So we begin playing a game with the child molester

I’m trying to figure out TikTok basically speaking and my little tomcat, the cool one who doesn’t break any rules but is naturally young and fun has somehow made his way onto my floor…the back door…and has found his way into my room. I love this cat. He’s gone, exploring the stairs.

I was just looking at the videos about Miracle Mile, preparing to post them, and I figured I would share this one since no one is watching yet as far as I know but I’m starting to write about this time, and in terms of “what the story is about” or what the conclusion is, that’s what I’m exploring now… a very real and unreal scenario. I thought I, I guess, knew what the story was. What I wanted it to be.

Even the phrase Miracle Mile. What we believe in, what can happen? The final stretch.

I started living with this Brazilian-Jewish family in a snap according to this Brazilian mother of six. My father was on a work trip at the time. From my recollection, this would put us at about five-seven weeks. I suppose, at four, I hung onto what I could in that I remember that stretch of time and wondering why he left me alone with Dr. J. I investigated this situation between the ages of nine and thirteen, about, more to understand her. It’s only recently, however, that I really examined these years.

My father came home, as he stated in his divorce file, and found our entire house redecorated from carpet to curtain and me “living with another family.” So, he begins to call the house to speak to me as if…I were a cousin. In the sense, this woman was a total stranger. He didn’t know her. He doesn’t go, oh, let me pick up the baby. He didn’t know that my mother told this woman that he was a child molester. So presumably, he’s innocent, coming home to discover that his child is living somewhere else…

Four years later, I launched an undercover investigation which is funny but I created a container around the situation itself. I was a child, at a disadvantage, knowing full well that people change their stories. I had no clue what just happened. It would perhaps make sense later. Might have been hard to put myself as an adult in these scenes but that’s what I did. The situation globally fascinated me—how did this work, what could I learn from this, what did this mean for a child who grows up in tough circumstances, even my mother? Madness and civilization, criminality and civilization, that too.

And I knew on some level that if I set this intention, even aligning myself with God, yes, thank you, that reality would respond. Even picturing me asking God for help, if my story can serve in some way, then work through me, I prayed, since this infuriated me on so many levels and spirit didn’t abandon me. On a matter of principle, even, since the church was so important to my father, God was not a casual subject.

I was paying attention, observing, the world, and my own experience through a lens, an intention in mind, since reality itself was fascinating to me. I was studying human behavior, expectations, psychology, all this. Child abuse also. A child molester. The truth, that one. Lies, even, that are delivered to people as “the truth.” I saw lying, especially, this topic as being rather topical, if not prescient. I conducted a psychological experiment on lying, as well. Once.

First of all, when it comes to a child molester, someone can act as if it’s not happening. Not real, hello, check out. So there’s something that can be “unreal” about that, and I think one could understand the shock of such a terrible crime, right? On a moral level, even, and here’s Dr. J in haute couture in church where sexual misconduct is known to be a problem. As a buffoon, even, she could be a harsh mirror, and I do think we try to find what is useful if not impactful if we find ourselves in a situation like this. A spectacle. So chaste, Dr. J, also.

I asked my father, why didn’t you just pick me up? I’m your child. He said, with his hazy hands, I hated him and he did not know why because I was instructed to act “normal” but we were playing a nice game with the child molester until my mother garnered up the courage to leave her abusive husband though she doesn’t come to visit, doesn’t call, not me, in any case. This stranger, every day for a while. I am the problem the moment I arrive.

You have to understand “the truth” you can keep. I was four. That’s the baseline. That fundamental readjustment, since I did that, was painful, to say the least. I had to deprogram all this to get here, now. Did I do some remarkable things, or did I make some unusual choices in my life—absolutely, but now, since I’ve integrated all this, I see contribution, purpose, in a new light. I might have particular skills, even, that could have been directed toward addressing some of these problems.

I was just listening to a song—”why she did stay?” So that could be extended to him. Not always easy to exit an abusive or insane scenario. But still. He doesn’t seem to be functioning already. He doesn’t know anything upon his return. “Vicious lies,” he said later. Except he doesn’t know that. So what was the conversation that happened between Dr. J and Nicholas J? Doesn’t go, oh, once again, let me just go pick up the baby. He didn’t try. This Brazilian mother would have probably attacked.

But then…

This is what I mean about this situation.

Did he call first? Or, did he try to come over? I remember a phone call.

Regardless, she would open the door, nice and wide, for the child molester, smiling like she had never been more thrilled, even moved, to see a person. But he knew that he could not cross the threshold. So, regardless of the order, if he called or tried to “visit me” first, he did nothing. He obeys the unspoken rule. I hate him, putting on a show, this was showtime, by acting really really really happy. Yes, Nicholas J, how strange. He doesn’t go, there’s an adult woman who I do not know…

“You were brainwashed against me!”

He’s standing at the door, nice Nick, not breaking anyone’s rules.

Pathetic, no? I always thought that my parents were from disparate universes. She was in the stars, outer space, sort of awesome in the “is this really who she is?” Her eyes the exact color of the clearest blue sky. Not a fall from grace, type of deal, very today, but a kite flying high in the wind: disconnection. Stars in her eyes. Up up up. There’s a villain up there. You think it’s dark, sinister, but this is not that. It’s blindingly bright. And it’s the reflections that she casts…that might end up disturbing people due to how human we are, and what does that even mean? She was pathetic, as a character, but this behavior of my father’s might suggest thematic connections between them. Pity being one of them.

“You can never see your father again,” this woman said, speaking to me like I was a four-year-old, five, who knows. Couldn’t make friends, ya know? Dr. J apparently, I think, arranged it so that her youngest daughter and I could attend the same fancy prep school starting in the 1st grade. There are some pictures of us at this school, that’s it. Weird. Like, he came by to visit me. They did, like once. So, where am I in this story? This child molester story?

Right, so I’m “never seeing him again.” I wasn’t seeing this man to begin with. I’m not in this school yet. Four years.

“Why?” I asked.

Because I would never see my mother again. I haven’t seen her. Or, us again.

“Do you want that?” Them. These strangers became my room and board.

There was no—we’re going to have a conversation about what goes on in your house. Do you understand what I mean? This is a total stranger who walked into my house, was alerted by me, and took me home for a day that turned into four years.

However, she acted like she knew. Every step of the way. And honestly, in this case, this could be a fundamental weakness even. You think you know what’s going on. We naturally draw connections between facts, situations, oh, she’s acting like that because… That’s what made this situation scary even and I always talked about it like you couldn’t do that. But I was four, that was the grand revelation. And when I went through hell around all this, I could have been harmed by this very, somewhat, natural patriarchal, even, approach. “I know.”

My “I don’t know” approach wasn’t exactly true, it was a choice, and I had to evolve out of that though it’s useful, obviously, depending on what you’re doing.

All this took like thirty years to land. She’s a total stranger. She has no idea what the hell she’s talking about. Unless she knows what a child molester is? In the words of the Ukrainian refugee, “so you have experience with this?” Then, she’ll bring it up after I am sent home with my father, casually, just checking—is it true? It isn’t true is it? Truly speaking.

You don’t expect someone to lie about something like that but you’ve never seen a more unreal person than Dr. J. Where the difference between a lie and truth doesn’t seem to exist, and that’s not an easy perspective to hold, maintain. I noticed. You’re so out in left field, that even how one might wrap it up, put it together…what do you do with something like that?

No one treats this as a real thing, for me. That’s already one thing. I would never want to find myself in this situation but Dr. J was so blatantly unhinged and my father is…responding strangely. He calls. Hi Maria! Hi. “Wanna go to Italy and New Jersey with me?” Not, hi, how are you? What is going on? Who is this woman? Nothing. “No thanks.” Because I can’t. I’m five.

High five! We’re gonna get him!!

So, at nine, at the time, reaching into this scenario to try and understand what might have happened to Dr. J since this situation fascinated me on several levels. Child molestation; someone lying about something like that, rape, even, and someone who might have come out of a freak scenario. Child molestation is very real, and I didn’t need to reach double digits to understand that, so enraged doesn’t begin to describe it, even the idea that the victim could be blamed. Alright?

Then, think about the path to adulthood. The utter disconnect between “a problem” that one might have as an adult and their childhood, that is, the beginning, the foundation. Someone told me “oh there was definitely something mental going on with Barbara Harris,” oh? You see, that language does not fly with me. Does that help? And yes, these truths. Such as “everyone becomes their mother…” or whatever this weird sentiment is. Take it. Not mine. A deep fear, in fact, and fear as a governing mode of operation, I wouldn’t suggest it. It’s not fair. I don’t have to inherit this. No.

I don’t know what to say about my age or coming into myself now but I do not want my success, even, to be attached to her. I don’t want any of that. If I could do what she could not do, fine, I’m not sure if she tried, though yeah. Not sure. That’s another one. Just because I don’t have all the details as to what this drive to save the world was, since it was all crazy. It seemed. Maybe she did. Try.

Even thinking about my father maybe…I came to understand how the past can come back to haunt you, in a sense, but also, how everyone has ego states, as in more than one. And when someone gets triggered, reality itself fits within that lens. The truth is another question.

At nine, I was trying to penetrate Dr. J’s storytelling, mode of being. Putting on some spectacle like this. Standard. It was even operatic. Her at the organ in church in couture ballgowns…she’s desiring to be seen, even, flaunt. But her presentation suggest no shadow, nothing, not true, not true. It’s hidden, you don’t see, that too. Appearances. A world of appearances.

Is this the type of problem that could be so unreal—a real child molester—that real action might not be taken? Is it a joke, Dr. J? Is rape, illness, all this, so unreal? Was it that real? You see. A lie, I mean, people lie, can lie to themselves so deeply.

I met others who had to deal with this problem in their family. It can be shocking. Not wanting to see it, can’t deal with it. So I know that a family might not tell the truth around this reality, and it could inspire one to kill. I know it’s complicated. So very real though it might not be treated as such. Reflections.

Was Dr. J special in some way, since this was the great drama of her life? The excuse, just please. Her psychology did appear to be somewhat unique, or different, in that, me, no, I do not have strict understandings of lie versus truth. If you dig…we have clever ways of masking ourselves too. It’s not all a lie, right, but this subject in particular fascinated me, maybe it was a deep despair, too, that drove that. I’m fine admitting that.

I can simply state this now. We all slept in the master bedroom. It was too suspicious an edge so I couldn’t admit that. Even go there. I just have one memory. I’m standing by the door in the dark, away from this. I’m four. Dr. J took the single bed that finally arrived, that I demanded. We slept in the same bed and I became very vocal — no. Now, no one said anything. Even my demands for a bed. HELLO? I yelled at these people. And now, she slipped into that one. Mine. She’s putting on a dying display as was common enough. He gets into bed like this isn’t happening as a woman is dying, pretending to be. I’m scared. I’m standing by the door at four with the fear that my mother had been a victim of abuse as a child, already, yes, and I do not know what this is.

So I have no choice, in this setup, so I crawl into bed and I watch him on his edge and I cringe and I hug the edge of this bed. Don’t want to go to sleep. Also, I don’t know if I’m being fed properly, or what? The hell with who I was at four. I was four. The idea that I would not be telling the truth, in this scenario, is beyond my ability to cope with. This is what happened! In my case, the way people could respond to my story, just take your disbelief somewhere else.

And I share this more because that was part of the deal. I didn’t share all this, obviously, so my fun tap dance, even, well, that becomes understandable, no? And look, on a basic level, I could pinpoint a couple of people in my life.

I demanded a sleeping bag next.

We’re picking up Dr. J at the police station most nights. From what I remember. After this. I always remembered it being the same hour, too, which I didn’t stop to consider until much later…at 4 AM. I went through a period of waking up at this hour when I began reopening this. In a brilliant, deep blue, at the original apartment in the Chelsea Hotel, that’s the Oldest Storyteller. Eyes of awareness. This is an awakening journey. And that was quite a journey, it really was. On the ground of change, too, what it means to change even if “the world is bad.” What we hold onto. I appreciate that wisdom.

Finally, one night downtown, I threw this Mickey Mouse sleeping bag aside, pissed. I grabbed onto his and her seat, wanting to see this. So angry. Why is no one stopping her? It appeared there had been a bust, flashing lights. And there she was, in her signature white mink coat leaving the station all dressed up, glam, with my father. We’re picking her up for “drinking, driving, and looking for sex” downtown.

Wow. Does anyone remember her from the station? They might. So what happened?

How the church factors into my investigation is good, I think, especially given where I was.

This woman ended up deciding that my father wasn’t a child molester. Sure, where is he? Not around. Dr. J was the biggest liar on earth, that’s not the problem. She was handling me, apparently, in a questionable manner in this woman’s opinion, okay? She told me that at the tennis club four years later. Shaking her hand, wasn’t too sure there…about my mother.

What do I do with that?

Oh well, probably? No.

Is this truly speaking some crazy joke?

My mother shows her signs of sexual misconduct with a child, “really?” Do you see? This was all very real for me. Think about everything combined. Everything I said thus far. And tell me what this situation sounds like to you? I operated on some level like “some things don’t make sense,” you cannot understand it with your rational mind.

“She gave you away to save you from herself.”

Again, I sort of put this investigation together later, coming to understand I was a child. The questions I didn’t ask. I was traumatized confused, just watching this, even this woman’s issues with me. Again, “understandable” is not my problem. It was telling. As a parent, since I had to step up, you could say I applied the same grace that I gave my mother to myself. I was enraged. How dare you?

I was operating with the understanding that it was a lie at nine. Coming to, as an adult, how she then casually asked me to confirm whether or not it was true…but then, you know, I came to meet women who came to the realization that they had been. In this case, I wish this had been handled appropriately.

I was lucky though. Can’t say that. That’s what everybody said. You’re so lucky. I didn’t go through foster care, and some of the stories, White Oleander, I can hear about foster care just infuriate me. So, even she, you see, asked me that question after she decided that he wasn’t. Whatever. Reflections, that’s what Dr. J inspired.

How could she lie about something like that? That was step one. And people can. Lie about terrible things, life and death. Like, Emmett Till. There are some terrible terrible lies out there, truly speaking, that someone can spread about you. Even the police department able to shoot someone and nothing, no action is taken. No, it’s not racism, no. We thought…It’s just to place this in a real world, also. Unbelievable, my story? Right.

Dr. J told these types of stories, about rape. It was that overt, and rape is quite common, also. Child molestation. Just please. It was too wrong, in the real and unreal, to lie about, regardless.

I was already destined to become her at five, how fascinating. How true, no? In my case, if I said, no, someone could say, of course you will, another innocent person, adult, who believes they know everything and totally disregards the reality of what that would mean for me. We’ll even insist, that can be rather human, that we know what the truth is. Nothing changes, can change—well, look at yourself. That’s not true. This is why I’m a fan of narrative therapy in some way.

I’m already going to become this.

I’m five, dancing the lambada, I was getting into the music. This Brazilian woman, innocently, exactly, says she doesn’t know about me. A theme, a characteristic. Keep my legs closed. Could never forget that. Now, as an adult, I look at her and me at this age—am I not being abused? Right now? I could raise all hell. Where am I? Do you see how that young, you can debase someone?

My mother’s cocky lover, whatever, hating me…because I was her daughter, and who the fuck is this guy coming over to this lambada party also in love with his best friend’s wife, just please.

Five.

So, this lover of hers, I was ten. I discussed this at length with this Brazilian mother, feeling so terrible about it. I watched this woman’s performance of my mother. How could she have all these lovers, looking at her, just given this picture? This guy who hated me, openly, when I was five and I was such a problem in this house. He was her lover. I requested an interview. I don’t have all my teeth.

Walking into her kitchen, I remember that. She’s making rum cakes. Again, the container of an investigation. That’s what I was doing. I knew that all I had to do was set the intention since, even in the minds of these adults, a child investigating you in this situation has a different ring to it, doesn’t it? He’s cocky, yeah, he fucked her. Why? Seriously. “She was asking for it,” and I understand that she was.

This was a very very sick person. They would agree. Right. Do you get my point?

This was the only way I had to get to know her, I was seeking to understand her. I was a child, already in this situation, so don’t insult me. If her past was ugly, alright, I’ll blast through this.

And this Brazilian woman, again, I’m just studying life, here. Well, men, right, she didn’t understand it either, but “men” talk. How could he sleep with her? It’s a hole, something like this, and look, the vulgar nature of this woman, my mother, as well as how this situation reflected that, well, that’s what it was. So, alright, I thought, at nine, ten, I see. This is one of these narratives, not untrue, you understand, that’s not exactly the point. “Men.” So, he fucked her because she was asking for it, threw herself like a rag but he called it off because it was too pathetic.

I know, this is my mother, and this Brazilian woman didn’t tell my father what I was doing.

Dr. J ended up showing up at this man’s house in medical scrubs, claiming she was going to medical school, and asked him to hit her. This is her response to someone breaking up with her, an illicit affair since she was married, the chastest woman Dr. J. Delusional. You shutter, cringe, that’s what it was.

There was a little child back there, you know what I mean? It hurt very deeply. I was searching for what might have really happened to her and/or wanting to expose her, even, since this behavior was beyond. She was fantastical. Did anyone go…I don’t know, there are other kids out there?

So, there are themes. Beating is one of them.

In the kitchen, I was looking around the reality of this, and recognizing that it was a reflection of how she felt about herself. Again, I was listening to Mary Magdalene. There’s a gospel, even, that I would be very interested in reading. This relationship between the world and the one on the block…wasn’t too hard to place my mother in her place. Laughable, even, Mary Magdalene’s crimes, since my mother engaged in prostitution.

It was then that I decided to expand my investigation to include the Catholic Church. I couldn’t disregard their religion. My father was religious. Not going to church wasn’t an option, but at the end of my four year investigation, I refused to go to church with him. I left the church. I got confirmed to be able to speak as a Catholic, because I knew they would, might, try and disqualify me. I was just like this, you see. I made a vow, like that.

The only thing my father knew about my mother—she had been shipped around the different family members beginning when she was two because her sister beat her…excuse me?

She would go up to the priest, he’s probably still alive, every Sunday bombarding him with her rapes. What was she doing? Yes, she was an addict, to add. Was it true, fantasy? A means of seeking/avoiding intimacy since they seemed to be a joint action. Even repulsion. She’s telling people she’s dying of terminal illnesses. She threw a party to die, even, which I was invited to at the end of my stay at this goddamn woman’s house. So dying, even dying on top of one, you see what I mean?

Then, her sister called a couple of times when I was four sounding like she was gasping her last breath. According to my mother, she married a murderer who beats her to death which is when she calls. Now, how this sister would present my mother even thirty years later, I’ll reserve, since she didn’t seem to remember “ahhhhhhhh,” gasping her last breath. That’s what she sounded like.

What are these dying games?

I didn’t put this together linearly. Remembering, oh my God, yes, these memories I have of being home which threw me across the universe—was it true???—occurred during these four years when we presumably believed that my father was a child molester. Where did I sleep? I do not have a bed in this house. No offense.

I was trying to connect these themes, thinking about fantasy, sure, and reality. These seemed to be one in the same, even, with her. Now, thirty years later, this sister contacted me, and seemed to almost debunk her genius, throwing out diagnoses that might not even be true. The father, yes? Listening. Had to help her through school…yes, she doesn’t seem to be able to eat properly. I’m not exactly a fan of your parents. The mother was crazy.

Right, and Uncle Gus and Aunt Adele, I interrogated them as I was free to go home with my father because he was no longer a child molester. I had a picture, they had driven over to her family’s house, my only eyes inside there, to visit me as a newborn. Now, if my partner, if the only thing I know about my partner is that her sister beat her at two, I might not send my newborn. No. But that’s the only time I had any real contact. I didn’t know anything about her family. “Creepy,” they said. Twelve people sleeping in the same room. They left the next day.

In haute couture, Dr. J. Ballgowns, cocktail dresses to church. A prodigy. Licensed to practice in the Supreme Court. A hypochondriac, prodigal, of course, with her pianist, organist hands. Her breath legendary. Red wigs, exclusively. Eyes as blue as a cloudless sky, too clear for comfort, limitless. They took me straight to space. Lie, truth; these distinctions didn’t seem to exist in her. Pure artifice.

She was featured in some articles: the tax therapist, “the Mother Teresa of the tax industry.” She was a skilled marketer in some capacity. She started her own business which seemed to do rather well, or there was the illusion that she was the hottest ticket in town. But then, in LA, it’s all about the car. Later, she was saved, by the way, from all this because she was a genius—which is usually when people went, no, what? Hold. They never had money, no money. Didn’t exist. But they had the car. So there’s the appearance of money, that’s a reality.

You didn’t have money, might as well, flick this nice car over the edge of some overpass.

In Neiman Marcus Magazine, which is the only article I have, she stated that her new client is typically about the go to jail. Now, I knew at four, actually, that criminals made up the bulk of her clientele. But then, I read that she apparently made a case for people who had mental health or substance abuse issues or even went through a terrible divorce. She reserved the comment about the bulk of her clientele for the department store—Executive Style.

It was the last sign of her real hair, if I’m not mistaken, curly red. I know, my mother is a redhead. To me, personally, she had a goddamn responsibility as a hot redhead, what the fuck was this? I have to joke, sometimes. Because she was attractive, and this seemed to be messed up. A picture-perfect grotesque. I had no issues with her looks or whatever. It was just so wounded. Make-up professionally done, stylish, maybe a touch theatrical, but who cares? It’s the whole picture. The only nice adjective I ever heard were about her looks and body, even from this Brazilian woman.

“She had a nice body,” yes, she had to admit that. Everyone saw it, apparently.

There’s nothing wrong with helping people in the criminal justice system, I just don’t know what to say about what she did. How she presented herself. The disconnect, potentially. She slept with her clients, even, which was spoken about. Known. Think about Anais Nin, even, she had two husbands or something that didn’t know about each other, she practiced psychology this woman and slept with her clients, no offense to her artistic contribution.

What to do with the art of monstrous Men and maybe she might be able to say that right back at someone. Like Lord Byron, since I read someone recently compare him to Epstein. I’ve read her.

Dr. J has something like 13 academic degrees and counting, she just kept on going back to school. In her biography on the cover of her book that she wrote the year before I was born, her PhD is in the Arts. In Neiman Marcus magazine, she was a professional pianist first. Then, I remember hearing History of Tax Law and then Economics. She might have a PhD, too, I do not know, but she says whatever. Do I sort of remember her degrees on the wall? Yes.

She took the top floor of our house as her office which is why we slept in the same bedroom: two rooms. She covered the walls in mirrors, she collected tea cup sets that sat on pedestals, I’m telling you. This was an aesthetic. The tea cup sets. In this office of taxes. Flouncy transparent dress, outrageous hats, gowns, naked, sometimes, just naked.

These mirrors caught my interest at four…she’s sort of like this. I reflected on her, the reflections of this situation, the unreal, real. The illusion. Distortion. Since these mirrors created optical illusions like accordions, like your reflection in space multiplied. A narcissist? And that approach, since I am writing about this, feels to have potential value: reality itself. To take all these very relevant themes into account. Even taking the article I read about the anti-heroine of the moment being the mother who abandons her child. Mostly, I believe, she was drawing her analysis from fictional sources. Maybe some of it was based on real stories, but let’s throw in Dr. J. A fiction in real life.

Ah!! Fabulous.

“Protect my baby from the evil man,” yes. Men are evil. Women are evil. We’re all evil, you know? It works, even, as a story. I get the evil. Not sure if I agree with this approach.

That was the facade though: powder, confetti, marionette, saving the world, overtly sexual, sickeningly sick, again that’s more of a direct quote from this Brazilian woman. Handsy, Dr. J. She’s wild, she really was, I could hardly believe her myself. That seemed to be part of the effect, what worked, the shock value. Even manipulating what people believe to be true, possible. I don’t know, this is more the steps I’m making to write a villain, you see, and I smile, because it’s true.

If she knows, what she’s doing, I cannot apply that question without looking at the criminal justice system. Do you think she knew what she was doing? And I’ve heard this. “HE KNEW what he was doing.” With this…? Not sure if that’s the best approach because our wires can be crossed, there are all sorts of motivating factors that might push someone over an edge of some kind.

“The success went to her head,” that’s what the Brazilian mother and my father said. Alright. I suppose she came from extreme poverty. My father came from a poor immigrant family as well, the Great Depression.

I mean, according to the man who saved her, her business had “potential.” She was a genius. That’s why he took her out of this situation. She got a protector. And his sudden arrival was stunning, a stunning feat of perfect timing.

My father didn’t really act like she had flown off the handle. Like, oh my God, she was so different before. He didn’t know her, only knew of this detail about being beaten at two. “And she believed her own lies!” He said. That, he seemed to know as someone who had a disease that he denied. I understand it was “the illness” but I’m going to extend that to include Dr. J.

After all this, my father is diagnosed with Parkinson’s and does not tell anyone and I found out about that ten years later when it was Alzheimer’s. These years with him were repressed. All these “adopted families” I had became so insignificant in a way but I still had to de-program all that. Forget the truth, you know what I mean, I am not beholden to this madness.

These are my parents. Had to clear up that basic confusion. Take a real look at my family.

I wasn’t proud to be these people’s daughter. I’m glad I worked through that and I wish I did sooner.

This Brazilian wasn’t “too sure about me,” shaking her hand, in a similar way, creating fantasy “birthdays in the future,” like I couldn’t get away from these goddamn birthday parties. Reflections. But with a situation like this, yes, what does one expect?

With the same hand, shaking, she drew the temptations, like the devil. Money, cars, the kingdom trying to tempt me away from my father. “Will I say no to that car?” Now, think about what she did. Think about my father’s behavior, but she decides he’s not a child molester, and pumps her thirst for revenge in reverse, this was deep in her, to be honest, and we all have shadow selves, if these are unchecked or unbalanced, that’s one thing. He’s the innocent man. Not me.

There is so much that is true, here. Revealing.

So, I got the themes. Rather complex this situation. In how I could analyze it flexibly. Were these stories true once upon a time? A drama, even, no, my story could be rather riveting, unreal, something you’d see on TV. Not real life. We have an appetite for drama, too. And it has its function.

Dr. J cried real tears. This Brazilian showed them to me, rolling down her cheek, so in person. They had meetings outside the house. ”Business meetings.” Ah, she bought a confidante. Or, she could have heard them on the phone. But she showed me the TEARS. She’d never seen a woman throw herself on EVERY man that walked into the room. What room? What rooms are we in? Every one, even it was just one. She came over a couple of times, one time with her breasts totally exposed, walking into this woman’s house.

I remember we went to Da Vinci’s to dine with this lady…she ignored me, as if I didn’t exist, pampering this woman’s youngest daughter with praise and attention. No offense, her performance was so fake, truly, a buffoon act. I couldn’t take this woman seriously, hard to be hurt, even, it was so unreal, but what was this hatred in the form of gushing, breathy fawning all lover this other girl? The success went to her head? What the hell did I do to this person? I was four, five.

OOHHHHHHH, you have to shoot for the stars with Dr. J, these performances.

Then, here’s another truth. Same hand, shaking at me, yes, this was what an investigator does, don’t they? That’s one in itself. I was jealous. It’s normal and true that a girl would seek her mother’s attention but in this case, in some cases, one does not want to teach that, and it was perhaps a little easier than not to be in twisted logic, not understanding that insisting to a child, even, right? That it’s true…that’s a bit of Dr. J villain coming in with a smile.

Of course, it’s true. Of course, you know. And why would someone go, well, come on, how could you not? You were not there. You didn’t smell her, you didn’t see these performances, why would I? That would be the accurate question. Back at you. Now, in other scenarios, one could understand how that kind of approach might be detrimental, damaging. Like I ain’t losing my mind for you.

With this, I can sort of go on, but it’s more beginning to work out some raw ideas. I can feasibly stand in front of a group of people in public and dialogue. I can be a child, an innocent, Sherlock Holmes type I guess, because I don’t have many references off the top of my head, navigating all these truths. My experiments. Some of the troubles I had, that I had to work through. And luckily, there is a larger world out there, that I felt valued the journey, that lifted me from that seat of that real experience. Embraced me even.

It’s a whole new world. It’s like, traveling, even, since I’m grateful, I suppose, because Istanbul is a stunning city that doesn’t cost me much. I have some savings. I have a place where I can finish my book. I can work on building from here. I could do anything. I have much more in touch with the value in my experience beyond the choices I made. I ain’t operating like I did in the past. So regardless of where you might come from, there’s a track…and that’s healing, actually, and I don’t really get what in that word can feel weird. Accessing one’s contribution. That’s like a step.

Are there very engrained values that might impede one’s ability to empower themselves? Maybe.

No, I didn’t go through a psychosis, I’m pretty sure. But breaking down the understanding I had of the whole thing, that was physical. One could argue that I was more “disconnected” from the reality before I went through that past to phrase it simply. But then, I could lay out the whole problematic framework of that, I just had a sense of self. It was a fundamental readjustment. That was the plan.

In other words, people could go through unplugging from a reality that isn’t correct, on some level, you see, manipulation, all sorts of things, since I sniffed it everywhere in that hospital. And they might need room to go through something outside of labels, patriarchal approaches, excuse me. So they can get to the other side. Yes, I didn’t know what the hell happened back there. Understandable no? No one asks a goddamn question about bodies. Even William James said “hallucination is a strictly sensational form of consciousness,” that’s interesting. So, why do you ask, “do you have hallucinations” and not sensations?

Disconnection might be the theme of today, also, in light of all this connection since that’s what so many people say. So I suggest approaching psychology as a body. Yes, even “mental health issues.” The emotional body, in particular. And no, families might not understand the dynamics…at work, at play. That too.

That’s my Sunday. I’m just off the cuff, sharing who my parents were. But like, my father was sick the whole time. What am I supposed to say? The other families, that became the dominant narrative, and now, it’s just not. I’ve forgiven myself, for sure. And I have to say this beyond a reasonable doubt that there are extraordinary people out there…that might come from complicated situations, too, and the whole “you have this option,” that’s not true. There are more. But then, the world can insist, “always a criminal,” though there’s no reflection back on the world itself.

That’s cast the first stone. No, isn’t this what that means? Then, I gotta hear some story that has its own documentary about the Catholic Church kidnapping some girl. Alright? Insane. That’s another reflection. Dr. J.

Christmas in Naples is a Sport is going well. I have broken through the problem of remembering conversations verbatim, and now can move through this more flexibly, and putting Barbara Harris street fighter as me seemed to do the trick. She would have been just so smashingly good as me in this scenario. And I appreciate her support on some level. I struggle sometimes being in this world as it stands now, looking at my phone. I am in this world. That’s also real. Though anything can happen, I want to reserve room, of course.

I think, writing essays, and all that, like I’m getting there, but travel is not it, not for me. And some of my ideas are good but require some hard, concrete, support, as in research. I like psychology as an architecture, but that, I’m going to have to spend time with, so I like my mosque meditations, but I’m not there yet. That’s a young idea and I prefer the oldest storyteller, since “Death” the master psychologist, which makes sense, will lead me to new understandings.

I’m going to have to meditate on that. I have Christmas in Naples. I’ll pitch some stuff, but honestly, I’m figuring out how to pitch, how to angle this. So, I could contact the NYtimes and say, alright, let me tell you about Dr. J. The antiheroine of the moment. And maybe analyze that, that’s what I mean. A story is a story, I might lean into my education more, drama. That. Miracle Mile, yeah, I can see that, that’s coming. Even thinking about Tim O’Brien because he’s one of my references. I’ll get there.

At this point, I’m also just settling with this new world. I don’t know where home is. I don’t know how to turn my wheel, not yet. But I’m moving forward. Even my Substack, like I don’t know. I applied for a newsletter grant, and right, it probably would have been more interesting leading with my family story, healing, and the research I could do around it, the experience I went through. So I’m thinking about all that. Since avoidance factored into the equation. Thinking I’m not that interesting. People sort of telling me that, too, though communicating the opposite.

I’m interested in how I disconnected, in a sense, from a framework of thinking to be able to evolve, successfully, or reach for ideas that will enable someone to thrive…to access their potential, all that. I’m not really sure how to phrase that, if evolving out of that system is a better way to put it, but I am out. So now I can think about the real process I went through in connecting with all these ideas, feelings, that I didn’t know I had and coming into the place I am now. Where the system might be wrong. “IT’S TRUE THOUGH.”

Anyway, thanks for reading, and I’m sure there are resources for people who go through psychological crack-ups. But child molestation, even? Manipulative scenarios. Weird to show my face like hello, this was my mother, my father, and I thought about karma, also, in my case. Things like that.

See you soon.