

I have been quiet this two weeks, yes, and the above video ‘AS ME (wrestling scenes)’ may say a little of why.  But, as I have said to Daniel day upon day upon years, “Every day is different.”  I’ve said that again and again, pretty much accidentally as we’ve woken to whatever has “happened” next, and I decide the day is a new one to tackle in a new way if we must, for every day is different.

Today is not yesterday – as if you don’t know that.  So if yesterday was no good for your wellbeing, I recommend letting it pass and seeing today anew:  new ideas, new ways to tackle whatever it is you must, new moves into new plans:  Your Life.

The weekend is almost here:  my visiting time:  ’see’ you soon.

Sincerely,

Noeleen 

How wonderful men could be

“Sweet Daniel,

This is my final week of late shift, because it takes me away from you too much.  I told them I cannot do nights any more.   I love you so dearly.  I don’t like picking you up in the night, dropping you in the middle of the day.

You’re awake!  Surely not.  Please, you must sleep.  I have to type before I go to work.

Here is another finger painting by you, done at the pool crèche – and a couple of wild pen-to-paper expressions by you, 16 ½ months.

Love, your Mama xxxxx“

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The Police recruits may have to train at night too, but I decided to tell the agency I could not be available nights any more.  I was sorry to alter my agreement of availability but I needed to make a decision for Daniel’s benefit.  I was not enjoying the number of times I rang Chris when I left work to ask if he had Daniel, or he left him with his sister Karen or girlfriend Tracy, to find that Daniel was not with him.  What’s that in the back ground?  People talking?  Is he at a restaurant again?  When people are not up-front with you, you can only guess from what you know of them.

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Time gave way to days, a month.  Soon would be another year.  I decided I couldn’t continue being an actor for recruits at the Academy.  As I walked up the hill of Stirling Highway, pushing the stroller, my backpack laden and bulging with groceries, I made the decision I would find another job.  If I had a normal office job, I could have Daniel regularly in child care.  The child health nurse had said again and again that routine is important to our young, but again and again I failed at living a life routine.

Daniel said ‘fuck’ the other day.  I didn’t know where he got it from.  As a parent, I had to tell him it was a ‘bad word’ – or not a nice word, really.  I had to begin conditioning Daniel that ‘fuck’ is offensive.    It is but not, to my view.    It can be very expressive.  But it is not expressive in a child; that’s just disturbing.

Chris doesn’t swear, I know; Tracy I do not know, her son Phong I do not know, his sister Aunty Karen I do not know.  I wasn’t knowing enough of who Daniel was with and I was trying to trust and believe everyone had Daniel’s best interests at heart like I did.  But I just wanted to know.  I needed to know.

I guess ‘fuck’ isn’t that abnormal.  Maybe there was an argument in one of the households – maybe that was it.

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As we reached the crest of the hill where the Claremont Fire Station stood, I stopped to take off my backpack and retrieve a drink for Daniel and me.  I squatted alongside his pusher and for a moment there was silence between us but for gulps of cool water, and relief.  I looked into Daniel’s beautiful brown eyes and saw an intensity of some kind, that fascinated me.  Wherefrom our young spring, I just do not know.

“There!” Daniel said, leaning as far forward in the stroller as the safety belt would allow.  “There!” he said again, his arms outreaching to me and his head looking toward the fire station.   Its enormous garage doors were open, showing a cool and semi-dark interior.  I could see two Firemen talking to each other, one holding a drink.

“Oh no, sweetheart.  They’re busy.  They’re men at work.”

Daniel began agitating to be freed from his restraint.  I hesitated, but thought that maybe as we had only a short way left to walk, I would let him out so he could use some energy.  He climbed over the railing and moved in the direction of the open fire station.

“No, Daniel!  Busy!” I said.

In my difficulty of repositioning the backpack and standing up, Daniel had already begun toddling off into the fire station, seeking out what he wanted in the world as if life were that simple.

I watched as the Firemen noticed Daniel wander into their garage.  Only one part of me wanted to call him back, with the other part of me also desiring an adventure, a diversion.  Perhaps Daniel could let me into a world I would never normally enter.  I decided to test the potential for an experience.

“Sorry!” I said, calling out to the Firemen and pushing the stroller in their direction.  Daniel, now under cover of the fire station, paused a second.  Standing in the presence of enormous fire trucks and two men in uniforms, my boy finally had hesitation.

“That’s all right” one of the men said, the two walking toward Daniel and me.  I met them just inside the entrance.  As my eyes adjusted to the light, I wondered if my body was physically betraying my secret titillation.

“He’s – we’ve never seen the doors open before,” I said.  They smiled.  “We often walk past but, you know.”

“You live around here?” one of the Firemen asked.

“Yes,” I said. 

Daniel, seemingly a 50 foot descent from the centre of the action, wanted up.  I picked him up and held him on my hip, facing the Firemen.  I suddenly felt not like a woman any more, but a mother.  My sense of flirt retracted and my face reddened.  I wasn’t ashamed of Daniel, but felt inferior, being “a single mother” as Stuart had so nastily pointed out was what I would “be”, “with a screaming kid hangin’ off ya”, before he left me, Stuart did, my lover of two years.  I turned for us to leave.

“Has he ever been on a fire truck before?”

“What?  Oh, no!” I said, still red but sort of smiling.

“Does he want to?”

I couldn’t believe it.  “Yes!  He’d love it!” I said, knocking back a sob in my throat.  I don’t know why, but I felt sad that they were so nice.  It was difficult to accept.

“Do you want to go on the fire truck, Daniel?” I asked my boy on my hip, and he beamed delightedly.  Daniel’s legs started kicking and his arms waving, and the men and me all laughed.

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It was some half hour later that Daniel and me left the company of the Firemen.  For no reason than that we were passing by, these men had given us an experience you would normally pay for.  I was overwhelmingly grateful how kind these men had been to my son, how wonderful men could be.

One had a wedding ring, but the other did not.  The other ventured into conversation which seemed to angle at my availability, my inclination to share my phone number.  But I felt too inferior, and so did not bite.  I felt he did not know what he was getting into – “a single mother”.  And I felt not as together as them in their uniforms, with their stable job, their lives in order.  I felt he was probably only curious to taste me as James had done those years ago before throwing me back in the water, for there are so many fish in the sea.  He couldn’t have been serious, I decided.  He couldn’t actually like me.  I had to be kidding myself – they were only passing time.

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The Firemen behind us as we continued our way down Stirling Highway, I wished I had the self esteem to believe a man could, ever, possibly, like me.

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I caught the phone, but only after almost tripping on the chair alongside my writing desk on which it rested.

“Hello?”

“Huh,” Chris said.

I didn’t know what that meant, and said nothing.  Daniel looked up at me, curious who was on the phone.

“Yes… Chris?”

“You won tattslotto,” he said. 

By Chris’ voice, I could almost see his sneer.  Then he laughed.  He had this thing, laughing at you when something was not funny.

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Copyright, Noeleen&Daniel 50/50

It.

Some days are so painful in my head, inescapably.  I wake up and know the day will be anguish, mental.  I brace to face existence aka life.

A demon clinging since childhood, it grins when I rouse from dreams, my departures.  Unpredictably it crawls into my room and under my covers as I sleep.  I never know when I am to be afflicted.  It claws down my face when I wake. I shut my eyes tight and wish it were not so. I open them again, and see sunshine.  But I feel bleak, hopeless, empty, sad.

Mum had electric shock treatment in a room somewhere down some hallways of some old mental institution.  But it did not stop her suicide.  Dad was electrocuted for ‘treatment’ too.  But still he was manic and depressive; still he viciously emotionally, psychologically abused us.  Seethed.  Seethed he did, like a demon personified.  White spittle always in the corners of his foaming mouth when he bludgeoned us with words that crushed my endeavouring spirit.  His spittle landed on my face, and burned.

My sister the schizophrenic; my sister not a schizophrenic but ever giving to professionals who counsel and counsel, for decades now; my other sister surrendered:  it’s easier to be a victim of our childhood, accept the benefits and call it a day, your life.  But I don’t know my sisters three, and they don’t know me. We are all strangers.  Same family, same orphanage, different planets in the universe.  Not a thread connects us, but blood.  And that has worn thin.

I don’t know, but what I see.

 

Today I cannot see light, life or beauty.  ‘It’ has come for me again.  ‘It’ sinks its teeth like a Rottweiler into my jugular and sucks the life from me, rendering the sun dull, perfume of roses putrid, the laughter between sisters in the streets a shard of no recall that slices down my wrist and draws blood tears.

I peep from under the covers, listen a moment to Daniel’s Angelic breaths in his cot.  I see the sun trying to force its way through a crack in the curtains.  If I fling them open, it will flood me with its glory, beauty, warmth, comfort.  And still I will feel void, lost on this Earth, sad beyond repair.  I know this even before I get up and do it.  But I get up and do it, because I must be victor of my mind, not victim.

Standing beneath the sun’s shine, bare feet on soft carpet, I listen more as my son takes breaths of life in my universe, his tiny heart keeping beat his tiny life.  I don’t want to move, to start today’s momentum, only to use all my energy to the point of exhaustion again – laughing gaily, crying.   But it is only a matter of time – will I be granted minutes or an hour – before I must do; before he wakes.  I must make Daniel and me food, I must get us out the door, I must have us doing something. 

My sister Wendy said in a letter that I should be still more.  She said I don’t need to exhaust myself propelling Daniel and me into activities daily.  But she knows nothing.  She doesn’t have a child.  She doesn’t understand their need and need and need of you, and I have never even been able to keep a pot plant alive – and how you have to keep giving the only way you know, because if you don’t then they cry and you hate to see them rejected by your need to be alone.

And besides, I must keep us active and moving even when it draws from me my last dregs of energy because if I still, then ‘it’ creeps over.  ‘It’ waits in corners of my life, I wanted to tell Wendy but could not; and if I still, ‘it’ crawls into my lap, this sadness from my past, and ‘it’ wants me to stroke its head and comfort it and indulge it.  But I can’t I can’t – I have to keep my energy for Daniel and me.

He catches me, he does, my new witness to Self.  He catches me on days like these staring at a crack in the wall, or a clump of weeds, or a paw print Pathos has so profoundly left in the leafy garden of our Cottesloe flats.  This boy so young sees me as I truly am, though try to hide me I do.  I try to hide ‘it’. I try and be victor of my mind not victim.  But always, he catches me.

~

Chris said he would still care for Daniel so I could work but he wasn’t going to promise to have Daniel any more.  He said that I was silly and over-cautious and he would leave Daniel with his sister Karen or with his girl friend Tracy when he wanted to, and he didn’t need to tell me.  I said that I had a right to know where Daniel would be and he said to trust him.  And I said but I was disturbed that he smacked Daniel for not standing up in the shower that time when Daniel was physically not capable of standing yet and Chris said “that was last year,” and I said “but I don’t want you forcing him to stare at the wall in a corner to teach him focus and obedience like you say you’ll do if Daniel ‘needs it’” and Chris laughed at me, and I said “but why do you say you want to see Daniel and then you palm him off” and he said, and I said, and he said.  Then Chris told me, “I have to go now” and I was dismissed again.

And I can hear the care taker sweeping the leaves on the path outside my flat.

Chris didn’t give back my number 5 top.  He said it was still in the wash.  I am finding it hard to believe him.

Daniel moved in his cot and I froze.  The day was going to have to start; I was going to have to live today.  Please, please don’t wake yet Daniel.  Please don’t wake yet, Daniel.

Milk stirred in my bosom, wept.  Daniel woke.

Standing barefoot on the carpet, staring at nothing nowhere in mental turmoil:  my son caught me, again.

.

.

Copyright, Noeleen&Daniel 50/50

A perpetual anti-climax, actually

WHAT DO Sam, AngryGaijin, Anje, Johnny  and Janine  have in common?

 - APART from that they each blog…

 – and apart from that they do not all sit down to dinner together at night (not that they wouldn’t want to, I’m sure – but they live in different countries)

 – and apart from that Willow left a Thank You award on my cyber-doorstep the other day and not theirs (tee hee!)…

PS… thank you Michael S. Fedison, author and aka The Eye-Dancers for the ‘Shine On’ Award the other day, Judy Unger for that Liebster,  Prinze Charming for the Very Inspiring Blogger Award.… and then IAmNotShe who threw another Liebster on the barbie.

BUT THIS IS NOT AN AWARDS ACCEPTANCE POST.  No-no! 

Sure, THANKS to all those guys, but I can’t get into the awards thing because – you know what it’s like if you take them on:  before you know it, you’ve used all your time researching 15 blogs to pass the award on to, or following rules like “write 5 things you’d like to do with your life” and neglecting Ze Grande Novel you mean to VENT.

That was a pretty good one by Willow:  she made her own rules, herself initiating the Thank You Award (for blogs that have helped her in some way.).  That’s gorgeous, Willow .  If, just say IF I were to list five things I’d like to do in my life, they’d be:

 Get up – UP, UP, UP!

Get lost

Get found

Get real

Give.

WHICH BRINGS ME (not really) TO recall the worst award I ever received.  I received it one weekend after gruelling – I tell you, GRUELLING –  tennis matches.  Of course, as usual there was no-one to cheer me on – it was just Me -v- The World (opponents-who-dared). 

I remember applying all my teen angst that day, my inner rage and never-admitted-wish that I had a dad like dads are meant to be (personal prayer:  may fathers please know how important a role they have on Earth, bring they a boy or a girl to this Life).  At the end of it all, I won an award.  I was proud.  

I ventured considerable pride about myself, though not a pair of eyes was in the audience to meet my happy little self.  I’d beaten all the girls who had mums, dads and siblings at side.  Pride is a sin, my Catholic raising scolded me within, but yep:  I was proud. 

THEN, guess what?  They asked for it back!!!!!!!!!!  I had literally just received it, and they wanted it back.  However, before they could extract it from my proud little grip, they had to get me to understand it was a ‘Perpetual Trophy’.  That is, my name would be inscribed on it, I could hold on to it for a year, and then I had to give it back. 

That was the anticlimax of my life – of my LIFE, I tell you.

I trusted the trophy back to them (like I had a real choice) and never saw it again.  I don’t know if my name was inscribed on it (and likely spelt wrong). I wasn’t part of that club, had walked miles just to be in the tournament, and walked myself back to where I lived after it all.  Yet, like all the medals I kept in a jar, I would likely have lost the thing and not been able to give it back.  So it was all just as well, I guess.

THEREFORE , WHAT do Janine, Johnny, Anje, AngryGaijin and Sam have in common?  Before I even got around to doing a post announcing I wish to be a contender for the BIG BLOG EXCHANGE and humbly beseeching your vote, they up and voted for me already!!  They saw the ‘Vote for Me’ badge on the right and placed an unsolicited vote.  THANK YOU!  

Subbers, literary nomads and all who made it to the very word, I here announce my going for this gig.  There is the opportunity for world travel in it, meeting other bloggers in real life who have a story to tell, and reporting to you the experience in any form I like (oh video camera!! ).

Votes close 15 April

The Big Blog Exchange wants to know what I would recommend for visitors to Australia.  They queried icons? customs?  Well, short of lobbing in at AussieEmu’s  joint to crack a tinnie and throw a shrimp on the barbie, I would recommend a visit to our brilliant Comedy Festival.  There, you are sure to get a taste of Australia which surpasses the Sydney Harbour Bridge, Ayers Rock and all those other icons.  My fave is Dave Hughes.

Thank you, if you don’t mind voting,

& totally fine if you do mind.  I know how “these things can get“.

The telling will continue.  

Cheers ALL

N’n.

The naked strippers or the naked gullible me?

Chris’ brother James was apparently a fighter.  He was, Chris said, always getting into kung fu trouble despite we were living in Australia, in this century.   He had neither a regular job nor a regular relationship.   In fact, nothing was regular in James’ life but Australian government benefits.

.

Sometimes James accompanied Chris when he visited Daniel, and I began to wonder what story was the in-roads to these men.  I had wanted to know Chris and his life when I was with him, but he would not tell me anything about his self.  He only gave vague responses to my inquiries personal, while I lay naked at his side.

Similarly I had wanted to know Stuart, my lover of two years post-marriage.  But he also would tell me nothing of his self.  He spoke in the alternative, such as that he had been with strippers.

“They’re not the lack of brains you might think they are.”

“But it is pretty dumb to think your sex is all you have to give – to not reach deeper into yourself than plain old tits-and-arse shaking. I mean, men steal sex from women all the way through their lives if they can.  There’s no way I’m going to sell it.  My sex is a sharing of myself to one or two especial as an occasion may be, never hordes of nameless desperados.”

Stuart’s contempt at me considering my sex special, he hardly attempted to hide.

“They empower themselves by selling it – instead of having men steal it.”

“It is an illusion of empowerment to prostrate yourself before the deemed master, him tossing coins at you as you ‘choose’ to do that, surrendering to his estimation of you – stripping from clothed to vulnerable, shaking your sex in his face, allowing him to inhale the perfume of your bouquet -”

“What?“

And that would be it.  

I would lie in the wake of Stuart’s sex, idly fingering my pearl necklace and staring up at the ceiling.

.

I had wanted to know James of the casino too – my first grip of man beyond marriage.  But James would not speak of his soul, stating, “I don’t want to love no-one and I don’t want no-one to love me.”  By this drawing of a line in the sand, we only engaged in sex.  He answered my query what his Indian tattoos meant to him, and I read Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee because of him, but what hinting of heart was not scored into his skin, I may not know.

.

And Chris:  a mystery too.  What was this new world I had stepped into, leaving my nine year relationship behind?  Was it normal to not share your heart, to only open your legs, to only ejaculate upon another’s interest of you?

My ex husband David did not know me intimately – typically, as had been my learned way, only physically.

I hid so much:  my bulimia, constant will to die, lack of self esteem so excessive that I hid in the cupboard some days when I heard him arrive with company.  David knew so little of me, whom he had declared love on.  

But I did not expect to encounter the same guardedness from men when I left the marriage.  Out of the marriage, I was willing to brave my self in the world.  I indulged passionately in my discoveries of flesh and spirit beyond the institution from which I had fled.  I reeled.  It truly stunned me to find myself a naked numph in a forest of men emotionally protective.

What had happened since I was 16, before I met David at 17, when boys, if you found the right one – from an abused household like you were, tuned into the music you were; when they were capable of being honest about their feelings through their eyes, touch of you, their time with you?

~ / ~

“He been good, Aunty Karen say he been good all day.“

It was an absolute delight to receive Daniel back into my arms after being free and acting all afternoon.  I had missed him, but I had loved my work.

My guilt at enjoying my work was a vulnerability, I knew.  Chris intoned in many ways and regularly, how fortunate I was that he was helping me.  As I was indebted to him for his stepping up as Daniel’s other parent, as appeared a choice for men, I had to ensure not to rock the boat by suggesting our son needed money for food or clothes or, say, ask for a packet of nappies next visit; nothing like that.

Our court hearing for child support was approaching but neither of us said a word about it.  Chris’ crazy “NO!” continued to resound, from the day I had rung and asked him, “Now the DNA tests prove you are Daniel’s father, will you please sign acknowledgement that you are, and avoid us going to court?”

.

James watched as I cushioned Daniel into my bosom.  I smelled Daniel’s hair, so curiously beautiful to smell, and looked over his head at James.

James continued to stare as Daniel groped about looking for my nipple, tiny hands feeling the flesh of my breast.  He had that stare of someone without the social consciousness to know when to look away.  Either that, or he just did not want to look away.

“Do you mean he was with Aunty Karen all day, Chris?  From when I dropped Daniel to you at 11 am?”  I lifted Daniel above my shoulders, smiled into him, distracted him.

“Yeah, I have very very important feng shui appointment.  Very important customer.  But I pay Karen:  no problem to you.”

.

It wasn’t quite working as we had discussed.  It seemed that Chris had important feng shui appointments every day he had Daniel, so that Daniel was left with either his girlfriend Tracey or with his sister Karen.  I still did not know much of his girlfriend, only the fact she had been a battered wife who escaped her abuser when he first ever caused their son to bleed. I didn’t want to judge Tracey for this, but I did want to know about who she was, that Chris was leaving our son with.

Should I accept Chris’ judgment of with whom he left our son?  Should I trust Chris?  Should I just learn to trust in general, for this I clearly lacked?

I wanted to say something about what rumbled inside, to Chris, though conscious I would be at risk of losing my job if Chris lost his temper over it.  I had to apply some intelligence to my phraseology.  I had to placate male, be gentle, ask without a tone accusing lack of Daniel as priority, why he chose to do feng shui in times when he had Daniel, for after all he was freelance.

“You left Daniel with Aunty Karen on Monday too,” I said.

“Yeah?” Chris said, and James continued to stare..

I often had a feeling that Chris and my interactions were an enormous source of entertainment to James.  He never said much, only looked much.

“Just… I think it would be good for your business image if you were unavailable at times.  They don’t need to know you are a father being with your child – they can imagine you’re busy with other appointments, other clients.  Let them think you’re in demand.  That would be great for your business!”

Chris was sullen one unreadable moment.

“I not even on the Birth Certificate.”

This was sudden.

In typical roundabout style, Chris was actually inviting discussion.

“How can I be the father, I not even on the Birth Certificate?”

“Chris, you are Daniel’s father and you know you are Daniel’s father.  But you abandoned Daniel verbally within minutes of him being born.  Do you remember my phone call to you, to tell you you have a son?”

“Yeah yeah, I busy then.  You embarrass me you ring up you say it’s a boy.  I have people there, I can’t talk.“

.

Daniel had stopped playing with my bosom and settled with simply being in my embrace.  James continued to watch the Australian domestic drama unfold before his eyes..

It was possible Chris had been busy that night I gave birth, and so unavailable to talk, and that’s why he brushed me off by saying it was written in my stars that Daniel was born to me and good luck to me (‘bye ‘bye).  Maybe I had been unfair to Chris.  

But how could he not have time to talk when I am ringing to announce that he is father to a boy?  No, maybe I had been unfair to Chris.

“Oh.  Well.  I told you that influenced my decision to not name you on the birth certificate.  I didn’t think you were worthy to be named, to be Daniel’s father.  But anyway – you told me to tell the government that you are a student who went back to China.  Aren’t you happy to not be on the birth certificate?”

Chris now thought about it.  It was his cue.  Would he be original of delivery or would James play prompt in the wings?

“I not pay nothing, I not on the Birth Certificate.”

“I don’t know if They ever change birth certificate details, but I can try for you if you want me to.  I can write to the Registry of Births, Deaths and Marriages and tell them the results of the DNA test and tell them I know the name of the father.  Would you like that?”

“Yeah I like that.”

“Would you then sign a consent that you are Daniel’s father, and be responsible to Daniel’s prosperity in a financial sense?”

“You don’t need all that official,” Chris said, reverting to day one.  I had naively accepted his word in the beginning.  I had believed that a father could not possibly prefer to go to the casino, entertain various women through the Personals as Tracey said he did, buy himself a new desk  and obviously live just fine, when his newborn son had so many needs – was just starting out in life, was born to him, had so many needs. 

I sighed.  “It doesn’t matter,” I said.  “We won’t talk about it again.  If you insist, we’ll go to court.“

James looked at his brother.  

Chris, irritatedly, turned to leave.  

James followed him.

“Yeah, the Godfather told me he read your palm, he told me I know you then I go to court.“

“What?“  

This was the first reveal to me of anything that had transpired that visit by the Godfather, when they spoke Chinese together, put up Chinese placards about Daniel and my home, Chris gave me $100 and said he would give what he could when he could, and they left.

“You’ve never told me anything that the Godfather read in my palm,“ I said.  “Tell me more!“

“HE TOLD ME I KNOW YOU, I GO TO COURT!“ he barked, and Daniel stiffened in my hold.  

Chris and James left dramatically, banging the door behind them.

.

I did not understand.  In this very moment, with this apparent awareness Chris had of the potential for court issues, he could avoid going to court by facing the challenge of moral responsibility which was presenting in his life.  

I question the value of feng shui, when you are not guided by it but rather, learn how to blame another by what it purports to reveal.

.

I closed our front door gently.  Daniel’s enormous brown eyes looked to me for reassurance that things would be okay. 

I could not provide that reassurance, but I could act.  I had grit my teeth as a little girl and bore it, many many times:  unfavourable moments:  attack by other humans: challenges – like when Mr Mason of 956 R’Road wouldn’t return my bond to me when I left renting his bungalow, at 17, where he had spied on David and me having sex – his gaze a cold shower, penetrating through the slits in the Venetian blinds.

“I’ve got Mr Mason keeping an eye on you.”

“What, dad?”  Chill.

This was just another it.  

I would do whatever was necessary to assert the rights of my beloved son in this day time and century.  I would enable for my son financial support by his father.  I would not be like the “other mother” – the mother of Chris’ daughter.  

.

But who really, I wondered as I set Daniel down to play and seated myself alongside – who really is the ‘pretty dumb’ female:  the naked strippers or the naked gullible me?

~

~

Copyright,

Noeleen&Daniel 50/50

Survival of life remained not possible without mental spillage by pen.

Thank you, Aunty Uta.  

You made a comment  some weeks back.  You said people would be interested in reading my James Diary – the words I wrote in my first year out of marriage.  

I wrote it here and there, in some parts literally crouched at my locker during work breaks at Burswood Casino, where I was croupier.  The other girls – people I did not relate to would say, “What are you writing?“  I’d reply, “Just stuff.“  But there I was in amongst them, recording life like an Illusion sunk slow-mo’.   Survival of life remained not possible without mental spillage by pen.  .

~

A private investigator I came to know – not Stuart the PI, my lover of two years, but Geoff; he read the James Diary.  I had mentioned it some day some why, and he wanted to read it.    

He finished it overnight.  Then asked what else of me he could read.  

I was sort of complimented – “sort of“ because dad had defined, and I had not yet redefined, that “Boys will never want you for you:  will only ever want you for sex.”  With dad’s decree not yet quite disproven, I was skeptical of Geoff’s interest in my “writing”.  It would be nice if he meant it – of course, of course – but, I don’t know…

~

Aunty Uta, thanks directly to YOU - and AussieEmu‘s generous and encouraging comments just  a day ago – when I received a discounted offer re self-publishing via email coincidentally, I decided to do it.   And now I’m doing it!  Here is my draft of the front and rear covers.  I wonder, does it make you want to read…?

FRONT COVER

BACK COVER

The blood splat will NOT be used in publication, as it is the work of Hot Cookie.  I am using it only in example to communicate to the graphic artists at the publishing house, what I wish represented in that space.  I was thinking “a splat of blood with a hint of heart”, then I found this visual of Cookie’s.  Perfecto!

What I do wish to use, though, is quotes from a handful of readers, of what they think of my writing.  I’ve chosen the following quotes, and here openly request your blessing, each, to use your comment on the back cover of the book.  May I have your OK Sharon?

“Haunting and heartbreaking. And yet amazingly, incredibly inspiring.”   Sharon - http://aleafinspringtime.wordpress.com

and Elle who commented on my ABOUT but has no link? 

“I just read ‘give and take’ and shook and cried for the longest time. Whole and true.”  Elle   

and Elizabeth?

“Beautiful… I was moved by it all… Great piece of writing too.”   Elizabeth – http://mirthandmotivation.com

and ‘Blackbirds‘?

“Very powerful writing.”   **NAME** - http://spinningblackbirds.wordpress.com

 and Colleen?

“You are a teacher.”   Colleen - http://bikecolleenbrown.wordpress.com

If so, please let me know how you wish to be represented.  For instance, do you want to be quoted as ‘Colleen Brown, USA’ & link or ‘Colleen’ & no link or ‘ChatterMaster’ & link or whatever.  Please let me know! 

~~~

I’ve decided The James Diary will be AUD$12.99 hard copy.  Plus AUD$3.99 post & packaging no matter where in the world you are for up to three books, then AUD$1 per book thereafter.   My birth date being the 3rd of the 3rd ($1+2+9+9=21… 2+1=3), this feels “all good” to me.  

SPECIAL OFFER

Because I’m just me – not famous, special or blogger extraordinaire; besides which, people are self-publishing all over the place, my way of making this first outting (of my mind) special, is to make a special offer!!  And that is:  the first 39 paid orders will be autographed by me.    How is that ‘special’?     {blush} Yes, I get your point.  

This offer is made ARGUABLY ‘special’ by the fact that I will not consider autographing another copy until after the 3,639th hard copy is sold (hah hah hah, hee hee hee – I know!!!…!!!).  If you think that may become a “genuinely special thing” in time, then invest in your hunch now. 

To honour this offer, we together need to know what a ‘paid order‘ and ‘the first 39‘ means in this offer.  So, a paid order is an amount of AUD$12.99/The James Diary + AUD$3.99/post & packaging worldwide +AUD$1/post per book beyond three made to me via Paypal,  and that payment being received by me.  

To pay by Paypal, input my email address nandd333@hotmail.com at the SEND MONEY tab, and follow the way.  It’s surprisingly easy – I mean that!  I’ve done it! Please email me (nandd333@hotmail.com), alerting me of your order, and what name and address to send the book to.

A ‘paid order‘ for the purposes of this promotion is NOT an order made using the email wordsfallfrommyeyes@hotmail.com.  Orders made through there will be honoured, but for accuracy of determining ‘the first 39‘, will not be counted.  

‘The first 39‘ is the first 39 book orders received through nandd333@hotmail.com Paypal, which are paid orders. 

~

Wow.  That was really businessy.  But I know that money is business and I wish to be completely transparent in what I am offering, and will deliver.  Please knowI am in pre-production and don’t expect the hard copy to be issued before 1 May 2013, at a guess.

Whether it will ever prove special that I only autograph 39 books before the 3,639th is “anyone’s guess“.   Hey!  I just realised this is special because only my subbers and passers-by will get this opportunity!  Sweet

~

Again, Aunty Uta, AussieEmu - all of you really:  thank you for giving me the confidence, at this later stage of my life, to actually put something up for publication.  I have had some short stories published, and erotica in both the U.K. and U.S.A., but this is something I’m a little more precious about: the inner me.

I know I’m paying for publication(!), but here today I begin to dream: one day by my words I profit and I then, after all in the very very end,  leave something for my only child Daniel…other than debt.  In that alone, I would have grown beyond what our family of Irish dysfunction/fortitude, Polish iron constitution/tragedies of the mind,  has ever achieved.

Make no mistake, you have played a part in this coming about.

Sincerely,

N’n.

The opening words of The James Diary:

Hi.  It’s Sunday May 16^th and I’ve just decided to write to you.

Actually, I decided it on Swanbourne as I lay naked with my face in the sand, wondering how I could stop myself from continually annoying you.  Then it hit me – if I wrote to you but never sent the words, just pretended I was talking with you and you were a wee bit interested, I’d be satisfying the part of me that wants to reach out to you.  Though not the part that seeks to touch you.

I really had to think of something because I know I’m irritating you.  Every time you’re in range I overflow with eagerness, and you turn away in distaste.  I trip up emotionally, try to hold back, try not to annoy you, try and not flush with sexual pleasure at seeing you.  But nothing works.  I’m not a person who can be restrained from expression – I don’t even see reason to cage what you feel, or reason to censor your delights, your thoughts, your passions, your moods.

.

I don’t expect I’ll write forever, but as long as I want to talk to you and you don’t want to hear from me, I’ll write this diary toward you.  It’s the only solution I see fit, for these last months I’ve written you so many times then just burnt my letters, lying on my bed in candlelight, or buried them on the beach where perhaps they’ll be stumbled upon by some person who dropped their keys in the sand.  At  least this way I can burn the whole book of you, not torturously letter after letter.

I can hardly believe I still want to talk to you after so long, but I do, and I hope these notes will systematically exhaust all I wish to share with you, and the whole event of James In My Life will finally, eventually, be over.

 

Copyright, Noeleen