It’s been like a scene out of the movie, “Fight Club,” the one where Tyler Durden keeps telling Jack to hit him.
“I want you to hit me as hard as you can!”
How much can you know about yourself if you’ve never been in a fight? The harassment has been constant lately as people keep provoking me into some kind of fight, some kind of outburst. I’ve been roofied a couple of times now, twice on the Southside of the city and then prevented from getting a cab, threatened I’ed be killed. I broke some Christmas lights in response and was arrested and accused of being suicidal. It was all lies, but that has never been a concern from the start of this nightmare.
The other time cops accused me of resisting arrest then the same Judge combined the charges and put me in jail telling everyone in the courtroom it was an “open and shut case!” That I was incompetent and needed another psych eval after I explained to numerous lawyers the fact cops were following me everywhere making up all kinds of false allegations about me along with the people involved in this. I was told I was delusional and needed to get treatment.
Running into people now is difficult as I slowly come to terms with the horrible reality they plotted to force me into being a “mentally ill crack whore,” they sneered.
After sleeping at another abandoned house, I walked up Market Street not sure where I would go after fleeing the porch I was sleeping on and found the third abandoned house. I stayed on the porch for awhile and then after being so sick one day and needing to be out of the elements, I walked around back to find an open window. As I lifted up the sill and sat on the ledge of the basement window deciding whether or not to go in, I wasn’t exactly in shape anymore and breaking my leg with no insurance was not an option, something had decided for me and I felt what seemed like a small forceful gust of wind push me, which landed me on the floor inside, grateful I didn’t get hurt, but then scared I would now be trapped in the dark basement. I looked around in the dark for stairs or access into the house.
I found a set of stairs after feeling my way around in the dark, damp room, tripping over stuff all over the floor—the air suffocating and moldy-smelling. I wasn’t sure where the stairs would go, but by this time already knowing it was going to be hard to climb up and back out the window, I was already getting tired and felt sick from the smell. Trespassing was not something I wanted to do, but after sleeping on the porch for the past four months and “Peacefully Protesting” what was being done to me and others, I knew I needed some safety after threats to rape and kill me started again. My protesting was once again ignored like my 12-day Hunger Strike in the jail that was referred to as just a “mentally ill person not eating” and needed to be referred to mental health even after I wrote numerous grievances.
I prayed as I opened the door hoping it wasn’t locked after ascending the stairs in the dark, dirty room that was getting scarier by the minute. As I turned he knob, it again seemed to magically open with a sort of kind welcoming energy, as light flooded into the doorway. How beautiful I thought, as I entered the room following the warm butter-colored light that embraced me.
The hallway opened up into a large area of blond hardwood floors and cashmere-colored wallpaper falling gently to the floor in areas. I was in awe of the exquisite light that danced everywhere, rippling across the room from each of the large windows that weren’t even open, but creases of the cream curtains allowed the sun through—I immediately felt at home, a feeling I hadn’t had in a very long time after my life had been destroyed or as they sneered, “Disappeared!”
I was a ghost now, I thought wandering around abandoned houses trying to find myself. I thought of another movie, The Sixth Sense. “I see dead people,” Cole says, there everywhere. Is that what it is? I was already dead, like his therapist, but didn’t know it, unable to move to the next place? Movies always comforted me and now was no different.
“Pack your stuff, get out!” my mother yelled all the time, but usually it meant we were moving. Somehow I wasn’t dropped at the children’s home like she threatened—we moved all the time.
Crossing out the list of addresses on my papers at school became a losing battle with the office ladies that called me in repeatedly to explain where we now lived and to continually go through all the different names me and my 1/2 siblings had. I was in the “Welfare program,” which had to be explained every grade. There was mostly only me, everyone else had two-parents and no one had different last names from their siblings—these “matters” had to be discussed continuously.
I wasn’t called in to be given pencils for free by teachers helping disadvantaged kids that many claim to do today, I was “on welfare,” which somehow meant to these women I was handed a check each week to spend as I wanted and they suspiciously eyed me about what it was I was spending all that money on.
There was always a “special line,” for me. It seemed ridiculous to my young mind—there was only me. I was so grateful when a new girl arrived from Alabama one year and was put in what I thought was the welfare program too because she had to stand with me, while everyone else had their line, which always made me a target to get called out to fight. Why did I get “free lunch?” This was way before it was more acceptable and there were more kids, back then it was mostly me, the girl from Alabama and my 1/2 brother if it included other grades. When our apartments started to get worse and worse there started to be more kids in my line, but by then I was getting older and started not to care about “explaining” that my mother was divorced and had boyfriends, which women didn’t do back then in my town. This was why I thought I was partly put in the “program,” because my mother was having sex “outside of marriage.” As a kid, I was confused because I always liked school and did well, but treated as if they were surprised I could lean. The welfare program meant you were also unable to read and write.
I went to church today after the last 5yrs of not going. I’ve been struggling with God for awhile now, but we’re getting along better these days. It was a beautiful sermon about strengthening our faith in times of suffering. I’m usually moved when I go to church, oftentimes I would be struggling with what was going on and feel much better after I left—today was no different.
It’s been 10yrs now since this nightmare started, but Jesus calls us to acceptance and to not carry around things that are dead. So much sorrow and loss, but it must be buried and not continually allowed to torment you.
The hardest is letting go of my little dog, “Bentley,” he was such a blessing through it all, but in the end he was taken too. I imagine he has his own journey to continue on with and ours had come to an end. In the same way my other two dogs were also a blessing—all three angels.
I wander around the abandoned house thinking of all these memories I have to let go of after knowing the truth now.
In Shamanism you learn to breath into the memory and retrieve it’s goodness, while transforming the parts that were lies, thus clearing out the negative charge and trauma. You can also see yourself as acting with the new knowledge and what you would have done. In this way, there is a more positive flow of energy that now replaces the negative one your carrying around. It’s like filling in the parts denied you because of the lies.
It’s also the “Ring of Fire,” on the Sacandaga Lake NY this weekend. The big end of the Summer party where everyone puts up their bond fires—circle of fire all around the lake. I had celebrated 20yrs of those before the last big one where I was sexually assaulted at and had a seizure.
I remember when we first purchased our Lakehouse and I thought I was finally back on the lake. I would often take walks past the campgrounds where my father kept his camp, on another road close by my bohemian Aunt and Uncle had a large Lakehouse, which was like a mansion to me as a girl. I loved going there, it’s still pretty big. I thought of it like a Rockstar mansion when I was a little girl, running in and out from the lake; tan, happy, my long wavy brown hair flying all over as I laughed and played with my cousins.
It’s hard to accept the same people have once again destroyed what was mine and left me to wander again unable to have a home.
My grandmother had also been denied property that should have been hers. Women were not allowed to own property back then and her brother had been arguing with others at their fathers funeral. He sold the land and my grandmother never spoke to him again. It was the same with her younger sister. My grandmother started over with nothing. She was all I had, I loved her dearly, but she also didn’t tell me the whole truth.
Abandoned houses have stories like abandoned people. I call the new abandoned house I’m staying in and trying to acquire “The RockStar Mansion” too. It’s elegant and big, and has been through a lot, but still very cool. The little girl I was wanders around the rooms laughing how much fun to live in a mansion similar to my family—ones I was not allowed to see after those magical Summers my dad was a Rockstar, singing and playing guitar in his band and me dreaming of being with him.
My ex said they will stand in the lake every fall at “The Ring of Fire,” and renew their oath. I know today it was probably based on me not being here—their horrible secret. Some days I still wonder if I am real, there’s been so much loss—precious things that can never be replaced, but I’m here, I survived and continue on; broken, torn-apart, old, but like my cool, abandoned “Rockstar mansion” still standing. The mystery of life continues on, and like the “Velveteen Rabbit,” the more we love the more worn we become.
I found a beautiful vintage ceramic rabbit in the old garage in the back of the house. It’s kind of like a magical garden shed. Mr Rabbit sits in the kitchen now by some small tools I found reminding me each day things can be fixed up. Most days it’s overwhelming, but he’s still here too he tells me.
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