Do it! Do it!

CB

nobody can save you but
yourself.
you will be put again and again
into nearly impossible
situations.
they will attempt again and again
through subterfuge, guise and
force
to make you submit, quit and /or die quietly
inside.

nobody can save you but
yourself
and it will be easy enough to fail
so very easily
but don’t, don’t, don’t.
just watch them.
listen to them.
do you want to be like that?
a faceless, mindless, heartless
being?
do you want to experience
death before death?

nobody can save you but
yourself
and you’re worth saving.
it’s a war not easily won
but if anything is worth winning then
this is it.

think about it.
think about saving your self.
your spiritual self.
your gut self.
your singing magical self and
your beautiful self.
save it.
don’t join the dead-in-spirit.

maintain your self
with humor and grace
and finally
if necessary
wager your self as you struggle,
damn the odds, damn
the price.

only you can save your
self.

do it! do it!

then you’ll know exactly what
I am talking about.

–Charles Bukowski

25 songs, 25 days

Well, I did it all in one day. Thanks, Twindaddy, this was fun!

Day 1: A song from childhood

I Write the Songs by Barry Manilow. I remember waking up very early to the sound of this one from the kitchen.

Day 2: A song that reminds you of your most recent ex-boyfriend

It’s been awhile, but These are Days by Natalie Merchant always takes me back to the summer after high school.

Day 3: A song that reminds you of your parents

For my mom, it’s You are my Sunshine, which she used to sing to me when I was a kid. I don’t have any songs for my dad.

Day 4: A song that calms you down

Hallelujah. I like all the versions, but Pandora plays me Jeff Buckley the most often.

Day 5: A song that is often stuck in your head

For a while there it was Let it Go. I’m glad the kids finally let it go.

Day 6: A song that reminds you of a best friend

Walk Like an Egyptian. If you can name the friend, then you know me really well.

Day 7: A song that reminds you of the past summer

Counting Stars by One Republic, so awesome until the kids found out about it.

Day 8: A song that reminds you of your “first love”

Everything I Do by Bryan Adams. Accent heavily on the quotes. Listening makes me hang my head in shame.

Day 9: A song that makes you hopeful

Tripping Billies by Dave Matthews. Do I really need to explain?

Day 10: A song by your favorite band

I don’t have a favorite band. There are too many good ones.

Day 11: A song on the soundtrack of your favorite movie

Son of a Preacher Man. Go ahead, name my favorite movie.

Day 12: The last song you heard

Does a Bach concerto count?

Day 13: A song that reminds you of a former friend

That’s What Friends are For, Dionne Warwick. Back in the days when I used to be obsessed with radio dedications and before a best friend of mine died young.

Day 14: A song that reminds you of your husband

Faithfully by Journey

Day 15: A song you love to sing along to

Here Comes the Sun

Day 16: A song that has made you cry

Fire and Rain by James Taylor. Actually it makes me cry every time.

Day 17: A song that makes you want to dance

Short Skirt, Long Jacket by Cake

Day 18: A song that you love but rarely listen to

Jesus Don’t Want Me for a Sunbeam by Nirvana

Day 19: First song alphabetically on your iPod

ABC by the Jackson 5

Day 20: Last song alphabetically on your iPod

Numbers are coming up last, so I’ll give you 99 Luftballoons in German. There’s a Z in there somewhere.

Day 21: My favorite song

Lately, Pompeii by Bastille. But I have a long-term relationship with What a Good Boy by Barenaked Ladies.

Day 22: A song that someone has sung to you

Nightswimming by REM, 20 years ago at a duck pond in the rain.

Day 23: A song that you can’t stand to listen to

See day 22.

Day 24: A song that you have danced to with your best friend

In the Mood by Glenn Miller, first dance at my wedding.

Day 25: A song you could listen to all day without getting tired of.

Down to the River to Pray by Allison Krauss

Want to participate? The full list is at Melanie Jo Moore’s blog. Melanie, good luck rebuilding your playlist!

 

The Damned Truth (about me)

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Welcome to the fourth installment of The Alliance of the Damned, in which a bunch of death-defying bloggers tried to come up with something that I didn’t know about myself. This was a tough one, since I know myself pretty well, but even so, I still managed to surprise myself. Results ranged from uncannily true to eerily bizarre – I even managed to snag my favorite stalker’s phone number!

Check out these great bits of microfiction:

cynk The Empress of Earnestness, Cyn K

Our Axe-Wielding Editor was once a lumberjack.

Shortly after college, Christi disguised herself as a man and signed on for the season with a Pacific Northwest logging company. She imagined publishing an award-winning expose.

Christi held her own, so the mocking of her small size receded. Still, she had to bite her tongue when the sexist remarks flew.

She had planned a big reveal before bidding the job farewell. But instead of tearing open her flannel shirt to reveal her true identity, she slunk off with the satisfaction that her presence had caused a homophobic coworker to question his sexuality.

 

ardenCrazy Cat Lady, Arden

After putting the kids to bed, she sneaks out into the night. Dressed in all black, she blends in with the shadows. Her family knows her as wife and mother, but they remain clueless as to her nightly endeavors.

She cuts down villains who refuse to learn the difference between they’re, their, and there. She slays the demons who think the word is pronounced ‘suposably’ or who believe ‘irregardless’ is actually a word. Wielding her mighty battle axe, she destroys all the things that make us writers cringe in disgust.

Who is Christi? She is a part-time, word-nerd ninja…

 

matticusThe Jester, DJ Matticus

Christi is a world renowned finger puppet artist. From a young age she knew that her true calling in life was to create friends for her fingers. After gathering the courage to share her earliest puppets with her family, after they ceased laughing and realized she was serious, they showed her the proper encouragement to send her down the path of destiny to fame, but not fortune. Sadly, there is no money in being a finger puppet artist, so she has resorted to blogging until the world is ready to compensate her at a level that matches her true worth.

Rarasaur

I sense a ticking, unrelated to the passing of time. Experiences and thought mark your own personal calendar, wherein the Day of Gifted Lizards and the Day of Waterslides mean more than whether or not it was January or springtime.

You are a creature of fate, not bound by it, but by sitting pretty in the middle of its tornado.

It is quiet, but not necessarily calm, and you give the tangles of fate your full attention. You are one of the few who can see them, so you watch carefully, and mark your moments as you happen upon them.

 

cutterMaster of Analogies, Cutter

Christi is immortal. She has lived for hundreds of years, and will live for hundreds more…unless another immortal being chops off her head. If that happens, the beheading immortal will gain all of Christi’s powers in a process known as the Quickening.

She has kept her immortality a secret through the years, adopting false identities every so often. She does not want to be discovered by the other immortals who, upon learning of her existence, would likely pursue her to the ends of the Earth.

Unfortunately for her, the secret is now out…

 

gray-e1396226139745The Grand Inquisitor, Grayson Queen

Born a Caucasian male, though you may have changed; in youth was a bed wetter and demonstrated signs of genius.  Your potential was overwhelmed by your obsession with taxidermy; where you killed the animals yourself.  Due to your troubled family background, you now have fixated on obtaining a nuclear family.  After multiple failed relationships you have begun hand picking your targets and kidnapping them utilizing Craigslist.  The taxidermy skills aid in the evisceration and stuffing of your victims.  You live alone, on the outskirts of a big city so that you can obtain victims easily, but go unnoticed.

 

samaraQueen of Snark, Samara

The minute he got into the elevator and faced the back, I knew.
A lifetime in jail had eroded his humanity. Confinement disfigures you; years later, all you are is hatred for small spaces and gray sweat pants and red jello.

We were a group of stupid kids playing an elaborate prank. Until that girl accidentally died. Nights like these she’s alive, over and over. Confined to a 10 by 10 foot holding cell in my brain. Along with loneliness, boredom, a deck of cards for good behavior.

And losing my virginity to a corrections officer on a cold slab of cement.

 

ekDuppy Conquerer, EndKwote

EditMoi doesn’t know that she has a stalker. Yes, a stalker.

His name is Fran. Fran has no hair on his head, but he has a thick, blonde mustache. It’s really creepy.

Despite his stalker stache, he’s really a nice guy.

Actually, I don’t know that. I’ve never even met or spoke to him. So there’s that…

Fran doesn’t physically stalk EditMoi. No, he cyber-stalks her. He reads all her work, salivating over every new post, mesmerized by every word. To say he’s in love would be an understatement. He’s obsessed.

Fran, who’s a a friend of a friend of mine, told his friend to tell me to tell EditMoi that he just can’t go on without her. He’d like her to call him at her ealiest convenience so they can discuss their inevitable future together.

His number is…

867-5309

 

Thanks, Alliance of the Damned, for having me among your ranks and for teaching me that I am a lumberjacking, bed-wetting, finger puppeteer, ex-con slash word ninja, who’s a victim of fate and a mustached stalker. I hope you guys don’t mind protecting me from myself. It’s going to be a long haul since I’m immortal. Wait, none of you are immortal too, are you?

One more thing — I swear I did not steal my kids off Craigslist. I got them the old-fashioned way.

Anyone else want to take a stab at decoding me in 100 words? Tell me something I don’t already know.

Nearly a Valediction

You happened to me. I was happened to
like an abandoned building by a bull-
dozer, like the van that missed my skull
happened a two-inch gash across my chin.
You were as deep down as I’ve ever been.
You were inside me like my pulse. A new-
born flailing toward maternal heartbeat through
the shock of cold and glare: when you were gone,
swaddled in strange air I was that alone
again, inventing life left after you.

I don’t want to remember you as that
four o’clock in the morning eight months long
after you happened to me like a wrong
number at midnight that blew up the phone
bill to an astronomical unknown
quantity in a foreign currency.
The U.S. dollar dived since you happened to me.
You’ve grown into your skin since then; you’ve grown
into the space you measure with someone
you can love back without a caveat.

While I love somebody I learn to live
with through the downpulled winter days’ routine
wakings and sleepings, half-and-half caffeine-
assisted mornings, laundry, stock-pots, dust-
balls in the hallway, lists instead of longing, trust
that what comes next comes after what came first.
She’ll never be a story I make up.
You were the one I didn’t know where to stop.
If I had blamed you, now I could forgive
you, but what made my cold hand, back in
proximity to your hair, your mouth, your mind,
want where it no way ought to be, defined
by where it was, and was and was until
the whole globed swelling liquefied and spilled
through one cheek’s nap, a syllable, a tear,
was never blame, whatever I wished it were.

You were the weather in my neighborhood.
You were the epic in the episode.
You were the year poised on the equinox.

–Marilyn Hacker

e[lust]#55 (Mmmhmm, I’m in there)

rose
Photo courtesy of Sex with Rose

Welcome to e[lust] – The only place where the smartest and hottest sex bloggers are featured under one roof every month. Whether you’re looking for sex journalism, erotic writing, relationship advice or kinky discussions it’ll be here at e[lust]. Want to be included in e[lust] #56? Start with the rules, come back March 1st to submit something and subscribe to the RSS feed for updates!

~ This Month’s Top Three Posts ~

Why I Post Nude Photos (and blog about sex)
Discovering Myself Through My Strap-On
Sex Toy Shaming and Bigoted Wise Cracks, FTW!

~ Featured Post (Molly’s Picks) ~

Aftercare and BDSM Play
Two worlds

~ Readers Choice from Sexbytes ~

*You really should consider adding your popular posts here too*

All blogs that have a submission in this edition must re-post this digest from tip-to-toe on their blogs within 7 days. Re-posting the photo is optional and the use of the “read more…” tag is allowable after this point. Thank you, and enjoy!

Erotic Fiction

Come Again
Undiluted
Shudder
Tattoo
And When I Take You…..
Ride on the Night bus
Superotica Valentine – Day 1
The spelling lesson

Thoughts & Advice on Sex & Relationships

Please let me just say “no.”
5 Easy Mistakes to Make While Flirting
SexyLittleIdeas – The Woman in the Dark Alley
Comparisons
Treasured Property
Supporting Love and Freedom
Predicting My Own Future
Let’s Go Down Again
How to eat my pussy
10 (non-sexual) ways to be intimate with your
Permission to be Human: Granted.
Squirting: What Science Says

Erotic Non-Fiction

Date with V. (N. Likes)
Luscious
Saving Movie Night
Wicked Wednesday: Nervous
The Painter
Stolen Moments Turn Into Treasured Memories
The Art of the Blow Job and Deepthroat
Stun Guns & Happiness
Fatal’s First Time (with a Hitachi)
First Session
Probation Officer #145: Bowre of blisse 9
Trust Games

Blogging

you will ask Me to fuck your ass
Fish & Chips
This is not an invitation
Men I Have Known
My Storyyy (Trigger Warning)

Thoughts & Advice on Kink & Fetish

More Than Whips and Chains
Being shouted at: kink or abuse?
Explaining violence and sex
Awww Yeah – Targeted Marketing!
Grass is always greener – swinging
Lazy Dog Sex Position

Sex News,Opinion, Interviews, Politics & Humor

Valentine’s Day Sex Toy Selections
Discovering My Sexuality
Pathologizing Male Aggression

Poetry

Sex is…


elustbutton200

Life is a sketch

“There is no means of testing which decision is better, because there is no basis for comparison. We live everything as it comes, without warning, like an actor going on cold. And what can life be worth if the first rehearsal for life is life itself? That is why life is always like a sketch. No, “sketch” is not quite the word, because a sketch is an outline of something, the groundwork for a picture, whereas the sketch that is our life is a sketch for nothing, an outline with no picture.”

-Milan Kundera, The Unbearable Lightness of Being

There are some books that I just come back to again and again because of their truth, like this one. Gwen over at Little Growing Pains shared a post this week that reminded me again of this quote. I think that the experience of making the sketch is the important thing, and sketching means making mistakes and changes.

A memory

This was written by my niece, my sister’s daughter. It means a lot to me to have some of her beautiful, heartfelt writing here on my blog. Thanks, S.

As much as I try to deny it and force it back, I find myself thinking about you more and more lately. I spent years suppressing any thought that had to do with you, where you might be, who you could be doing it with, if you’re even alive. What should have been my first indicator that something was not quite right.I don’t remember how old I was, because so much happened in such a short period of time, it all kind of blurs. For a lot of the time I was with her growing up, she was in bed, and I do remember times when I would try to get her up to play with me, while my dad was hard at work, because all I wanted at that time was to be with my mom, even if I was always more of a daddy’s girl. Why isn’t mommy getting out of bed? I never knew until years later, but it did upset me at the time, and I guess my brother did a good job of keeping me distracted while he could.

Either way, I did get some time with her, when she felt good enough to get out of bed. She would creep into my room in the middle of the night, and now, at nearly 30, knowing what I do, I’m not sure if she was completely sober and just wanting to spend time with her little girl, or high on something and needing a junk food binge, but she didn’t want to be alone. My brother never wanted to go, yet I was always willing to climb into the car in my night gown, windows down, music blasting. She would take us up to High’s, a convenience store that was open all night, and I could pick out the candy bar of my choosing. We would keep this secret between us, because, of course, it would upset my dad to know, and I liked keeping secrets at that age. Having the special time with my mom that no one else did.

We would sneak back into the house like criminals in the night, making sure not to wake either of the boys snoozing upstairs, and she would tuck me back into my bed, singing “You Are My Sunshine” to me, in a version she had altered, and I would drift back to sleep.

That’s one of the few good memories I cling to, because not long after that, things went downhill fast. Emotional trauma, divorce, living two separate lives in two separate homes, I don’t really know how I made it this far. Sometimes, I feel her sickness creeping into my brain, like we did on those nights, in the form of my anxiety and depression, on the days when I feel like I can’t leave the house. Does the apple really fall far from the tree, especially when the tree is withered, and the apple gets knocked around and bruised by every branch it hits on the way down? Life is funny that way.

Flashback: 1980

I’m excited, you guys. Last week, my godmother sent me these:

20130811-093611.jpg

They are a collection of letters that she received, separately, from my mom and my dad. They were written in the late 70s and early 80s, when I was a baby.

I read this one on Friday:

20130811-093934.jpg

My dad wrote it in 1980. His writing reveals him to be thoughtful and quite spiritual. Also long winded. He wrote about me a lot, which surprised me.

I’ll write more about the letters soon.

I also started reading this:

20130811-095321.jpg

It’s weird. I’m not into it yet. But I did check the copyright page. It was published in 1980, the same year as my dad’s letter. That’s funny, right?

20130811-095442.jpg

I guess I’m going to spend a few days in the 80s. Maybe I’ll put on some legwarmers and crank this, too.

Want to join me?