Red Monkey

January 31, 2008

Living at the Edges

In Austin, we had lived miles from both elementary schools I attended, the beloved Pillow Elementary and the much despised St. Louis. After just six weeks back at Pillow for third grade, we moved to Arlington (in between Dallas and Fort Worth). My mother was ecstatic that they'd found a good school for us ... and just six blocks from our new house. Once again, my father had chosen a home with a backyard that was bounded by a fence ... and behind that, no other houses. In Austin, we'd lived in Balcones Woods and behind our fence was a wild tangle of woods untamed, unkempt and beautiful. Here, it was simply an empty field, but at least it was not another home staring straight into ours. I suppose this was Dad's response to living "in town" ... I don't think he liked the 'burbs any more than I did.

At any rate, Mom was ecstatic that I would be able to walk to school or ride my bike and she could be relieved of that burdensome chore.

There was a playground outside the school, but it seemed it was always reserved for the younger children. The older kids went out to the field to the south of the school.

Since I'm strolling around the elementary school stomping grounds, I thought I'd show you the climbing tree I mentioned in my previous post. This is shot from just south of my climbing tree ... a little west of the other day's dreaming valley ... and looking northward to the school. Clicking the image will open a new window with a somewhat larger version .. you know you can refer back to the big images whilst I point out details. :)

Hit Play to listen to a song that always reminds me of this time period ... and just the general feel of my warm woodsy places.

Things have changed both more and less than I had thought when I went back for a look a couple of years ago. My personal playground of trees were all still intact, including my climbing tree here. It's just a scraggly ole twisty pine tree. Resin would "bleed" out of the tree and stick to our hands and clothes. And as you can see here, being up in the tree, you really had little cover to hide from the teachers if they happened to come by that way. The funny thing is ... I'm horribly allergic to any of the aromatic trees. Cedars are the worst, but pine trees will set me off, too. But I don't recall ever getting an allergy attack from this tree.

In the middle area of the picture, you can see a fire lane. That wasn't there back in the day. Instead, there was a little run-off. We called it the dry creek ... unless, of course, it was raining. I would pretend it was a canyon for my Fisher Price Adventure People (these were the precursors to the Star Wars action figures), even though I wouldn't bring my prized toys up to school. The various undercuts and sediments in the "canyon" there made me think of my beloved New Mexico and cliff dwellings and I often lamented the fact that we didn't have such a cool run-off in our backyard so I could play in it properly. My parents, of course, were flabbergasted that I would want such a nasty trip hazard in the backyard. Parents are so short-sighted sometimes.

The other fun we would have in the creek was "mining for lead." Until we realized that lead was a metal and not the stuff inside our pencils. Then it became "mining for graphite." The dirt was a brown-red colour, tan in places, darker in others. And buried in the hard sediment were "pebbles" of graphite. We'd take hardened sticks and perform our digs ... sometimes grabbing sharp rocks to help break apart the hardpan dirt. Suddenly, you'd get this red-brown marble to pop out, usually showing some of the graphite where your stick had burst the outer skin of dried mud.

For some reason, the school did not really appreciate our graphite markings on the sidewalks and bricks. It wasn't vandalism to us, we'd do it right in front of the teachers. It was decorating our home. Leaving our mark on the place where we spent so much time.

Adults, truly, were unfathomable at best. So picky. So many stupid rules just for the sake of rules.

For a suburban school, we had a pretty "rural" playground unfettered by an overabundance of metal apparatus or being restricted to the concrete and asphalt. The soccer field to the left of the picture? That was mostly an area of no grass and had deep creases in the land from rainwater run-off ... nothing like our dry creekbed ... but enough to make playing soccer there a bit more complicated than the norm. Back then, our goal posts didn't have the diagonal outcross where the net is attached now. We had just a rectangle of thick pipe delineating the goal. Most of the time, there would be a mob of boys on the soccer field, standing in little groups here and there ... and then a huge mob with a cloud of dust, scrabbling over the ball. Girls were not really welcome on the field, although I did play a few times. I mostly got yelled at for kicking the ball in the wrong direction. Which was interesting, really, seeing as I was not on anyone's team. Girls were not picked for sides in soccer there ... so I became my anarchist, oppositional self and simply kicked the ball wherever I wanted to kick it.

I can recall one day in fifth grade, hanging from my hands ... I was perhaps an inch or so off the ground, just dangling from my grip on the huge pipe. There were probably six or seven girls pretending to do some sort of arcane gymnastics off the bar, but in reality, we were all just kind of hanging around. The boy who was goalie on this end got mad and wanted us all to go away. He hollered. We ignored him. The ball was waaaaay down the field on the lower end. It was not coming up here for quite a while. I think he was bored more than he was mad at us. He paced. He groused.

And then he came up behind me, shouted "GET DOWN AND GO AWAY!" and he pushed me in the small of the back.

I landed on my ass, my arms out behind me propping me up. The left arm hurt and I wanted to cry ... not from the pain in my arm which was not that bad - I'd felt worse ... but because I had been singled out. There were a bunch of girls still hanging around. Why was I different? Why was I a target?

I stood up, dusted myself off and headed down the hill.

I didn't realize that my arm was broken. I thought at worst it was sprained and I dutifully told my mom that night at dinner that I thought I had sprained my wrist. She rolled her eyes, always certain that my sister and I were making up any maladies, because, well, that's what kids did. In the eleven years as my mother, she had yet to realize that when I said "ow" ... there was a serious problem afoot, probably more serious than I thought. So Mom rolled her eyes and asked how bad it hurt and I said, "Not that much. I think it's just sprained." Instead of upgrading it from "not that much" to "crap, my kid is hurt," Mom downgraded it from "not that much," to "kid is exaggerating it."

And with a great many kids, that's not a bad guess. The thing is, you have to know your child to make this call, and of course, sometimes you still get it wrong. But I would have thought my dramatic eardrum bursting at age 4 or 5 would have been the one incident to point out to her that I have a very high tolerance for pain.

After three days of trying to use my left hand as little as possible, I finally told Mom that I thought I needed to see a doctor. This was a big deal in our family, and it often felt like I was making a huge imposition on Mom's time and budget. She fussed, but agreed to take me. I could hear her telling the nurse that no, she didn't think my arm was broken, but that I wanted it looked at.

The doctor sent me in for an x-ray and as we drove back to the doctor's office ... Mom pulled out the x-ray and looked at it. Well, okay, not while she was driving, but as we sat in the car before returning to the doctor.

"It's not broken," she pronounced as she looked at the film. "All of this is for nothing. Do you know how expensive x-rays are?"

"I thought we had health insurance," I protested.

"Well, yes, but it still costs something."

Chastised and down-hearted, I stared out the side window all the way back to the doctor's office. Once there, he took the film, put it up on his light and pronounced quickly:

"Yep, it's broken, all right."

My mother was in shock.

So was the nurse. "You told me there would be no casts today!" The doctor was a little surprised at her vehemence. "I wore my black slacks today because you said there would be NO CASTS."

Since the break was at least 3-5 days old at this point and since it did not need to be set, the doctor decided on a compromise. They wrapped my arm and then made a U from the elbow out to the wrist. Then they put an ace bandage over that. The doctor was proud of the lightweight cast. The nurse didn't get any plaster on her black pants.

And I missed out on the rite of passage to have your cast signed by all your friends.

And to add insult to injury? They gave me a crappy square of some kind of cotton-thin canvas material to use as a sling.

I was floored. No plaster cast for everyone to sign. No cool, form-fitting sling. Just a painful knot at the back of my neck.

I had had enough. Mom refused to buy a "cool" sling and I was not going to take any more "good enoughs" that day. I dove into Mom's fabric basket and came out with a decent sized piece of blue corduroy, some thread, a needle and headed back to my room to sew myself a nice, form-fitting sling. Took quite a while to sew it all by hand with one arm in a sling, but it came out pretty well.

The next day at school, all the teachers wanted to know where I'd gotten that cool sling and their eyes bugged out when I nonchalantly answered, I made it. ... no, I didn't have a pattern. No, I didn't have any help. I didn't like the sling I had and I got mad and made the kind of sling I wanted.

I was stubborn that way.

At recess, I sat at the base of my climbing tree, my t-shirt getting bark and resin on the back ... and I watched the boys playing soccer, my eyes constantly scanning for one.

I never did know which boy broke my arm.

I spent the next six weeks reading books under my climbing tree until the cast finally came off. At the edges of the playground. On the edges of the kids playing. Watching. Reading. At the edges.

Posted by Red Monkey at 5:53 AM | Comments (3) | Storytelling: She was, of course, supposed to be sleeping. | Vacations and Photos | Stumble

January 29, 2008

Dreaming ...

It is a well known fact to anyone who knows me at all well, that I hate winter with a fiery passion. That, in fact, I proclaimed in CCD (think Catholic Sunday School) loudly and frequently that hell was not hot, but cold. Naturally, the parents who'd volunteered to teach were scandalized but hardly knew what to do with a child who simply out-logic'd them about the issue. (Well, we say "left out in the cold" when someone leaves us ... or "turns a cold shoulder," right? And if hell is the absence of God ... then God has given those in hell the cold shoulder and therefore, OBVIOUSLY, hell is cold. These poor volunteer teachers just kind of blinked at me and ignored the issue all together.)

Come to think of it, this is the way most adults tended to deal with me. Anyway.

I talked in an earlier post this month about when I first moved to Arlington and began attending Butler Elementary. There was one area we used to stage our Pretend games of Hardy Boys ... Nancy Drew when Tracy got upset and put her foot down about us playing at being boys. Sometimes Star Wars and sometimes we just made stuff up. There was a tree that was our front door ... another that helped delineate the "rooms" of our "house." Another that I climbed incessantly despite the fact that tree climbing was expressly forbidden. (And it's a measure of how invisible I felt ... and possibly how much the teachers knew what "being in trouble" meant to me ... that they sometimes walked right underneath the tree I was in and never said a word ... despite the little ratty tattle-tales.)

But this place ... this place was for dreaming and the photo does not even begin to do it justice.

If you click through, a desktop wallpaper version will pop up ... 1680x1260.

That rock, that's flat to the ground, mostly buried ... yeah, over there on the bottom, kind of to the right. We used to sit on that and look down into that little "valley" below us and just dream. We were always quiet and serious there. Some places just ask that of you and even grade-schoolers can sense it. Later, when recess was a little less about games of Let's Pretend and a little more ... for me, anyway ... trying to figure out life, the universe and everything, I can remember laying on my back, watching the sky ... trying to find a way to watch the sky and my little valley at the same time ... and, of course, solve all the issues in the universe. All in a 30 minute recess.

For me, the small pathway entrance into the woods represented so many different things. And that clearing you had to pass to get to it. Completely exposed ... except because it was a "valley" ... the teachers couldn't see us if we went down there.

I know my love of that spot drove most of our teachers crazy. It was at the very, very edge of our "safe" playground area. Going down to that valley, or worse, into the woods, was strictly forbidden. The kind of forbidden that kids hate because you can feel the adults' fear behind the edict ... when they are honestly scared that "bad things" will happen to any child who disobeys. It's a very different feel from the arbitrary, we're-imposing-order-upon-you kinds of rules.

And, to be honest, the entire time I went to Butler, at least once a year there were reports of "flashers" in raincoats just waiting to show off for some kid. And, there was a creek which ran through the narrow strip of woods ... home to the ever-lovely cottonmouths (water moccasins).

For me, the woods represented something else completely. Some flashes of a special place. Tinged with hints of fear. Coloured with a need to explore and discover and learn. A need to know and put an end to something that I couldn't name ... and at the same time I was terrified that I was not ready to know what answers the woods might hold, what they might unlock.

Our teachers took small groups through the woods on science expeditions from time to time. And I could see where the older kids ... the neighborhood kids had set up BMX bike ramps and obstacles. A rope swing to get across the creek.

The magic of the woods danced on the unknown edges during these excursions, as if the mere presence of adults ... of a gaggle of other children ... forced the things I needed further away into the undergrowth ... dancing up the vines into the treetops ... lurking in the gaping wounds of some of the tree trunks.

A couple of times, when I was near the end of elementary school ... when I had started junior high and was playing one summer, I went into the woods alone, hoping to unlock this thing that kept teasing me. Nothing bad ever happened. I saw a couple of other kids, playing. No adults. No snakes.

And no answers to my mystery, either.

Despite the fact that the woods taunted me from my recess perch ... when I was finally able to explore them, I was left with one conclusion:

These were the wrong woods.

Beautiful and interesting in their own right. Mysterious and captivating.

But these woods were not, after all, my woods.

And my woods ... Balcones Woods ... back in Austin ... those had been torn down.

I would have to find my answers another way.

Posted by Red Monkey at 5:23 AM | Comments (5) | Storytelling: She was, of course, supposed to be sleeping. | Struggles | Vacations and Photos | Stumble

January 24, 2008

Writing

Dan Leone over at Cafe Leone was wondering if other writers prefer to write their stories longhand or on the computer. After I'd typed in two paragraphs in his comments and was getting read to start a third, I decided that perhaps I should make a blog post about this instead of leaving poor Dan a novella of a comment.

So, longhand or computer for writing? Well, it depends on my thinking process, actually. There are times when I want to move more slowly and deliberately and think through things - that's when I write longhand. I'm usually still getting a feeling for the characters at that time and possibly the plot (at least the beginning details) as well. Often I haven't fully built the world in my head yet.

Once I'm rolling, I certainly prefer the computer for writing. I can type much faster than I write and my handwriting, particularly since I have ADHD, is beyond atrocious. I have a terribly tendency to write with a .5 or .3 mechanical pencil and begin writing smaller and smaller as the story goes on. This makes transcribing it later a nightmare.

The first novel I wrote in high school, Lichtman's Bluff, was based on a dream I'd had which really, really captured my imagination and I knew I had a great storyline and great characters. School that day was a torture - I wanted to write, not listen to boring classes. That evening, I had to babysit my favourite family. As soon as the kids were in bed, I found some paper, pulled out my trusty .3 pencil and commenced. The first draft was about 30 or 40 pages, light pencil scratch on baby blue paper ... no margins to speak of. Then I began transcribing it into the Commodore 64 word processor. I could not touch type then. It took forever. A year later, I had my own word processor, a Magnavox Videowriter, and was working on the third draft. At that point I was closer to touch typing and the story went a lot faster. Not to mention, the action on the C-64 keyboard almost required me to two-finger type anyway. The action on the VideoWriter was much easier and less stressful on my li'l ole fingers.

(I was going to post a scan of that draft ... but I can't find the original draft any more. :( )

Most of what I write today begins life on the computer. Not everything, though. I have been known to grab scraps of paper and begin a character outline ... or a bit of plot ... just to capture the moment. Even I don't have my laptop with me every moment of the day. (I know this is hard to believe, but it's true. Of course, when it's not with me, I go through withdrawals, but that's another story.)

However, the biggest drive to using the computer to write fiction today ... has less to do with the feel of paper and pencil versus keyboard. It's much more practical than that. You see, I prefer to write in the dark. I can, to quote Adam from MythBusters, "reject your reality and substitute my own" far more easily with the lights off. And since I have a happy MacBook Pro with the light up keyboard ... writing in a dark room with just the glow of the stereo and the computer, I can more easily transport myself into the world about which I'm writing.

So, the short answer to Dan's question is that I use both ways of writing at different times and for different purposes.

* Photo of the Magnavox Videowriter is from Joe Schumacher's EXCELLENT photography site. If you have not been there, please check him out. There are just some stunning shots there.

Posted by Red Monkey at 5:00 AM | Comments (0) | Storytelling: She was, of course, supposed to be sleeping. | Stumble

January 16, 2008

It

In high school, I wrote my first complete novel. I'd been attempting novels since the sixth grade, but I had this amazing dream early in my senior year of high school and spun it into a novel. It turned out to be a horror novel, which surprised me. I'd never read any horror books and thought they were probably all lame - scandalous elitism (hush, cabal) from someone who loved science fiction and fantasy books. So, I decided to read Stephen King to see how I stacked up. I found Carrie interesting and appalling both. It was interesting enough ... too short ... definitely a writer's "early" work ... and great googly moogly, but I could write that well. Sheesh, if that was the bar for getting published ....

And then I read Stephen King's It. I was hooked on Stevie-Boy for life at that point. My friend Andy dragged me to go see Stand By Me. Again, I was mesmerized. Stevie-Boy and I thought a heck of a lot alike.

What hooked me the most was his ability to write characters and to understand them so very well that not only do you get deep insight into many of them, but the interplay between characters, particularly in "The Body" and It, is almost to be one of the gang. What was particularly poignant for me was a line near the end of chapter 32 of "The Body" novella in the Different Seasons collection:

Friends come in and out of your life like busboys in a restaurant, did you ever notice that?

We moved so often when I was little, friends were hard to come by for me and they were precious. So while I understood that you lost friends and made new ones when you moved, I was searching for stability in my friends ... and I didn't understand how they could move in and out of each others' lives and mine so "easily."

A fast breakdown for those who haven't read the blog long:
born in Amarillo, Texas; moved to Houston, another place in Houston; Albuquerque, New Mexico; Oklahoma City; Carmel, Indiana; Austin, Texas. Then I started kindergarten in Pillow Elementary. Second grade at St. Louis Catholic School. Began third grade back at Pillow, but after the first six weeks of the year, we moved to Arlington, Texas. Out of six possible semesters of junior high, I had 3 at Nichols and 3 at Shackelford. High school was blissfully the same all three years.

Despite having both a mother and a father, a "stable" family unit ... my life was anything but stable. I was always waiting for the next time I would have to move on. I was terrified to make friends and too lonely to not make them.

I can remember the first weeks of third grade at my third new school in as many years vividly. Being introduced to Carrie Thompson, who was to be my "official" friend and show me around the school ... show me the ropes, as it were. We became good acquaintances ... she came over to my house and I went to hers, but we didn't seem to have a great deal in common. And then I stumbled into Tracy and Jill. We seemed to hit it off well at first. Recess games were fun. We hung together in Language Arts class. But, unbeknownst to me, Tracy and I had some similar family issues which made us both bull-headed in different ways. For Tracy, it was a need - and this is totally my interpretation and may not be at all how she sees things - but it seems to me she had a need to be in charge and to not let anyone truly outshine her. I don't think she wanted to be noticed any more than I did, really. But she was determined not to be at the bottom, either.

So for the first week or two that the three of us were friends, Tracy ran our schoolwork with a fist more iron than that of the teacher. Third grade in the 70s consisted of mimeographed purple worksheets. Half the time, the sheets were still damp from the machine and sadly lacking a grape smell that might have made the purple colouring tolerable. Tracy would tell us what number to work to. Maybe to number ten. Then you would stop and wait for the others to catch up. That way, we could all be twinkies and turn our papers in at the same time. I soon learned it was so Tracy wouldn't be the last one to turn in her worksheet, but that we could all three turn them in together.

Our school was "Open Concept" which was, in general, an utterly hellish educational experiment of the 70s and 80s:

Years before the recognition of Attention Deficit Disorder issues, Butler Elementary began as an "open concept" school, with grades one through six in one large "room" of the building. Each grade level was "divided" by rolling bookcases about five feet high and more of these bookcases were used to lightly subdivide each "classroom" within a grade level. Teachers' desks were in a cluster in the center of the grade level area.

I struggled at the beginning of that year. I was put in the second high language arts and math classes at first, despite the fact that at my old school, I was much further ahead in both subjects. When I was finally bumped up, to the "high" classes, they were still behind where I had been at Pillow. So it didn't take long at all before I tired of waiting for Tracy to catch up on the worksheets. And the day I did, despite how much I wanted to make BFF with Tracy and Jill, was the day that I inadvertently started a war.

I remember clearly working on the purple inked paper. Looking over to see where Jill was. And then looking over to see how far behind Tracy was. There was just no way. I couldn't pull out a book and read until I was finished with my worksheets. And I just couldn't sit there and wait for Tracy to catch up any longer. I continued working on the worksheet. When Jill reached the requisite number, she turned to look at my worksheet. The look on her face ... panic. Alarm. And that probably should have been a warning to me as to how Tracy would react. Jill looked over at Tracy's worksheet. Back at mine. I remember her hesitating. Shrugging her shoulders. And continuing her own work.

When Tracy finally got to the stopping point, she looked at Jill's paper. Shocked and betrayed. Looked over at mine. The look of terror and anger both overwhelmed me. I hadn't expected this. I didn't mean for it to be a big deal. I just couldn't wait any more.

Tracy, however, saw it as my attempt to usurp her power. She burst into tears and told the teacher that I had called her a name or some such nonsense. I was shocked. The look of loathing on her face. And from that moment on, the war was on. For the rest of third grade and fourth grade, we did remain friends ... and even added new people to our little group. But from that point on, Tracy was diligent about remaining in charge and largely held that group of four together through high school.

And partly because I didn't see the point in "being in charge" of my friends ... and partly because I was terrified to even attempt to make other friends, I tried not to fight her. Even when she got ticked off and "hired" boys to come beat me up during recess. (Oddly enough, the closest one ever came to beating me up was a boy who fought like a girl, all cat scratches and no good solid roundhouses.) She would always tell me that she didn't do it, but invariably when I asked the boy why in the hell he was attacking me, he'd always say, "Tracy asked me to."

By fifth grade, I had no friends to speak of. Tracy had finally gotten furious with me for something I can't recall and commanded everyone in our group to stop having anything to do with me. For my part, I was tired of fighting with her and I simply stopped even trying to hang out with the others in our group. It was simply no longer worth it. I eventually did make other friends, but it wasn't until ninth grade that I had really close friends again.

And perhaps this is why Stephen King's "The Body" and It speak so poignantly to me. Both books revolve around the concept of friendship, of doing anything for your friends and of knowing them well enough to know their weaknesses not so much to exploit them (although teasing is, of course, perfectly acceptable), but to keep them out of trouble and to protect them from others.

Gordie and Chris from "The Body," knew that their families were ... let's say not supportive. Chris' family was outright abusive and the surrounding community simply abused Chris further. Gordie's family ignored him. The boys became family for each other. Teddy's family was also extremely abusive and Vern's was a little harder to read (or I don't remember it as well). Certainly Vern's older brother was not going to win any good brother awards .... But, despite the fact that the four boys were something of a family to each other, Vern and Teddy slipped away ... "like busboys in a restaurant." Chris and Gordie continued to be family to each other.

In It, there is a larger group of children and a definite set of enemies for them to fight. (One supernatural and one set was "mundane.") And again, the children bind together in an exceedingly strong family for the duration of the crisis. (The slipping apart has more to do with the supernatural plotline, so I'll skip that.)

I never had any friends later on like the ones I had when I was 12 - Jesus, did you?

Those friends for me didn't come until later, until I was 14 or 15 or so. And that was largely my own fault as I had simply never learned to be human enough to truly let potential friends in. Even still, I found it difficult to let my friends know just how important they were.

And, I suppose, that ruminating on all of this is why I have been trying so hard to hook back up with the people I knew in high school (and some of them even longer than that). It is partly a reality check on my memories (do you remember when we did ...) - but it's largely because to me, my close friends were like family to me then and I've always hated that we let that connection slip away. On my end it was simple fear that I had imagined that connection and that they meant far more to me than I to them. On their ends?

I've no idea.

I love that I've reconnected with some of them. One of them is even from Tracy's little group, although she wasn't part of the fighting from third grade, and, in fact, was friendly with me all throughout school and even college. I'm proud of her like I'm proud of my buddy, Andy. Like I would be proud of siblings. There is still that family connection to me.

I know now that a portion of this is that we do have families of choice as well as families of origin ... and that this is especially true when there was significant childhood trauma involving the family of origin. But I don't know how to express what I'm thinking and feeling at this moment ... just trying to explain what those old friends meant and still mean. I'd hoped by this point in the post, I'd be able to say something meaningful ... but because we do think so much alike, instead I'm left with one last quote from Stephen King's "The Body":

The most important things are the hardest things to say. They are the things you get ashamed of, because words diminish them - words shrink things that seemed limitless...

Posted by Red Monkey at 6:46 AM | Comments (2) | Storytelling: She was, of course, supposed to be sleeping. | Struggles | Stumble

January 1, 2008

Cheese Circles

The current project ... a page from Cheese Circles: A Children's Book for Grown-Ups.

Posted by Red Monkey at 5:13 AM | Comments (4) | Sketches | Storytelling: She was, of course, supposed to be sleeping. | Stumble

December 25, 2007

Serendipity

First, I'll be honest. I had one of those utterly, I-am-content-with-the-world days that simply don't occur often enough for most of us. I was relaxed, happy ... shoot, I even braved the mall for some last-minute serendipitous shopping. (And yeah, I'm writing this at 4 a.m. on the 25th ... but I still haven't been to sleep yet, so "today" is still the 24th to me)

I know most people avoid leaving their homes as much as humanly possible on the 24th of December. Traffic is horrible. Most people are tense and tired and cranky and feeling sooooo pressured.

And yet, it's one of my favourite days to go out. Maybe it's that oppositional thing that my therapist called me on. Dunno, don't care. I go out, and I feel no pressure. Check this store and that store ... is there something I didn't know about that might just make someone's Christmas that much better?

And ... I like to go and make sure I smile at all the retail workers. I can recalled Christmases whilst I was in college ... working retail ... and trust me, it can be hard to even believe in God at all during the "joyous" Christmas season in retail. I'm pleasant ... I'm smiling ... I'm not rushed, but I'm not moving at OAP speed, either.

In fact ... today I went to the one store people pray to every god imaginable that they don't have to visit on the 24th. I went to a toy store. I discovered some LEGO Indiana Jones sets that I don't think are supposed to be out until January. At least every website I saw after I got back home said January. And considering that this store was selling them for more than the suggested retail price, I'm pretty sure a manager thought these would fill out their empty shelves and sell well. (The $50 kit was selling for $70 ...)

I wandered around, looking for a Humvee toy for my other half. She works for AM General, building the H1 Humvee, and I know she showed interest in one when we were there months ago. They didn't have those anymore, but they did have some old skool G.I. Joe figures that I knew she liked. Snagged 'em. Serendipitous shopping. Neither one of us knew these existed, but her face sure lit up at seeing Scarlett and Lady Jaye.

And when I was through poking around, I went to check out. Short line. Staff didn't look too terribly stressed and frenzied. I noticed there was some stuff on the counter, but I thought they belonged to the woman checking out. Just as I'm about to put my stuff on the counter, a woman rushes up with a toy or two in hand. She's freaking. She's apologetic. "I just need to add these couple of things," she blurted out, terrified I would tell her to head to the end of the line (which, actually, ended with me). The few things on the counter already were hers.

I smiled and told her not to worry about it. She apologized, tried to explain. She was speaking so fast, she was tripping over her words. I smiled again and told her, "Look, it's fine. I'm not on a schedule."

I thought she was going to fall over. "You're NOT???"

I just smiled. "No, really. It's okay, go ahead."

She couldn't stop thanking me. And I suppose this is why I like going shopping on Christmas Eve. Random Acts of Kindness ... spreading a little peace around.

And then, tonight at church ... lol

I was more than a little bouncy myself. It had been a good day and a great evening. I spent some time really reflecting how I'd been in such a bad mental space last year. This year, I have no job and I'm getting nervous about the severance running out before I find one ... but still, things are better this year.

Across our round sanctuary sat ... mmm, let's call him Thomas ... so Thomas sat across the sanctuary from me. He'd been on the computer, checking NORAD's Santa site to see where Santa was now every couple of minutes before church started. Running all over the place. All that pent-up Christmas energy. And our 11 o'clock service is a very meditative, calm, peaceful time. How was he going to survive it?

And as soon as I thought that, he looked up at me. I gave him a smile ... not my usual Hey-why-don't-you-and-I-get-in-trouble grin ... but a nice smile. He gave me the sweetest, most genuine smile in return.

Instantly, I remembered a Christmas when I was a few years older than Thomas. Our family tradition was to open our gifts Christmas Eve after we'd been to mass. (Early mass ... my mom didn't have the stamina to stay up much past the evening news.) This one year, Mom wanted me to open one present early. She had a present picked out for me and one for my sister ....

It was the mid-80s and it was a Timex digital watch. It looked so adult, with its black leather band and the gold watch itself. The glass was a bubble and in the center was a small digital bit of circuitry. There was a button to push for light. It wasn't something I'd asked for, I don't think. Wasn't something I'd thought about, really. And it was sooooo adult looking. I was enthralled with it.

I can remember sitting in church, much like Thomas this year. Trying to listen, trying not to bounce. Staring at my watch in awe. In fact, and I'm sure this is simply my "old" person's memory banks using Adobe Premiere and AfterEffects with the images stored in my head, but I can see that dreamy golden glow around the whole image of me admiring my watch in church.

And as I type this, speaking of serendipity ... Green Day's "Time of Your Life" just came on. While the song might have felt like a semi-bitter break up song to its lyricist, the wistful and dreamy quality of the music on this song coupled with the lyrics (which don't necessarily scream break-up) speaks to all of this for me.

Another turning point;
a fork stuck in the road.
Time grabs you by the wrist;
directs you where to go.
So make the best of this test
and don't ask why.
It's not a question
but a lesson learned in time.

It's something unpredictable
but in the end it's right.
I hope you had the time of your life.

So take the photographs
and still frames in your mind.
Hang it on a shelf
In good health and good time.
Tattoos of memories
and dead skin on trial.
For what it's worth,
it was worth all the while.

It's something unpredictable
but in the end it's right.
I hope you had the time of your life.

Serendipity indeed. Funny how "way leads on to way" ... the paths our memories and our lives weave.

Posted by Red Monkey at 3:55 AM | Comments (5) | Storytelling: She was, of course, supposed to be sleeping. | Stumble

December 8, 2007

Paddington Bear ARRESTED

Prime Minister Brown is set to take on illegal immigration in the U.K. and has served notice by going after one of the most loved and well-known illegal immigrants in the U.K. - Paddington Bear.

"It's an outrage!" claimed Paddington from his home West London after his initial release pending further investigation. "I was a mere cub and was forced onto the boat by my auntie. I knew nothing of immigration papers or applications."

However, a neighbor in Notting Hill recalls a gleeful young Paddington bragging about beating the system. "He was constantly laughing at me and telling me to call the Border and Immigration Agency but that it would do no good. He said he knew someone on the inside and that I was simply a cranky curry to be tossed in the bin and thought of no more."

"I may be from darkest Peru," the angry bear stated early in the day from his holding cell, "but I know this is just a ploy to boost his polls. I don't understand why the government must persecute me in this way."

The Home Office had this to say: "We are taking a robust approach to tracking down people who have no right to be here and removing them from the UK."

However, Mr. Bear's family and friends claim this is all a dark plot to paint Mr. Bear as a terrorist. "We just don't understand why the government would make these claims! Certainly his fur is a sand tan colour, but he is Peruvian, not Middle Eastern. This is racial profiling at its absolute lowest form - because it's not even based on facts, just the appearance of a different ethnicity."

Long-time friend and companion, Pooh Bear of 100 Acre Woods, declared he overheard two bobbies claiming Paddington Bear quite obviously fit the profile of a suicide bearer. "I mean, indeed!" exclaimed Mr. Pooh Bear. "Everyone is quite well aware that the phrase is suicide bomber, not bearer. This is simply gross bearism in its most heinous form."

Mr. Bear has resided at 32 Windsor Gardens, Notting Hill, west London since his arrival in the U.K. some fifty years ago.

BBC article regarding the arrest here.

Posted by Red Monkey at 9:59 AM | Comments (5) | Never Underestimate the Power of Human Stupidity | People Say I Have ADHD, But I Think - Hey Look, A Chicken | Storytelling: She was, of course, supposed to be sleeping. | Stumble

December 7, 2007

For Friends, Whenever I May Find Them

What a dream I had ...

We walk into a large, very fancy library. The kind of library which is supposed to look old and formal, but comes off looking new and pretentious ... complete with marble lions standing guard outside and a long, panoramic array of steps leading up to the library ... those very shallow steps that you could take four or five at time, except they're wide ... you could almost put two feet heel to toe before you reach the next step. And, of course, there's no visible wheelchair ramp.

I have a purpose for being at this library but since I am simply relating a dream, all I know is that there is a dream-logic to that purpose which fades away very quickly once we're inside. We have walked inside the library and around a center area whose floor is lower than the rest of this narthex. As we come in, we walk on the right side, past the area for checking out books. Before us are the large and ornate wooden doors which lead to the library proper. Before we can enter, I turn around and look down in that little "pit" in the center of all this marble tile. People are busily working on honestly old wooden tables, some with piles of books around them, some still beating on the keyboards of the computers to find the sources they need.

I stop dead in my tracks. It can't be. After all this time, some twenty years ... constantly wondering whatever happened ... why did she never get back in contact with me ... I'm seeing things, it can't possibly be her.

I'm down the steps in a heartbeat, rushing up to this person I haven't seen since the summer after high school. "Janet?" Another step. "Kyungah?"

She turns around and it's true. My illustrious locker partner, as I used to call her back in school.

She's a bit standoffish and tries to quickly direct my attention to other Lamar people I know who are also here. They are certainly people I know, but not as well as KK. I'm puzzled and hurt. All I can think is, "but you and I were friends ... I only know of these people." The wall remains despite having found Janet at last.

Most people I know can't wait to forget about high school. They stay connected with a few friends, but seem to try to put everything else completely behind them and move on. Except of course for those few who prefer to live in their "glory days" and constantly rehash all the wonderful moments.

I don't seem to fall into either category.

And yet I would love to still be friends with some of those folks, I regret losing contact with so many.

I suppose that because I often felt more at home at school than at home, I came to think of some of these people almost as siblings and favourite cousins than friends. I didn't expect that I would completely lose contact with them for so long ... and when I have caught up with them, we've had (for the most part) a single good conversation ... which fades into politeness. We don't really know each other anymore and apparently it's too much effort ... or it's too much a reminder of another time others would prefer remain forgotten ... and the effort at renewing friendship seems to fade clean away to a dream-state of a million yesterdays ago.

And yet, I can't quite let go of those old friendships.

I want to know what life has thrown them. I want to know that they are okay, they are happy, they are loved, they are content. I want them to know that there are those folks from "back in the day" who are rooting them on to meet their dreams, whatever they may be and however they may have changed over the years.

So this song has been running through my head today ... really, only the first line of the real song has anything to do with this at all ... but I've done what I used to do in high school all the time ... re-written it into something else. It's mushier than I would like, but not as mushy as the original song, so I suppose that's an improvement. (For Emily, Whenever I May Find Her - Simon & Garfunkel)

What a dream I had
dressed in fogginess
clothed in adrenaline
and wistful happiness
sweeter than the rain

I've wandered empty malls and
past the shop displays
I heard distant murmurs
floating through the hallways
as I walked on

and when we met again
your dreams changed as the night
you've walked on frozen streets and fields of daffodils
I remember then

And now look what you've become
(silence)
I wish you happiness
With my grateful memories
Oh I miss you all
Oh I miss you

(I told you it was mushy. Bah)

Posted by Red Monkey at 11:17 AM | Comments (2) | Storytelling: She was, of course, supposed to be sleeping. | Stumble

November 21, 2007

Who Are You? Who, who, who who

Incinq from BlogCatalog asked a great question about ethnicity/heritage. I started to reply over there and then realized that my own answer is so odd and lengthy, it'd simply make a better blog post.

By the time I was about five, I began to understand that there were other countries than the U.S. in a very visceral and real way. I would pore over the atlas and pull out all of the ancient encyclopedias just to look at maps. Using the encyclopedias as my maps, however, caused some interesting glitches. Think about this list for a minute:
island, England, Ireland, Greenland, Poland.

Yeah. I thought Poland must be an island. I got into a very heated argument with my mother over this about the age of five. I was utterly convinced that she was wrong and I was right. It all made perfect sense. To me, anyway.

The long and short of that, though, is that my parents were highly uninterested in our cultural heritage. I was searching for roots that they had long since dug up and tossed aside. When I asked ethnicity we were, I was told American. Okay, that's great, but that's only a part of the story. Where did we come from? And I don't mean the stork.

Unfortunately, I was not quite savvy enough to say it like that then. So, predictably, I got a book on where babies come from instead of an answer. This was a recurring theme of misdirection in our family when someone didn't like the questions being asked.

Eventually I got Mom to say that her mother's mother had emigrated from Lithuania. Excited, I asked where that was. Mom's reply was that Lithuania wasn't there any more. It had been swallowed up by Russia.

Now, you have to understand that I was about five at this time. And to my mind ... which worked in oddly logical and literal ways (as most five year old's minds do) ... this meant Lithuania didn't really count because it didn't really exist.

Frustrated that we were apparently not "anything," I began to search for a good heritage. I decided that I was Irish.

To this day I have no idea what made me choose Ireland. I recall my mother being irritated with me and telling me that we were NOT Irish. I would calmly smile and tell her, "I am." It was as if, for whatever reason, I needed roots that my parents did not. I know that both of my parents had moved some when they were kids. But I don't think they had the tumbleweed childhood I'd had by the time I started kindergarten. Six towns and seven homes by the time I was in kindergarten. Perhaps I just wanted something consistent in my life.

I know that when I was a little bit older, and I would ask again (this was a constant question throughout my childhood), Mom would sometimes recite a little ditty that her father used to say, "We're Irish and Dutch and don't amount to much." This simply fueled my Irish flame. I researched the country periodically. I aligned myself with the IRA (without any real realization of what that meant ... to my mind they were simply freedom fighters). I often growled about "the bloody English" and especially that fool, Cromwell.

I begged to be allowed to do the foreign exchange program and go to Ireland for a year of high school. My mother, ever paranoid about everything, refused on the grounds that Ireland was a land of war. I argued eloquently that the fighting was primarily in the northern six counties. I pointed out that Ireland was Catholic, so I would never miss mass. All in vain.

In the course of growing up, besides deciding I was Irish, I became very very invested in being a Texan as well. These two "ethnicities," if you will, gave me a certain grounding and identity. I adored teasing my sister about being an Okie and pointing out that Dad and I were true Texans ... whilst my sister was "just" an Okie. {Why does Texas not fall in the Gulf of Mexico? ... ... ... cuz Oklahoma sucks ... ... ... MWAhahahahaha} I periodically teased my mother for being a damyankee.

In retrospect, the reason that I constantly looked for some kind of national identity was because I wanted to belong ... and I never did feel like I belonged to my family. We always seemed like a foursome of random people who happened to share the same home. I was close to my sister and I tried to help her deal with our odd little family ... but somehow ... I always felt like an outsider ... biding my time until I could escape into my real life.

Looking for a heritage was simply looking to belong to something bigger than my life; something which with I had an affinity, something in common.

There was a third component to my search for heritage.

We lived in Albuquerque for three months when I was three years old. Dad had already been there for a while on what was to have been a temporary assignment. It dragged out for quite some time. The last time I talked with Mom about this, she had thought he'd only been there for three months before we joined him. But on thinking about the timing of it all, she thought he'd actually been out there much, much longer than that.

I was two when he left for Albuquerque on this temporary assignment and when I was a teenager, my mother would bitterly tell me how hard it had been for her to deal with me. Not because I was acting up whilst Dad was gone. But because I was depressed that Daddy wasn't there.

To understand her bitterness, you have to understand that my father was not a particularly nice man most of the time. As an adult, my mom had figured this out after about 8 years of marriage. As a two year old, of course, I had not yet figured that out. She was hurt that I was upset at Dad's absence when she was still there to hold me and play with me. I suppose it's simply a complicated thing and I don't know if you, Gentle Reader, will really understand it without having lived it.

At any rate, this was about 1971. Mom and I finally moved to Albuquerque to join Dad since it looked like this temporary gig was going to be a bit longer than that.

In 1969, a group of American Indians took over Alcatraz Island.
In 1970, a group from the American Indian Movement seized the Mayflower replica on Thanksgiving day.
In 1971, the American Indian Movement also had a group occupy Mount Rushmore.

Remember how my mother would not let me go to Ireland for school when I was a junior in high school? Because she feared it was a country of war?

New Mexico has a large native American population. Tensions were running quite high in the 70s. My mother was utterly terrified of anyone different from her ... so Albuquerque was a city of dirt and fear to her.

I, on the other hand, thought I'd gone to heaven. I was back with Daddy, I could run outside, there were mountains. And, I'm sure that given my asthma, I was feeling far better in the dry Albuquerque than the humid, wet armpit of Houston.

Mom and Grandma and I made a trip up to Santa Fe one day to see the fabled "The Mall." This trip has become legend in my mind ... I don't know how much of it I have embellished over the years, but this is my story and I'm sticking to it:

Mom was surprised that "The Mall" was actually an outdoor collection of handicrafts, jewelry and such. We wandered from booth to booth, Mom becoming more and more scared by the collection of "dirty indians" around us.

I, of course, was utterly fascinated. I can just picture myself poised over a blanket of pottery and sand paintings, all cautious and curious three-year-old style. Hands to myself, eyes sharp and darting from storied item to storied item.

And then the questions started. "What's that?" "What does that mean?" "A Thunderbird? like the planes?" "What's a yei?" "What does it guard?"

Thirty six years later, I see this poor shopkeep as a patient man. Chuckling at the bilagaana child. I like to think that I was polite and curious, waiting for his answers ... but that may simply be because I know Navajo speech can be considered slow and pondering by anglos.

During my informal schooling in the symbols used by this Navajo artist, my mother thought I was still with her. She'd gone off to look at other booths. She was always like that once she got into shopping ... focused on the next booth or store or rack. Naturally, she eventually realized that I had not placidly followed her like a duckling straggling after its mother. Naturally, she panicked and began retracing her steps. Just in time to hear me tell the patient shopkeep:

"When I grow up, I'm gonna be an Indian, too!"

Whether it's clear memory or my vivid imagination, I can see him chuckling and then swallowing all emotion quickly ... a flash of fear before the mask of nothingness settles ... and my mother grabbing my arm and yanking me away.

We argued for years after that. I was going to grow up to be a Navajo. I was quite certain of it. Mom was appalled. She finally got it through to me that I would not be Navajo when she pointed to a picture of some native Americans and asked me what colour their skin was and what colour my skin was.

"You'll never be an Indian. Look at you."

Now that I think about it, that may be why I decided I was Irish. Pale as can be ... Mom's hair was auburn and mine was beginning to carry some nice red highlights.

So, my ethnicity and heritage is really a lie, in a way. I know far more about Ireland and about the Dineh than I do about Lithuania.

And yet, somehow it seems fitting to me that my heritage is something that I've chosen rather than what I was born into. So much of my life has been about abandoning that which I found dysfunctional and unhealthy and trying to align myself with carefully chosen healthy connections.

And yet, when it comes to the holidays, I find myself craving Koogali, a family recipe passed down from Mom's side of the family ... from Lithuania.

My heritage? I think the simplest answer is that my heritage is one of contradictions and obstinance.

Which then reminds me of a line from my second novel: Coyote is a trickster.
I have a certain affinity for this trickster figure. Unfortunately, it comes from the bilagaana's incomplete understanding of the type of trickster that Coyote actually is. He's not just a benign teacher of lessons. There's a darker underside to him ... and apparently these darker stories are not really much shared with the bilagaana.

So my heritage is chosen, incomplete, contradictory and in some cases, just flat out wrong.

But it is certainly unique to me. And despite the fact that I started my quest for a heritage in order to belong, I wouldn't have it any other way.

Posted by Red Monkey at 10:36 AM | Comments (4) | Storytelling: She was, of course, supposed to be sleeping. | Stumble

November 1, 2007

Yet Another Rowling Post

So, back on the 22nd of October I listed a few things that I intended to blog about after I recovered from the exhausting trip to Texas. I think I covered most of them, but was reminded that I had not yet discussed J. K. Rowling's announcement that Dumbledore was gay.

First, let me say that this is not going to be some emotional, reactionary piece. In fact, whilst it uses Rowling as an example, it's a post about children's literature ... how we treat kids ... and how we treat people who are different.

The Discussions:
Timing of the announcement.
The series is over. Why announce now that Dumbledore is gay?

The "controversy" of having a gay character in a kids' series. Is Rowling making it up now for attention now that the series is over? Were there signs? Why bring sex into a children's series?

First, why announce it now? Well I would think that the fact that the series is over and done with is certainly a major factor. The mad rush for the Potter books is somewhat over. It is, in one sense, relatively "safe" to make such declarations now. Had this been announced with, say book 3, there would have been much uproar which over-shadowed the excellent story telling and character development. Rowling is a business woman and has been quite canny about protecting her story and characters. Why open herself up to more criticism for something which was, ultimately, a behind-the-scenes bit of plot and characterization?
Dumbledore's love life, ultimately, is a non-issue in the series ... with the exception of the fact that there was a history/connection between Albus and Grindelwald. In other words, it didn't matter to the core of the series what ANY of the teachers' sexuality was. It is, after all, a children's series and about the children who grow up during the series.

Which leads me to two: why include this at all, were there clues, why bring sex into a children's series?

Rowling NEVER brought sex into the series.
EVER
Let's just get that out of the way. To those reactionaries who claim that to announce Dumbledore is gay is to bring SEX into a child's series, I say, bullshit. I know there are those who claim that if a person says "I'm gay" or they say "That person is gay," that they have brought sex ... or "who they sleep with" ... into the public arena. HomoSEXuality. Why broadcast it for all to know?

What Rowling did was simply to honestly answer a child's question: Did Dumbledore every find his true love? The adult answer is: not really. He fell completely enarmoured of the young Grindelwald. No one who has read the books would deny that there was a definite connection between the two young men.

From an adult perspective of the text, I think it's easy to see what happened. They fell madly in love. Infatuated with each other. Perhaps over their intellectual ideas as Aberforth certainly believed. But it became clear that through the course of their interactions, a very deep connection was made. One in which Albus was not thinking normally. He was blinded. When his eyes cleared and he could see ... well, obviously his first "big" love had not gone well.

Dumbledore states that he knew he should never have power. That he became too easily engulfed in power and therefore he could not be trusted with it. When I first read the Deadly Hallows book, I took this at face value. When Rowling said, Dumbledore is gay ... it fell into place. He knew he could not be trusted to have power, true. But he also feared something else. He feared that his falling in love caused him to be too easily influenced to do things he shouldn't. That to keep and enjoy that love, he would lose a piece of himself. Despite his telling Harry over and over and over that love was the answer, Albus always meant philia, the love between friends, rather than a romantic eros love. (I don't think he discouraged eros, just that he focused on philia or agape.) One of the great tensions and complexities of the books, and probably one of the reasons that the child asked about Albus finding his one true love: despite his great love for all people ... he held himself aloof from a great love of one partner.

At least, that's my interpretation of the sum of his life that we get in the books.

Rowling's books do not say that Albus and Grindelwald dated. What possible plot point could that really convey in a series whose books were often called "too long" by adults? We did not hear about Minerva McGonagall's dating life. Nor Professor Sprout's.

We knew that the Weasleys were married. And now I have a question for those people who think that saying "I'm gay" is declaring "who you have sex with." Isn't being married the same announcement? An even more specific declaration? Isn't announcing "I'm not gay" the same thing?

At any rate we see only the burgeoning relationships of the children discussed. And it's all age appropriate stuff. Harry and Ron being confused and scared. The girls' being disgusted with the boys awkward attempts and their painful misunderstandings. Hermione straining to be noticed.

And we see just one adult relationship begin and grow ... and end. We see how isolated and how much of an outcast Lupin is. We see that Tonks is really something of the same. She's young, she has unusual talents, she's clumsy. So even though she is more a part of society than Lupin the Outcast can be, she is still, like many of Rowling's characters, an outsider.

Dumbledore is a power unto himself in the series. He is apart from much of the society, but it is apparently because he is a private man who keeps close counsel. He holds himself apart.

Lupin is an outcast because of something he cannot help. He is not "normal" according to society. He is ill. He is defective. He is Not To Be Trusted.
Lupin is an outsider, a leper, a symbol of all of those who are cast out because of their differentness. He is the AIDS patient, the cancer patient (bald and wan and fading), the racial outcast, the one below the poverty line.

And yet, Lupin and Tonks together, despite being outsider and outcast, are ultimately greater together than they are apart. They accomplish more. Their sum is greater than their parts.

Just as Hermione, Harry, Ron, Ginny, Neville and Luna have a sum which is greater than their parts.

And it bears repeating now: Dumbledore is a power unto himself. Why discuss his relationships? They are not a part of the plot.

Why announce that Albus Dumbledore was gay? Because Rowling does not sugar-coat the truth in her books. She came under fire when the series became increasingly dark. Despite the fact that she said repeatedly from the beginning ... this is a story of war and it will be honest. Rowling likely knew from the beginning, or at least fairly early on, about the relationship between Albus and Grindelwald. Her books are too well thought out ... too coherent ... to suddenly spring this revelation after the fact. Besides, the clues are in the final book at the very least.

A child asked, Did Dumbledore ever find his true love?
A lesser writer would have said, no, he never did. Or perhaps, yes, he did, but it went badly and so he decided to always be alone.

But Rowling has some fervent beliefs. One is that people should be accepted for who they are ... and their differences should be looked upon as good things. Neville could so easily have been dismissed as a buffoon. She didn't let that happen. Draco could have easily been dismissed as "the bad kid" ... but things got more complicated than that. She did not want one-dimensional cardboard children, which leads to her second fervent belief: children are not stupid.

Given those two beliefs, how else could she answer that question, knowing the truth of that character? It was time to acknowledge the "missing piece" of the Albus/Grindelwald subplot. And, it might also have helped to explain Aberforth's turmoil with his brother as well.

To those gay rights activists who have lost their freaking brains and have been raving that "Rowling didn't do enough" ... that "Lupin was really the gay character and she caved and made him marry a girl" ... to those people I say: STFU.

Rowling had a story to tell. An important one. There were LOTS of little side paths.

But there was no place in the storyline for which sex Dumbledore preferred. There was a place for his story with Grindelwald ... but there was no place for their bedroom life, whatever that may have been. This is a children's series. The plot does not call for saying Albus slept over on many occasions and shyly stuttered or lost his voice when around Grindelwald. Why add a subplot which serves no purpose? Rowling is not Stephen King ... and the Harry Potter books are not It. (sidenote: that's one of my favourite books of all time ... I'm not knocking it ... just acknowledging differences)

There was no place in the storyline for the bedroom life of Arthur and Molly. Or for Lupin and Tonks. The difference is that we know it did exist because there was the issue of that activity.

I am sure there are some gay rights activists who might even scream, "Rowling is homophobic" because the relationship between Albus and Grindelwald turned into this Hitler-esque nightmare of ethnic cleansing.

Again, I say pish and tosh. Being straight did not make the Dursleys good people. And, honestly, we don't know that Albus never loved again ... only that he did not seem to ever settle down with a "one great love." And that answer does not belong in a children's series, so of course, it's not in the books.

Were the plot hints there? I think they were. And I think there were all the way through the series, and as age-appropriate and plot-appropriate as they could be in the final book.

And, ultimately, what does all of this mean? That Dumbledore was gay?
Not a darn thing ... except that it furthers Rowling's agenda of tolerance and celebration of differences.

I thought about simply naming this post YARP for Rowling's honesty in answering this child's question.
To paraphrase Whitman, "I sound a mighty, barbaric YAWP"
Well, YARP is darn close, anyway.

Rowling sounded a call to children and adults alike. That good can triumph over evil; that not every "bad guy" is clear cut (look at Draco); that differences among people can lead to a stronger group; that difference is not bad; that love for each other, that listening honestly to each other are good things.

That even our heroes are flawed ... Albus, the great man that he was ... sometimes didn't listen. How often did he tell Harry all the mistakes he had made? The stupid things that he had done? That he was human and only doing the best that he could, the same as Harry. The fact that Harry is heterosexual and Albus homosexual did not matter to the series.

I applaud Rowling for her honesty in the books. For her knowing what details to put in a children's series and what was not important. For saying what needed to be said, despite knowing that she would once again rile people up.

Who cares that Dumbledore was gay? I don't. Instead, it makes me sad that he never truly found a one, great love with whom he could share his life, that he was so traumatized and even frightened with what had transpired the first time, that he could not allow himself to risk it again.

Bravo, once again, to J. K. Rowling for honesty and a storytelling skill that surpasses most adult fiction published today. For knowing what to say, how much to say ... and when to say it.

Posted by Red Monkey at 1:28 AM | Comments (1) | Storytelling: She was, of course, supposed to be sleeping. | Stumble

October 31, 2007

A Halloween Ghost Story

To get everyone in the mood for Halloween, I'm reposting the four ghost stories I have experience with over the next couple of weeks. These are all true stories, so far as I know. Several of them I have personal experience with; one happened to a guy I worked with as he and I discussed whether or not there was really, truly, a ghost where we worked.

This is the third in the series, "Haunted" being the first. And "The Haunted House" being the second.
And the third being The Graveyard (and there's a second part to that one ... you'll see the link to it at the top of the post).

Enjoy!

And now for your Halloween ghost story ....

In the Haunted story, I talked about a ghost that haunted the sub shop I worked in during college. As John and I discussed the possibility of a ghost running the juke box and occasionally making things fly around, he eventually told me that these things just tended to happen to him. If you're into the paranormal, you might call John a sensitive or a medium. Ghosts just tend to like him.

His first experience with a ghost was at seven.

John went to spend the night at a friend's house. His family lived waaay out in the country at a small gentleman's farm and they had just moved in about a month before. John met Kyle at school and the two fast became inseperable.

The two boys ran around the farm and played for hours and when it was time to come in, they played board games. Including ... well, what Halloween story would be complete without the Ouija board?

At first the boys played with it like most kids play with the Ouija board, making it say things and being silly. Then, for whatever reason, the little plastic piece begins moving on its own. John gave Kyle a look and Kyle snatched his hand off the toy. It was still moving. Half-convinced that John was just messing with him, Kyle began asking questions.

"Who are you?"

The board spelled out J - O - N.

Kyle laughed. "You can't even spell your own name right."

"I didn't do it," John told him.

Kyle laughed and put his hand back on the toy. "Right, John, right." He looked back at the Ouija board. "Where are you?"

R-I-G-H-T H-E-R-E

"No, I mean where do you live?"

H-E-R-E

M-Y B-R-O-T-H-E-R I-S S-C-A-R-E-D

"Why?"

D-A-D

"This is dumb, John, make it say something good."

"I told you, I'm not doing anything."

"I wanna talk to something good and scary."

"I don't wanna play this anymore, Kyle. I don't like it." John took his hand off the plastic toy.

With both boys' hands off the toy, it began flying across the board.

"What's doing that?"

I A-M J-A-M-E-S
Y-O-U A-R-E B-A-D

"Kyle? Make it stop. How are you doing that?"

Y-O-U-V-E G-O-T T-O B-E

John picked up the board and tossed it across the room. Kyle was white as a ghost.

At seven, of course, they did what any sane seven-year-olds would do -- they ran out to the living room for Kyle's mom.

Of course, Kyle's mom figured the boys had been telling scary stories and had just frightened each other. She gave them a snack and sent them back to Kyle's room and told them to go to sleep and not tell anymore scary stories.

After kicking the game under one of the beds, the boys wrestled and played until Kyle's dad came in and told them to knock it off and go to bed. So they did.

A few hours later, Kyle's mom woke up to all sorts of noise coming from Kyle's room. Convinced the boys were playing, she opened the door only to find everything in Kyle's room flying around in a circle. His clothes, his toys, everything. Completely unable to believe what she was seeing, she was convinced that she was merely dreaming and walked back to bed.

The next morning, Kyle's dad went out to the barn to muck out the horses' stalls and finally stormed back into the house. "Were those boys out in the barn yesterday?" he asked his wife.

"Of course, they were playing out in the loose hay."

"I have told Kyle a million times that pitchfork is not a toy." And his dad stormed off for the boys' room.

Every toy and piece of clothing Kyle owned was scattered around the room.

"KYLE!"

Neither boy moved. His dad, completely disgusted, turned around, surveying the "damage" of Kyle's playtime the night before. The door to Kyle's closet was open, the light was on and there was nothing in the closet. Every piece of clothing, every toy, jigsaw puzzle, everything was in the middle of Kyle's room.

Except the pitchfork, leaning against the back wall of the closet.

Kyle's dad snapped. He'd had it with his irresponsible son who just didn't seem to understand that the farm tools were not toys. This was the first time he'd found one of the tools in the house, but not the first time that Kyle had wandered off with one hand tool or another. Furious, he grabbed the pitchfork from the closet and began hollering at his son.

The two boys woke up to Kyle's furious father screaming and coming toward them, pitchfork in hand.

His mom walked into the room and screamed - partly at the total mess in the room (and remembering her "dream" of the night before) and partly at the sight of her husband wielding the pitchfork at the boys. Surely it was just to emphasize his anger, but still ....

Kyle's parents left the room and calmed down, got rid of the pitchfork and then came back in to talk to the now terrified young boys. They explained that the boys shouldn't have trashed the bedroom or taken the pitchfork into the house -- shouldn't have played with the pitchfork at all.

Of course, they both protested and insisted they had done no such thing. And of course, Kyle's parents assumed the boys were lying. His mom was somewhat disturbed by the odd dream she'd had the night before, but it had to have been a dream.

So, the boys' first sleepover was a bit of a disaster and John was in trouble again when he got home for not behaving properly as a guest.

But, a few weeks later, John's parents called and asked to come over with Kyle. Not sure what was going on, but responding to the tense voice of Kyle's mother, they agreed.

They sat around the kitchen table ... both sets of parents and both boys.

"I know this is going to sound strange, but I need to ask John a very serious question," Kyle's mom started. "What happened when you and Kyle were playing with the Ouija board?"

John blinked a few times and then told them. "At first me and Kyle were just making it move around and being silly. But then it started to move on its own."

"John!" his mother was shocked at this bald-faced lie.

"Vivian, wait, please. John, what did it say?"

He told them that it said its name was Jon, it lived "here" and that his brother was scared. Kyle's parents blanched.

"I told you!" Kyle said. "I told you!"

"Then what happened, John?"

"Well, Kyle thought I was doing it and he thought I was being stupid so he said he umm, that he wanted something scary."

"And then? This is really important, John. What did the board say next?"

"This is ridiculous," John's father said. "What are you getting at? The boys were playing silly games and they acted up."

"It's more than that. We've done a little research." Kyle's dad turned back to John. "What did the board say next?"

"It said we were bad. And it was gonna do something, but we stopped playing."

"Anything else?"

John thought for a moment. "James. It said its name was James."

Kyle's mother blanched.

"What the hell is going on here?"

"Boys, you go on up to John's room and play," Kyle's father said.

The boys, of course, scurried around the corner and eavesdropped on the adults.

As it turned out, John and Kyle discovered that about 20-30 years before, James and Madeline Winchester and their two sons, Kyle and Jonathon had lived in the farmhouse. Not more than a few months after moving in, however, James had completely lost his mind and murdered the two boys in their bed with his pitchfork.

After the third time the pitchfork found its way into Kyle's closet, his mother couldn't stop thinking about the "dream" that she'd had when John had stayed over and began asking around the town about the house. The local librarian helped her research the house and discovered the story of the Wincehester family.

Of course, John's parents took far more convincing than the boys did, but as it turns out, Kyle's folks just wanted to confirm with John what Kyle had already told them. The final straw for John's parents was the news that they had already talked to the local priest and scheduled a cleansing of the house which was to be followed up by something resembling an exorcism for the house itself.

At the very least, John's parents realized that Kyle's folks were taking this seriously. They went on to explain what Kyle's mother had seen that night and other things that the boys had not yet heard.

Of course, John's parents didn't want John spending any more time at Kyle's house ... and he was fine with that. He'd had the crap scared out of him waking up to Kyle's father and the pitchfork. Particularly when Kyle told him why his parents had begun researching the house. Kyle was now terrified to go to sleep in the house, and had, in fact, been sleeping with his mother in a motel for the past week.

His father had been caught sleepwalking several times, each time found either in Kyle's room or on his way down the hall to Kyle's room, pitchfork in hand.

A few weeks later, the "exorcism" of the house was ... well, not particularly successful. The priest insisted that the entire family needed to be present at the home. Kyle refused to tell John what had happened, but the family moved into a motel immediately thereafter and quickly moved to another town. John never saw him again.

And, of course, in the true tradition of all haunted houses like that, no one ever bought the farmhouse. By the time John left home and moved away to college, he said the farmhouse had begun falling down. The town had talked about having the house bulldozed in an effort to make the property saleable ... but it hadn't happened by the time John left.

Happy Halloween!!

Posted by Red Monkey at 2:58 AM | Comments (0) | Storytelling: She was, of course, supposed to be sleeping. | Stumble

October 26, 2007

The Graveyard, Continued

To get everyone in the mood for Halloween, I'm reposting the four ghost stories I have experience with over the next couple of weeks. These are all true stories, so far as I know. Several of them I have personal experience with; one happened to a guy I worked with as he and I discussed whether or not there was really, truly, a ghost where we worked.

This is the third in the series, "Haunted" being the first. And "The Haunted House" being the second.

Enjoy!

This is a continuation of yesterday's post, The Graveyard.

A few years after my trip out to witch mountain, I'm still kind of fussing at myself for getting worked up enough that I kept imagining hands trying to grab my feet from below ... and not even a cheesy imagining zombies reaching up from their grave -- I kept imagining it from the "clean" area at the front of the cemetery. The area that hadn't yet been used for graves. What a weird little imagination I have.

So, again, near Halloween, I'm talking with some friends and I share the story of going to witch mountain.

Candice goes absolutely as white as possible. I'm talking no blood left in her face at all.

"You went WHERE?"

"Some witch mountain place out near Duncanville. It's way out in the country. It's this funky graveyard."

She just blinks at me and doesn't say anything for a minute, so I continue telling the story that I wrote here yesterday.

"You were damn lucky to get out of there," Candice says.

"What do you mean? It was the middle of the afternoon."

"Promise me you won't ever, ever go out there again."

"What is the deal?"

As it turns out, Candice's folks were highly religious and expected her to be as well. As part of her teenage rebellion stage, she did what every teenager does - went as far opposite her folks as she could think of. She joined up with ... you guessed it, a satanic cult. The very cult that used that graveyard I'd visited.

According to Candice (whose name and details I've changed here for her protection), the things that my classmate had told me about the graveyard were just the tip of the iceberg.

First, the cult did rule the graveyard after five. They'd show up (I didn't ask if they drove and made the cops let them in) at the graveyard, practice some random vandalism and then ...

... then they'd crawl into their tunnel system for the real rituals.

Evidently the most recently dug up grave was always the entrance to their tunnel system.

And, evidently, that weird thought I kept getting about having a hand reach up for me was not so weird after all. Or, depending on your point of view, it was even weirder than it had been before. The tunnel system honeycombed that whole front area.

Then Candice tells all the stuff this group was into.

Now, here's the deal before I go any further. It is a known fact that there are satanic cult groups all over the U.S. (and other countries, to be honest). Many of these groups are completely harmless and only "play" at being evil. That is, they get together and read the Satanic Bible and hold their masses that are a perversion of the Catholic mass and that's all there is to them. Other than offending a lot of people, they don't really do any harm.

Then you have groups of teenagers who get together and do things they think that satanists would do and at the same time, try to scare the crap out of each other. This often involves heavy drinking or sometimes drugs. These groups are mostly harmless.

Then there are groups that take things a step further. They look up old books, they attempt to follow old patterns from mostly forgotten ancient cults. They generally find at least a few victims to terrorize. They may go as far as to sacrifice animals. (Some Santeria practitioners, for example, will do this to chickens and perhaps goats.) Those groups can get more than a little frightening just on a personal safety level.

Then there are groups who do worse things.

The group Candice had been involved in was one of those.

Now, again, there are two types of these nasty groups. One type simply stages scenes. They'll go to elaborate lengths to make new initiates believe that they have supernatural powers -- perhaps by breaking a thick marble gravestone into pieces. There are also groups that appear to actually be able to do things they shouldn't be able to do. The problem is, most of the time you can't tell the difference between these two groups. They're both dangerous.

I can't tell you if Candice's group was one that was simply staging events or if some of the folks involved could really do some things they shouldn't be able to do. I wasn't there and no one was running scientific equipment to try to verify any of the events. So, you'll have to make up your own mind.

Evidently this group had built a series of tunnels under the "blank" part of the graveyard up near the gate. The tunnels were actually a maze. Some of the tunnels led to deadfall traps. Others took a funny turn and dumped you out on the dropoff -- and if you weren't careful, you'd end up in the river below pretty easily.

Some members of the group stayed in the tunnels during the day. They were supposed to guard the ... well, for lack of a better word ... the secret hideout from anyone not in the group as well as from the newer members who might be trying to discover secrets they shouldn't.

Candice told of bonfires in the fields (and I accidentally typo'd that as bonefires which is a much scarier image). She told me about the time one of the head guys in the group slaughtered a German Shepherd as part of some insane ritual.

She also told me that I was damn lucky, broad daylight or not, to have made it out of there without any confrontation at all. Evidently they'd leave a large group of people alone during the day, but groups of two were fair game to attack ... either a mundane fight or scare or actually try to drag you down into the tunnels.

She claimed they'd killed more than one person.

Now that's a lot of hearsay. I don't know how much of it was true, but I do know that Candice was honestly scared out of her gourd. She stopped a couple of times and had to mutter to herself that they wouldn't hurt her now. That they couldn't know if she revealed some of their secrets.

The fact that I announced I wanted to go back there to check all of this out terrified her beyond words.

Then she told me about some of the supernatural things she'd seen: simple levitations, curses, the standard scary stuff.

But then, stumbling and almost stuttering her husband told us about finding a severed goat's head in the middle of the living room, floating. Obviously still shaken, he told of how Candice had freaked when they came home and discovered it. Oh, sure, he freaked too. No one likes to see a floating goat head in their living room.

Candice said it was a sign that they had found her and had not forgotten her. It was a sign that they were coming for her. She was practically hysterical. The head fell to the floor and her husband called the police. The police recognized it for a cult calling card and said they'd keep an eye out. No one mentioned the floating part, though. Who would believe that?

In fact, over the years, they've called her repeatedly, left other pleasant calling cards. She did finally escape them ... but it took moving to Saudi Arabia for a few years before the group finally quit contacting her.

I never did get back out to that graveyard. I still want to.

And I'm curious now. Duncanville was starting to really build up in that area. Candice told me when she first joined that cult, you couldn't see anything but trees or prairie grass anywhere around. But when I saw the place, there were some condos within sight of the graveyard and signs out along the road claiming that more would be coming soon. Not that they'd even broken ground yet, but still .... If this group was really such bad news, how would they react to a residential development? Would they wreak so much havoc the developers abandon their plans? Or would they be forced to leave their secret hidey-tunnels and find a new graveyard in a more isolated area?

I don't know. But I'm still awfully curious about it.

And I never did actually promise Candice that I wouldn't go back.

Posted by Red Monkey at 1:01 AM | Comments (0) | Storytelling: She was, of course, supposed to be sleeping. | Stumble

October 25, 2007

The Graveyard, Part One

To get everyone in the mood for Halloween, I'm reposting the four ghost stories I have experience with over the next couple of weeks. These are all true stories, so far as I know. Several of them I have personal experience with; one happened to a guy I worked with as he and I discussed whether or not there was really, truly, a ghost where we worked.

This is the third in the series, "Haunted" being the first. And "The Haunted House" being the second.

Enjoy!

Here's one of the spooky, but slightly less ghost-infested stories.

My first year in college, I was going to my voice and diction class (I started out as a drama major, go figure) and talking to one of the kids in my class. It was probably about this time of year, weather barely turning cool -- it's Texas, remember -- and she tells me about this place near where she grew up -- maybe half an hour or so away from school. The kids called it witch mountain or ghost mountain or something. She told me that it was this awesome old, old graveyard out in Duncanville. It's one of those perfect old graveyards, way out in the country, trees all around.

And, she says, she doesn't know about haunted, but the satanists "own" this graveyard.

My interest is now beyond piqued. "Let's go out there after class," I enthuse. She's a little less sure about that, but I finally talk her into it.

As we're driving out there, she tells me that there's only one road that goes up to witch mountain. And there's a gate on that road. And every evening, there's two cops in a patrol car stationed at the gate. They'll open up the gate if you absolutely insist on going up there, she says, but they also warn you that if you break down even ten feet inside that gated area, they won't go in there to help you. No one goes in there after dark unless they're part of it or stupid.

Now, personally, I wondered why the cops didn't just start taking everyone who wanted up there after dusk in for questioning on the vandalism at the graveyard, but whatever.

She tells me about all sorts of horror stories about this graveyard. Mostly the standard types of scary stories -- these satan worshippers kill people there, hold all sorts of scary rituals. They're so bad even the cops are scared of them.

So, when we get into Duncanville and out into the hinterlands, sure enough, I see the gates open on the side of this road. They're the basic kinda triangular metal tube gates that often block off parking lots at universities and high schools. Stephanie (the girl from my class) is now visibly nervous. It's maybe noon on a Thursday and she's actually already scared to be driving up to this cemetery.

We get to the cemetery and park just across the little street. There's an open field on the side of the street where we park, all blowing prairie grass. The cemetery is bounded by trees on two sides. The other two sides, near the road (the road makes a right turn here), are bounded by an old-fashioned wrought iron fence. There's a great big wrought iron archway and gate at the entrance to the graveyard and a large expanse of grass in the front before you get to the modern graves. There's maybe four or five rows of modern graves before we start getting into folks who died in the 40s, 30s, 20s and a whole bunch from the 1800s. The cemetery is maybe about 75 yards long and about half that wide. As we walk closer to the entrance I can see why they didn't even bother to bound the north end and the east end with a fence. There's a dropoff there. A little kid might say there's a cliff on those two sides, but really, it's not quite high enough or steep enough to truly be called a cliff. Nonetheless, I can't imagine too many people would want to make that climb.

The leaves had already fallen on many of the trees, leaving some at the top level looking dead and barren -- while some whose roots were deeper and a little further down the incline still with a full "head" of green "hair."

The weirdest thing that I noticed as we approached the front gate is that some of the trees appeared to be wearing decorations. I couldn't quite see what they were but it wasn't some kid's lost kite.

The gate to the cemetery was open and I noticed a set of heavy chains and a really heavy duty lock that was used to lock the place up. All shiny new, they really stood out against the black matte and rust of the wrought iron fencing. There was a sign just outside the cemetery listing the hours it was open. It closed at five p.m. Now that seemed really weird to me. Why would you close a cemetery that early? Most of the ones I knew of were open until at least nine or ten p.m.

We walked in across the "front yard" of the cemetery -- all that blank expanse of grass just waiting to be filled with more graves. We walked quickly past the modern graves, but I admit, I got creeped out almost immediately. In addition to the multiple modern gravestones that had been broken, there was a grave that had been dug up.

Now this was not a freshly dug grave. This was not something where the coffin had just been buried. No, there were bits of flower arrangements, bits of plastic wreath frames, and a vase or two sticking out of the dirt. Also, a freshly dug grave doesn't generally stand about three feet higher than the ground level.

And there's generally not a hole big enough for a human to actually disappear into left there.

Despite my very overactive curiosity, I was seriously creeped out by that grave. I walked quickly past it after a very cursory look and went on to look at the old graves instead.

On the way to the back of the graveyard, I could see where someone had tossed plastic wreaths out into the trees, leaving them trapped there. I'd thought it was some kind of weird frisbee before.

I was fascinated by the old graves and appalled by the vandalism. But I'd really seen nothing that said satanists used this place.

Except for the dug up grave.

Oh and the really weird thing ... you know that wind whistling through the trees that you hear in horror movies? I always assumed that this was some goofy sound that Hollywood had made up and was just a stupid contrivance to signal that something scary was going to hapen.

I heard it repeatedly that day. Now if that's not enough to get an overactive imagination running wild.

Well, as we were leaving, I got seriously creeped out going across that expanse of lawn. I kept imagining someone reaching up through the ground and grabbing my feet.

Silliness right?

Tomorrow I'll tell you want happened a couple of years later, as I was telling one of my friends about my trip to witch mountain.

Posted by Red Monkey at 2:56 AM | Comments (1) | Storytelling: She was, of course, supposed to be sleeping. | Stumble

October 18, 2007

The Haunted House

To get everyone in the mood for Halloween, I'm reposting the four ghost stories I have experience with over the next couple of weeks. These are all true stories, so far as I know. Several of them I have personal experience with; one happened to a guy I worked with as he and I discussed whether or not there was really, truly, a ghost where we worked.

This is the second in the series, "Haunted" being the first.

Enjoy!

Since I was a tiny, little thing, I've been determined to meet a ghost. Well, actually, I misspoke: I wanted to see a ghost. That still hasn't happened, but I have met a few.

As a kid, I did not understand AT ALL, how people could be afraid of ghosts. What's the big deal, I thought way back then. They're not physical beings, so they can't possibly hurt you.

I was misinformed.

Okay, I would STILL love to see a ghost. But I don't ever ever ever ever want to live in the same house as one any more.

1144 E. Corby Blvd. is a haunted house.

I lived there from 1994 until 2001. And at first, I didn't notice anything at all odd about the place, other than the fact that South Bend has some of the tiniest homes with the most oddly teeny-tiny little rooms that I've ever seen.

Between my various roommates and I during this time, we had anywhere from four to six cats in the house. Cats notice odd things, right?

It was ultimately the way the cats would act when one of us was already noticing something odd that finally let us start talking about the possibility of ghosts. I mean, no one actually ever saw anything odd happen. But you would be sitting alone in the house and you could hear people talking. Get up, look out the windows, nope, no one was near the house. Stand in the doorway to the basement -- bingo! The conversation stopped. Hmm.

The corner of the living room where I sat when I heard those conversations was the one corner every cat who ever entered the house would try very hard to avoid. Double-hmm.

Again, sitting upstairs, I would hear a kid giggling. Now, as I've said before, I collect old Fisher Price Little People. And at the time, I had a bookcase in the far corner of the basement which was filled with all the old playsets: Sesame Street, the old garage, the children's hospital, a couple of houses and so on. Well, I would hear a kid giggling and that distictive clink/thunk of a little Fisher Price car rolling off the bookshelf and hitting the astroturf floor. (I don't know, this house was the landlord's "party house" back in his college days. I guess astroturf is easy to clean up after wild parties.)

I'd look around upstairs. Every one of the cats was up here with me. Go down to the basement: sure enough, some of the pieces had been moved around and there was a car on the floor.

Well, okay, so what. The floor's not perfectly level down here and, as it turns out, we live close to a fault line which occasionally rumbles a little bit. Just a little fault line, the North/South continental divide. (Who would believe there's a fault line that close to Notre Dame? I keep waiting for the earth to just up and swallow that place!) Anyhow, things fall over. But what's with the giggling?

If this had been all there was to it, I would have totally ignored it. Maybe a ghostie, but probably just the house settling and those little earth rumbles. (But what about that giggle?)

But there was also a really nasty, nasty bad ghost living in that house. Got the distinct impression it was a 'he,' but who knows.

If you heard a serious thud from the basement, you could freaking feel the bad ghost at the same time. It was one of the creepiest times of my whole life. And the weirdest thing was that I would go downstairs and look through the whole basement -- and I couldn't find anything that had been knocked over. But the whole time I was downstairs, I could just feel that malevolence issuing from the basement. Feeling a bit stupid, I'd just head back upstairs (a little hurriedly, of course!). Again, the cats were NEVER in the basement when this would happen and they'd stay out of the basement for quite a while after.

But the worst of it, even worse than just the weird feeling -- wait. You know when you watch a really scary movie late at night, alone and you get that feeling that the serial killer is just on the other side of the door? or waiting in the next room? And you know you're being silly and stupid and it's just because of the movie that you feel all paranoid, but you can still feel it?

Well try getting that feeling at random times while walking around your family room (the basement) for no apparent reason at all. It's even creepier when you can't blame it on a scary movie. And it's even creepier when there's this bit of personality attached to the feeling. It felt male. It hated any nudity at all. (Occasionally you could feel him in other areas of the house, too.)

So anyhow, even worse than the weird feelings were the nightmares that everyone who stayed more than a couple of nights had. You know how in most dreams you have dream logic? You know it's your house, for instance, but in real life you've never lived anywhere even remotely like that?

These dreams weren't like that.

These dreams always took place in that house and if you were really lucky, you could make yourself wake up before the obvious conclusions happened.

Some examples:
I would walk into a room in the house and reach for the lightswitch. Nothing. Horror movie feeling. Overwhelming fear. Lights across the house go off. I've got to go down to the basement and mess with the circuit box. Flip at the basement stairs lightswitch, just in case I'm lucky.

I'm not.

Flashlight on, I head back into that corner of the basement where he lives. If I'm lucky, I wake up now. If I'm not, I go back into the room that used to be the landlord's darkroom. Just a flashlight. The feeling is becoming unbearable. I know he's there, in the back-most part of the basement, by the furnace, water heater, crappy toolbench and the circuit box. Under the stairs. I know he's there.

On occasion the dream goes far enough that I turn and see him briefly with the hunting knife. But I always wake up before he can strike.

The feeling lasts for a couple of days -- not just a few hours like with most nightmares. And no one after having one of those, will actually go into that back part of the basement -- especially not when one of the breakers trip. And they trip all the time in that house. I'm not saying the ghost actually tripped the breakers, but going back to the circuit box usually involved figuring out who had had the nightmares last.

The worst nightmare that I had involved me waking up in the morning and walking out of the bedroom. The house was not air conditioned, so I'd put a little window unit in the bedroom because I canNOT sleep if I get too hot. So the bedroom door was always closed during the summertime to keep that cool air in.

So in this nightmare, I walk out of the bedroom and into the living room. And into one of the worst things I've ever seen in dream, reality or movie.

Not so graphic version: my cats had been killed. Stop reading now if you're the squeamish type. Skip down until you see
*****HEY IT'S OKAY NOW*****

*

Seriously, you don't want to read this if you're easily grossed out.

*

Okay, I double-warned you. I walk out into the living room and each of the four cats I had at the time has been mutilated. Each one has a frickin' railroad spike through the chest/tummy area and is nailed to a wall. One cat to one wall. There's writing on the wall, using of course, the cats' blood. I don't remember what it said, I'm not sure I even remembered once I woke up for real. They were further bloodied, but I won't go into it.

*

*****HEY IT'S OKAY NOW*****

And we all knew that those weird nightmares that took place in that house were related to that ghost. I've never had any nightmares similar to that since.

But the last coincidence that really just confirmed things was when one of my roomates had a friend over. We were sitting on the living room floor when this friend suddenly got a weird, weird look on her face.

"Is there a ghost in this house?"

I shrugged. "I think so. There's a kid who plays with the toys down there. I can hear him giggling sometimes."

She shook her head. "No, there's some--" She shivered and paled a bit.

Now, look. I think this lady's a bit of a flake most of the time, but this was really freaky. She was sitting in that spot where the cats wouldn't go -- above the spot in the basement that I thought of as the ghost's. And it was obvious from her reaction that she wasn't doing this just for her "rep" or for attention. You don't turn that color for fun. And I never saw her do anything like it ever again. (Of course, she didn't set foot in that house again, either.)

"What's the matter?

"There's something wrong in your basement."

My roommate shot me a look. I nodded. The bad ghost had been very active lately.

"There's a bad ghost down there, too."

About six months and two roommates later (I'm a little more stubborn), I finally had a roommate who was himself so scary that the bad ghost quieted (or left, I was never sure which).

How did Justin get the ghost to leave? He played techno-goth every night. He watched more horror movies than any human on the face of planet. And anime. The really, really violent anime.

I don't know if he scared the scary ghost or if he just satiated the ghost's need for violence.

And that's the story of the bad ghost. And that's why I no longer think that ghosts are harmless. I don't think they could physically hurt me ... but that one taught me they can make you hurt yourself just from the paranoia you start to get!

Posted by Red Monkey at 2:54 AM | Comments (0) | Storytelling: She was, of