Progress apace

Updates continue… have the beginnings of my blogroll, mostly faith-related at this time but will be expanding gradually.
The archives are slowly coming up to par. Much of what I’m doing right now is migrating livejournal posts in from my old Deviathan journal and then editing both old gallycat posts and deviathan posts to reflect the style format of an open blog–using first names only or internet handles for personal friends, calling my son “K” and my partner “DFH”. But as I go back in time, the partner names will change; I’ve had several relationships since I started keeping an online journal. So I guess for them I’ll try to come up with nicknames that will reflect who they were at the time to me.

Right now, the meat and bones of this journal is still primarily faith-related, but that is going to be changing rapidly as I incorporate other content here. Also, for those of you who read this via a feed, you may occasionally see backdated posts appear when I create a new entry for old content without using the import tool on wordpress.

I love going through my old content, however. There have been a lot of LOL moments in the past few years that I had totally forgotten about.

I really wrote that?

I was really into writing reflections back in 2005, before I had any idea what I was doing. I’m going through the process of importing and cleaning up archives, and found this one that I wanted to share on the nature of being right and wrong, originally published on Livejournal in October of 2005.

Ten years after the apocalypse

Well that didn’t work.

Try this the old fashioned way. I know a couple who are having problems because one person’s behavior was hurting the other and the former didn’t understand why. Too often, people think of “cheating” as being sexual infidelity, but it can take other forms; if a couple is accustomed to trusting each other completely and expecting openness from one another, for instance, finding out that a close friend actually gets more of that trust and openness can lead to a similar sense of jealousy, and it’s a lot harder to pin it down. In this essay, I explain how partitioning off bits and pieces of one’s love for a spouse can disrupt balance and harmony within a relationship. I say this because it happened to me, once.

You can read it, if you have an account, at Facebook, here. And if you don’t have a Facebook account, it’s become my favorite 2.0 platform, and I’d love to see you there.

Missing connections

Wondering if any of my Virginia connections know the Rev. Anne Coghill MacNabb, ’cause I went to high school with an Anne Coghill and I’m wondering if it’s one and the same. She had long, wavy hair and there’s a fuzzy image in the Sept. 2004 Virginia Episcopalian of the Rev. MacNabb, who also has long, wavy hair.

It could be a coincidence, but when I saw her name in the most recent V.E. (which I now get in the mail! yay! thanks, Calvary!) as recently leaving St. Thomas’ McLean I was curious if it was the same person.

The matter of privacy

I always struggle with how much to talk about here. Lately, more of it has been coming out in comments at other places. And I still find myself wrestling with it.

I have had some really awful things happen to me over the years at the hands of people who ostensibly loved me. And I don’t want to talk about them in public because they still have the power to make my life pretty miserable.

But I’m really compelled to write a memoir. Heck, I have one in progress already, with more than 7,000 online journal posts in various places. Yes, the life of a compulsive writer.

There’s a lot of funny amid the pain. I wonder if abused people who manage to come out of the wreckage emotionally intact always have a slightly edgy wit going on. Or, if the comedians with the subtlest humor always come out of warped households.

But how do I tell my story without eviscerating my very real, very living demons in public?

Ah well. You’ll just have to wait. 🙂

Biding time

I am so in limbo.

Saturday faithspaces didn’t happen this week, partly because of that limbo. Actually, it has more to do with discovering that my Nikon USB cable has a short in it, and a standard mini USB doesn’t work with my model. Ah well.

But limbo. I feel so out of sorts.

We went househunting at the beginning of the year, in between discovering we couldn’t afford Rockville and deciding to pursue Operation Hogwarts. We found a gorgeous house in Front Royal, adjacent to a Civil War property, on the main drag.

I’ve been getting my financial ducks in a row to prepare to buy a house. But I don’t want to buy a house only to have to unload it a few months later–this house has been on the market for a while, and I don’t expect we could flip it.

But I’m determined to be out of this house before summer. I don’t much care for the people my future brother-in-law brings over to the house. Or who just show up randomly with tales of the local roundhouse. Ugh.

So, get an apartment, right? Get my own place? It’s heartbreaking to think I might have to. See, I want to own my own home, and my options are buy 60 miles west or south of here, or move into a $1600/month apartment here. I can’t save if I’m dropping that much on rent–I’ve already learned that.

So I’m sitting here with a modest downpayment ready to drop on this lovely house in Front Royal (click on the 360 tour link in the ad above to see just how lovely) and set up my home office and take up the joy of telecommuting and possibly set up a small business helping churches blog or generate their websites 2.0, or something. Plain and simple–I want to merge my occupation (editor and webmistress) with my talents (humor and spirituality and writing) and my vocation (helping gen-x and younger folks become comfortable in their spiritual skins, so to speak).

But I have another earnest desire: to go to graduate school, so I can eventually teach or publish (which puts me on the academic path, not the ordination path). Oh, and a longing to get out of dodge–to find a lifestyle that doesn’t involve being packed like lemmings into shiny metal boxes … contestants in a suicidal race. (I have to go see the Police if they play again. I *just* missed the Synchronicity tour in my youth.) With my experience in higher-education communications, I know… I just know I could be a tremendous asset on the staff/administration of the right school.

But in the meantime, I’m in limbo, floating from parish to parish (but going back to St. Anne’s for EFM regularly), feeling homeless, feeling unsettled.

Today I had occasion to mention to someone an experience I had back in 1999. I quit a job that I hated, that was getting in the way of my life. I told her about this because she is going through something akin to discernment; she’s at a crossroads and not sure what path to take–and the one her heart is leading her to is one that makes her question: is it stupid? or is it brave?

And I remembered 1999 more clearly–’98-’99 are hazy years for me, at best–I remember two women in my life. My mother and my aunt. See, I quit a job so that I could pursue two parts of the dream: to become a writer, to graduate from college. There was a five month period of freefall between when I quit my job and when I started working at (and attending) Temple U. When I asked my mother for a $100 loan to help my son go to daycamp that summer, my mother’s attitude was that since I had quit my job, I didn’t deserve a loan. My aunt, on the other hand, let me continue to rent (at a very modest price) a room from her, floating me for a while when I couldn’t make ends meet and yes, helping my son go to day camp.

My aunt believed in me. Back then, I didn’t believe in much of anything, but having one person believe in me made it a lot easier for me to believe in myself. Later, my aunt would also help me learn that I could believe in God.

I’m at a crossroads. I can’t start down any path just yet. But new paths are opening here and there, shorter ones, or ones I can visit regardless of which longterm path I go down. So, even though I’m walking in circles right now, I’m going to take a cue from the labyrinth, and just concentrate on the journey inward. I’ll know when I reach the center, and have to choose a new path out.

Oh, and I got a minor promotion at work. I actually got it back in October, but we finally worked out a title for me: I’m now Print and Web Editor for the financial services magazine that’s been my home for the past two years. I love the fact that I wear multiple hats, that I can do print AND online publications. I have mad skillz, yo.

getting on the bandwagon

Something ms. clayton posted got me to thinking. I have gone through a lot of “favorite band” phases. For no reason whatsoever, I'd like to document them here.

1982-1986: Duran Duran
1986-1988: The Damned
1987-1990: U2 (with some overlap with Depeche Mode)
1990-1993: Peter Murphy and Peter Gabriel
1994-2001: NIN with a short flirtation with Apoptygma Berzerk
2001-2003: VNV Nation and Covenant
2003-present: I no longer have a favorite, but I still adore Duran Duran, The Damned, U2, Peter Murphy, Peter Gabriel, and NIN. Of these, the only I have not seen live is Peter Gabriel.

I'm also totally over EBM. I think all my goth points are fired.

freakzors

i have not forgotten that i was loudly broadcasting my atheism as recently as fall 2002. don't ask me why the then-love-of-my-life's abrupt departure from my life essentially made me do a 180 on that, but life as a whole started to really improve as a result.

it's disconcerting, though. i started a community (remember that?) called for the express purpose of being among the “not under God” crowd. I strongly encourage you'uns to resurrect it, because I still believe that people who don't believe in God should not be made to feel like they have to start in order to be a good citizen.

at the same time, if i can help someone to understand what I did not at the time, i will try. and that is: it's completely pointless to criticize people for getting bent over wanting to keep “god” in. If it means that much to them, instead of fighting them on it, ask them about why the pledge is so important to them in the first place. There are much more important battles to fight. For peace. For the poor. For the helpless. For the hopeless.

My 16 yo self, part deux

On third thought, definitely don't want to talk to her.

Sept 10, 1987

Steven threw a wad of paper at me today. It's depressing to think he should want my attention [1]. As it was, I was typing [2] and the small peice [3] of paper landed in front of me. Having noticed that the paper came from the direction of Steven, I turned. Bryan and Steven were looking at me, so I said, “Thank you, Bryan.” Robbin later told me that Steven was contemplating throwing it but then told Bryan to look at me so i wouldn't think Steven threw it at me. At me.

At me. Ha ha. It's gippy [4] that I should get so worked up over a lousy piece of paper. Anyhow, Carolyn says Wayne will be coming down here soon, so I might get to party next weekend. Plus Kathy is planning a surprise party for Joe. I have a new saying: The irony is stifling in here. Steven was punked out today. What a punker. [5];

[1] I had a debilitating crush on Steven A. for the better part of my sophomore year, and then found myself in a class with him. [2] Said class was yearbook class, the beginnings of my career in magazine journalism.
[3]This is how I spelled the word in the journal. I then carefully wound a proofreader's
squiggle around the miscreant vowels to technically invert them back to their proper position.
[4] One of the less obscure Colonial Heightsisms as it does not involve words like dekcams and wolboj, which are probably a lot less secure to my more sophisticated mind. But it worked for making adults look at us incomprensibly and generally keep out of the loop with regard to our illicit activities.
[5] Here, I've cut out the rest of the entry for your sanity, but I do want to mention that comparing the relative attractiveness of Steven A. to Larry Mullen, Robert Smith, and John Taylor says a lot about what lyric magazines I was reading and cutting up for wall hangings at the time.

You know…(Note to 16-yr-old self, part one)

I started to do the five things to tell your 16yo self meme. But then I realized two things:

I would not be who I am today if I followed my own instructions, and I would be lacking the most significant person in my life, and probably the second and fourth most significant people, as well.

But then I realized I wouldn't have listened to my 34yo self anyhow, and the endless logic loops that followed ended up being mildly entertaining but somewhat dizzying.

That said, here are the five things:

1. Don't drop out of school. No, wait. Drop out of high school, and go to John Tyler for an associate's degree instead. Then finish your bachelor's at 20, your MFA at 23, and save yourself the scenic trip toward a successful writing and editing career. That way, by the time you see that dream editorial job you want at the Smithsonian when you're 34, you'll be qualified.

2. Don't marry George. He's going to drag you down and get in the way of your ambitions, and then when you have kids together he's going to break your heart with him and drive all kinds of nails of despair into your psyche that it will take you 5 years to recover from. In the meantime, you'll manage to unravel two very good relationships all by yourself because you're going to be in a cocoon of selfishness for having been so poisoned. And while you're at it, stop
being so god damned defensive.

3. You are a writer. You'll probably make a damned fine teacher of antiquities, but once all the cute guys have satisfied their language requirement, they're not going to be in your Latin classes anymore and you'll most likely glaze over while translating. Stick with writing. Start your first book now, because once you're 30 all this other stuff is going to keep getting in the way.

4. Don't get a summer job at Kings Dominion. Find a friend of the family who needs office help. You'll get much better paying work while working your way through college if you have good administrative skills.

5. Find your faith. It's not what you have always been told it is, but it will always be there for you when everything else is going wrong. It's the lesson of Pandora's Box, and you may have to wait until you're 33 to figure it out, but it may well be the most important thing you ever learn. I know where you are now, and you place too much faith in love. It doesn't work that way. You find love in faith.