Monday, May 16, 2005

returning to jail

I don't know how much longer I can writing.  My intuition and reason (experience based upon memory of the pattern) tells me that soon I will be in jail on another bogus charge, placed there by the homophobic, misogynistic theocrats who refuse to grant me the right and freedom of individual choice and dignity.  They, in their audacious moral depravity (think "Inquisition"), believe that they they have the right to charge an innocent person with what they know to be a bogus charge and send them to jail.  These are sheltered priests and nuns, who don't have a clue what jail is all about, since the only incarceration they have ever experienced is in their willful locking closure of their minds so that they maintain conformity with an orthodox dogma that I believe is more soul-destroying than soul uplifting.  With the election of "Pope Torquemada", they no doubt are confirmed in their beliefs and methodology ("destroy the body but 'save' the soul").  Profound Christian ideological fundamentalists that they are, they don't acknowledge the God given gift to us of FREEDOM, nor do they respect that we humans are embodied souls (my body is carrying lasting scars and chronic pain  from the last time I was in jail, when I was abused while in handcuffs by a sadistic correctional officer).  They don't care.  They have this deluded vision that coercion will produce conversion.  I can just see the Spiritual Life Instituters sitting around, discussing their plan, thinking they are going to create another John of the Cross.  I can see Dave Denny guffawing with emotionally disconnected laughter, thinking he's a great wit and spiritual director when's he's just a pathetic, priestly wimp, hiding behind his clerical collar. 

But their stupidity and delusion is not to be taken lightly.  It is the same stupidity and delusion that is driving this entire country to a collapse of constitutional values and integrity (that is, the best of American self-identity), and even ruinous, grievous, globally destructive world war.  There's very little I can do about that--I gathered that from my conversations with God while I was working to help elect Kerry (at cross purposes with the explicit design and intent of the Catholic hierarchy who think s that Bush is a more true reflection of Christianity as they know it....and sadly enough, he really is---another ideological fanatic).

It is the same stupidity and delusion that helped to destroy other homosexuals before me---especially Verlaine and Oscar Wilde.  I have to admit that the first stint in jail severely undermined my creativity.  To be surrounded and immersed by constant noise, intruded upon by small-minded and petty conversations and actions (and I would be hard put to tell which  intrusions were more destructive--those of the inmates or the CO's), to suffer from no exercise, inadequate food and medical treatment, and pervasively mind-numbing ugliness, all combined to leave me separated from deep self and more focussed on the periphery.

I was noticing the other day that I'm having trouble writing in this journal, because I have grown unaccustomed to reflecting on my experiences.  It used to be that I could write pages over every single iota of experience, but now I have difficulty even reflecting upon any experience for a journal entry---a direct result of the punitive actions taken against me for the fruit of my reflection, and a six month stint in the most uncontemplative environment I could possible imagine.  Torquemada's minions of the Inquisition have done their psychological torture well--I'm editing my own thoughts and feelings now, out of fear and repulsion

I can remember my free thinking civics and history teaching us, "you can lead a horse to water, but you can't make him drink, but you can kick him in the stomach for refusing to drink."  Well I don't drink from their poisoned well of lies, but I'm doubled up in pain and chronic injury from being kicked in the stomach.

Believe it or not, that was my first clue that I was going back to jail--that I was starting to feel really good about my healing process over my physical injuries.  The last time I felt this good about my back---like I was really on the verge of the possibility of complete healing --the Inquisitors in their classic MO, colluded with corrupt civil authorities to throw in jail.  My body is now worse than it was before, with constant pain and locking in my shoulders from where CO Bridget Perea abused me while I was handcuffed (and when I put in a grievance to her superior officer, he gave me an amused smile, that said "you really think I'm going to do something about this?").  I also have added fat on me from all the substandard food I ate.  I was perpetually hungry the whole time I was there (not stomach hungry, but body hungry, when you know you are seriously malnourished--my teeth were loose in my gums by the time I got out).  I figured (quite honestly) that we were on a 1200 calorie a day diet, but when all you eat is starchy, ill-prepared pasta and white bread with bologna, with pancakes for breakfast, muscle turns to fat really quick.  I've gained back my muscle but I haven't been able to lose the fat. 

 I can imagine the hit my body is going to take when I get there--especially with my sensitive thyroid medications that has to be taken at specific times with continual dosage adjustments. (I can hear the judge now, "tell them you need your meds when you get to jail"---hysterical lol--do those judges really think you get medical attention--besides all the gratuitous pelvic exams dr. feel me up likes to give).  I remember how painful the swelling was last time.  This time around, I'm not even going to try to maintain my health.  It didn't do a bit of good last time, so I'll try going the other way around.

So when my body started feeling like it was moving towards real healing, I knew it was time for the soul rapists to make their move.  My original injury came from a young man having flashbacks of childhood rape, and I know that my back injury is related to my own childhood rape.  Well the Inquisitors of the SLI and Paul DeBlassie have taken up where the cultic rapists of my childhood have left off.  Rape is a matter of the soul violation through bodily physical coercion, and that is what jail is---and especially for an innocent who recognizes exactly who is framing her and why...I am tired of having my freedom stolen from me by soul eaters of the feminine who have no relationship to it, except through domination and control.  I have done everything I know to make those inquisitors understand that I am not a member of their faith or tradition; they have sold out my trust and earned my undying enmity.  They think they are trying to exorcise some deep anger in me (what kind of fucking idiot tries to exorcise anger through abuse?--only someone totally sheltered from reality and starting with Wm McNamara, that is exactly where the inquisitors come from and where they are).  I have told them, but they don't listen or respect my own self integrity and relationship with God (who is the one who explicitly told me), that I will be healed through love, specifically the love of one woman, which they won't accept.  This brings me to the real reason for the abuse I've endured at the hands of these soul raping torturers....I'm lesbian.  They tell everybody that they are trying to exorcise my anger, but what they really are about is neutering my sexuality.  Well they will fail.  They can throw me in prison for years.  They may destroy my body and they may destroy my creativity, but I will not let them take from me my sexual being and orientation.  They can throw me any bone they want---oh, you want a job with the UN?--oh hell no, not as long as you are offering it.  I want my freedom, and if I can't get, I will think, wait, and pray until I get it.  But I want nothing more to do with the Christian religion qua religion,  or institution.  With Ratzinger's election, and the debacle of evangelical excess (Justice Sunday!), I see the destruction of the churches coming from within (and without, but thats any story; the church has already silenced its prophets, so I need to need to shout into a howling wilderness of indifference and self-complacency).

This has been a negative post, which is what I wanted to avoid.  I want to focus on a positive alternative  and vision of authentic faith--integrating spirituality and sexuality, but I have been seriously depressed for the past few days as the realization of impending incarceration, and the cascade of memories it has originated has really got me down.  I don't know how much longer I have (if I keep writing names, my span of freedom could be prety short), and I have a lot of details to attend to, but I will do the best I can to continue writing.......

Sunday, May 8, 2005

Sunday morning blues

May 8, 2005--I dreamed last night of stopping at a gas station to fill up my car.  It was an energizing feeling.  That is how I feel-- energized---in some way, though I feel so frustrated and stymied over my forced celibacy.  More than anything,  I want the woman I love to be beside me, talking to me, and a little Sunday worship (ie, sex) would be most welcome, too.  Instead, I try to meet my relationship needs via the web.  I usually know who I am talking to.  I sent this link to everyone on my buddy list--even those enemies who hide behind anonymity in an attempt to continue to warp-conform me to their patriarchal ideology.  So Tessa, Dave, and the evil doctor---go ahead and enjoy.  My writing is not for you, but I need to get it out to the people I truly love and want to see happy.

I am writing before I go to the gym.  I probably should write after my return from the gym, as working out releases a lot of aggression from within me.  And as sexually frustrated as I am, you had better believe there is a lot of aggression.  I spent a little while playing some music this morning---the first time I had picked up the guitar in weeks.  I guess my decision to be as proactive as possible regarding my straitened circumstances, has released a lot of emotional energy.  I do play my dulcimer more often, but that is because it is such a feeling instrument (what do I feel?--sorry, can't divulge that information---I am not allowed to have passionate feelings unless they are approved by religionists, so I have to keep it all undercover, but they are there).  I am practicing a little bit, because I am getting ready to go to a family reunion in a couple of weeks.  My roommate asked me an interesting question this morning--"Was I moving back there to stay?"  I can't believe that she was serious.  I looked at her, and told her that there was no way I would ever move back there.  I absolutely hated living in Huntington when I was a teenager, and believe me, nothing has changed.  How could an "out and proud lesbian, politically conscious, and intellectually astute person like myself be happy there?"  Yeah, my life has got nothing going on here for me.  And maybe, just maybe the reason I can't find a job here right now is because the religionists are trying to pressure me into moving back to West Virgina (laughing out loud---I think I got it).  They knowI will need to ask my mother for money there, and they will try to pressure me to move back. 

NO WAY! NO WAY! NO WAY!  I have been having dreams about Ohio (talking in my sleep maybe?), but I know what Ohio stands for---it stands for the the lowest benchmark in loss of political integrity this country has ever realized.  We are no longer a democracy, but a dictatorship of the rich (whoever can afford to fix the election).  When I dream of going to Ohio, that is symbolic of uncovering and addressing the political corruption that runs rampant.  But as usual, the religionists have no depth or breadth of intellect or heart so all they can do is assume and plan literally.  I don't know what is going to happen, but I know I will be homeless before I move anywhere that these people want me to move. 

Don't let me lose you on this post.  It's highly personal and emotional.  I promise the next one will return to intellectual objectivity.  I just had to let go with this, when I realized that people who genuinely love me are afraid I might move to West Virginia.  Talk to you, later....

Proclamation of Emancipation

May 7, 2005--

Finally, I have decided to start writing again.  It has been hard not to write--writing is how I live out my spirituality and explore God's will for me.  It has been very hard for me these past few years to realize that my writing was actually being used as a weapon against me, by people who did not, and do not, respect my relationship with God or my relationship with self.  I know that I cannot be completely honest--not yet---and that has been the big stumbling block for me.  I cannot fathom not being completely honest---i.e. telling the whole world exactly what I think and what I know and what I feel. 

But it has become clear to me that institutional Christianity is as totaltarian regarding spirituality as an aethistic, religion-persectuting Communist society.  I am a person of spirit being actively persecuted by so-called Christians who want me to fit into their warped, small view of dogma.  I don't want to blow any new, would-be readers away just yet (wait a while--once I've earned your trust and respect, I will tell you the entire incredible story), so I will start out by speaking in generalities.  But I will start speaking.  I have decided that speaking out is what a person of spirit and faith is called to do.  I can't be totally honest.  I am like the early Christ followers--I will not be ashamed or shady regarding my beliefs, but I will attempt to protect them from the rapine and destruction of rigid, soul-destroying religionists.  I've already experienced deep,  psychic and soulful rapine and destruction from these people and carry the wounds and pain in my body.  I am working towards and praying for forgiveness, but an even greater imperative, is to make sure that no one ever suffers what I have suffered at their hands.  This means, quite frankly, that I am committed to 1) an alternative space and place for people of authentic spirituality whose fidelity to self and God precludes them from acceptance into any established community of worship; and 2) the radical transformation of institutional patriarchal religions (you might say "demise"), so that spirituality is unchained from its  authoritarian warp that creates and nurtures childish dependency and bondage, rather than true relationship with God and freedom to live the fullness of life and individuality to which I believe we are called.

What are my qualifications?  Well, I am a lifelong spiritual seeker, who joined the Roman Catholic Church after a profound religious conversion in college.  Currently, I believe that the Roman Catholic church is under judgment, and that I will see that judgment come to pass in my own lifetime (forgive the generality---discretion....), but I am not one of those fundamentalist churches who believe that the Roman Church is the great Babylonian whore, while they and their adherents are going to ascend into the Rapture.  I am against all religion that is based on political power (rather than the power of love), and fanaticism.  Thit means that all of institutional religion, including Christianity, is sick and weak and counterindicative of the spiritual life.  A few years ago, I would have wanted to work from within for reform.  Experiences in the past couple of years have made it clear to me that reform is not an option.  The churches are all under judgment, and razed to the ground, they must be, if a true spiritual awakening and regeneration is to occur.  This does not mean that there are not genuine spiritual people within the churches,  because there are, but I honestly believe that we have reached a critical point, where there are more truly spiritual people outside of the churches than within. 

I am not sure what the alternative will be.  I know that I need to write and expess myself, because that is how I open myself up to God's voice, which I trust to give me glimmers of what the alternative will be.  I will no longer allow fear of pain and punishment to deny me this access to my own spiritual life.   I do know as a lesbian woman of faith, that the church's teachings on sexuality and women are completely erroneous.  I am not objectively disordered (though for years I believed that I was), nor am I determined into a proscribed and limited self through gender and masculine projection and needs.  Certainly, a prime casualty of religion has been healthy sexuality.  Sexuality and soul are inextricably linked.  That is why I cannot reclaim one without the other.  In this blog, I intend to do just that....