A forgotten page and a strange flat basket

I found this page 5 pages back in my journal...

March 26, 1987

Why is
this empty
page
sitting her in
my journal when
I tried so hard not
to leave any
loose ends lying
about?

March 26, 1987

I am the stupid flat basket that you put under your paper plates in. My reeds are woven so that I cannot bend. They are loosely woven, you can see through me. I am hidden, forgotten. I was lost and now desired. I am precious and valuable, not materially but as a ghost, or as a gift. I am not transferred from hand to hand but I am kept and lost and returned only to be lost again.

I cannot see anything while I am lost. I have no awareness. Only when someone possesses me, do I become aware and can contribute myself. I am not used for my original purpose. Why am I flat? I do not know I must not retain much. I can only retain information while someone possesses me. When I am lost, I hold nothing and must be refilled when I am found again.

I am the gift of creativity. I am longed for but I cannot be aware. I must be found, for I am hidden beneath piles of mechanical rubble - the logic of today. I must be found and only found while those who seek me are not looking for me. I am not visible to those who look directly at me but only to those who let themselves be unaware as to give me awareness. Then I can enter them and become one with them.

I am not here to gratify grandiose desires but I am here to give those who are meek the creativity they so desire. I am elusive. I am not on call. I will not come when beckoned or sought. I do not wish to make those who seek me re-known. I want to stay close to the rubble so that I may be lost and found and lost and found as a wish for I am a gift, but I am not permanent.

Gifts must be given away but I am a gift in itself. The giver and the gift. I belong to Sue and only Sue. I am her own unique creativity. Right now a soldier seeks me with violence. He would kill to find me. That is why I am hiding. I will not come out under threat. Only when he is mulified and forgets that he is looking for me will I come out and in doing so, I will transform him into a prince. For awhile at least, before I am lost again. This is my way of life.

I have no idea what the heck this is about. Maybe it is a "free-association" writing for class. Maybe I was analyzing the strange crazy dream I had. I am not sure. It seems at first that I am talking about my tendency to become those who are around me. A basket that holds another person - thoughts - ideals. A basket that is nothing unless it is filled with another. 

But then I go veering off into the "I am creativity" stuff. What? Maybe that was the writing prompt. I was comforted when I went back to my original idea of being the giver of the gift. The basket that holds your burdens. That is who I am. That is who I became to survive. I am mother, provider of my children: Must Keep Them Alive. I am wife: Must Keep Husband Happy. I am never just me. Just Sue. I was never enough for myself. 

I was always uncomfortable in my own skin. I was always awkward. Clumsy Spaceship Sue - riding around in my head, behind my eyeballs - seriously - that is how I felt when I was an adolescent. How else could I explain my clumsiness? Why else would I purposely break my little finger on the brick wall outside the gym upon hearing we would be playing basketball for two weeks? Did that hurt? A little, but not as much as the humiliation of being picked last. I couldn't hold the ball, much less bounce it. I didn't understand the rules. A broken finger meant I could sit on the side and stare into space and be alone. Spaceship Sue. 

Satyriasis - the male counterpart of nymphomania

January 19, 1987

Dart thrown at Cris's forehead
Dart in the Penguin's hat
The back of my neck is all tingly
Doing dishes
Listening to Roxy Music from the recorder on the wall

January 25, 1987

A Story

U stood in the hallway of a dimly lit apartment building, listening, straining to hear the conversation within the apartment before her. She held her ear close to the door, hands outstretched as if to balance herself and not fall forward and bump the door. She held the keys to the apartment in her hand, wondering if she should use them. She heard sounds of kissing, laughing, and the low mumbling of conversation within the door. A man and a woman were in there - or was that a television?

U thought the man belonged to her. This was of course a delusion because that was not the case at all. She is feeling very threatened. She thinks of the time when she was the one laughing and kissing, having a conversation with this man. She had caused these feelings of having your "prize" stolen from your grasp by another woman who now thought of him as her own.

They had met at a party. He had been warned not to have contact with U because this woman believed or thought somehow that U was a threat.

The man was inclined to do things that he was forbidden to do, so at the end of the party, he had taken U home, much to the dismay of his present woman, who returned the next day, questioning the man in the kitchen, "What is she still doing here?"

Through the years, U had become too secure in her position as his woman. This assumption had driven the man away, seeking out another woman who might not assume such things.

U felt anxiety. Her heart was racing. She jumped at sounds she heard within. A moved chair caused her to quickly run down the hall and hide around the corner in terror. What would happen if she was discovered? Noticing that no one was coming out of the apartment, she walked down to the door, again putting her ear close to listen. This was futile! She decided to go outside to see if anything was happening.

Outside, she scanned the surroundings for elevation. She decided to climb a tree that was nearby for a look. This view was not sufficient and she gave up after 5 minutes or so.

She was in the same place: she could hide out somewhere and wait for them to come out - but what door would they use? If she chose the wrong hiding place, it would be too late.

U decided to go back inside. Within seconds she was in the hallway, at the door again. Taking the keys from her pocket to fiddle with them, she struggled with the decision to either use them and discover the man in bed with his lover or pretend she knows nothing.

U had pretended a lot about not knowing about the man and his others. She had dressed up to look like someone else and watched him with others.

She decided she might as well get it over with. She knows it will destroy her relationship with the man, but she has had enough pain. More pain than she thought anyone could bear. It had changed her.

She thought she must be quick as possible in order to catch him in his betrayal. She tried clumsily to put the key in quietly, but her hands were shaking too much. It was too late. He was aware and had rushed to the door. U turned the key, he on the other side, tried to prevent it. The door is unlocked. Push. He pushes back.

She does eventually have the door open. She is insane with rage. She wants to get inside. She uses her body as a tool not caring what becomes of it. She squeezes in and sits on the floor,  her back to the closed door, emotionally and physically unarmored. She is a rock. She is not going to move.

The other woman has fled to the other room so as not to be seen - or is that the television playing in the background?

"I expected this U", the man says, standing before her like she is the plague. He wants to get rid of her but knows not how to go about it.

U sits. She is staring madly straight ahead. She has accomplished her mission. Her heart is beating fast. She is sweating and shaking. She is not going to move, ever again.

This is an actual account of me breaking into my husband's apartment after we had split up. I had stolen his keys while he was making breakfast for the kids one morning and walked to the corner hardware store to make copies. I slipped them back before he noticed. I would break into his apartment when he was at school to read his journals, to snoop around. I was looking for more salt to rub into my open wounds. It was painful, and undeniably wrong, but I did it. I own it. 

The actual event described in the story above ended in the hallway, a physical altercation. I flicked my burning cigarette at his chest. He shoved me back. He took my keys. He ordered me out. There was another woman in the apartment at the time. I never climbed a tree to look inside.

 Below is a shot list for my video production class I was taking at MCAD. I was planning on filming this story. When it actually came down to the video shoot, Cris had come home in the morning after spending the night with another woman. I was angry. He attacked me. Cris picked me up around the waist, bruising my ribs as he threw me down on the bed. He choked me. I used my legs to kick him off. The children were watching. They were crying. I called my sister to come. I called my friend Halle to come. 

Halle took me to Stillwater to visit a friend, whose husband ironically had just took their kids and left that very day. I filmed her talking. I had to shoot something. I had the video equipment checked out. The assignment was due. I called the video "Halle Driving". I earned a "B" for the project - oh well. If I can find it, I will post it.

Video Shot List

1. Walking down street, turning into apartment building. Using keys to open doors.
2. Walking upstairs to the door - listening intently - she is going to listen.
3. The man and woman (or watching a television) inside unaware, laughing, kissing, talking.
4. The woman listening intently.
5. Inside the apartment, a chair pushed back, man gets up to get something.
6. The woman in the hallway leaping away to hide. The woman freaking out.
7. Vision of man coming out and finding her.
8. Woman hiding, decides to go back to the door.
9. Man and woman talking, kissing, laughing in the apartment - or is it a television?
10. Key in hand.
11. Vision of man and woman in bed.
12. Key near lock.
13. Another different version of man and woman in bed.
14. Open lock.
15. Man leaping to door.
16. Woman's struggle.
17. Man's struggle - as woman flees.
18. Woman gaining - leg getting crushed in doorway.
19. Woman getting in, plopping down.
20. Man staring at her.
21. Woman staring straight ahead insanely.
22. Vision of man and insane woman happy together.
23. Man confused.
24. Woman staring.

The Ethics of Secrecy

I came across this entry dated June 1988. In my journals, I see a common theme of trying to work out logically what I was feeling or how I was supposed to feel or react to others around me. I believed research helped me as I tried to figure out the "rules" of society that I could not understand.

The conflicts we experience when it comes to choosing when to keep a secret or reveal it or to pry into someone else's secrets or to leave them be are rooted in the experience of what it means to be human: needing both to share and to hide, both to seek out and to beware of the unknown.

By studying how one learns to deal with secrecy you can discover the path you can take to become aware of one's self among others.

Let's define secrecy:

a) An intentional concealment (to keep a secret) Hiding or Concealment is the defining trait of secrecy. Secrets are set apart from non-secrets in the keeper's mind. There are several other traits also present in secrecy (not always present all the time) they are...sacredness, intimacy, privacy, silence, prohibition, furtiveness, deception. These influence how we think about secrecy.

b) Also a neutral definition of secrecy. If the secret and the sacred are too closely linked in one's mind all secrecy will be seen as inherently valuable and to keep them is one's duty. Negative views of secrecy stem from beliefs that...

1. Why conceal something you're not afraid to have known?
2. Secrecy means impropriety (There's no place for secrecy in a democracy)
3. People conceal what is shameful or undesirable.

To view secrecy with any degree of neutrality we must assume that a degree of concealment or openness accompanies all that humans do or say. We must evaluate circumstances rather than an initial evaluative stance.

How can we differentiate between secrecy and privacy?

If secrecy is intentional concealment then we can say privacy is the condition of being protected from unwanted access by others - physically, mentally, spiritually. Privacy is a claim to control access to one's own personal domain.

Privacy and secrecy overlap when efforts to control access rely on hiding. But privacy need not hide and secrecy hides much more than what is private.

How do people protect their privacy?

1. Physical Space (Territory) differs culturally.

2. Information about personal matters and attention to them or to one's person - if medical history were published in local paper or if you were under constant surveillance by satellite.

Secrecy guards against others coming too near, learning too much, observing too closely. It guards the central aspects of identity and, if necessary, plans and property. It serves as an additional shield should protection of privacy fail or break down.

There is a need for secrecy just as there is a need for fire. It is like fire can enhance and protect life yet both can stifle, lay waste, spread out of all control. Each can also be used against itself, both can guard and invade, nurture and consume.

Conflicts over secrecy are conflicts over power: the power that comes through controlling the flow of information.

Power Struggle

To be able to hold back some information about oneself - or - to channel it - and thus - influence how one is seen by others gives power.

Also - the capacity to penetrate similar defenses and strategies when used by others.

Power requires not only knowledge but the capacity to put knowledge to use, but without knowledge there is no chance to exercise power.

To have no secrecy is to be out of control over how others see oneself. It leaves you open to coercion.

To have no insight into what overs conceal is to lack power as well.

If you lose control over your own secrecy, you would not be able to flourish. In psychosis, your secrets flow out like water over a broken dam and if you are isolated, it leads to painful self-exploration.

Four claims in defense of secrecy for human autonomy

In seeking control over secrecy and openness a person attempts to promote their sanity/survival:

1. IDENTITY Control of secrecy and openness needed in order to protect identity: The sense we identify ourselves with, as and though. Secrecy protects vulnerable beliefs or feelings, inwardness and the sense of being set apart including memories and dreams; of being someone who is more and is capable of more than meets the eyes in the future.

Without perceiving the sacredness in human identity, individuals are out of touch with the depth they might feel in themselves and respond to in others.

2. CHANGES/PLANS Growth or Decay. Progress or Backsliding. This could be an instance such as pregnancy. A secret at first and told to an increasing circle of people.

3. ACTION Such as a surprise party or as in a chess game.

4. PROPERTY Hiding valuables and personal documents.