Condom Dream (should I open the jar and pull some out?)

Me and a woman I went to high school with walked to the door of a store to buy condoms.  Two men were with us too, but they weren’t our significant others or sex partners, just casual male friends standing behind us and despite their presence, we were in charge of our own condom choosing and buying.

The other woman knew what she was doing, had obviously interacted with the costumer service man before and even had a semi-secret code word related to her condom purchase.  As for me, this was my first time buying condoms – and since I wasn’t buying them with a particular partner in mind (because I didn’t have a partner), I had no idea what brand or variety to choose.  I was asked what size I wanted and how should I know?  I was asked if I wanted any special features and I didn’t know that either.

Since I wasn’t buying condoms with a particular cock in mind, I said standard size.  The other woman had spoken softly, and when she told him what she wanted, he was standing right in front of her; but when I was asked what I wanted, he was standing across the room next to the various condom accoutrements and so I had to loudly announce (almost yell) my uncertain answer in front of the whole store.

Then I got brought a huge jar-sized contraption (about triple the size of a mayo jar), with hundreds of condoms inside, all of them unpackaged and tiny. Less than half the size of an un-blown up balloon.  I wasn’t sure if I was handed this large jar with tiny condoms because he thought I wanted to buy the whole jar or if I was supposed to take off the lid and pull out the amount I actually wanted.

The woman next to me knew what she wanted and quickly got what she always got.

The two men behind us just stood there saying nothing and waiting for me to be done.

I’m not an easily embarrassed person; sex talk doesn’t bother me.  But I am a very uncertain person and I felt uncomfortable and slightly embarrassed about myself for not having a helpful partner (or any partner for that matter), not knowing what to do or choose when handed a huge container full of tiny condoms, and feeling like a clueless condom gimp.

A clueless sex, love, relationship gimp.

An odd little dream based on my current uncertainty about all those things.

Relationship Shape Shifters

I don’t have any particular sexual fetishes (although researching fetishes and hearing about other people’s and even experiencing other people’s sometimes turns me on), but if I did have a small fetish, I think it might be sharing lots of details about me to lots of different people.  Too much information sharing, by some people’s standards.

I’m not talking about details like bank account, phone number sort of stuff.

I’m talking about personal brain wave details related to my true thoughts and feelings and artistic passions and forces and sources and leanings.

Of course there are exceptions. For example, I don’t think people should be frequently forcefully blurting themselves out in other people’s faces or spaces.  But within their own space, I think people should often feel free to express themselves as frequently and as openly as they choose.

And on a semi-related note, why should a strong, deep, in-depth romantic relationship be kept a secret?

Maybe some people have fetishist slants towards the gleeful joy of secrecy.

Not me.  For the most part I don’t desire to be kept a secret .  It  makes me feel like I’m hidden in a back room, waiting for him to be in the right mood for me.  Or like I’m frequently put on hold and sometimes I barely even exist inside his brain.  Or like I’m not powerful or important enough to be anything ongoing.

If he acts like I’m incredibly special and meaningful, but only does so in front of me and keeps it secret in front of others, how is that supposed to make me feel?

(Like a strange underwater pearl?  Like a broken treasure lifted up and soon to be thrown back down?)

It makes me feel like he might be interested in/communicating with quite a few DIFFERENT women, so he doesn’t want to make any ONE of those women openly public. To me, that’s okay as long as he’s straightforwardly honest about it – and isn’t secretly acting as if each ONE is his favorite, when he actually has several different favorites. 

If he says he doesn’t know what to tell me, does that mean he doesn’t relate to honest, open, ongoing communication anymore?

Obviously every two people have some similar interests and some differences (and it’s a matter of how those outweigh each other). In any case, I think it’s important to be yourself and express yourself your way. I mean what the heck is the point of diving yourself in with a partner if you faked it at the beginning? Unless it’s your latest sexual experiment – or unless you feel like staying committed to fakery all your life. 

If you exaggerate what you are/are not interested in, depending on the interests of your latest partner, what the heck is that all about?  For example, she’s not a religious type; she might have her own spiritual leanings, but they’re not related to standard church and god stuff – so you’re not a traditionally religious person either; in fact you’ll downright make fun of overly religious types.  Until your next partner is god-loving and suddenly you love god too.  Either that or you’re a sudden shape shifter.

You've suddenly shifted towards the next partners leanings and are no wearing a fake cross necklace.  

What happens when that cross breaks?

Mid-Life Crisis Bad Dream?

It was me and him and another woman.  I didn’t know her very well and my mind and heart got really bad vibes from her (including the vibe that she’d fake it and lie to get what she wanted; personality traits that I pretty much despise), but what could I do?  I sure wouldn’t choose to hang out with her one on one, but he apparently liked hanging out with the both of us, and I really liked him (probably way too much), so I went along with it.

It reached a point at which I was supposed to guess the other woman’s age.  He & I were of similar ages (38/40), so I assumed she was too, but I’m not good at guessing age based on looks.  She looked young; she looked attractive; I figured she might be a little younger than him & me; maybe 35-ish; so I decided to guess a few years younger, just in case. I guessed 33.

She spurted out a playful sounding laugh and at first I thought it was based on her feeling delighted that I thought she looked younger than she actually was. I was wrong. 

I’m 23, she said in an annoyed voice.

Then I was annoyed at him for being so into a woman who was way more than ten years younger than both of us. Really!?!  I blurted out, in semi-disbelief. Next thing I knew they were both glaring at me.  A 38 year old man who I thought had felt very strongly about me personally – and a 23 year old woman I couldn’t relate to at all, but whom he also seemed to feel strongly about. I did not understand their connection and so I sort of freaked out, thinking he would try to work me out of my freak out and tell her to tone down her rude laughter.  “Should I just leave?” I asked.  “Do you want it to be you and the 23 year old?”  I was sure he’d say know and try to calm me down. Instead he looked at me with an unsmiling expression and glared out, ‘Yeah’.  A feeling of semi-devastated disbelief came over me then.

Me: Really?!?

Him: Yeah.

Me: Are you serious?!?

Him: YEAH!

Her: You heard him.  Get the hell out of here.

Rude, mean, gleeful smile.

 ***

Not a fun dream at all, since it involved real people and felt realistic - and even though the ending really surprised me, that surprise ending felt unfortunately realistic too.

When a relationship oriented ending surprises you.

When a man you thought felt truly strongly about you suddenly changes his mind - and then chooses to replace you with a woman way younger than either of you – a woman from whom you can clearly sense the vibe of fake chick who will say and do what she thinks he wants to hear, in order to take him away from you and he can’t sense her fakery.

When a bad dream combines age and relationship issues and causes you to make up feeling as if your looks and your personality and your life experience has no appeal and doesn’t really matter.

When you’ve become easy to replace with an uncaring mean chick almost 20 years younger than you.

When a pretty mean chick who laughs in your face when you lose is the one he chooses.

MIXED FEELING MESS (some thoughts that emerged during a recent poetry interview)

I was recently working on answering a series of interview questions related to my POST-STROKE poetry chapbook (Blood Pudding Press for Dusie Kollektiv 5, 2011). That chapbook was the first new poetry collection to be written and created by me after my stroke, which happened early in 2010.  I had a tough time dealing with questions about it at this point in time, and so I needed to write some of my challenging thoughts/feelings out of my system before focusing on the specific interview points of view.  I will share those thoughts/feelings here on my blog – and then later, when the interview is posted on the Poet Hound blog, I will link to that.

Within the last few years, I have been a mixed feeling mess, about myself and others and life in general.  It’s hard for me to figure out and decide what I ought to be focusing on (aside from my poetry and art stuff) – and it’s hard for me to believe that anyone will be deeply interested in and able to tolerate me, except in small, short term doses. From family members to friends and even to significant others, I feel as if I’m not right for anyone anymore. I feel as if some people seem to think that I’ve focused on my health issue too much; whereas other people seem to think I don’t focus on it enough and should be more diligently making ongoing efforts at increased possible recovery.  For example, my ex-husband was tired of hearing about it after just a couple months – but then the next man I became seriously involved with after my divorce seemed to think I didn’t pay enough attention to my health, as if I should be primarily focused on that for as long as it took, even if it took the rest of my remaining existence.

I want others to allow me to make my own choices and to like me for WHO I AM. 

Not for whom I used to be – and not for whom they think I should try to be, by spending the majority of my time and energy and effort on repeatedly having my brain tested and scanned and researched and possibly improved upon in the midst of never ending medical stress.

Well anyone ever again appreciate and love me for WHO I AM RIGHT NOW?

(It hurts me thinking that the answer is probably know – that I’m not a very likable person – that I’m not good enough or fun enough or otherwise appealing enough anymore.)

On the poetry side of the spectrum, I am well aware of and understand that there are all different kinds of poetry out here – that some people will accept your style and some people will reject your style – that nobody’s creative work is going to be everyone else’s style. Personally, I’ve never aimed for main stream appeal or bill fitting poetry or vanilla snack pack pudding poetry (thus, why my press is named Blood Pudding Press). 

Despite being well aware of different styles and different tastes (and not caring whether I fit into them all), I got a bit bummed recently, in regards to a note I received from a press I had sent a query too, about whether they might be interested in partaking of my full-length poetry manuscript. My query had included a brief note letting them know how the title of my manuscript derived from my stroke – and then I also sent them three sample poems. 

They wrote back informing me that they thought the subject matter of my collection was too specific and might not warrant mass appeal, however they wished me health.  Well, of the three sample poems I had sent them, only one of those had been written after my stroke. It’s not like all of my poems focus on the subject matter of health or brain disabilities – and it’s not like my poetic subject matter has an obvious approach anyway.  My poetic content and style has never been very clear cut content wise.  If because of that, it doesn’t mesh well with their press’s style, then fine.  But don’t assume that the bulk of my poetic content and style is related to my stroke, just because I had a stroke and revealed that part of my book’s title derived from that. 

After reading that editorial response, I felt as if maybe I should change my manuscript’s title and remove every tidbit of my health background from my credits section - because when it comes to my poetry, I don’t wish to give the impression of being predominantly health-focused – because I’m not.  I want to be creatively poetry-focused – because I am.

However, I also don’t want to downright ignore or avoid significant parts of my life, as if they never really happened or barely exist within my brain - or not focus on them at all within my creative realm.  Thus, I honestly have found my health issue rather tricky in real life AND in my poetry life. My health issue did not largely change my poetry reading and writing style (except for slowing them down) – but my poetic content is mentally/emotionally based and the health issue certainly had an impact on those parts of me.

I’m pleased that I am still able to creatively express my thoughts/feelings/emotions/ideas through odd oodles of non-mainstream poetry. If I wanted to be a different kind of writer who was predominantly focused on my health issue, then perhaps I’d move away from poetry and try to focus on writing a real life story about my issues.  But guess what? That’s not what I want to focus on right now.

Still though, along such lines, when an interview I’m participating in is focused on my stroke, I do find myself wondering if most poets might not even be interested in reading this, because they’ll think its focus will be more about health than about art – and thus it will be rather boring and something that they’re just not particularly interested in.