I may find it painfully dull to be among people

October 28, 1986

Things are beginning to lose their Char-ness. The Walgreen toothbrushes, the composition books, the sweater of her lover before you. I no longer feel as violent about Honda Civics - even the oxidized red ones seem virtually harmless. The coffee pot, jar and the knife she gave you are losing their pasts. My bed only vaguely remembers her presence. The clothes you wear have almost lost the dust they retained within their fibers from her bedroom floor. The clothes you possess are losing the remnants of Char as they rubbed off your body in the morning.

My memory of Char is painful. She was my rival, the taker of what I believed to be rightfully mine. I hate her.

Your memory of her is more of a mourning of the great love and happy times you once shared with her. It is sad - these differences. I feel bad that I cannot think nice things about this woman whom you once loved. I tried at first, but I never will except the fact that she has a right to a bit of your life - because I know your love is yours to give away as you choose and it is hard to believe, no not believe - accept - that the receptor of your love wasn't me. As I know I am only receiving a deflected love even now.

You seem to be in love with someone (or more than one) else besides me. I don't see how you can fragment yourself - not giving it all to just one as I would wish to believe would be the easiest thing to do, but you prefer the role of silent suffering - suffering in self-denied love.

Now I'm going among people. I may not know anything, but a new life has begun for me. I made up my mind to do my duty honestly and resolutely. I may find it painfully dull to be among people. To begin with, I decided to be frank and courteous with everybody. No one can expect more than that from me. Perhaps even here they regard me as a child - it can't be helped! For some reason everyone regards me as an idiot, too, and it is quite true that I was so ill at one time that I really was an idiot. But what sort of an idiot am I now when I know myself that people take me for an idiot? The Idiot, Dostoevsky

Alexithymia is a term that describes an impairment in someone's ability to identify and describe feeling states. Tony Attwood says that people with Asperger's Disorder often have a limited vocabulary of words to describe feeling states - especially the more subtle and complex ones.

I see in this journal, that I have resorted to descriptions of the items around me that provoke the physical responses that I recognize as "feelings". I use a wide paint brush to describe my emotions too. I am Sad. I am Hurt. I Hate. I Love.

The quote from The Idiot seems to me now a great expression of how I feel about the world now. It surprises me that I had enough self-awareness to see myself in the writing. 

This is the last entry in this journal. I am actually a little sad to let this one go. It has been a painful and thoughtful journal through this time in my life. I have learned a lot through this stroll down memory lane. Tonight, I will look at the pile of old journals and writings and pick up another. I wonder what I will find within its pages.

The wrong side and the right side

August 7, 1985

A Dream...
Cris and Char were in his room and I walked in. They were making love - Char on top. She quickly got off of him and she quickly got off him. She sat between his legs and watched me take a look at the photos of Aja I was looking for...

I wasn't watching them at all. I was even behind the curtain, but after awhile, I told Char it was alright, that she should carry on...

I finished looking in the closet and called "information". They couldn't tell me anything. So when I was finished on the phone, I came out of the closet and Char and Cris were still just laying there. So I knelt down by Cris' head and kissed him and apologized for having interrupted the "proceedings". He said casually that Char wanted to know if I wanted to join in, but I took a shower first and never got around to joining them.

August 1985

I watch Cris now, how he seems. He seems so much happier and at peace. He is very tender when he is in love and I feel he really does love Char and I both. He loves Char with patience I haven't seen in him for a long time. It doesn't hurt so bad anymore. I wish I could wear my ring but I am not - maybe I will again later, nothing matters much anymore. I hope I don't end up a fool in all this.

After I had confronted Cris with the knowledge of his affair, I was so afraid to give him an ultimatum. An ultimatum would give him a chance to choose to leave. I could not live with that. I feared being left.

Cris had been given power by me and Char. I said in an earlier blog entry, that Cris chose vulnerable women. Char and I were his training ground. He wielded his power like a knife and cut out our hearts. He arranged an introduction. He and Char at one side of the booth of a Minneapolis cafe and I alone, very pregnant on the other. He caressed her openly in front of me. He did this to calm her while he destroyed what was left of my fragile ego. My journal continues with an existential quote...

...What counts is to be true, and then everything fits in, humanity and simplicity...

What I wish for now is no longer happiness but simply awareness...I do not want to choose between right and wrong sides of the world, and I do not like a choice to be made...The great courage is still to gaze as squarely at the light as at death.

"The wrong side and the right side" Albert Camus

I stare at people

March 30, 1987

ianthe woke me up at 6:45 this morning. I popped up happily - which is unusual. She was hungry. She had fallen asleep before having supper last night. I gave her Cheerios; she didn't eat them until I changed her diaper. She ate all of them and drank lots of apple juice. She was thirsty, so was I. We drank together and smiled. She was very sleepy. I gave her a bottle of milk and put her back to bed at 7:05. I did the dishes - well half of the dishes for Cris - happily - to make his day more enjoyable. He let me wear his purple sweater. He woke up to say goodbye. He asked why I was so chipper this morning. Well, I felt good - good to see ianthe before the afternoon, good that Aja and Harris were too wiped out to wake up with her crying at 6:45 and too tired to wake with me putting her back in bed.

In class later, they went to watch a video. I couldn't take it. No more sitting in dark rooms. I sat up on the third floor thinking about the movie I will make soon. I leaned my head against the glass, looking down into the gallery at a guy with two girls. They looked weird, all foreshortened. When another guy joined them, he looked straight up, not with any purpose and saw me. We stared at each other maybe 30 seconds. I did not want to look away. I was doing nothing wrong. I thought it was pretty weird, only head and shoulders.

Being alone with ianthe, my youngest child, always brought a sense of calm to me. I chose her over Cris's wishes. He had asked me to think about aborting her when I told him I was pregnant. Immediately - within a split-second - I thought about it and the decision was made, "No", but he didn't ask about my thoughts until days later. He was furious. That was the end of my marriage - that choice - the right choice. He soon was coming home from school with drawings on his pants, decorated by Char, a woman who was "just a friend" he assured me. I was so sure he would not stray, when I suspected an affair, it was one of his male friends that I expected him to have strayed with. 

He had no interest in my pregnancy. He painted a violent painting called "The Fetus". He had no interest in naming the child. I chose ianthe, naming her after Richard Braughtigan's daughter. He said he hated it. I chose Tristine, naming her after Peter Davidson, the blond Dr. Who. He played Tristan in All Creatures Great and Small. Tristine is the female version of Tristan = child of sadness. Cris hated that too. I was defiant. He hated everything.

ianthe rarely moved when she was a fetus. I often thought she had died. Once a week, or so, she would move her elbow or knee slowly across the surface of my belly, announcing her presence. She was precious to me. I chose her. She was mine. Cris said he would not take me to the hospital. He told me to take a bus. I did not know what to do. I was plunged into a deep depression. 

When she was born, she just looked around. She was a silent child. She never cried. She just made small sounds. I did not speak to her. I only stared at her. ianthe communicated with small sounds and grunts. I thought she was deaf. I asked my dad (he was a doctor). He reassured me that nothing was wrong. I wanted to believe him.

She was sitting at 4-1/2 months, crawling at 5 months, walking at 7 months. She was a wiry, thin, tall, spider-monkey baby. I was so very depressed raising her, that I forgot to feed her solid food. I breast fed her first, and then thought, "Oh, I should try to give her food", but she wasn't hungry by then. Eventually, she was referred to the University of Minnesota, "Failure to Thrive", they said. They gave me suggestions for diet. Yet, she only ate bananas: banana rice cereal, banana oatmeal cereal, banana barley cereal, and bananas. I lovingly called her the Banana Pan.

ianthe was close to 3 before my sister Cindy agreed with me that she might be suffering from hearing loss. Cindy provided daycare for me while I worked a temp job altering men's suits at Dayton's. She noticed that she had to make eye contact with ianthe to get her attention. She had a very limited vocabulary. She said a few simple words and phrases, notably calling both Aja and Harrison "Aya", "Stop it", and "Bye, see you later".  I took her to the doctor for a hearing test. She had a congenital defect - both of her middle ears were filled with gunk - had been that way since she was in utero. They cleaned out her ears and put in some tubes while they healed. When I took her home, an airplane flew overhead. "Loud mama," ianthe said, startled, covering her ears. Poor baby. She has permanent hearing loss of both high and low ends of the frequency, but human voices are mid-tones, so she does alright.

I always spoiled ianthe. She had only me. She needed extra love. Cris would threaten to fight for custody of the children after our divorce - but he never meant ianthe, he meant only Aja and Harrison. He made it apparent that he wanted nothing to do with her. I am so sad that she knew that. How hard would that be growing up?

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.