March 7, 2018

 

 

 

 

 

 

Not complaining, evaluating.

I had to take sleeping pills to drop off last night. Probably the twelfth night ever in my life. I took 2 days off, I was shook as fuck and I promised myself I wouldn’t drink.

Woke up with a feeling that absolutely mirrors a hangover, except from the pills. Oh the agony of insomnia and irony.

I think I’m losing my mind this time this time I’m losing my mind.
~Beastie Boys

I’m not losing my mind. I am digging through it and doing some exploring, some of it is not pretty at all.

I’ve been through so much worse.

Not the best mantra.

I’d very much like to get outta my head now, please? I lost the key somewhere.

And my favorite earring from NOLA.

Bummer.

It may yet be found. The key too. All the things. If they are truly mine, they shall return.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r3RRrLE5IOQ

I am the key to the lock in your life…I am the pick and the axe.

And right now I am climbing up the walls ~ Radiohead

I can get a new lock and a new key, I can turn that earring into a pendant. I’m resourceful.

Overwhelmed and undercharged. 15% battery and I am hanging on by my fingernails.

I am ready to rebuild any time now universe (do you hear me?) as soon as the earth stops shaking. I forget how hard it is to trust the ground after an earthquake, especially one I caused myself with my own upheaval. I did this.

 

You know I almost miss my explosive rage. I would crack and there would be this amazing release.
In the moment it felt so good to explode. To hit and hurt so someone else felt as shitty as I did even for a moment. So I didn’t have to be alone in pain. I wonder if the earth feels that way.

But so much collateral damage. Unnatural disasters.

It’s been years since I snapped and there is still fallout.

I am more of a controlled crumble now.

I almost miss blaming everything on everyone else.

So much easier than looking inside and finding my fault lines, then tending to them before I cave.

I have to slow way down on the drinking and if I can’t slow down, I have to quit.

That thought has me quaking in my stripper boots.

Did you know I was not drunk in a bar until I was 26 years old? I danced sober for 2 years. How in the fuck did I manage?

I quit drinking the January before my 19^th birthday.

I started drinking at 15 or 16. I would get black out drunk and rage. I was so angry back then. I was the squeaky wheel screaming for grease.

Any attention was better than none.

Now I don’t really want any attention to be totally honest. I get shy when people notice me. It’s harder here because I am supposed to be shiny and new. Not feeling my shine. Like I deserve any attention at all.

It’s hard to accept accolades for just barely holding myself together.

Got my period the day after a meltdown #2 and though hallelujah it is finished.

Nope, one more, forgot about the rule of 3 for a minute there.

And the Lord said let there be another earthquake and there was and fuck it sucked.

Last night was hard.

Had to happen, I could see it as it was unfolding. Didn’t make it any easier to watch.

Didn’t stop the aftershocks from keeping me awake imagining scenarios.

There was a fight yesterday, and I finally saw how I used to be, right in front of me. Like an ugly mirror.

The witnesses said I had great composure. How do I admit that it wasn’t exactly calm keeping me quiet, in reality I had so much shame I was choking on it. Like that I suppose.

I heard my own voice in the screeching cyclical arguments and the twisting of truths.

How did I ever exist that way?

All that anger? All that blame thrown everywhere but where it belonged?

How am I not a pariah of my own making?

How did anyone put up with me?

And better yet, why?

In the time called before I would have had her up against the wall by her throat 5 minutes in.

Dealt with the fallout as it came.

But I am not that girl anymore.

I am the one who looks inside and tries to figure out how to get better.

And fuck it is like work.

No wonder not everyone takes this path, it is a lot of uphill, but the wide open spaces are glorious, if memory serves. It does, too well.

I have to forgive that girl I was then too, make peace with my rage.

Everyone else has.

It is not enough to deny that part of myself. I was angry. From lack of love. Love from where it should have come from and love for myself. I felt disposable, why not behave that way?

Push everyone away and then blame them. All out of fear that they were leaving.

I would have run.

But by the grace of god some of them stayed. Something in me must be worth loving, so I should probably find that part of myself and be as much of that girl as I can.

I can’t remember when I realized no one was coming to save me.
No one is coming to save any of us.
I do remember being terribly afraid for a minute, then relieved.
Light and enlightened.

It is an equal amount of work to blame everyone else as it is to look inward. And both ways are messy I suppose. Just at the end of the day when I set about rebuilding from the rubble, I can feel like I accomplished something instead of waiting around for someone to fix it for me.

If I accomplish my own successes, own my own failures and muster my own happiness from inside, it cannot be taken from me.

 

 

There really is no such place.

All the girls in the middle hear alternately that the west or the east is better. All the girls west and east hear tales of the middle and the opposite coast.

Every place is what you make of it really and so far I have made a mess here.

I am not proud.

But this is as close as I have come to home since I was part of a hand-picked group of girls chosen to revamp a club. That was my heyday. Made more money than god, no rules, no extras and I did amazing stage shows and was paid accordingly.

Before the accident, before the massive decline in the industry.

I know it’s not coming back and that is okay.

I came back.

This is my swan song.

I have 2 years left in me and then I will be “Sarah the writer”, probably bartend too. But I got about 2 weeks left in me if it keeps going this way.

You put a bunch of people with not enough supplies to go around, on a tiny island and whaddya get?

An episode of Survivor.

I don’t like games and alliances. That was my marriage. Sneaky backstabbing, head games galore.

Twisted lies and utter horseshit as I sat on the couch trying to maintain my Zen.
My mantra?
Its okay, I know what I said and I have the screenshots.

I thought I left that world behind, but out of the frying pan into the fire.

Truth be told, I would rather be in the fire, it is warmer there and I have a chance to be reborn from the ashes.

For now I am a dentist pulling teeth and a firefighter, putting out the flames as they erupt.

And an impatient, slightly charred phoenix.

But I have to remember.

My last boss sat me down at the bar one night and told me I had a small army of girls willing to do whatever I said, called me Mama Billy (my old dancing name), high priestess of the place, queen of everything, master manipulator, he went on for about 3 minutes straight. I know he was trying to make fun of me and be insulting, but there was some reverence in there and a whole lotta ‘I have no idea how to deal with you’.

Work with me then, not against me.

Bless him, after a year of fighting me on everything, he decided to start using my ‘talents’ and I gladly let him. Everything simmered down for a good long time.

That has also been indicative of a lot of the clubs I worked at, especially the last one with its iron clad hierarchy, Halo at the top and the rest of us in an unpredictable pecking order underneath.

I was Queen B, which made her Queen A.

She ruled her changeroom and I took care of the girls in mine. For the most part we had a good system going after we ironed things out. But we are both gone and all kingdoms fall apart sometimes. It can’t be helped.

I was so happy to get out of that microcosm. When it was bad it was very very bad and when it was good…it still fucking sucked.

I almost reposted https://www.ourladyoflustandgrace.com/open-letter-to-the-girls-i-work-with.html

But then I realized the butthurt is real and I remembered my last up down relationship and the fact that they take everything personally and cannot seem to grasp dates and times.

I made a couple good points in that article though. I remember why I wrote it. I had 2 girls at work that needed saving, but they were bitey venomous things. And I remember the parable of the woman and the snake. She helps said snake, gets bitten and the only explanation was “you knew what I was when you picked me up.”

I have been down this road before. At work and at home. I know how it ends.

I don’t need anti-venom if I don’t get bit. My snake charming days are behind me.

I know exactly what that was. I just didn’t hear the rattle until it was almost too late.

I am out of practice and have forgotten how to play the game. I was hanging out with a girl who I did not realize was something akin to bipolar on an upswing and she crashed and tried to take me with her.

She lied to me and about me. I cannot abide.

I am on a one strike rule. Unless you are fucking me and it’s good, then the number strikes I will allow seem to rise exponentially with the orgasms I get out of it.

Speaking of…

No sign of the boy.

I had hoped he would come after I told the ocean I was home, and him and it was his birthday.

That was a massive let down that took days to recover from. And another meltdown. Fukushima sized.

No real money yet but that is typical for here this time of year. Sometimes you can know exactly what you are getting into and still get slapped with the reality of it. Sometimes you can ignore all the signs and get slapped with that too. Hugs and punches baby, not enough hugs and too many punches.

I really do need a hug and a $1000.

Been drinking too much, the stage fright is real. So is the shyness.

 

Ya know, the usual.

 

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This post seems to be about as scattered as I feel right now. Which is a lot.

The voice in my head keeps telling me to hang on, spring is coming. And I know this to be the truth. I have been here before, kneeling and reeling from way to many kicks when I was already down.

But I got back up every other time and I will again.

Fall down seven times, stand up eight.

The fun thing about being me is that eighth time, I get to fly.

When I get dragged this far, I know something wonderful is coming.