schvetybetty

It was brought to my attention that my address was visible on that Anne Northrup letter post, so I tried to fix it and repost it, but I can't get it to work...dammit.

I'll try again, but in the meantime, Anne can still go smoke a pole (says tomdog)...

We've been given the opportunity by the Kentucky Women's Foundation to go on retreat at their farmhouse for the whole weekend to work on new songs.  Sailor's bringing her trumpet, I'm bringing a violin and a cornett ( I don't even know how to play it, much less spell it).  We've got a fabulous menu planned, bringing lots of Bourbon, of course, and the entire back-log of new material we've been building up.

We've also decided to stop recording for a while, because it's taking way too fucking long, and are going to put out a vinyl 45 with 3 songs, and will keep working on the rest as we feel like it, to put them online as mp3's.

Yes, there will be cameras everywhere, hopefully some video, and some sort of audio-recording doohickey to catch our spontaneous jams.

I've not been around for the last few weeks because I was so busy with the end of the semester and with a job I had organizing the Children's Activities Tent for the Derby Paddle Boat Race Party at the Louisville Visual Art Association.  I was looking forward to being free for at least a few days after that gig, which was a big success, lots of fun, and lots of hard work.  I had amazing volunteers, James in particular-oh, thank you, James.

The next day, my sister called me with bad news:  one of my aunts (mom's side) committed suicide on the 4th.  I rented a car and drove to NC the next day.  I really didn't think I'd have to go through that again, ever, much less with a family member.  I'm doing much better, but the strangest things trigger sobs and snot. I was physically ill, I mean SICK, for half that week.  She must have been leaving my body.  That's what happened when Josh died, too.  Assholes.
Her parents, my grands, are still alive.  That's the hardest part for us to deal with.  So horribly cruel.  I'm really pissed off.  Really.  That's why I haven't been around for a while.   If this happens again, I...I don't know what I'll do.  Please, don't do it no more.

Freakpowertix's visit was hilariously fun- Lydia performed for us a song and dance routine about "Anths in Ya Panths!" that made us laugh until we cried.  And then, she turned into a salty bitch for a few days.  Well, I'm salty most of the time, so what do I expect?  It was so crazy and fun while he was here that we forgot to bring our cameras everywhere we went.  There are plans in development for a trip to Kalifornia toward the end of the summer...will keep you apprised.

That's the latest from Bettyville...will post Retreat Madness early next week.

She was yelling in her sleep, she often does.  I stood up, took off my coat, and waited to see if I should go in or not.  I walked up to her door.   She was awake; I went in.  I petted her head, asked if she wanted some water.  She shook her head, "yes".  After she drank, I asked her if she had a bad dream.  "Yeah..." 
"What was it about?" 
"A family witch."
She went on:

We went into the forest and hunted a bear... (Oh? Then what happened?) We ate the bear.
She smiled.   (Who killed the bear?)  We did.  There was a table with points on it.  She moved her pointed finger up and down to show jagged points.  (Like a saw?)  Yeah.  So we could skin it.  You don't want to eat bear's fur.   (No, that would be yuck.)
She sat up, excited- I went into the woods by myself, and I wasn't afraid!  (Wow!  I'm so proud of you!)  Her face was serene.  (Why weren't you afraid?)  Because the bear was already dead when I found it!  (Oh!  Good luck!  Who killed it?)  You did.
And when we ate the bear, our bellies were big and happy and the bear was happy in our tummies.  (That is a very good dream.)  Yeah.  And there was a baby bear.  It was this big...she held her thumb and index fingers together, squinting through them.
(Oh, a little baby!  Did we keep it and love it?)  Smile. Yeah, and when you touch it with your hand, you turn into the size of it and you go like this: she nuzzled her cheek against her shoulder.  (Oh, what a happy dream you had, sweet girl...)  Yeah.  It was a good dream.  (Why were you yelling earlier?)  Because I was going into the woods...

Someone's spamming my buzz!  Links for cheap meds!  Goddammit!
How in the hell?  Why?  Why?!

This Saturday marks the second year since my friend's suicide.  I feel weird.  I've been short-tempered and depressed, and thought it was all about PMS. Yes, that makes it even more...special.  Both of these events snuck up on me.
I've got his ashes still.  I don't want them anymore.  I don't know what to do with them.  I've had some ideas, like making an urn out of his ashes, breaking the fancy one they're in and using the pieces to inlay the words "FUCK YOU" on it.  I've suggested this as a piece for my sculpture class, but it was judged "too personal".  Really.  I ask you. 
I've got to get them out of my closet.  I feel like mixing the ashes with my tears, my piss, my menstrual blood, to make the clay.  That personal enough?
Bastard.

For some reason, the buzz sez I have no photos loaded yet...Have they disappeared forever?  Should I cry now?  What the fuuuuuuuck???!!!
Pax, I read your last comment.  Problem is, I can't see where you commented, on what post.  I miss you, too. 
I feel slightly nauseous at the thought of my photos and comments being devoured by the hungry ghosts of cyberspace.  Anybody else having this trouble?
I can't post comments on anyone's posts, either.  I was about to spend some time putting up new images.  Suppose I'll just come back later, and hope everything's back to normal by then.  Gulp.

monday night:
lydia kept waking up. she finally slept in my bed, for about 2 hours, soundly, during which time, i dreamt that:
i was hanging out with the osbournes.  yes. it was not so weird.  yes, it was.
i tried to find my way out of the maze of suburbs on some wheeled vehicle that was more like moon-rover than car. i got lost on some trail, and saw in front of me a 20 foot long snake zip ahead through the weeds...i was afraid, but kept going, although to the far right side of the rutted path, away from it.
as i passed, i noticed that it had left it's skin behind.  i went back for it, and looked at it closely. then i ate it. all of it. and an egg-sack, too.  it was bitter, so bitter that i puked, twice. once in the ditch, the second time in a toilet clogged with pink toilet paper and piss.  i tasted the bitterness all day; that's what woke me up, the taste.  i tasted it all day.
last night, or sometime, i dreamt about falling into a hole in the porch of the SC cabin, except i was a black woman...i was standing beside myself, watching her/me fall into this creepy pit.  she didn't make any noise when she landed. i screamed and ran to the road and called for help. when they dragged her out, she had huge, shiny black spiders crawling over her face, over her whole body, with snakes, too.  someone, another black woman, yelled at me for letting her fall.  i asked her why she didn't make any noise, and she said she was too afraid to move with the snakes and spiders crawling all over her. she was unharmed when she emerged, and she wasn't mad at me.
i was shaking, but relieved.  i was also pissed that there was a jagged gaping hole in the porch, but i knew it was there before we went inside, in the dark.

i looked spiders and snakes up, they represent feminine creative energy;  symbols trying to get me to use them, or their power. 

fucking hell, i thought i was.  maybe little snakes and spiders of art are going to burst through my skin.  again...ok, then. here we
GO!

but i miss you, very much, and i'll have pictures of my final projects/processes and of ScorpioFest in about a week or so. all of this work is exciting me, perhaps the most best yet. there's a lot that must purge itself from my bones; i got a lot to scream about.  think: surgical glove apron, papier mache back brace, alien female form suspended inside cage large enough to walk through- suspended because this has been a large part of my life the last year since i decided to make my move.  maybe i see you sooner if i get stuck and/or can't stand the pain of  not seeing you all...maybe later if i get stuck and fucking flip my wig or some junk, flippin' duh!
i love you, i love you, i love you, i love you, i keees you one hundred times on the eyelids
remember me to your families
bluebirds,
schvety

this little cat
a tabby kitten
has taken to me and sumo
she's on my porch, crying
i want to let her in
or at least to feed her
she's crying
so am i
i have no cat food
should i give her milk?
fat-free vanilla yogurt?
wet dog food?
dry?
it will make her sick, or will it?
why should it matter if she's already starving?
drop some food on the poor fuckers in the
civic center, the superdome
why can't i take her in?
why?
i can't seem to do anything helpful right now
for anyone
not even you

2.17.04

'did you talk to him?'
'no, i won't be able to.'
smirk, 'oh, what, is he in jail or something?'
'no, terry...he killed himself...'
what? what? what? what?!  uhnnnnnnh...
'yeah, terry, he killed himself.'
I heard drums
 everything shook, my body shook, my hair, my eyes, my teeth
I dialed someone's number
to just tell someone, someone objective and strong.
funny, a friend of hers jumped in front of a truck the day before.
feel myself separating from flesh, floating above and beside
I am sheer, off-planet,
a static-y holograph.
smirk.
only coming through in waves.
so many things he gave me
in my house
everywhere my eyes fall
I wore the brown boots he gave me for the first time
yesterday, walking to school, smiling because I could feel
the imprints of his toes
the narrowness of his ankles.
funny, I was saying my practice from the Kalachakra, the 3-verse version, in rhythm to my steps
in his Docs
the first time I could make it all the way through...
I hung up the phone and looked for them
everything in sharp-focus, zoom detail
drums beating.
I wanted to hold them,
sniff the insides to see if I could get a whiff of him
I could
I wanted to lick them,
to sleep with them like
two awkward brown teddys.
I got online to tell my professors
I wouldn't be there because I couldn't stop crying.
I stared at the screen, moving the pointer back and forth across the tool bar
'Help'
the button transformed into 3-D with each pass
HelpHelpHelp
I stroked the word with the pointer, I PETTED it,
wondering if I clicked it, if I could rewind or fast-forward
erase.
It's only been a week
I am still sheer
'a mother's son has left me sheer'
6 suicides in one week said the Funeral Director.
I wish I could avoid February altogether from now on.
We had agreed to quit smoking.  They said the garage floor was littered with cigarette butts.
I had been rolling my own, judiciously, until then
I bought a pack of pre-rolled American Spirits, the sky blue ones.
That was Our brand.
I don't like going to work anymore
I see him everywhere there, bouncing on his toes and beaming.
I find myself thinking, 'oh! I gotta tell him this...oh...
...oh!  Josh would love thi...s...
I still think of him as accessible, even though I saw him
I saw him dead in his fancy fucking queer suit
I swear I thought his eyelids fluttered.
I keep thinking it's merely an elaborate prank he has devised to
shake me to my very
toes...oh.
I suppose it is.
I have visions of him sitting up, a vampire-zombie, biting me.
I just compulsively ate a Wendy's #4 combo-
the most I've eaten this week.
hope I can keep it down.  I'd like to puke all over him.  Dead.
His lips were still red
I know I saw him breathing
How long will I feel so sick
so blurred?
I smell some cologne on some passing faggot,
it's him.
I see the back of someone's buzzed head-
him.
everything, everything is a reminder.
I hate him.
I was afraid I would punch his corpse when I saw it.
But I was only afraid when I saw him, tricking me, lying there.
Just afraid.

from 3.7.95

Laundry, and at 10:15 am a drunken boat of a man with a 2-day old shiner looked at me hard
and asked me if I had some kids-
'no kids.'
'you like suckers?'
'yeah, i like suckers.'
He handed me a little brown bag full of Saf-T-Pops
and said
'don't say nobody wasn't nice to ya taday.'
Then he winked
and asked if I 'wanted a beer taday?'
 'no, not today.'
He tried to tell me how to win at the Pick 3, but he got distracted,
or noticed me trying to avoid his
tangible breath,
and wafted away.
At Zeiden's Pharmacy soda fountain, the retired lady scraping the grill
was singing along to
'Sentimental Journey.'
I pictured her at my age,
and picked at my Reuben.

there was a night at the Chapel Perilous, again,
 and, again,
it was full of fruit and grammar. we learned things about pesto, the treasures, not obvious, to whom only a select few will be privvy...
i gave my Number to Chance and, Orange Grand-Dad Be Praised,
we were giddy. A #, some code, same code
 juxtaposed, but with similar
accents
 grave.  "Well, I guess I cain't...Do Whut?"  Well, wull, Ah guess ah won't
ah wants
ah won'ts
i have made many attempts to post from the  LastNight- ToNight -Eleventh Night
Calling Sister Midnight
i have been distracted before
managed to get things done but,
tomorrow,
i face the DoktoR.
i face her Test.
i face her with Pink Hair and Red Glitter Barrettes.
I face Her and Her Instruments at Noon;
High Noon. It is a fair distance on the TARC.
Right Here in River City!  Oh, We Got Trouble!
 Best Wishes!  Bon-Bon-Bom-Bom-Bom!
Good Luck with The Eval-
There Will Be A
Settlement
I Have A Lawyer-Friend, and His Name
Is
Valentine.  He Knows What To Send YOU, Fuck-O.
I. I. I. I.
STILL
HAVE To keep moving,
I
stiLL
Halve
TO stretch until it makes you un
com
fort
a
ble
and you are sOOOOO
Flexy!  Were you a Gymnast?
Wow! 
How was that?  Did your Parents make you?
Did they Make you EAT
EGGWHITES?  SALADS in the early 80's
in the LIVING ROOM?don'tforgettobrreathe...ssssmmmmmmhhhhaaaaahhhhhhhhggggkkk
ggggkkkkhhhhccchchckkkchckggggggghhhhghgaccchk....Fonda
fondue
forks
can you tell which?
maybe so
but shut the fuck UP! 
What  ARE  you THINKING?
BEsides
outSIDEs?
It ain't like the
Seventies, Babe
Your Parents
favoured Colonial
Prints and
Despised
Condi...Ha, ha
if only they
new.
I meant,
Knew.
I don't Feel
37.
Not like You.
Not Like
Yew.
And the Marriage
and the marriage
andthemarriagetree
ihavetosleep
tangledinmyfamily'shair
youwear
yourhotel
youuu
wearitwell
you
weaahaairitwell

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youown
uglyhats

hard
hard to
wear
i
am
humbled