In my Sensitive Content Warning blog, hilarious, I was in a sex scandal, you see, sure, rated “PG,” please, just hold off, don’t judge me yet. What I’m saying simply is that my mother wrapped me up in a sex scandal when I was four. I had problems.
I’ve been learning how to give myself more space, more time, as a book happens over time. I wish I considered that earlier. I would not have treated it as my sole profession, not until —or if — it became that, only because in my case, that was unnecessary. Space actually works in your favor.
I left it. I took a long walk out there in the world, engaging with it, when I got hit by a stroke of lightning — a clear thought. Giving myself more space is allowing me to just take my time with it, and think about how I want to construct it. I’m beginning to understand that approaching it that way might just bridge the gap of time… so I’m getting into a better relationship with it, which I’ve needed to do, as I had mysterious events where my experience of time changed. I was nine, ten, consequently, the year that my father was diagnosed with his secret dementia, as in, he was diagnosed with Parkinson’s and did not tell me, anyone, no one, literally, I was ten…just coming out of these years on Miracle Mile. I found out about that diagnosis when he took a dive ten years after that, when it was unavoidable. I already found a new family by then, and it was “Alzheimer’s?” His doctor echoed back to me on the phone, “they said Alzheimer’s…” he got angry, “Parkinson’s! I told him ten years ago! That he had onset Parkinson’s!” In the back of a UHAUL, I never recovered from the shock of that statement. “What?” It was my junior year of college. I couldn’t even, wait, my head spinning, I was right? I was RIGHT? Something was WRONG! All along? He denied his illness to an unbelievable pitch, he told me to change, when I was in a sex scandal, asshole, when I was four, and the rock hard of sentiment I had to break through, to arrive at that statement. Yeah, asshole. Do not be ridiculous, that was unacceptable, not sappy, unfortunate— ridiculous. I could not believe that statement, wait what? His secret illness, a goddamn joke. I would have appreciated being informed. I got out of a sex scandal, and then, he got diagnosed with dementia, some form of dementia, and he didn’t say anything, completely insane, sick, whatever, I couldn’t tell the difference. Reflections, sharp angles, Angelica Leibowtiz fell for another sob story now from my father. Why would I like him, listen to him? Think about it. This was a mad king. I came from madness, wake up. She treated it as if it were normal, his pity parties, and all things considered, she wasn’t sure, that realization, sure if it was a lie about him, in fact, as she had decided that it was, because this situation got too crazy. You see, the question: when did it become a lie? That changed my life.
That realization, as sitting down to write a book about these years woke me up to them which irrevocably changed my life, was, like, getting a column blown off, like, there’s a column? You mean, you weren’t sure, which brought her entire response to this debacle to a nightmarish pitch. What once held up my world, not the only column, but a fundamental one was knocked out. The sharp awakening, of hearing the exchanges between this woman and I, and going, “I’m sorry?” I was eight, nine at the time. “You weren’t sure? You weren’t sure if my father wasn’t a child molester?” Grasping onto this story, not understanding why it was looking as though, wait, no, it could not be, could this true? On that road to get here — I got knocked down, knocked down by people who acted as if they didn’t know they were trying to take me out with bowling balls, nicely, even, erase me, even, but if you’d let me tell me the full story, it’s going to make sense. But no one asks a question anymore. People tried to deny me out of existence, and it was so easy, and they didn’t care if they killed me. If I died… I learned that. I went down a strange road, but I got to the other side, cypress trees, mountains, I find myself in the mountains on a pleasant overcast days, where the greens are richer, the bark is wet, and there’s an other side, of a journey, indeed.
I’m having a fun time now finding my voice, I just felt like I was running up against roadblocks, only roadblocks, so I’ve wanted to change my relationship to writing, something, so I could feel better about it.
So now, I spent some time — as that’s the gift, not the thing that’s running out — with what I’ve published thus far. I decided to, oh what a crazy idea, to take two days off, a week, even, because the journey to get here was exhausting, I’ve been trying to find more spaciousness. I ended up feeling like something clicked, came together, and I’m rethinking Miracle Mile. So I’m starting it elsewhere, actually.
I’m going to go with the fairytale, as a book is a formal exercise, too, and I’ve defintiely struggled with it. So I’m now taking the time to refine my idea and reorganize what I’ve done thus far. I’ve just been learning how to slow down, so I’m spending time with what I’m published on my blog thus far, and that’s given me the space to conceive… so I’ll start over…I’ll start with the lambada, because she translated it to me as if recounting a fairytale. I’ll begin in her bedroom, formal, this is about sex, I mean, I was in a sex scandal. Rated PG, of course, no worries. This was definitely a story suitable for children.
That’s what I’m going to work on for Monday as I publish a section on Mondays on my blog. So now I hope I had a breakthrough, having thought this through, and I can move forward, having had the simpliest thought, actually, somewhere around 14th and 8th, like, it’s writing, not snapshots of what you see in my head? Tough nut to crack, writing. It’s writing. I just took a brief moment to reflect on that basic idea, forget images, scenes, think language. I felt like I wasn’t approaching it correctly… I thought about Napolitanos advice, about not writing what you know but what you like to read.
It gets easier if you actually give yourself the space to figure out how you want to do. I’ve found a blog useful, because in fact you’re never really ready, if you catch my drift, so I just put it out there, even if no one is reading. There’s something about putting it out there in publict, as it is, and thinking about it being received by a public that’s helped me think about it, as I want someone else to read it.
So now, I have a formal idea, it’s about something, I thought about that. This story, whatever it is, is about something. So I’m starting with the lambada in her bedroom, this fertility sex goddess from Brazil, even hilariously, the woman who took me home for four years to get cash thrown in her face as well as talk of child rapists… a nightmare, just a true nightmare. Imagine, as a parent? You have kids already, and you take a four-year-old home one day to play with one of your kids, and you soon get cash thrown in your face and talk of child rapists. “Protect my child, please…here’s thousands of dollars…” you let crazy into your home…and you have a very small child… in your home… and your wife…is Brazilian? Your husband is Jewish?
It has amazing ingredients, just thinking about these living room dance parties, and what the tone is. It’s not so much the literal song playing, as this song from Barbara Streisand is it. It was the lambada regardless of the song, and it became about so much than sex, it was life, the force, it brought all these people into the world, so it was the closest thing you could do to sex with your clothes on, so dangerously edgy in thinking about why I was there, and yet, though this story sliced me to pieces, there was so much wisdom in it, there really was, and I reached for a future, I’ll be honest, I did. Public, the public eye in my case… was a light at the end of a long private tunnel, because I knew that this story would be received differently in the public eye than it was in the private world, only samurais, wanting to take me down, not wanting it to be real, but I didn’t know it was, either, you see, though I did, I just went through such a revelatory experience that it changed me.
So I have to tell the story emotionally, with the love songs, the short snippets of conversations from those who heard this story along the way, as I got hit every step of the way by people’s questions anytime I opened my mouth. So now, formally it makes more sense, and I’ll let it be what it is. Once Upon a Time on Miracle Mile. A love song.
“Everybody needs a little time away, I here to say, from each other,” the piano keys, “even lovers need a holiday…far away from each other…holdddddding on, it’s hard of me to say I’m sorry…” Chicago. Picturing this sports family — taking off across the lawn,six kids, and they now have a seventh to deal with that came from Crazytown…child molesters? Cash thrown in their face. The drama, the absurdity of the story. The woman can’t call child services, because foster care is a crapshoot, a mythic place where the fate is uncertain, even sexually for a child, as they are at a higher likehood of being abused, somehow, and my story was so impossible to people, when that’s just status quo. Apparently. And I thought I just saw a reflection of it so sharp, so dangerously close, that wasn’t true, but now I don’t know that, that’s the journey… in a sense, but I’m speaking from a new place.
But already, the premise is strong, this is about a sex scandal I was in and how I woke up to it, and in opening up the book, I have the opportunity to make a strong choice that isn’t so on the nose, even, as I was trying to start with the central drama, at the BH tennis club, where Angelica tells me what my mother told her, but I think opening with her singing me the lambada and beginning in her bedroom — with the dance — might be a solid place to start, so I think about this ride, or story, as emotionally gripping as it was. I thought that the last scene I posted, that might be better towards the end, or something, as I’m still figuring out how I want to do it.
I feel better about it now. That wasn’t that hard, but that took time to get to, I got wrapped up in psychic shit for sure, when all I needed to do was — take some time, read some books, and just think about it, post on my blog, figure out what my process is, make it work, find what works. I need this to work, I need it to work better, I need to find more enjoyment and money, too, but figure out what works, what I’m good at, basic basic. I didn’t need to become an X-Men, which is what I became. Someone actually told me that I was a portal, channel, and antenna traveling on multiple planes of existence, but my psychicness handicapped me, also, I needed a helmet, type deal, which was retarded. No offense. Not me — you. How the hell did I get sent down this road? Insane. Into the netherregions because of this story, on top of it? I was vulnerable in a way that shocked me. Standing on a public stage, the comedy stage, that clarified wonders, it did, as to what is ethical and correct, like I heard some crazy shit back there that these people wouldn’t ever admit they believed publically, even standing on a public stage and saying, I was in a sex scandal, that changed my life, so the public stage ran so true and clear even in expressing my utter surprise in how my circle responded to me… seriously not knowing if that was true about my father, which was heartbreaking, terrifying, and revelatory.
So that’s it for the evening. I’m a bit tense, as I can’t quite find a job, but for the most part, I don’t feel worried. I think things are going to go well for me, but I have basic kinks to iron out. I’m trying to open my mind to ways of making money that might fulfill me, I wanted to open up to my gifts, and figure out my income, so that might mean something else besides writing, I do not need to do this all day, not at all. Anyway, I’ll start over Miracle Mile on Monday with the new debut, the lambada, and think of it as a fairytale of sorts. I think the Beverly Hills Tennis Club is definitely in it, but maybe not the first scene or the governing structure—it’s about the dance, her bedroom, a stronger image related to the theme. Once Upon a Time on Miracle Mile. I think I feels right to me.
Thanks for reading.