Joy, my mother’s name, it might have turned so rancid in her, but paradoxically, as my child eyes really searching through this darkness for her, once upon a time, a child, one who grew into a woman who would treat her own so terribly, with a smile, too! I saw her joy as perhaps as a real seed in her — and over the course of my life, I came to find in my interaction with others pain because my joy always brought me disrespect, criticism, backlash. “Why are you so happy?” I got that question so many times, like, life is a gift, just ask Common, yes, the rapper. He knows what I’m talking about. And that amazed some, I don’t know why, I don’t know why people searched for problems within me. I buckled, collapsed, under the pressure, in the end, too. This guru — he just wasn’t a match. I just wanted to be happy. I didn’t need to be psychoanalyzed, I wasn’t floating in an esoteric universe, I didn’t want to live there. I wanted the guts, you know, of falling in love, staying together, and creating a real life. He stayed extremely close to his family, he never made his own, so he saw no value in it, he concentrated solely on my ability “to make it.” His presence in my life sucked the joy out of me. It was crushed. He isn’t exactly warm and tender. So, he could accept who he is and make decisions accordingly. Neither was my mother, she was fantastically cold, so that was an abysmal dynamic. Laughing, I laughed because he was so closed off. Ever try to connect with someone who isn’t there? You know? So, peering through time, joy. There was so much of it in these four years— those sensational nights, dancing the night away, where I was reborn — a dancer, a wild body, throwing my little fists down, all around, really concentrating on my hips, awkwardly, except, apparently I wasn’t. It was even funny. I could, move. Angelica would clap me on, cracking up. “Look at her…” Louise would laugh — because I was unleashed on the living room dance floor to the point that I had to calm down, in a chair, with a glass of water, jutting my chin up and down, serious in my expression. I don’t know what to say about the whole, I was so young, was I fed as a baby? Jesus, even Angelica would not know what to say about that, but she didn’t know what to say about the whole event. My mother was a bitch, a curse, a witch, mentally ill, sure, a wounded person, sure. I suppose I never thought it was fair — who gets “get out of jail free” cards and who doesn’t, who gets that wounded talk, and who doesn’t… as, what she did, was borderline criminal, I mean, conceptually. But nothing MATTERS the guru said, nothing MATTERED to him, there was no such thing as REALITY, in fact, no such thing as “real talk,” so weeeee, Dr. J take us away… who cares? A jubilee! And still, we were dancing, we were dancing!! Through it all. We did Sabbath and then danced. We honored sorrows in the next room, so one house held everything — terrible fates, unspeakable atrocities, supernatural help, supernatural evil, even, and an outpour of life, the lambada, where sex became good…a force that brought life into a room, and it was everything, moving, and it was joy —
-
I don’t know why I went there today, but I’m still figuring out what this book is, honestly, and I woke up in the middle of the night to send a newsletter, and I was thinking of adding my experience with the Albanian refugee, the Russian thief, the sweet drug dealer with dreams of opening up a salon (lol), and the Ukrainian refugee — some of that, as that was an extension of this investigation. And I thought maybe of bringing some of that in in relation to what I ended up going through, how I went through the lack of care I saw reflected in my mother, and how heartbreaking that was, because I needed me, I didn’t find anyone, though I suppose I had Hannah Arendt and Barbara Harris, so there’s an argument for spirit, but I was just trying to think about — a real story, so there’s the conflict, or what I had to make peace with — I’m not sure. I’m more trying to think, even about the guru, my cousins, how that story brought me a real adversary that was difficult to identify. People sort of cared, strangely, and my friend said, “people could have very strong reactions to you, even in college,” you know? I don’t know what to say there, but I’m trying to be with what I want this to be, so I can have a clear sense of the story arc, how I want to tell the story, as I can’t quite figure this out formally. I might spend some time with Maggie Nelson, I’ll see, as I’m trying to follow my own flow, my own natural way of writing. I like Blackwater by Joyce Carol Oates, that cyclical storytelling was very effective, and I thought, oh maybe I keep circling back to the lambada, these family parties.
Just because the juxtaposition of sorrow, some of these Jewish holidays almost happening on top of this scene of dancing, togetherness, is emotionally stirring, at least, for me. Just their cultural meeting was so moving to me. And everyone sort of agreed. It was a miracle, you know? I tried to tell Christians that, Christians who don’t know they are Christian, and I assure you, that will make sense to some people. And we’re dancing regardless, through the ignorance, we’re not getting caught up there, not tonight. And the lambada was born from oppression, it was a dance of liberation, because it’s the life force, and that’s freedom to the Brazilians. There’s dancing even sexier. The skirts are even shorter. Their getting UP into each other’s business—hot. It’s their battle dance, and isn’t that amazing? So I’m not sure about the title, but that transcendence, I’m trying to get there, as a feeling, simply, and I saw simply, because, even in trauma talk, which was never really my scene, I felt like I belonged to maladaptive patterning category, even if I had pain, of course I did, or problems with my parents, they were traumatizing at times, I suppose, but I felt more comfortable on the drier side of that talk, and when you’re in a room with so much history, and we’re talking real Trauma, capital T, what does transcendence mean? So I enjoy the tensions in the dance, the corporeal embodied whole, spinning. We’re spinning in a universe, I saw constellations in that room — the whole keeps spinning.
So I might spend time with Clarice Lispector as I find her to be so deeply interesting as a writer, I love some of her prose, her talk of the present, she seems like she really channels something in the present. And I love Maggie Nelson, so I might move into reading them, so I can maybe organize this text a little differently than something “classic” whatever that means. I might move to Obama’s experimental choices… though I’ve really enjoyed the love story at the sea, only because that’s really well-written. It perfectly and very cleanly inspires clear images with extremely economical language. It’s easy to follow. I’m reading that right now, and I’ll move into some of these other writers that I respond to, as Napolitano, she gave a piece of advice I really thought about, “write what you like to read…” not necessarily what you know. So I’m thinking about all that today, just where I go — do I fly to other instances when I’m moving with Joy, though it’s couched in other people. “You’re going to therapy,” and I practically have to fist-fight the Albanian refugee to go — “you came from war.” And that’s an exaggeration, you see, her aggression was benign, just stomping around, just dancing around my talk, we had this conversation actively, she did. I wonder if there’s a way for me to bring all this in, to think about how I’m waking up to this, as my understanding of everything changed, I don’t know what to say about that, because my experience was so mixed up, I just mean, the guru getting involved didn’t help me at all — was I fed as a baby? Are you serious? You’re telling me that indirectly? You’re manipulating me to get there? “THEY FEED YOU I LIKE HOW THEY FEED YOU…” I don’t know what to say to that.
That’s heartbreaking enough as an IDEA — that he shoved down my throat as I weren’t GETTING IT. He took my own hand and hit me with it.
And she’s dancing regardless. I’m getting into position — five — with Nicole and we begin to kick it back, but me — I’m flying across the living room. We’re dancing regardless. A Jew arrives by the name of Brad, blue tie, blue eyes. He’s smiling, for sure, dusting himself off, born to be a lawyer. He loves these parties, he really does.
So maybe I’ll keep circling around. I’ll try that. I’m going to work on the next section I have today, as I’d like to do something interesting with these ingredients: tennis, dancing, this story, everything falling apart, and finding the dance through that, again, and maybe ending at the party, something. I’ll have to see. I’m still trying to breathe and give myself time to figure it out. I’m trying to stop telling myself that I’m not a good writer, I’m trying to figure out what feels good. I wrote an essay for the Hannah Arendt Center, as I really enjoyed an essay they published on Medium last night. A somatic worker wrote a great piece — so I pretty much finished it, I gotta make sure I paid my membership fees. But right now, I’m trying to just get a job, and I like supporting people, I like supporting a boss, I’m a reliable and super trustworthy person, so we’ll see, and I’m going to reach out to agencies — as I like branding. And I’m trying to maybe read some more, like Vanity Fair, like some of the publications a staff writer might like to end up, you know, the trajectory, and seeing if I can start pitching differently, or working on pieces that are going to help me get better work. I wrote one thing for Business Insider and that got me a job, at least.
I’ll keep going. I got this restaurant job, with my old employer, and I really enjoy them, they’ve always taken really good care of me. So I at least will have my bases covered, and if I can get a full-time job on top of that, yeah, I should be able to get closer to my financial goal. If I… amazingly blaze to some crazy well-paying acting job (lol) right away, “wow, cool,” but regardless. I’m going to have to invest money in these one on one classes because I have to meet people who are casting things. I’m going to go to every goddamn panel —London, New Mexico, sure, LA. I’m going to every panel—Tina Turner my light—every panel. I’m going to give it all I got, but all that is going to cost money. I’m not 17. Feeling much better today.
It’s just Joy — I met Dirk Silber, trance DJ extraordinaire, a bear, a German portly fellow at Four Seasons Bangkok, nice bar, nice grounds. And I had really tapered my enthusiasm, considerably, by then, coming out of the dark period, and still, even he was like, “oh, lots of exuberance there,” because I was naturally enthused. I always have been. It’s an inheritance. I have just learned to fade it out, completely. It doesn’t work, not in this world, it doesn’t bring me respect, it just didn’t. I’ll channel it in other ways. I’ll go dancing, I’ll have my own Laura Linney in Love Actually moments alone in a stairwell. I’m just speaking honestly based on what I’ve learned. No thanks. YOU be joyous. I’m behind a wall, for sure. Maybe in the acting world, in a room, or something, that might be different, I don’t know, I’m just trying to channel Muay Thai. That’s it. “Sure,” I’m sure you mean well. “I’m sure you’re into me, really,” and “I’m sure you might think I have something special,” and I’m still staying behind my wall. Walls are good. Call them boundaries.