You Just Don't Argue Anymore
This wasn’t the post I wanted to be writing, but I can’t get it out of my head. This deals with sensitive topics like emotional abuse and trauma, but hopefully only for the first paragraph or two.
It was the nightmare ending to an otherwise perfect (well, imperfect) late night double feature picture show. A monster in a sea of raucous, riotous laughter and debauchery (it was The Rocky Horror Picture Show, after all). A real-life specter from ages past sitting front and center-stage left. Perhaps I imagined the smirk from a decade-plus past. Perhaps my spidey senses were a little too on edge. (Honestly, it was more like Ron Swanson sensing Tammy II.) But I was transported back to a place and time I thought I’d left long ago. Where I was isolated from friends and family and was made to distrust my own mind. I’ve never really been able to get over it, no matter how much I’ve tried.
I feel like I’ve spent much of my adult life running away from that time all those years ago (and from that guy), but since apparently the theme of this year is facing my shit head on (whether I like it or not), I suppose I’m facing this too - that’s what therapy is for! (And some specters are best left on their side of the river.) The best thing I can say about my possible little close encounter of the abusive ex kind, is that I know where he is and knowledge is power. And he has no power over me or the people that I love. And no matter what he’s threatened in the past (for he has threatened in the past); he can’t harm, threaten, or kill me - or the people that I love.
But the past can have its joys as much as it can have its tragedies. This week saw the release of the first Beatles single since I was 7, and to be honest it feels as much like a Beatles song to me as “Let it Be” oe “I Am The Walrus” does. I haven’t been able to listen to The Beatles much since we lost my dad a long time ago, it always hurts too much. But now I can’t get them out of my head. Like this new song made it ok to listen to The Beatles again. It’s all terribly bittersweet, because I know my dad would’ve been all over this. (Huge Beatles fan, he was.) It’s sad that he didn’t live to see the last Beatles song, but I’ve been remembering him through the rest of their music all week, and that was lovely.
But not everything has been full of introspection and fear and heavy stuff. There’s been a fair amount of levity and love and optimism as well. Halloween was full of cauldron puddings (courtesy of my delightful husband the pastry chef), Sta-Puft Marshmallow Babies, and dogasauruses. My small and wacky jewelry collection is growing just in time for the holidays. (Stalk my Etsy store for more details.) Slowly but steadily we pack our apartment. The return to standard time seems to have reset my circadian rhythm. (Yay?) The house hunt looms ahead of us. And the holidays. Oh the holidays. These holidays will be entirely different from the last several years, so much preparation will need to happen. And this year we are having a motherforking Christmas tree.
But plans for next year are in the works. Plans for projects and videos and things to put in the Etsy store. Draft II for my screenplay is in the works (finally). I actually cracked open the other one I started in 2021, and think I might start working on the outline for that over this Winter. Also, I discovered recently that my husband has been watching greenhouse build videos while I’ve been sleeping. We may have a project for when we have a house with a yard. (Insert maniacal laugh here.)
2023 has been a beast of a year of almost soap opera like proportions (and I’m guessing I’m not alone in this), so I’m cutting myself so much slack for not being as productive as I’d like to be. I’m calling survival and keeping my marriage intact pretty big accomplishments. (Though my long-suffering spouse can claim half the credit for the latter. Our marriage counselor helped.) Getting out to see friends and family more. Visiting very important chosen family. Going out in public again. Also getting out and performing.
Doing Rocky Horror was AMAZING. Columbia and Riff Raff were phenomenal, as I knew they would be. (I wouldn’t have done it if I hadn’t been performing with them.) Performing while chronically ill is really really hard. I got a migraine right at the beginning of “The Time Warp” and Riff Raff was right there to catch me and hold me steady. And he and Columbia helped me out with the unfamiliar blocking (not my usual theater) and the fact that I couldn’t see. Despite my difficulties, it was an overall positive experience.
This wasn’t the post that I planned to write, that’s for sure. I’m still nervous, especially about the holidays and other potential surprise run-ins. (Those are the days I really envy my friends in other time zones or continents.) But my spouse and I feel secure in our plans, and my product inventory slowly grows. We just need to survive the next two months. Here goes nothing…
