Crazy

Oldie but goodie…and it feels even more apropos in these crazy-ass times. Maybe because the antics we are seeing played out daily in our political discourse are extremely familiar if you grew up with a family or you know, interacted with anybody who didn’t necessarily have your best interests at heart. 

Stay strong out there!

xox

Judgment alert! There may be some judgment leveled here. Hey, I’m no saint.

How come the crazy ones never lose any sleep?
Is it their complete lack of a conscience that causes them to appear so slick, smug and impossibly fresh?

Not a hair out-of-place.
Barely a hint of the devil that lies within.

While those of us that have the misfortune to find ourselves in their orbit are sleep deprived, disheveled, walking disasters.

The fact that people who operate outside the constructs of polite society can close their eyes at night and sleep the uninterrupted, peaceful sleep of the just.

That will always bother me.

Why is that?
How can it be?

Case in point: The night before an arbitration with the attorneys for DWP to discuss the fact that their one-hundred-year-old water main had burst and turned my store into an aquarium, I tossed and turned until the sheets were knotted up around my head and neck, fashioned into some kind of an unattractive turban/noose—and I ground my teeth down to tiny, baby, Chicklets. This left me the next morning gumming my toast, with a foggy brain and pronounced sheet marks on my face that didn’t fade until after lunch.

Once at the courthouse, the team of He, She and It, who represented the water company, entered the room laughing. Uproariously.
Like Tina Fey and Jimmy Fallon had driven carpool.

I felt at a distinct disadvantage. Out of the loop, like the funniest joke ever told was completely lost on me. Was that their plan?

Upon closer inspection, they were meticulously coiffed and groomed, cool as the proverbial cucumbers, while I was permanently wrinkled, drenched in flop sweat, and frantically struggling to remove a poppy-seed from between my two front teeth with my tongue.

Note to self: Don’t accept half a poppy-seed bagel when you’re out of coffee. And you forgot your water.
You’re going to need something to rinse your mouth with when the Big Guns enter the room.

If I’d had more sleep I would have remembered that.

They all seemed so nice, so genuinely happy to meet me; that is until the bell rang and we went to our respective corners. Then the gloves came off and the crazy started to show.

They gaslighted. They made shit up. Their entire alibi was jack-crap.
With graphs, documents and flow charts they made a pretty compelling case. Listen, if you show me a flow chart, I’ll believe almost anything. Somehow they double teamed my attorney and me, and in the most well crafted, legal babbley, thinly veiled insulting way, they pinned the whole thing on me! They made the accidental, midnight break of their water main seem like MY fault!

It was 2009. Business was slow, debt was high, banks were failing left and right and I needed out—only I was too stupid to commit arson.

I know, crazy, right? But when we broke for lunch even I wanted to throw the book at me.

The picture they painted of me was that of a sad-sack, loser of a businesswoman, which was exactly how I felt at the time.
I think my lawyer drank the Kool-Aid too—they were that convincing. She wouldn’t make eye contact, skulking into the corner on her phone, and then disappearing for the entire lunch break.

But you wanna know what trumps sleep deprivation? Rage. That’s what.
It also instantly removes sheet marks from your face.

It also over-rides all victim-hood.

Crazy and Rage are curious dance partners and they should never be left alone in a room together.
Let me tell you why. Crazy is so put together, so charming and unflappable that she never breaks a sweat. And that bitch looooooves a victim, she gets off on them—they get her panties wet.

Rage is no victim, he’s a gangster. He’s raw, he’s greasy and he talks real dirty. He wears a wife beater t-shirt and too much Aramis; and he has only one thing in his crosshairs—Crazy.

Crazy gets high on Rage and it quickly becomes a street-brawl.

But let me tell you something, Rage is better than Sad, which is where I’d pitched my tent for eighteen months. Some say you can get caught in anger and never feel despair. The opposite had been true for me.
And sad victimhood? Well, that’s like chum in the water to Crazy.

So Rage felt better. It felt…empowering. If sadness felt like quick-sand, Rage, like solid ground.

It got my attention and cleared my vision, so I could finally see the truth and it kicked Sad’s ass to the curb.

I locked myself in a public bathroom stall and kick-boxed the toilet-tissue dispenser for nearly an hour before taking a walk around the building, coming to my senses, and finding my courage.

I knew my opponent. I was very familiar with Crazy.
You see, I had met her as a teenager in the form of my father’s second wife. I had witnessed her devour her victims whole and I was smart enough to remember that Rage threw her into a sort of drunken frenzy.

I also remembered that there is no reasoning with Crazy, and nothing can get to her.  Nothing touches her heart. There is no sympathy, empathy or compassion and absolutely nothing is open for discussion.

She acts as your judge, jury, and executioner.

And the more they sense is at stake, the faster and louder the accusations come. Their aim is to keep you off-balance, on the ropes.

Remember, Crazy is rested, ready and strong after her peaceful night’s sleep. How is that fair?
Because Crazy get a buzz off this shit and she doesn’t care about anything other than winning.

I sure wasn’t feeling sad anymore, Rage had taken over and hatched a plan but I knew better than to let it enter that arbitration room. I could hear the team of Crazy, Crazier, and Craziest, whopping it up inside so I waited outside until I saw my attorney exit the elevator.

“You handle this, I’m leaving” I announced. I had her by the arm and was walking her back down a long hallway of endless doors, out of earshot of the hyenas.

“What?” she looked surprised.

“You don’t need me here. They can smell my fear and sadness, and well, their offer is beyond ridiculous. See what happens when they can’t focus on me. When they have to deal with you and only the facts.” We had walked in a circle making our way back toward the bank of elevators.

She reached into her bag for paper and a pen. “Give me the number you’ll you settle at,” she asked. She seemed relieved like the day could be salvaged. Like it could go back to a language she understood—the law.

I wrote a figure down. She looked and nodded in agreement, folding the paper into a small square and tucking into her suit-jacket pocket. Just then the elevator chimed, opening right on cue. People were packed in like sardines, but as I stepped inside she grabbed my purse strap, turning me around. “This could end today,” she said with a hint of a smile, letting go of my purse as the doors closed.

A hairy mystery hand reached around me and pushed the button for LOBBY, getting me the hell out of that DWP building. I know it was Rage. I could smell his Aramis. But I made sure I left him behind, losing him in the crowd.

*I got the call a couple of hours later that they’d settled on the figure I’d written down. “Piece of cake” I remember her saying in a distracted voice, she was already on to her next case.

I feel safe in saying that we all slept well that night.

Maybe some of you guys needed to hear this,
Carry on,
xox

*And don’t get your panties in a bunch if I anthropomorphize emotions. We all know crazy is not female and rage is not male, so calm the fuck down. 

I think we can all agree that the world has gone freaking crazy.

Like flip city crazy.

Whether I’m in the line at the market, pumping gas or flipping someone off, gently reminding them it’s not okay to text and drive—I swear–there’s a special brand of madness out there.

This weekend it felt different, more virulent than the generic cray, cray we’ve been living with for close to a year. You know what I mean—the up is down, black is white, and truth are lies reality that we are all attempting to navigate without losing our minds.

“Snap out of it!”

And we can’t even blame the full moon you guys, it’s too early!

Friends told me that they argued almost to the point of a duel at dawn over issues they barely care about.

Insecurity loomed large.

Our mail carrier (who drives at a glacial pace) got broadsided at the end of our block.

And I ate pie. All weekend. Like, the entire pie.

That wasn’t the only display of cray at our house this weekend. The wildlife, which you know if you read this blog has overrun our house, well, it upped the ante.

“We have a crazy squirrel”, Raphael informed me as we sat down to play cards on the patio Saturday afternoon.

“That sounds like an understatement. Have you met the squirrels around here?”

“I’m not kidding”, he continued, unamused by me. “It either has rabies or it ate some rat poison.”

“Wow. Those are terrible odds”, I replied, trying my best to stiffel a giggle. “Hey, how can you tell when a squirrel is…you know…crazy?” I was trying to make a point. I knew the squirrel hadn’t eaten poison. After the summer we all had, the entire neighborhood has rat fatigue. All our poison stations are empty. Besides, as intended, the openings are too small for the squirrels to get to the poison.

I know these things. Raphael does not.

“All I can say is it’s not acting normal.”

No one is acting normal anymore. No one.
Not our elected officials, not our relatives, not even our beloved national pastime! When the final score of a five-plus hour World Series Game is more like a football score—12-13. Normal is so far in the rearview mirror it has disappeared on the horizon.

Besides, what is normal squirrel behavior anyway? My observation has been that they run around our backyard like lunatics, hiding peanuts and fucking like…squirrels. Not a bad gig.

When I pressed him for details he just said it was acting “weird”, taunting the dog and then barely making a clean get-away.

I brushed it off. I had to survive. My experience with the fauna in our neighborhood this year has given me a form of PTSD.

Raccoons, and skunks and rats—oh my!

I just couldn’t wrap my brain around the fact that the squirrels had now jumped the track.

Now, let me set the scene for this last part.
There’s a dog running around and two adults enjoying a couple of hours of cards. There’s music playing both inside and outside and patio doors open to catch a rare, cool, late October breeze.

In a nutshell…a peanut shell—there’s noise, activity, and broad daylight…and a crazy-ass squirrel lurking inside under a cabinet like Kato from the Pink Panther, waiting for us to come back in the house.

When we did—all hell broke loose. The house went full metal cray.

“That damn squirrel is in here!” Raphael yelled as he held Ruby back by the collar.

There was screaming. Even from the squirrel.

It ran into the fireplace and hid (not very well I might add) among the twigs and leaves I collect throughout the year for kindling.

The dreaded boom came out. The death broom. But Raphael was able to quickly sweep the daft little fellow back onto the patio where he stopped, fixed his hair, and did the Macarena.

Great! Now the wildlife is nuts. What’s next? Attack of the killer gardenia?

I give up.

Carry on,
xox

This is a Flashback from a couple of years ago that I was telling a friend about just the other day. Her husband has to fly up to the Bay area in a couple of weeks for a mediation on a lawsuit that is one of the bat-shit craziest wastes of time you could ever imagine. I can SO relate and it’s easier for me to repost this than to tell them the story—and I figure maybe a few of you might need to read this too.
Big love to HT & CT.

Carry on,
xox

“Anger is just Sad’s bodyguard… and Shame’s too, I think.”

Someone tell me, how come the crazy ones never lose any sleep?
Is it their complete lack of a conscience that causes them to appear so slick, smug and impossibly fresh?

Not a hair out-of-place.
Barely a hint of the devil that lies within.

While those of us that possess a moral compass and have the misfortune to find ourselves in their orbit are sleep deprived, disheveled, walking disasters.

That will always bother me.

The fact that people who operate outside the constructs of polite society close their eyes at night and sleep the uninterrupted, peaceful sleep of the just.

Why is that?
How can it be?

The night before an arbitration with the attorneys for DWP to discuss the fact that their one-hundred-year-old water main had burst and turned my store into an aquarium; I tossed and turned until the sheets were knotted up around my head and neck, fashioned into an unattractive turban/noose—and I ground my teeth down to nubs. Which left me the next morning gumming my toast, with a foggy brain and pronounced sheet marks on my face that didn’t fade until after lunch.

The team of He, She and It, that represented the water company, entered the room that morning laughing.
Uproariously.
Like they’d all participated in a hilarious episode of Carpool Karaoke on their way to work.

I felt at a distinct disadvantage. Out of the loop, like the punchline to the funniest joke ever told was lost on me. Was that their plan?

They were meticulously coiffed and groomed, cool as the proverbial cucumbers, while I was drenched in flop sweat, permanently wrinkled and frantically struggling to remove a poppy-seed from between my two front teeth with my tongue.

Note to self: Don’t accept half a poppy-seed bagel when you’re out of coffee. And you forgot your water.
You’re going to need something to rinse your mouth with when the big guns enter the room.

If I’d had more sleep I would have remembered that.

They all seemed so nice, so genuinely happy to meet me; that is until the bell rang and we went to our respective corners. Then the gloves came off and the crazy started to show.

They made shit up. Their entire alibi was jack-crap.
With graphs, documents and flow charts. Listen, if you show me a flow chart, I’ll believe anything…almost.
Somehow they double teamed my attorney and me. In the most well crafted, legal babbly, thinly veiled insulting way, they pinned the whole thing on me.
ME!
They made the accidental, midnight break of their water main seem like MY fault.

Business was slow, debt was high, it was 2009, and I need out—only I was too stupid to commit arson.

Seems bat-shit crazy, right?

When we broke for lunch even I wanted to throw the book at me.
The picture they painted of me was that of a sad-sack, loser of a business woman. Which was exactly how I felt at the time. I think my lawyer drank the Kool-Aid too—they were that convincing. She wouldn’t make eye contact, skulking in the corner on her phone, and then disappearing for the entire lunch break.

But you wanna know what trumps sleep deprivation? Rage. That’s what.
It also instantly removes sheet marks from your face.

It also overrides all shame and victim-hood.

Crazy and Rage are curious dance partners and they should never be left alone in a room together.
Let me tell you why. Crazy is so put together, so charming, pretty, and unflappable. Crazy looooooves a victim, she gets off on them, they get her panties wet.

Rage is no victim, he’s a gangster. He’s raw, he’s greasy and he talks real dirty. He wears a wife beater t-shirt and too much Aramis; and he has only one thing in his crosshairs—Crazy.

Crazy gets high on Rage and it quickly becomes a street-brawl.

But Rage is better than Sad, which is where I’d pitched my tent for eighteen months. Some say you can get caught in anger and never feel despair. The opposite had been true for me.
Sad victimhood covered in shame is like chum in the water to Crazy.

So Rage felt better. It felt…empowering. Sadness felt like quick-sand—Rage, like solid ground.

It got my attention and cleared my vision, so I could finally see the truth and it kicked Sad’s ass to the curb.

I locked myself in a public bathroom stall kicking, screaming, and raging for nearly an hour before taking a walk around the building to help me come to my senses—and find my courage.

I knew my opponent. I was very familiar with Crazy.
You see, I had met her as a teenager in the form of my father’s second wife. I had witnessed her devouring her victims and I was smart enough to remember that Rage threw her into a sort of drunken feeding frenzy.

I also remembered that nothing can get to Crazy. Nothing touches their heart. There is no reasoning with Crazy. There is no sympathy, empathy or compassion and absolutely nothing is open for discussion.

They act as your judge, jury, and executioner.

And the more they sense is at stake; the faster and louder the accusations come. Their aim is to keep you off-balance, on the ropes.

Remember they are rested, ready and strong after their peaceful night’s sleep.

How is that fair?
Because they get a buzz off this shit and they don’t care about anything other than winning. So it’s not.

I sure wasn’t feeling sad anymore, Rage had hatched a plan but I knew better than to let it enter that room. I waited outside the double doors of the conference room until I saw my attorney exit the elevator. I could hear the team of Crazy, Crazier, and Craziest, whopping it up inside.

“You handle this, I’m leaving” I announced. I had her by the arm and was walking her back down a long hallway of endless doors, out of earshot of the hyenas.

“What?” she asked, looking surprised.

“You don’t need me here. They can smell my fear and sadness, and well, their offer is beyond ridiculous. See what happens when they can’t focus on me. When they have to deal with you and only the facts.”  We had walked in a circle making our way back toward the bank of elevators.

“Give me a number you’ll you settle at”, she asked as she reached into her bag for paper and a pen. She actually seemed relieved, like the day could be salvaged. Like it could go back to a language she understood—the law.

I wrote a figure down. She looked and nodded in agreement, folding the paper into a small square and tucking into her suit-jacket pocket.

The elevator chimed, opening right on cue. People were packed in like sardines, but as I stepped inside she grabbed my purse strap, making me turn around. “This could end today”, she said with a hint of a smile, letting me go as the doors slowly closed.

A hairy mystery hand reached around me and pushed the button for LOBBY, getting me the hell out of that DWP building. I know it was Rage. I could smell his Aramis. But I made sure I left him behind, losing him in the crowd.

*I got the call a couple of hours later that they’d settled on the figure I’d written down. “Piece of cake”, I remember her saying in a distracted voice; she was already on to her next case.

We all slept well that night.

I know some of you guys needed to hear this,
Carry on,
xox

You’re gonna love this essay by Danielle La Porte. I did. Keep reading and you’ll see why.
Then, Carry on,
xox

Just don’t expect crazy people to be sane (cause that’s crazy).
People are going to be who they are most of the time. In character, not out of character.

Guys with anger issues can complain about kittens and unicorns.

Folks who run a lot of anxiety will worry about the days of the week coming on time.

Positive thinkers figure that the train derailment saved them from disaster down the tracks.

Punctual people are punctual.
Sweet people are sweet.
Takers, take.
Givers, give.

People change and evolve. Breakthroughs happen. But hey…

Don’t expect crazy people to be sane (cause that’s crazy), or super emo girls to behave like stoics (did you think she wasn’t going to cry just this one time? Of course she’s going to cry. That’s how she is.) The guy who’s kinda wimpy? Well, he’s probably going to wimp out. That girlfriend of yours who runs on chaos like a truck runs on diesel? Ya, she’ll probably keep making choices that make chaos — she likes it that way. The overly generous soul, she’s probably going to be illogically generous and it’ll get her into some trouble — but most of the time it works. The friend who’s always late? Chances are they’re going to be…late.

People are — for better or for worse — generally predictable. An old gentleman friend used to say to me, “Well what do you expect from a pig, but a grunt?” Oink. Point taken. And, Eagles soar. And, you can rely on reliable people.

It’s useful to analyze the stuff of people’s character. Hunh. So why IS he such an asshole? Judgement is inevitable, it’s part of conscious discernment — but sometimes, it makes us a judgmental asshole.

There’s so much sanity to just flowing with someone’s predictability — their norm, their nature. Accept it. Forgive it. Just tolerate it; or peace out if you don’t want it in your life. But don’t waste too much time trying to change it.

All for Love,

Danielle

https://youtu.be/Rzu6zeLSWq8

Here’s to the crazy ones.

Because the people who are crazy enough to think they can change the world, are the ones who do.
~Apple Ad 1997

Carry on you crazy ones,
xox

*This is an oldie but goodie from a little over a year ago. Similar drama, same cast of characters, familiar circus—just the monkeys have changed. Better shoes.
Carry on,
xox

“Whenever you become anxious or stressed, outer purpose has taken over, and you lost sight of your inner purpose. You have forgotten that your state of consciousness is primary, all else secondary.”
~Eckhart Tolle~

Man, can you feel it? There’s a LOT of drama out there.

It’s like the Shakespeare Festival has staked its tent and all the players are acting out their melodrama…inside OUR lives. Crazy has come to town.

It feels not only national, but global…even Cosmic.
Lots of amped up solar activity lately. March even spit us an X class solar flare on its way out. I blame everything wonky on solar flares. Computer goes down, car won’t start, dog poops in the house.

“I call it! Solar flare!” From bad TV reception, to cranky pants postal workers, to epic fly away hair and static electricity. I went to pet the dog last night and produced an electrical arc that would have made Tesla proud. “Solar flare!”

If you think that full moons bring out the crazies, I betcha twenty bucks solar flares are worse.

Mother Earth is even rattled for Pete’s sake. It’s rockin’ and rolllin’, and keeping us all guessing. “They” even say that the 8.2 in Chile was not “The Big One”. “They” are not helping. “They” need be run out-of-town with torches and pitchforks. Kidding. But seriously people, you don’t know ANYTHING for sure. Pipe down or soon everyone in Chile and California will be sleeping in the park.

Oh yeah, Crazy loves to camp.

Driving is especially insane these days. On the freeway this morning, there must have been an accident every mile and a half.
People are short-tempered and stressed, and that makes them drive really fast while texting, eating an Egg McMuffin and putting on mascara.

I’d tell you it’s safer to fly, but…honest to God, where’s that freaking Malaysian plane?

The energy seems to be crackling with chaos and turmoil. So how do we stay above the fray? How do we not get caught up in all this drama? Especially when the majority of it doesn’t even belong to us?

1) TURN OFF CNN.

2) Breathe and stay in the moment. Someone’s got to keep a cool head.
Don’t worry about what “could” happen. Breathe and stay in the moment.

If the Earth opens up and swallows your neighbor’s house…breathe and stay in the moment.
If the car next to you swerves and flips on it’s back. Breathe and stay in the moment.

3) Keep a cool head. Stay grounded. It’s not your shit. Help out.
Be one of the people who stays calm and carries on. We need you.
If it’s not happening to you directly, breathe and stay in the moment so you can be of assistance.

If YOUR house is hit by an asteroid, you know what I’m gonna say:
Breathe and stay in the moment.
Then grab the dog and run.

XoxJanet

How crazy is it where you are?
How do you stay grounded? Or do you? I want to hear about it in the comments below.

Love, lust or any other addiction.

It hijacks the brain and its ability to reason, the mouth and it’s ability to bargain, a vagina for obvious reasons; and is apparently able to override a fear of heights.

In the mid eighties I left my husband. We had a perfectly lovely life — just absolutely NO sexual chemistry…and I wanted some. BAD.

I read about it in books. I saw it in the movies. I dreamt of it and fantasized about it; this elusive beast, and being that I was in my twenties, I was damned if I was going to live a life without it.

Cut to: 1985 — Sharing a dive apartment in drug infested hookerville, with my little sister who had just left our father’s cushy home to find her way out from under his thumb and forge her own independence.

It was Flashdance meets Friends —  only without the great clothes, the sexy dancing and the killer apartment.

My sister had moved a saltwater fish tank up two flights of stairs only to have the summer be so fucking Africa hot on the second floor; in the Valley; with no air conditioning; that even after trying to cool it off with trays of ice cubes — eventually all the fish cooked.

Later, after she’d emptied most the water and cleaned the green slime off the glass, and since we had no entertainment budget, we organized races with little plastic wind up swimmers from the novelty stores on Ventura Boulevard.  Frogs, Snorkelers, a fat man in an inner tube whose legs furiously tread water; even an alligator doing the backstroke.

These were real races. Beers were guzzled. Bets were placed. Money may have exchanged hands.

I’m telling’ ya it was the wild west inside that toasty little shit-hole with the sticky green shag carpet in North Hills.

After the Feds shut down the toy races, we floated three basket balls in the tank.
It was art.

Speaking of art, one morning when I was getting my fried, I mean permed, blonde hair nice and Bon-Jovi gigantic, my blow dryer gave out from exhaustion. The eighties were a rough time for blowdryers…and hairspray. My sister and I could go though a case a week.

Anyway, my blow dryer started throwing blue sparks, and inside of a small unventilated bathroom full of Sebastian Hair Fix fumes, well, the whole apartment could have ignited — blowing us all to kingdom come.

Since only half my head was coiffed, I finished with my sister’s very upscale blow dryer and hung my little flame thrower from a plant hook in the corner of the dining room.

At night we would turn off all the lights and plug it in; then sit and watch that thing shoot blue sparks into the air — because it was art.

It was beautiful and dangerous art. We just had to be diligent about keeping our hair a safe distance away.

How we’re not both dead is beyond me.

Which leads me to the window in my room.
It was rectangular, running from floor to ceiling and was narrow, about the width of an average person. Because it was so freakin’ hot, even with my fear of heights, I would sit on a towel (there was no way I was going to let my ass touch that disgusting carpet) next to the window at night and read, paint my toe nails or talk on the phone.

I talked on the phone a lot.

You see, I had fallen hard for a much younger boy/man who had lived with us for one glorious summer and then gone off to college (yes, that young). I pined for him something awful, so we’d talk on the phone late into the night, he from Cal State Long Beach and me in front of that window, smoking cigarettes, searching for a breeze.

That window became like a portal.
All sorts of weird shit happened around that window.
It just so happens that there was a street light directly below, one of the few in the hood that hadn’t been blown out. I always tried to park my car under that light, you know, for safety, although thinking back I’m not sure why I bothered. Anything valuable had been stolen off of, or out of, my piece of shit Mazda within the first month we lived there. Parked under the street light — in full view of that window.

Late one hot summer night, the three of us were startled awake by the sound of shouting and car engines. Of course we went to the window to see what was up. My sister soon joined us, all the noise had woken her up but she couldn’t see the activity from her uneventful, non portal window.

Our three sleepy, middle-of-the-night faces were now wide awake and fascinated,  silently poised right above all the action as we watched more and more police cars surround a vehicle with two men inside. Soon a police canine unit and tow truck joined the crowd. “Drug bust” my boy-toy whispered.

We watched for hours as they carefully and methodically stripped the car down to its skeleton. The seats, the dash, the inside liner — they had this down to a science.

We got snacks; we took potty breaks; all the while staying quiet enough to be eyewitnesses to a potential drug bust. Then, just as we were beginning to lose interest, and it seemed as if the drugs didn’t exist, we heard a cop yell, like they do on TV, “Bingo!” and fifty cops descended onto the metal frame, like ants at a picnic. There it was, bag after bag of some illegal substance, hidden in the dark recesses of that car’s guts. They hauled the two guys away and it was all over, as if it had never happened — in fifteen minutes.

Yeah, I know, great neighborhood. Not really, it was the site of drug deals, used condoms and hookers, Oh My!

Another evening, as I waited for my sister to get home with pumpkin pie (we both worked at Vons at the time, so we’d call the one who was working late, right before their shift was over, with junk food cravings), I was sitting next to the window, writing a letter to my beloved — yes, with paper and a pen — when I thought I heard moaning.

Now, moaning was a regular occurrence in our apartment. We had a couple with a very active sex life that shared a wall. She was a moaner and he had white-boy rhythm as evidenced by the intermittent, uncoordinated frenzy of headboard banging that used to make us howl with laughter.

But this moaning sounded different — like a wounded animal.
I turned down the TV that was always on to keep me company; and listened. Just below the window was a balled up something on the dead, dried up grass under the street light.

I decided to investigate.

I put on my dime store flip-flops, took my keys to the security gates with me, and walked down two flights of stairs to the street below. It was just slightly cooler outside than inside the apartment but still around eighty degrees — an Indian Summer night in the Valley.

As I slowly closed the gate by hand behind me so it wouldn’t slam (a habit), I could still hear a low moaning. Walking slowly toward the street light, I still couldn’t figure out who or what was there. It was rolled up tight into the fetal position, small; like a dog… or a child? I remember it was beige, the color of skin. Could it be a person?

“Hello?…are you okay?” I ventured closer.

“Do you need…” I screamed and reflexively jumped back.

“Oh my God…” I kept backing away slowly, terrified and unsure of what to do.”I’m, I’m, I’m going upstairs to call 911!”

Her face (I didn’t know it was a woman until later), looked up at me, toward the sound of my voice. Her ear was missing, replaced by shredded skin. I knew she couldn’t see me, her eyes were purple and swollen shut, and her face didn’t resemble anything human. It looked like a hideous Halloween mask.

I ran so fast I flew out of my flip-flops.

No such thing as cell phones in those days, so I sprinted back up to the apartment, made eerie by the juxtaposition of the TV laugh track and the scene on the street below as I dialed 911. The phone was on the floor in front of the window and I watched her like a hawk the whole time. I was shaking so hard it took me three tries to dial 911 correctly.

A squad car pulled up before I even had a chance to speak. I hung up, turned off all the lights in the room and watched from my second story perch as they slowly, cautiously, got out of the car and walked toward her. One cop poked her with a stick and when she moved and looked at up them — even they flinched. The other cop was calling it in as his partner crouched down to talk to her. The paramedics and a fire truck were there in minutes and I watched, nervously biting my nails, from my dark window as they took her pulse, assessed her injuries, loaded her almost totally naked body onto a gurney and took her away. My sister got home just about that time, “What’s all the commotion down there?” she asked.
It took me a minute to gain my composure. “I’ll tell you over pie” I replied.

As the story goes, and I can’t quite recall how we got this information; the woman was a regular at one of the local dive bars peppered throughout our neighborhood. The drunker she got the more she bragged about getting a big bonus at work. As she bought round after round of drinks, she exposed a thick wad of bills that was like fresh meat to the low-life wolves at the bar. Apparently, as she walked to her car, under the safety of the street light, two of the animals beat her in order to get her purse (which she fought to keep, ladies, don’t ever do that, just let them have it). She fought so hard they practically pulled her clothes off — both of her hands sustained multiple fractures. The last I heard she was hospitalized with a cracked skull, and in need of massive plastic surgery.

It happened right under my window, under the street light, and I never heard a thing.

Why didn’t we move?

Last but not least is the story about the time I jumped out that window. That second story window. To chase after a boy.

“I loved him somethin’ awful” If someone says that, believe them…it was awful.

I had, at long last, found me some chemistry. It burned hot, and was highly combustible, constantly boiling over like those science experiments gone awry.
My whole body was on fire. I was consumed by lust which I was calling love, because honestly, I didn’t know any better.
My brain went offline.
My mouth said things that still, to this day, make me cringe. It bargained and begged.
I was reduced to a writhing pile of pheromones and sex organs. He was a beautiful disaster.

When this boy/man said he had to leave after spending three days straight in bed with me; well, I went a little berserk. I couldn’t see my way clear of the crazy.
I stumbled to the window over the dirty dishes, coffee cups, bags of chips and piles of clothes that had surrounded and sustained us that entire weekend.

It was over and he had to go back — to school — cringe.

I heard his car pull away as I got a running start and literally flew, in one giant leap, through the screen and out that portal/ window without thinking.

“Noooooooooooooo! Don’t go!” I screamed in mid-air. The large rectangular screen made it to the ground first in a twisted mess. I managed to clear a shrub and stick a nice tuck-n-roll landing, but that still didn’t bring me to my senses.

It’s amazing I wasn’t hurt; clearly people that stupid are indestructible — That does not bode well for the gene pool.

My screaming continued to echo outside and around the block.

“Don’t leave, not yet!” I got up as fast as I could and ran out into the street, where I could barely see his tail lights at the corner.

“Waaaaaait!!!!!” I wailed at the top of my lungs and sprinted as fast as could after his car and out of my flip-flops (what is the deal with that?)

I’d obviously lost my sanity and my shoes, and now I was losing my voice but it didn’t matter, I continued to scream his name at the top of my lungs until I saw him pull into the Seven Eleven parking lot around the block — the one just before the entrance to the 405 freeway.

When I saw his face I knew I’d gone too far.
Who was I? What had come over me?
I was bent over, trying to catch my breath while he sat in his car looking stunned.

When I could finally manage to speak all I could say was, “I’m sorry…I just…this is so NOT sexy; right?”

He shook his head slowly, got out of the car, gave me a mediocre hug, got back in the car and drove away.

As I took the slow walk of shame back to the apartment I could see the crumpled screen lying dead on the sidewalk, but there was no sign of my flip-flops.
Someone; some other size seven; had stolen them while I’d made a fool of myself — chasing after a man in a car — barefoot — for no good reason other than addiction.

That stunt shocked me…finally!

To say it was not my proudest moment is an understatement.

I learned so much about myself that day; what I was capable of, how, if I let my vagina make all the decisions I could really get hurt since in her narrow-minded focus on chasing desire, she had little regard for my personal safety — and that we needed to get the hell out of that apartment.

It changed me, I started thinking about self worth, boundaries and personal responsibility so that nothing even remotely like that would happened again.

I blame that fucking portal/window.

Okay. So who here hasn’t done a crazy-ass window jump in one form or another in their life — show of hands? Uh huh, I thought so.

Tell me about it below.

Carry on,

xox

ME!

I was in the middle of writing today’s blog post, when I received an email from my friend Steph in Florida.

The subject line of her email read: Divinity or Batshit?

When that flashed across the screen of my laptop, I stopped typing (my 17 words a minute) – color me – intrigued.
As I read on, I realized that it would be perfect for another, DA,DA, DA, DA, Daaaaaaa! (Fanfare)

What-The-Hell-Wednesday

Divine Visitation or Batshit Crazy Person? Can they be the same thing?

It seems she’s been visited at work by several “interesting beings” as she put it. If you’ve spent any time in retail this comes as no surprise. The general public is…interesting at best.

Just the other day, during a jewelry repair, a woman spent the entire time talking about meditation and her spiritual journey.

You know, like you do while they’re sizing your ring.

There have been several more out of the ordinary exchanges, but the weirdest one happened just this past Saturday.
According to Steph, a modestly dressed, quiet woman, looked around her store for awhile, until she found a necklace she liked. Steph engaged her in conversation, asking her if she was buying it for a special occasion. The woman was quiet for an uncomfortable amount of time, looking down, deep in thought, then she looked up and locked eyes with her.
“Have you ever heard of the Pearl of Great Price?” She asked.
Steph started to make a joke about having much more expensive pearls in stock, (one of the many reasons I love her, quick on her feet…and funny), when the woman caught her even more off guard, “From the Bible” she said, getting intense.
“Um…no.”
Here is the rest of Steph’s email:

“Now I’m confused, but I’m listening.
She says that she IS a prophet, an angel on earth who walks with the light of the Lord. She tells the parable of the pearl and in her interpretation the pearl was faith in God and that he “sold all his earthly possessions to buy it” meaning that the man in the parable gave up all material possessions to walk with God.

Needless to say, the jury is still debating over the possibility of divine contact. My best guess as of right now is a combination of true belief and a little bit of batshit.”

Crazy right?
Yes, I really do live a life where people send me these stories, asking for clarity. Because batshit is my specialty. Well, that and Estate Jewelry, chocolate bundt cake, and divine visitations. Needless to say, they know I’m not going to laugh, I’m obsessively curious, I take nothing at face value, and I’ve probably had something similar happen to me.
It has also been my experience that the Universe uses the disenfranchised of the world as messengers (less filters, no set schedules/obligations).

Case in point. Here is my response:

“All I can say is Wow! And Holy Cow!
I’d love to see what the letter to Moses said.

David and I never spoke about the feather, and I often wondered “why me?” he didn’t go to anyone else’s booth that day, handing out white feathers – just made a beeline to me. (I don’t wonder anymore- I get it)”

When she sent me the letter to Moses, it was kinda out there.
The woman had signed it so I looked her up. She is definitely fringe.
She causes trouble, minor stuff, nothing too major. No Grand theft or anything for Steph to be concerned about. She is around forty, has kind eyes and a nice looking mugshot from two years ago, and get this; they described her as a white MALE.

Aren’t we all going to feel foolish when Moses comes in to get his mail?

So there you have it. Another What-The-Hell-Wednesday. 
Divine or Batshit? Are they the same?
I choose to suspend judgment – I’ve learned my lesson.
Your call.

Do you have any stories for me? I’d love to hear them, you can’t shock me! You can email me at atikhome@me.com 
I’m starting to figure out that ya’ll like to email rather than comment.

Stay crazy!
Xox