So I know that I said that I wasnt going to post on here for awhile, but I was really happy about the following, and wanted to share:
My sister, the one who was "cured" of her bisexuality 'through her faith", just informed me that she does like a girl, and that she is okay with that.

.fuck.yes.

(its not that im overly excited to have a queer sister, but excited that my very obviously queer sister has decided to ignore her southern baptist upbringing and accept that part of herself.)

Aside from the girl-drama thats been hanging in a thick cloud over my life since, well, my drama became dyke-drama, everything has been going really really well.

I go to florida in a week or two. which is frustrating (trying to make travel plans and such), as well as exceptionally exciting (for obvious reasons), and kind of nerve-wracking (because ive been gone from there for so long).

My new job is really... tolerable. It comes with really great perks, and I dont mind the work, but shy, dyslexic people should never run cash registers.
.ever.

I started a blog. one that I'm not as tempted to load angsty stuff on. I think I may concentrate on that for awhile and not post on my others. my writing has gotten unbelievably slack, not that it was good in the first place.

Sometimes I forget that people out there might actually read this crap.

I would really appreciate it if you would visit this website:
www.reportitnow.org

And if it applies to you, fill out the webform.

Its for a campaign called, well, Report It. The purpose is to give visibility to how many sex crimes go unreported. So if you have ever been a victim of any kind of sexual violence, please please pleae go fill it out.

heres the official ditty about it:

The Report IT Campaign is a nationwide state-to-state rally to Report sexual violence and abuse on the same day! It was created to raise awareness on the vast under-reporting of sexual assault including rape, incest, and abuse.

Report IT exists to showcase solidarity in the movement to end sexual violence as well as a call to action to stop the systemic revictimization of victims that discourages reporting. This campaign is inclusive of men, women, children, trans-gendered and trans-sexual individuals and everyone who has ever been affected by sexual violence or abuse. You do not have to show up if you were a victim - show up if someone you care about was a victim too!

The Report IT Campaign features an anonymous online reporting system to gather statistics on the occurrences of sex crimes.

We encourage you to officially Report IT to the police as well as fill out our online form. If you are going to the police, please contact your local rape crisis center or support group so you will not go alone. If you do not have all the information about your case, if your offender is deceased, if the statute of limitations is up in your case, or if you cannot officially Report IT with the police - please fill out our online form and show up in person to the rally!

The online form is anonymous and is strictly for the Report IT campaign and will not be shared with the authorities. If your case is open, please do not share your real name and fill out the form under "Anonymous."

I wish my mother would stay.the.fuck.out/away. when it comes to art.
shes an agriculture specialist. who was educated at clemson in south carolina. and has never set foot in a gallery except for my shows. where she picks pieces off of pedestals, and tries to carry them across rooms to show people.

and calls the smithsonian institute with sappy fucking emails, looking for an stream-of-concience inscription that may or may not mention me on a piece of pottery from their collection.
who.fucking.cares.
i certainly fucking dont. and I dont like namedropping, which she forces me to do every.single.fucking.time.she.can.work.it.into.the.conversation.
I dont care if my name comes up in one of peters pieces. and certainly not whether or not that piece is in a museum or not. What I care about is him, and the person that he was to me. and that my namesdropping parents are too lazy to drive me to see him, despite the fact that he probably wont live for that much longer.
I'm just really beyond upset, because my mom seems to feel as though she can suddenly step up and take credit or pride from things that happened when she had left, when she didnt even bother to talk to me. shes never cared about me until recently. when shes handicapped and needs someone to look after the house, and to look after her. now all of the sudden shes taking an interest in what im doing, and insisting that it can become part hers, too.
I dont want her to be my partner in anything. especially not art. I dont care if she just wants to handle the "managing" part of it. she uses everyone in her life, and thats all that she wants me for now.

pretty soon shes going to find out that shes not the only one who can use someone.
soon as i dont need her for room and board, soon as I am starting to be able to really support myself, I'm out of here. I used to just regard her as completely pathetic. a whiney, crying bimbo who used men and everyone else to support her famiscle of an upper-middle-class existance. not having enough money for food so she can send her kid to some elitist private school, and a membership to a country club. yeah mom, sounds great.
now im beginning to hate her.

I still have yet to hear anything from cvs, where supposedly I'm employed. If they dont call me back this will be the second time in this job search that I've been led on and then stood up by a job. Usually I could insert some humorous euphanism about my love life following that, but happily things are looking up in that department.

I'm still trying to decide whether I want to take today off from working at ceramics. Which is ironic because I havent managed to finish a single thing since I got my wheel, although I've been working plenty. But between playing nursemaid for my mom, fill in mom for my sister, and running the house, all of the things that I start end up drying out halfway through the process of finishing them since I'm so often interupted.

However, this week is definately looking up, even if I'm getting frusterated with my schedule. Wednesday I'm going to a lecture on the DIY feminist media of the 90's, and this weekend I get to go to gov school for an undetermined amount of time. Hopefully that includes seeing j, but I'm not sure yet. She put together a film screening at the school, and is beyond scared that absolutely noone will show up. Although a) I'm sure people will , and b) shes doing it as a part of her humanities project, so theres going to be elective credit given for going. which means it rides that fuzzy line between class and not-class, I'll be the only non-student coming, and all of my favorite teachers will be there (thats a nice facet, but a really really weird facet.) It feels really beyond strange to be occasionally going to classes and seeing a girl at the high school I graduated from. And I dont know how to navigate between seeing people that I am already really close to there, and going down there to see her.

Although I must say, it would help me to feel a little less pathetic if when those things do happen, and people do see me and ask me what I'm up to, I could say something other than running a house, packing lunches, and having my mother drive me everywhere. Actually, thats probably more of the problem than anything else, its just that showing up at my old high school really illuminates it.

So heres a quick follow-up to my last post:
all went suprisingly well. J was beyond understanding, but I'm pretty sure that that may just be because she seems to have formed the opinion that I have Dissociative Identity Disorder (multiple personality disorder) and just dont know it. Which, besides the fact that she has DID, is kind of understandable because of her closeness with my sister (who has post-traumatic stress disorder as a result of our shared child-hood experiences... DID is primarily a result of childhood emotional trauma.)

In general, everything is going really really really well with that. I just wish I could see her more often. Which is probably going to happen soon, as my grandad just sent a check in the mail to help out with me getting some transportation.

I got my potters wheel yesterday. i cant remember at the moment if I wrote in here about the completion of my career 360 degree turn. In short, after a years long lovers quarrel (mostly- well, almost completely about money) with art, we have decided to make up and I'm finally committing to a long-term relationship.

I already got my first commission. I'm beyond scared. I might turn it down, because I'm just too damn intimidated, and dont feel like im ready. I was supposed to call around 10 minutes ago to speak with contractors (its a job designing/ executing custom lighting fixtures for this fancy restaurant downtown thats opening in about a month.) but I really think that if i do take it, ill regret it. nothing like a botched job and a bad reputation to start off a career.

Anyways, I'm fucking exhausted-- ive been throwing all morning and my muscles are really not happy with me. I'll try to update more later. right now im definately overdue for some sleep!

Last night, in a stroke of genius, I decided to facebook message j, the girl that I've been seeing, and tell her about the I'm-probably-more-than-likely-schizophrenic thing.

This morning it started to feel like it really wasnt a good idea after all.

- She hasn't read the message yet, says facebook.
So I go in and furtively try to find a way to delete the message before she sees it.

-It doesnt work.

Then, I reread the message.
- That was a big mistake. I sound completely neurotic.

I could go and send a less neurotic/self-concience/awkward follow-up, but unfortunately last night I was feeling sufficiently self-concience enough that I already sent a short follow up.

- I dont come out any better in that one, either.

Then, I proceed to have a massive panic attack about my possible long-term mental state.
.way.to.be.even.more.neurotic.

I'm a complete basket-case. I don't even know why I'm so paranoid about telling anyone this, especially j. Or why I'm so paranoid about getting help. I used to think that that meant that I was more in control of myself. that if i could get by without help then obviously I was in control of the situation. Now I'm beginning to feel more like that's a lie I keep telling myself to deny the possibility that its actually the not-right part of me that is generating these feelings. Because deep down I'm really very scared of getting any outside help. Especially of going to a doctor and talking to them about all of this. One of the first time I heard voices... at first there was one. and among other things it said that I should never tell anyone, and then when there was two they began talking to each other about the horrible things that would happen if I did.
how in the world is it that I feel like I'm in control of the situation, really?

I really don't want j to open that email.

In general things have been in state of suspension that I've started to grow acustomed to since leaving school.

Mostly the only things going on are in the romantic sector, which is ironic considering how often I experience human contact outside of my immediate family.

Tonight is the first night since leaving school that I haven't called L, even though we supposedly were over as a result of the move. I know that on her end it was something else, but on mine it was hard to say no to the makings of a long-distance relationship given how it was asking no actual sacrifice of me and how much human connection I've been lacking. We were together for almost 6 months in person, plus the extra time I mentioned above. I moved in with her for 2.

Its kind of horrible that the longest romantic relationship I've ever maintained was a result of a drunken hookup and an overwhelmingly emotionally lazy facet of personal inertia.

Went to gov school all day saturday with the family to help my sister find a prom dress. I thought at the time that it was beyond unfortunate that none of my established friends were there, but it turned out to be quite the opposite. I hung out with j, who I talked about in my last post,all day. We walked around and then sat together and made art. Which has everything to do with why L has neglected to call.

At first I was really overwhelmed by all of the things that come with getting to know her... well, I'm still overwhelmed, but am trying to deal with it better. Everything is so different around her.

When I'm with j it feels like I'm with another part of myself. Which is not to say that she reminds me of myself or anything like that. Or even that I feel at ease around her... in fact it's kind of the opposite. Everything between us feels uncomfortably honest -- vaguely familiar and yet foreign and distinct.

Her unrelenting honesty makes me feel the gravity of the minor alterations and substitutions that we make in our process of being or expressing for the sake of appearances or social graces.

Its not even necessarily that she's laid all bare for me (we've talked alot on the phone and in email in addition to hanging out). It just feels like unrelenting honesty when in reality shes just grazing the surface of what she has/is experiencing. But it makes all of my omissions seem so cowardly.

Sunday night she called me because she couldnt sleep.
She only sleeps 4 or so hours a night, because of nightmares.
I was busy feeling exceptionally sorry for myself and bitter towards my parents because I may not get to go back to school next year because of their financial actions. She said she hates her mother and I asked her why. She calmly relayed how her mother carefully washed the blood out of her panties from the ages of 7 to 11, and did almost nothing beyond that and reassuring her that "it would all be over soon" in response to a family friend raping her at least once a week.

Saturday we were sitting on some steps and I held her from behind, holding hands for the longest time. She said that she could feel my heart beating and that she felt safe.
I wish that holding her could make her feel safe when she slept.

Ive been writing on here so infrequently as of late because it always seems like not much at all is going on in my life- ever. However, things have popped up, and I think I forgot to mention them on here. So, in review:

-I moved up to asheville with my mom last week. I havent lived with her since I was in 3rd grade- and even then it was mostly and my dad, I hardly ever saw her.

- I've been talking alot to my sister's friend that I *think* I've already mentioned. I think that she's very interesting, but hard to understand, which doesnt make me that hopefull about the possibility of a romantic relationship, even though supposedly shes really interested in one?
I guess its just difficult because she seems like she never really relaxes, or really acts body-language wise like she's interested in me, or even acts interested in me romantically at all. Which is wierd considering that all I've ever heard about her from my sister, her roomate (also a mutual friend), and various other people from that school for the past few months is how ridiculous of a crush she has on me. It's a little off-putting.
The whole thing is really weird. my sister is home on break and talks to her (J), multiple times a day some days, so sometimes it feels like she knows more about what's going on than me. She also announced to my family at the dinner table the other night that me and her friend j are 'in a relationship'. ? the girl hasnt even alluded-much less acted on or told me- that she likes me. To make matters worse, I really dont want to be the one initiating any sort of physical expression of my attraction to her, because she was the victim of long-term childhood sexual abuse and rape, as well as a victim of rape more recently. I'm just really not that comfortable going there, and she's really not giving me that much to work with her.

... wow. that turned into much more than a simple bullet. sorry?

-still.havent.found.a.job. My mom's been keeping me so busy being ms. housekeeping since I got up here that I havent had the time. Hopefully that will change tommorrow?

-really thats all. I thought there was enough to merit bullets, but evidentally my life just isnt that interesting.

so my mom has been wanting to move into this house across town.
unfortunately for her she cant actually afford it without her nearlycommonlawhusband/boyfriend/fiance-even-though-he-never-officially-asked-her person's help.

she called me yesterday and said that Jeff said that she can probably get the house-- but only on the condition that I can have a ceramics studio in the basement.

W%#^%$@!%#$%$%%#$%#!!!!!!!!!!!!

he seems to be under the impression from talking to his gift-shop-business connections (he embroiders things for a living) that I could actually make a living off of it.

Also, I think I'm not going to teach after all. at least not here, not full time, for all of the reasons I've discussed in other entries. So I'm really not sure what I'm going to do now.

In unrelated news, I have a kind-of date tommorrow. with one of my little sister's friends. well, kind of friend-- used to be friends but now they dont get along, but go to gov school together in the same program so they tolerate each other. part of me really wants it to go well because she seems like a really interesting person from what ive heard, and part of me wants it not to for the abovementioned reasons.

so far this taking-time-off-of-school thing has been a little miserable.
its really lonely being confined all of the time, and when i do get to talk to people i care about, it sometimes gets even more upsetting because the way that i think of them has remained suspended in these little emotion-bubbles, but they've moved on, things have been changing for them, and people-- relationships-- cant be expected to be the same from year to year. which is of course how things always go, but somehow that comes as a very emotionally isolating suprise when you only see the people that you want to be with a few times a year.

im just so depressed right now and i really need to get out of the house. unfortunately the only way i can do that is get a ride from my dad, who literally only goes out to go to work and to see his girlfriend. both of which dont involve me for obvious reasons.

EDIT:
after some sorely needed quality phone time, I feel infinitely better. its funny how even the slightest bit of quality human interaction can change my mood so drastically these days.

I wish the boss-man would actually tell me to come work.
supposedly i have a pretty sweet job, so now I dont even have job-searching to do.

Ive been reading about systems theory, and after my january term (where i studied art nouveau architecture) its probably more than a little inevitable that Ive become really interested in architecture that not only examplifies some of the organism based ideals of viollet le duc, but which also is reactionary or at least in tune to the environment and to the way which people live in it. its probably completely unrealistic, but i like it.

I went to the humane society on saturday, and it was soooo much fun, but sooo very depressing. The humane society here is chill to a fault, and there were beer cans and puppies everywhere. it was pretty ridiculous. and the only volunteers other than me were college students from usc who had to do community service for things like underage drinking.

anyways, it was so good to be able to hold the dogs. Ever since I got home theres been zero physical affection like always (although I'm not really sure id even like it if my dad was), and while I really love my rats they arent really holdable.

and thats really all i have to write about.

New Game plan: (well, more like old game plan, but with more planning) I'm going to send an email posing as a concerned parent to scpie, a fundementalist organisation that is pushing for the schools to be complete southern baptist training grounds. I'm going say that i have children, am debating whether to homeschool them or let them attend the state schools because of the "normalisation of the homosexual lifestyle" that could be "unfairly pushed on my children", and that basically i want to know what the boundaries are of what a teacher can legally get away with, because poor-old-me is not sure that the principle in my area isnt concerned enough with the "instillment of proper and natural morals" in his school to entrust that he will take care of things on his own.

That way, i can test the waters (noone has ever really tried to actively oppose this part of the education system-- theyve mostly been fighting for things like allowing evolution to be covered in the textbooks-- as long as its not in class--(that only got approved last month!) so there isnt much information that has been gathered through the trial and error of others and i cant tell where the clearcut boundaries are.)

also, the founder of this fundemental group has just been elected as the chair of our state board of education. so not only should my email appeal to her because its basically an email from herself say ten years ago (she homeschooled her kids so that they wouldnt be exposed to our HORRIBLY IMMORAL school curriculum.), but she will be more than well informed, and it will serve as a litmus test as to how the laws may actually end up being read.

oh, and I think i might apply as a teacher intern for summer school here?

and so begins the long journey to stir things up in gilbert, south carolina.

I never realised how ridiculously unreal it was the gov school (high school I went to) existed in South Carolina. Until tonight, I never fully appreciated the fact that my school included gender expression and sexual orientation in their non-discrimination policy. that we put on productions of plays like "the laramie project" and that franks always (well, up until last year, but ill get to that later)included "angels in america" in our curriculum. That we have 5 openly gay staff/faculty and that all of said faculty was always accepting and supportive. that queer art was covered in art history and sanna (english teacher) was always freaking out (in a good way!) about gay subtext in texts that even I didn't think was there. that my department head would offer to take off work and sign students out to drive them to protests against fred phelps-- who attended the fundemental Bob Jones University-- which by the way is within walking distance of gov school. I am very aware of that fact thanks to the fact that I had to go through their protests against "fags" with my homophobic father in crawling traffic every time I went home.

It turns out that legally in my state, schools can't "indicate that they find homosexual behaviour acceptable"( see star at bottom for explaination as to why all of this doesnt apply to gov school). turns out that in 8th grade if I would have ever gotten up the guts to go to the principle about the sex ed teachers homophobic presentation of "the facts" that bothered me, I probably would have been the one who is out of line. Far from encouraging a safe workplace, the senator for my area has been pushing and pushing for a federal bill banning teachers from being able to be open about their sexuality. No wonder the dean tried to keep everything VERY hush-hush when finally a student-- with parents, became outraged and started to raise hell about "angels in america" being featured in english. Oh, yeah, and did I mention-- just to put the icing on the cake there-- that that student is a little homo herself who hit on me. (lets just say that wasnt well recieved)

Oh, and we just got a new chairman for the state board of education, who:
a) lists pushing intellegent design as one of her biggest goals in south carolina schools
b) has never had experience in the education system.
c) is a religious fundementalist who pulled her kids out of school so she could "protect" them from the obviously liberal-ridden south carolina school system
d) oh, and I went to her website and she was pushing this book called “Domestic Tranquility: A Brief Against Feminism,” saying that:

“Mrs. Graglia (author) utilizes her professional background in law to make an incredibly well documented (the end notes are incredible!) and exhaustive case against feminism. She accurately and persuasively connects the ‘victories’ of feminism with their destructive results in woman’s lives and in our society. This book is an incredible resource for women to help them cogently argue against a wrold view which has consistently removed protection and provision from them and their children.”

and it looks like shes here to stay. everyone in the state fucking loves her.

way to go, sc.
oh, and did I mention that by law teachers have to be supplied with these pamphlets whose entire purpose is to argue that anything that goes against the traditional family is the cause of anything going downhill in sc or the us? I really dont get why good ol' fred left us for kansas in the first place. he should run for fucking governor.

The reason that this is particularly relevant and upseting to me is that I know some of the exceptionally closeted gay teachers who arent lucky enough to be at gov school, who not only dont talk about their personal lives to many people, but live in seperate houses like its the fucking fifties. I'm close to these people, and as ive gotten older and begun thinking about my career choice, that i want to be a teacher because of those people. because middle aged women with kids and a mortgage shouldnt have to risk their jobs for some goddamn respect. Ive seen the way that glbt youth are treated in sc public schools, and it disguists me : i wanted to be a person who had nothing to lose and could stand up for all of them. I dont want to start a family, i want to live cheap, and as unafraid by financial or career-related knives hung by strings over my head. I wanted to change things and influence people, help people. sc has less than a 50% graduation rate, and when the school districts are drawn up race and economic status definately coorespond pretty suspiciously. I wanted to teach and to possibly open up my home as a small glbt safe house. so many of the openly gay teens in the south arent accepted and remain closeted because resources for that sort of thing dont exist in gilbert, sc amongst the chicken farms. theyre in new york and san fran. places like that.

when asked about the need for anti-bullying programs that actually acknowledged homophobic bullying, once state senator replied that we dont have a problem with that in south carolina. and im quite certain that he wasnt referring to the open and caring environment in the schools.

i feel like the only way someone is going to be able to catalyze internal change in this sytem is if they are straight and slightly middle of the road at. or else they really honestly arent going to be able to be around long enough to be able to do anything.

and i definately dont fit into that category.
I dont know what Im going to do.

I believe firmly that if things are going badly for the community youre from, its your duty to stay and fight for what is right. if everyone who can catalyze the change leaves, what is that going to mean for the ones left behind? and in addition to the connection that i feel with the gay community of the carolinas, southern community will always be a part of me too. I was raised on farms and swamps, with family barbeques in the barn and civil war memoirbellia passed down from generation to generation. my family arived in sc in the late 1600's and never left-- ive only been out of the south once, for a fifth grade fieldtrip to washington. even though I am considered to be a rather "alternative" type of person, at the heart of it being southern is still always going to be a big part of who I am. So yeah, I do want to help overseas, to travel, but here is where I want to CHANGE things.

im just beginning to feel like thats not possible.

*gov school is different from any other public school in the state because of the admin. and because of the nature of the school. basically two really important state senators bugged the state gov so much about their "neglect of the gifted and talented" students of south carolina that a few rich friends later she was given permission to set up a school that didnt have to abide by state education laws or budget where we could live all together at the top of a hill by a waterfall and paint all day for free.

I havent written on here in awhile because, well, you know how people on here are all the time saying that they really hoped that noone in "real life" would find their journal on here? well, my crush/friend saw the site when I was on the computer a few weeks ago. after the initial panic (when I went through and erased my most recent entries) I decided just to lay low for a few weeks-- even if she was initially curious its very unlikely that she would be on here now, right? at least thats what im counting on.
in the meantime: (copy/pasted from lj, so there will be addional parentheseed (sp?) material throughout)

- i was reunited with my cameras yesterday
- brought the engine on the johnboat back to life.

the combination meaning that im going to try to get up at real-early-o'clock to photograph the geese on the island.

- This week I heard shots coming from the direction of the island, and found a whole bunch of beer cans and empty shotgun shells there when I went later the next day.
-Geese arent (to my knowledge) even still in season

this.means.war. dont shoot my fucking geese.

-I decided that I'm definately not going back to New College
- I really miss everyone

I just dont like the person I am/was there. Not that I'm usually a completely different person, but some undesirable trends were definately starting to take shape.

- Im always on the phone lately. (as in constantly. with l. remind me again how a drunken fling that i dont even remember committing turned into a 6 month i-dont-even-know-what-to-call-it-because-we-didnt-call-it-any-thing-its-just-that-everyone-knew-and-i-lived-in-her-room?)

I wish I hadnt assumed that certain things would be self-resolving by virtue of me leaving. 500 miles definately dont make things easier.

(i.e. everything is perfectly horrible, because at this point its like kicking a puppy. shes so stoic all the time that the full gravity of how she feels about me was not evident before I left. or maybe I just didnt see it because I didnt want to. either way, it hurts alot when she asks how I think about the possibility of their being an "us" in the future now that i know that I'm not going to New next year. mostly because ive never thought about an "us" in the future ever except in a "well, eventually its going to end, and man wont that be messy.".
I feel like because weve never communicated well that there were alot of expectations and assumptions made on both sides that have got me in a kind of trap because i really above all things dont want to hurt her, but its really too late to avoid that.)

Schim and Magda (my rats) live right next to my bed, and they seem to like it here so far, despite the loss of Rita's (roomate/ their other mother) companionship and love. Especially when they get to go outside and run around on the dock.

-My dad isnt wild about them so far.
-judging by the newly-chewed whole in his jeans, the feeling may be mutual.

I'm still convinced that they'll settle their differences over a beer any day now. (my rats are complete alcoholics. schim once fell in a gin glass in a drunken stupor. they have to be watched very very closely around alcohol.)

- im making home-brewed wine. its going to be a blackberry, peach, and honeysuckle wine.

hopefully that tastes as good in real life as it sounds on paper.

- I have an interview tommorrow at petsmart for a job where basically all i have to do is take care of the small animals and help people pick out pets.

My dad has a sinking feeling that this means I will be coming home with under-loved mice and rats on a pretty regular basis.

I have a sinking feeling that he knows me too well.