test - ok since it'll let me post - check in may 20th

I really don't know why this thing

posts sometimes 

& doesn't post

other times 

I really do think

it's the universe trying to get me to

do or not do things

BUT 

it's erratic and 

STRANGE

I had

what felt like 

QUANTUM entanglement 

pretty strongly 

I'm using my thumb nails to play

because thumbs aren't loud enough 

& hurt

but it's slower & not as accurate 

SO

if I'm going to improve 

I'm wondering if 

duct tape

might work 

anyway

I like some it

BUT 

I guess the limited palate of notes

does give a more limited

range of notes

I was just surprised because they

SOUNDED more different 

when I was recording them

I love the wa wa sound

the buzz is sometimes great

& sometimes a little much

I hope you are having a beautiful day 

I LOVE you VERY much sweetheart 

I might be getting a handle on the sleep cycle

I'm not sure if that's the thing to do

or not

the PROCESSING 

or has been 

better

BUT 

maybe it isn't now

I was feeling like I was making good progress 

but I had this last little bit 

hasn't felt like progress

it doesn't feel like 

I know what's going on 

which is a little scary 

I might be able to play this, must build sustainable thumb calluses

my thumbs already hurt

LOOK 

I love you

& if you decide 

I'm too difficult I'm not gonna blame you

BUT 

I don't want to assume that your 

LOVE

is going to go away 

THAT'S 

a thing I have trouble with from my 

family of origin

I think you are

MAGIC 

if I don't tell you the right way

at the right time 

I still think

you're 

MAGIC 

update

the package got here really quick 

it shipped friday 

it's already 

here

I LOVE you VERY much sweetheart 

it's more difficult than it looked

will you post this

I suddenly have to tell you

I ordered the kalimba

on some level

to play with you 

or for you

& I'm not saying 

NO to anything 

let's see if it lets me post this

I can tell something is going on

I'm not sure what 

I'm definitely having emotions 

that I don't know where they're coming from 

SO

I'm trying to find my brain 

I'm trying to do it quickly 

this tension 

throws me off

I want to be 

NOT

some weird way I've been before 

I want to be

OPEN 

to whatever goodness is possible 

NOT

limited by my past pattern

YOU 

are the only thing that has ever made me want to

LIVE

THAT sounds slightly psychotic 

we've talked about it before 

but I guess what I want to underscore here is

YOU gave me HOPE 

for LIFE 

I want to know you as well as I can

I don't want to hurt you or trap you in any way 

I feel like there's something 

I'm not doing or saying 

BUT 

I don't know if that's because I'm picking it up 

OR

if I'm having some fall back paranoia 

check in may 18th

TODAY 

it's letting me post 

what's up with that

I'm sad

& I keep hearing 

the sound clip of the buzzy kalimba

SO

what does that mean

I can't imagine that anything I said 

about myself was offensive 

& honestly I'm at a point where 

MAYBE 

I should be less concerned about being offensive 

BUT 

I don't understand why I'm sad

are you quitting me

I'm so weird

I'm guessing I'm right

BECAUSE 

I'm hearing 

under african skies

in my HEAD 

more thoughts

I had trouble posting 

& I decided 

THAT

was the universe telling me 

I needed to write 

on substack

& I was

going to

I was trying to figure out 

HOW 

& I started this thing

that I THOUGHT I liked

BUT 

then I got up

& I read a thing

& I went back to sleep 

& had some DREAMS 

& the dreams 

didn't make sense 

I don't know how much that influenced 

check in may 16th

I LOVE you VERY much sweetheart

bespoke dances not social constructs

I found a video 

which 

finally explained for me

what I've been trying to explain 

for years

it really helped me 

ALSO

bespoke dances

tall in the saddle

after the dream of falling & calling your name out

these are the roots of rhythm 

& roots of rhythm remain 

the personal vibration 

the wave

of the person

is important to me 

I interact with that

it was a good day

I think it's an

EARWORM 

I've been hearing it

ALL day 

I think 

between all the permutations of

mbira/kalimba/kongoma/

etc

there are lots of 

sound variations 

I'm getting 

KINDA

like I got with chords

only I have more

EXCITEMENT 

it's supposed to ship tomorrow 

I have this

unified front of excitement 

ALL the PARTS 

are LIKE 

we play an instrument 

NOW 

I LOVE you VERY much sweetheart 

I FEEL 

FUN-er

for a while

I don't think I've felt fun at all

for a while now

I'm like the full spectrum of 

the goofiest woody guthrie song he wrote for his kids about hanukkah to

some extended

julian cope

poet is 

priest

mix

&

I'm into it

I'm going to try to sleep 

YOU are MAGIC 

test

it wouldn't let me post again 

the universe 

may be

telling me 

SOMETHING 

if you have gaps in communication from me

KNOW that it's not that 

I've stopped 

it's that I'm having 

technical difficulties 

I LOVE you VERY much sweetheart 

YOU are MAGIC 

long talk gotta sleep

when I'm stressed

or too think-y 

I have two things that I love to listen to 

handpan drumbs

& RAIN 

they both

resonate 

wash through me with sound

when I was trying to decide what the vibration 

of ME is

when I heard the mbira

felt resonant 

then I found this thing

it's a lot of different SOUNDS 

it's a very resonant kalimba with the rattle board

& I don't know if it's songwriting instrument 

I just know that if playing an instrument 

every day was a THING 

THAT'S 

the one I want to play

it might be

PURELY 

ceremonial 

maybe it's meditation 

maybe it's therapy 

there's a physical-ness to the playing of it

I'm pretty beginner I just got a ten key

which might be limiting 

it's in pentatonic g

which as it turns out

is mostly the same notes on the handpan

I figure nothing I do would sound terrible 

I learn what I like

I'll be able to put together 

combinations that I like

nothing says

it has to be a rapid succession of notes

especially with the wa wa factor

it's only got two not four

of the bottle cap resonators

so I hope that doesn't lose too much of the 

RAIN sound

it's pretty compact

it's LIKE 

eight 

by

slightly less than four

when I was really little

I had bongos

I don't know where they came from

& I'm not saying that I 

COULD 

play the bongos 

at ANY point

BUT 

I know the way you need to move your wrist

to get the SOUND 

I LIKE 

right

I had a thing for tambourines

there was a certain sound

& of course 

you can use the wrist thing

the reason I have

the collection 

is about

certain sounds 

I find soothing 

& about the whole shamanic trance thing

I'm not sure if I've got good 

ENOUGH 

rhythm

I KNOW in ballet

the teacher

would try

to get us to tell her what the time was 

& I don't know what my problem was 

but I just could not put that together 

three four time

four four time

or

something 

I feel like

maybe I slide off beat somehow 

maybe my attention wanders

the walking on tip toes

MIGHT 

be autism

the SPINNING 

might

have been

STIMMING 

those where the things that led to the conclusion 

dance lessons 

BUT 

I loved dance

& I got it all twisted up with

BALLERINA 

BUT 

it was about

FEELING 

ENERGY 

in a particular way

& I can't spin anymore, REALLY 

I need to move the energy through my body

there's some way

that I need to

GROUND 

myself 

I

think I may be connecting things

that might seem

unconnected

I need to sleep 

I wasn't gonna stay up

so late tonight 

BUT 

my cat got out

& I couldn't sleep until he came back

then I got started

I feel like I 

might not be speaking in a way that

makes SENSE 

I feel like 

I'm speaking some kind of shorthand maybe 

that has to be deciphered 

I'm not trying to do that

I dreamed for a long time & it seemed like 

I was really working through stuff 

I came away with this 

WEIRD 

I want to call it awareness 

of like some kind of processing upgrade

like solid body something 

where the thing doesn't need spaces

it runs cooler

I'm not sure what I'm talking about 

at any rate

I didn't get up till evening 

I'm all turned around 

which probably 

isn't good 

or

maybe 

it is

more thoughts

I am also

LEGITIMATELY 

fascinated by plate tectonics 

I have watched people's eyes go dull

listening to me try to explain it 

BUT 

I love all that earth stuff 

it's LIKE 

those

TOWEL MACHINES 

they had when I was a kid

the plates do THAT*

they come out

in the DEEP OCEAN

USUALLY 

*they don't really because they aren't connected it's more of a free floating situation, but there is subducting on the other end and that seems like the same thing to my child brain that delighted in machines I embarrassed my aunt joan one time because I wanted coins for the tampon machine I was obsessed with putting coins in gumball machines.  remember gumball machines?

test, it wasn't letting me post yesterday, I tried a bunch of times -- so I figured whatever I was saying wasn't supposed to be seen for some reason -- this test posted & then I wrote this -- let's see if it posts

my point

was

NOT 

that it was too math-y

my point

was that I couldn't concentrate on 

what was going on

in the class

UNTIL

I understood 

GRAVITY 

SO

I had to go and get an

ISAAC ASIMOV

BOOK

that explained astro- physics 

to people who weren't 

MATH-y

& I gotta admit 

EVEN THAT

was pretty tough going

BUT 

I DID feel like

I had a grasp

BUT 

I wasn't gonna be able to keep up

SO

I did end up dropping 

BUT 

it didn't make me less interested

it just made me understand 

my limitations 

& none of this

is about my bowling average

I'm still talking about

HOW I move through the WORLD 

check in may 9th

BIG 

move forward 

on the neck and shoulder 

BODY 

whatever 

I LOVE you VERY much sweetheart 

I'm gonna try to sleep now

I realize 

I didn't talk today 

I'm having FEELS about 

a bunch of stuff 

& they're 

not

really talk-about-able

YET

& MAYBE 

some of them won't be coherent enough to talk about at all

& MAYBE 

some of them I don't want to talk about 

I'm kinda grieving who I hoped my mother 

MIGHT be 

& I've been staying away from the news

because I don't want to have to feel that way about ameriKKKa too

I'm trying to connect to 
ME and my 

narrative thread

but I've been a little down today 

I LOVE you VERY much sweetheart 

sleep now, maybe

I LOVE you VERY much sweetheart 

I've never been able to read

proust

I looked dr freeland up

she's retired now

I think she had just started (more or less)

when I was taking her classes

she hadn't written her books yet

there are parts of me

I haven't taken out to look at

for a long time 

tori amos has a new

like really new

album

when I met you

I still remember the strange

supernatural quality about the atmosphere 

like I could SEE our auras or something 

I watched a video about twin flames

& THAT could be what's going on 

that could explain the quantum entanglement 

& that image I used to have

about us embracing 

& bursting into flames

I'm not sure how it all fits together 

is that a vision

LIKE 

OH

it will be 

SO 

HOT

at this point

it's LIKE 

we've been together forever 

BUT 

not yet been together 

& that's an unusual 

thing

lots of thoughts

I took a nap today too

I dreamed

that my mother said she was going

to the West Coast to have

a brain tumor removed 

she seemed perfectly 

cogent

BUT 

was trying to get me to come look at

some leaded crystal

she clearly wanted me to take

& I was like

NO

I don't want more

STUFF 

& I was just happy she wasn't 

SENILE

although not specifically interested

in the brain tumor

STORY

I thought of a joke

my mother is a narcissist 

her pronouns are 

I/me/mine

I also thought about ways

to use the science film I saw before lunch

in fourth grade

as some kind of metaphor for 

my identity 

it was about snail reproduction 

snails are all both sexes

they mate

by sticking their 

HEADS together into some big yucky joining

where they exchange genetic material 

& THEN 

they

BOTH go off and have babies

I found it disturbing 

I almost couldn't eat lunch

BUT 

there's a WAY 

in which 

THAT

seems more relatable 

than any of this

HUMAN 

stuff

although maybe that's memes

before memes meant internet stuff

I can remember saying to dr freeland

that I wasn't all that worried about 

passing on my genes

because I wasn't sure they were

all that great anyway 

based on my family 

BUT 

MAYBE 

I DID 

want some of my memes to go on

which was deeper and more sensical before it was dumb internet jokes

I wish I had gotten to know her

a little better now 

I think she had 

a LOT of anxiety 

she had a good friend who was schizophrenic 

& she re-read proust

remembrance of things past

every year or so

to check herself

against herself 

she taught my philosophy of women class

& 19th century philosophy 

& images of madness in art & philosophy

which was an undergrad philosophy 

& a graduate art class

team taught

with I don't remember who in the art department 

the philosophy was mostly 

FOUCAULT 

& she asked me one time

in the philosophy of women class 

what is a political lesbian 

& I KNEW she was asking me because she wanted to know my take on it

not some pat answer

& I had to answer 

I really don't know 

there was a woman in the class

who kept saying that SHE was a political lesbian 

but she didn't ask her

it SEEMED to me 

if you're saying you're a political lesbian 

what you're trying to say

is you are trying to 

wiggle out of

the

SEX

PART

but still trying to keep 

the radical part

not saying 

for example 

I am womyn-centered

or

I am engaged in a family unit

that de-centers patriarchy 

instead --- I sleep with women

for political reasons 

& WHAT does THAT even MEAN

I was at a lesbian bar

& I NEVER had any success at them

on this particular occasion 

I was sitting at the bar

there weren't many people there

& I was talking to a guy

who was at the bar

& I kinda assumed he had just wandered in

he was from out of town 

& I was enjoying talking to him

the way one might enjoy

talking to a guy at a bar

if you were 

ALSO

a guy

it NEVER in a million years occurred to me 

that he was trying to pick me up

ANYWAY 

we closed the bar down

& there was a coffee shop attached

& I asked if he wanted to continue talking there

at which point

he explained something about 

his wife loving the generally approved

lesbian curriculum and he was hoping that

THAT was what I was interested in

the IDEA that he was

in fact

trying to pick me up

freaked me the f*CK out

& it was an ick moment

& a suddenly unsafe moment

& I guess it's a bookend

to the guy who tried to pick me up

when I was at the mining company with friends 

the mining company was a gay denim/leather bar

which was my favorite gay bar

although they didn't really 

like women there that much

he might have been bi

I don't think he was confused about where he was

but michael jones had just done a mild

cigarette -- nipple round

that I think this guy might have witnessed

SO

he might have had reason to think I'd be fun

& honestly 

HE

didn't freak me out 

I just wasn't trying to be with men then

& I was out with friends 

SO

not looking for 

a pick up

BUT 

my near misses at being picked up

don't make much sense 

& no ick from him

he seemed like

a real person 

& his reasons seem

BETTER 

like maybe he saw me slightly aroused 

I was into that kinda stuff 

small sexy pain

I don't know what I like now

probably not that 

& I think 

should I be telling you this

BUT 

I'm pretty sure 

I've told you all of this

BEFORE 

I had experiences out in the world

& I READ a LOT 

I had all the hanky codes memorized

for example 

BUT 

as far as experience 

WITH 

sexual partners

very little of that

MAYBE 

if I went home with that guy

at the mining company 

MAYBE 

I would have cemented myself

in the s/m community 

become a famous 

SWITCH 

& solved all my hang ups 

I think that's more the person I maybe 

represented myself as

when I first started

writing to you

I don't feel like that at all now

I KINDA think of myself as

a political 

ASEXUAL 

now

I saw a woman walking towards me

at the grocery store the other week

& I started to think

she's 

HOT

& THEN 

I'm LIKE 

can't you just say

man, she's FIT and feel happy for her 

you have no interest in even

IMAGINING 

why ya gotta objectify

I fell asleep writing this I'm awake to pee now going back to sleep 🫶

I LOVE you VERY much sweetheart 

I thought about you 

& I watched some 

ani videos

& I had a headache and took a nap

I had a lot of dreams 

that I don't remember 

& things moved around in some way

I'd have to call

gravitational 

although I can't yet explain what I mean by that

I hope you are having a beautiful day 

& I hope 

I'm not seeming to pull away

because I'm trying not to do that

while simultaneously 

not focusing

MORE 

on what you might want me to do 

that what I think I need to do

because my balance on that kinda stuff is not 

CALIBRATED right

long incoherent ramblings

I feel like 

TODAY 

I should have been taking 

NOTES 

I coved a lot of material 

& at points

I'm LIKE 

SO

MUCH 

PROGRESS

& then at other points

maybe not as much as you're thinking you are

internal weather 

heyoki empathy

doing things because of freaky scripts that come from where

percussion 

OH

HEY

this is the progress part

I have been building a 

NEW BRAIN 

SO

if I think differently 

OF COURSE 

I do

& I KNOW that doesn't 

SAY anything 

& that it's possible to make that SOUND BAD 

& I can make anything 

SOUND BAD

THAT

is part of the bad programming 

at points in the past

I have felt an enjoyment of 

things like

TEACHING 

& I could read the room

I THINK 

menopause was an important part

of the emerging audhd or whatever

& then the pulling inward of the pandemic

like activated the "autistic" something 

SO

it's LIKE 

I WAS

some KINDA way

BUT 

I'm not looking to go back

BUT 

also I don't think I could

I thought about

the stripped back quality

of the guitar

in the storm that's coming for you

how it's almost percussion 

what's my inner weather

what is my resonant

SOUND

I had some technical difficulties 

with the purchase online music 

& that told me it's not the right time

SO

UP and DOWN 

there's this WAY in which

I'm figuring out 

HOW I FEEL 

about 

ME

so I'm not letting any of that sneaky psychological stuff 

ruin anything 

& THIS probably doesn't come across as

COHERENT 

& MAYBE it isn't 

BUT 

I LOVE you VERY much sweetheart 

& I am thinking about 

dancing with you

I want to dream about that

sleep is good

goodnight sweetheart 

I LOVE you VERY much 

thoughts

I had to go back

& listen to her version 

I wasn't able to hear it properly 

it's beautiful 

I particularly liked that thrumming 

echoing kinda like 

THUNDER

BUT 

respectfully 

it's SOMEHOW 

different weather

I FUNDAMENTALLY do not believe 

she HAS any color CYCLONE

it's a storm that's 

COMING for YOU 

& maybe you better hope

some actual storm

comes for you

FIRST 

check in april 4th

I re-read that last post I made

I wrote it 

& it barely made sense to me

I had crazy dreams 

I can't remember 

I LOVE you VERY much sweetheart 

check in may 3rd

I went to phonecia yesterday 

got overwhelmed 

got like thirty pounds of lentils 

today

I was gonna buy some

PLANTS

I thought I'd move up to herbs

BUT 

I couldn't find anything 

container-wise

that I thought was acceptable 

I had a headache 

& it was so sunny 

the whole experience was disappointing 

my neck & back & shoulders

are better but still not great

I LOVE you VERY much sweetheart 

I am imagining 

giving you 

an enormous 

HUG

you are 

MAGIC 

check in may 2nd

I LOVE you VERY much sweetheart 

brain churn, maybe

there's this way

in which I

FEEL 

like I'm not the same 

from day to day

& have these

PARTS

I am finding it slightly unsettling 

& I just had this really 

BIG anxiety 

thing

I wouldn't call it an attack 

it was MORE like 

my perspective SHIFTED 

I SAW something 

& it freaked me out 

I was brushing my teeth 

I started gagging 

hacking up

sputum 

I'm not sure what it was

I was thinking about 

HOW 

that looking for how you fit in

that SOUNDS 

very trad feminine 

&

I was contrasting 

I have some things that I'm very trad masc

AND

I'm not SURE 

is that LIKE a PARTS thing

or a non-binary 

THING

I'm feeling like there is stuff going on 

that I don't understand 

& I didn't finish that area

I haven't been able to do it I'm all LIKE 

I'm not STRONG enough 

BUT 

there is a connection between 

disengagement with 

REALITY 

& STUFF 

& I can't map exactly how much time 

I'm connected to some though

that is not EXACTLY 

disengagement 

so much as

ENGAGING in THINKING 

MAYBE 

one of the tangential lines of thinking 

is HOW uncomfortable am I

with the things

I've ever done or thought or felt before 

& WHAT I might 

pick instead

& MAYBE 

I'm NOW overanalyzing 

probably that's right 

I have this 

IDEA

of

STANDING as MYSELF 

which I thought I pretty much always DID 

BUT 

in SOME WAY

maybe I mask 

or maybe 

I need to focus

on getting 

something across specifically 

I guess I'm coming from 

we KNOW we could be

EASIER 

to understand 

WHAT 

are we making 

CLEARER

I need to do that with myself as well 

goodnight sweetheart 

I LOVE you VERY much 

check in may 1st

I am thinking about 

this dome greenhouse I saw

& whether I could 

SLEEP 

in it

or if that would be 

uncomfortably 

HOT

or stuffy

I THINK 

I always thought about 

intimacy between people as being

aggressive & slightly 

VIOLENT

& I don't think the new me

thinks about it that way

I've really changed a lot since I first met you

& I think one way I haven't quite finished changing YET 

is that I don't WANT to just be trying to figure out 

where is the 
SPACE 

I FILL

& I don't know if that makes sense 

I feel like that is how I'm programmed 

& I'm not sure how to 

NOT do THAT 

sleep time

that piano song 

really made me happy 

& strangely 

I was hearing the theme from the young & the restless when I was falling asleep last night & then again this morning 

strangely because 

THAT was not a soap opera I watched 

I guess it came on 

BEFORE 

or something 

because I'd heard the music 

I think maybe it was

a little more 

SPICY

or something 

I'm maybe 

trying to get a feel for myself as

I don't think I WAS ever

EXTREMELY

SHY

THAT

is part of this

newer CRAZY

that's all an oversimplification 

RECENTLY 

I've discovered that I have Saturn 

in the first house

& that means 

MAYBE 

I have some out in the world disciplined 

being seen type destiny

MAYBE 

especially when combined with the 

SAGITTARIUS midheaven 

& I remembered that 

I WAS MORE like THAT 

than I feel like I am currently 

BUT 

I'm building a new thing-y

& I realize

the old thing-y was

BROKEN 

I don't want to put the broken stuff 

back in, but that's easier said than done 

MAYBE 

I am not sure what I'm doing 

goodnight sweetheart 

I LOVE you VERY much