The little things

Each time I accomplish something, no matter how small I am learning to celebrate it.  Because no matter how small that thing is, I did it and it is a part of a progression of that small thing turning into something bigger.

It has been said in my blog before that I am a huge fan of a motivational speaker called Mel Robbins and currently I am reading her book “The high five habit” and though I am not seeing massive results three days into forming this habit.  I did notice today a small, very faint in fact, smile on my face when I went to the mirror this morning.

I’m not presuming you know what “The high five habit” is all about, so I shall tell you.

Mel Robbins suggests that each morning you high five yourself in the mirror in order to acknowledge yourself, try not to criticise yourself the first thing in the morning – self-love is key to making solid foundations in other relationships, if you don’t love yourself or take care of yourself enough, you can’t do that for other people, can you? 

Why? 

Because you will feel depleted in yourself and you won’t give it your best shot. 

Many people feel that high fiving themselves in the mirror daily boosted their esteem and performance throughout the day.

Why? 

Because a high five is a positive reinforcement and it makes you feel you have value.

Three days, that’s all I’ve done so far, though when this post goes out it will really be five days, because I am posting this to schedule.

I have barely done any writing since September 2023 but I am celebrating any writing I do even if it’s only a small sentence now. 

Why?

Because I am feeling depleted and I don’t like it and it was with Mel Robbins that I learned I felt depleted in so many different areas in my life through a free course I finished last week ran by her.

https://www.melrobbins.com/takecontrolthanks

I learned all these tiny little areas of my life built up and gradually I became overwhelmed and because my social circle died around four years ago – I never found a way through other people to pick myself up again.  It’s all self-reliance only, 100% pure self-reliance and most people can’t pick themselves up when they are being 100% self-reliant, but I have no choice right now so any little thing is going to be great progress for me right now!

Today I have written two poems, this blog post and approximately 1600 words towards my vampire project, not a lot really – not for me and how I used to write several years ago!  But I am learning to be kind to myself, not to whip myself so much because I have learned recently I am an incredibly mean slave driver to myself and a tyrannical bully – as I always felt I was so darn lazy, yet I wasn’t.

In the scheme of thing, in the law of averages I wasn’t.

I’ve been working under overwhelming conditions for a decade and didn’t realise it and the more I was putting onto myself the harder and harder I would beat myself up about it.

No wonder I struggled with suicidal thoughts for so long, no wonder I had no drive and energy to get out of bed and try harder.

I was beaten, purely by myself – no one else did that to me!

I escaped abusive relationships and I became free from all of that and I became my own abuser, pushing myself constantly, being hard on myself for the smallest thing and mistake, because that’s how I was trained by people from my past and I was carrying over in my head, their idealism of what I should be doing and putting it on myself. 

Effectively I escaped abuse from other people but replaced it with me abusing myself in the same way they did to me.

It takes something like doing a course by someone like Mel Robbins or reading their books to really get deep inside of yourself to realise these things are happening to you, because of you.

What’s more, these things can change because of you too – only you can save yourself from yourself!

It’s a weird world, but it’s true for all of us!

You don’t need someone else to get things to happen in your life, you do it for yourself.  Letting someone else hand things to you;

A; is very unusual to find someone who will do that to you anyway and…

B; handing your power over to them, thus disempowering your own potential!

If you feel you need to rely on someone for ANYTHING then you have chosen to be at another person’s mercy.

Now for me, to a certain extent this is fine for me, because I am happy to have some direction from others. 

But most people want to master themselves fully and that’s fine too.

However, even the most ambitious people can often fall into the trap of disempowerment because of their reliance on another person and they will become frustrated and even vicious with that person if that person doesn’t live up to their expectations to receive what they want from them.

Some people do this in romantic relationships, in fact a lot of people do.  They mistake their need for love with a need for resource and often confuse the two.

If you love someone, you don’t use them – you love them, you care about them, their happiness if your happiness and you will protect that the best you can… if that’s not true in your relationship, then there is something seriously wrong with the relationships foundation and it will fail.

Do you know how rare it is to find someone who will love you selflessly?  It’s actually very special and many relationships fail because one or even the both of them fail to look at the relationship from a selfless perspective.

Now this wasn’t something Mel Robbins said, this is me talking now.  This is what I have experienced – I am not perfect, I’ve done the same in my past too and it’s not right and it’s not fair!

Where am I going with this?

To be honest, I don’t know.

But then again, nobody really knows what’s going on in their lives do they, let’s be honest?  We’re all just learning as we plod along, doing our thing. 

So, today I’ve done 1600 words towards my vampires – I celebrate that!

I did three lessons on DuoLingo for Italian – I celebrate that!

I wrote two poems – I celebrate that!

I read several pages of a book and magazine – I celebrate that!

I managed to eat a breakfast which is rare for me!  – I celebrated that too!

All these micro things are a progression to something bigger – foundations of something that will be big for my future.

The little things count, because doing nothing doesn’t.

Sitting back and thinking doesn’t count as productive time, because you’re not doing anything in action, you’re just thinking!

Anyone can think!

Anyone can waste oodles of time just sitting back doing nothing but plan everything to the letter!

But action brings things into motion, action is progress, no matter how small – it counts, it’s a manifestation, it is beyond thought, action is tangible, thought is not.

So when you write 50 words towards your novel and other writers laugh at your dreams of being a writer, remember this… you wrote 50 words, you didn’t just think them and that counts towards creating a book.  Sitting back and thinking about 50 words and not writing them, doesn’t make you a writer, it makes you a thinker!

Honestly how many writers out there think away hundreds of words per day but fail to write them down because they weren’t confident about it, didn’t trust the process and felt they needed those words to be absolutely perfect before they wrote them?

Also, how many days go by, weeks, months, years even because of the same thing?  Because of writers block?  That doesn’t exist actually; writer’s perfection does and guess what?  It doesn’t have to be perfect until you send it off to be published and even then it won’t be!

Just get the thing written, because you’re going to have to rewrite it anyway, so why waste time trying to be the impossible?

Nobody is perfect!

Not even the bestsellers, it doesn’t exist because perfection can’t be defined as everyone has a different idea of what that means to them!

So what you find as perfect is somebody else’s trash, basically.

Cold hard truth and I am not sorry for saying it.

The only successful people in the world are the people doing the things they want to do – doing, not thinking, not waiting on a hand out, not sitting back a dreaming – doing!

So celebrate the little things you actually do, not the great ideas you thought about and didn’t do anything with!

Thanks for reading!

Sex and poetry

A warning first and foremost as this post digressed hugely into talks of so-called sordid activities and smut, when it was namely about my poetry. 

Sometimes I write poetry and delete it thereafter because I am ashamed and I don’t want anyone to ever see it; other times I write poetry and I can’t bear to destroy it, but I am also slightly ashamed to want to publish it anywhere, so what do I do with those?

I put them into my cloud in a file called “Never Publish”.  What is the point of this you may ask?  I may as well delete them like I have others, what makes these ones so special?

Honest answer is I don’t really know and for some, I know that I need to verbally read these poems out to people for their opinions before I publish them.

Most of the ones I lock away in shame are about sex and some other non-sexual but dark views, views beyond suicide or graphic detailing of body horror, many of which are from my past bad memory stores. 

Some of these poems pertain to the BDSM lifestyle and others to the occult – and because some people can’t understand a writer who can write from different perspectives of their own and they often label the author as being “whatever” label fits at the time pertaining to the subject they’ve written at the time; I am quite nervous to be branded a “whatever” wrongfully.

My point is.  I believe a whole caboodle of things and I write from many perspectives; I am able to separate another person’s point of view away from my own and write as though those were my thoughts and feelings and I think to be a good writer, this is an essential skill to learn but it is fraught with difficulties and discrimination from others who may misinterpret you as a person.

This is why I don’t share a few of the things I write and I won’t even do so under a pseudonym.

Some poems are created and burned alive screaming, some are written and hidden in shame and others published online or waiting to be sent to a poetry magazine when I feel confident that I am a poet.

I’ve been in denial of being a poet for years, how is that for amusement?

I have often been heard saying “I’m not a poet, I just write poems from time to time because I am bored, I’d rather liken myself to a lyricist who can’t compose because I can’t access my software anymore”; Look really darling it’s the same thing, but try drumming that into me… it doesn’t always register.

Tonight I wrote one of the NEVER PUBLISH poems and they won’t even be published, why?  Because it pertained to quite graphic sexual acts of sodomy and I knew that for some people this could be offensive.   I just wanted to write something dark and sordid because I am feeling more than a little playful and dirty tonight and yes, I am quite open to say that sodomy for me is not a sin – so that’s what I came up with and I didn’t mean to offend anyone with it but rather entertain lustfully – but I had my reservations because of the sensitive people in society who will think that I am just either simply disgusting or that I am offensive to their sexuality.

Whereas to me, I was merely celebrating it in true revelry and the poem really showed the primal urges of humanity at their most base and animalistic level, but I know in some ways I went too far! 

Sex can sometimes make us feel dirty, make us feel like unwonted creatures and this is what was portrayed in the poem I stashed away.  True delicious filth and yes a woman can relish in homosexuality of men and sodomy in general, I relish in pleasure by definition and I enjoy observing the pleasures of others, is that so evil of me? 

Don’t answer it, I don’t want to hear those dogmatic views. 

I don’t think that’s an act of evil, do you?  Not if I love it, not if I don’t judge it, not if I don’t hate it… what do you think?

I have personally done a lot of art over the years pertaining to sex and what some people in society would call “Sleaze or smut”; I like drawing sexual figures, sometimes in abstract, sometimes in caricatures and I get immense pleasure from it.  But, I was raised to feel ashamed about being proud of sex and my sexuality and you know… stay a quiet good girl and don’t show public feelings for whoever you are with.  Shocking girl!

Who do you think you are to constantly be touching your partner as you are out and about, don’t you care that you might embarrass them?  But for me, no… it’s not like that, I like touching and being touched, if I give a person the permission to do so that is!  Being in a sexual relationship with someone, why not?  It’s a given, isn’t it?

I like the protective reassurance of a man who constantly touches me in public if I am his – holding my hand, guiding me to places, snuggling up against me and warning the world off with one glare over my shoulder as he embraces me from behind.  Why not show the world how you feel about each other? 

My only concern with this is that I am so easily turned on the whole world will know I am gagging for it and can’t control myself, that’s my only fear with it! 

My whole life I have been a very sexual being from quite young – mostly with myself as pitiful as that sounds – ha-ha!

Time and again I have entered relationships where the other partner has not been very tactile and to find someone who likes to be touched in my experience seems rare and few and it’s disappointing to say the least and it affects my confidence as a lover and often makes me feel rejected by them and used – I say used because it is like they can touch me when the feelings catches them but I can’t touch them!

I’ve got out of the habit of being tactile myself and now I am free and available again to look for a new relationship I am afraid that I may come across as rigid as over the years the touchy touchy me has been trained out! 

Yes anyone can be sexual and they can have lots of sex and talk about it whilst they drool, but do they really understand it?  Do they really have what it takes to be a genuinely sexual person who isn’t shy about it?  I am no exhibitionist, but I am proud of my sexuality. 

For me sex is more than just dip and go or rather in my experience with men I’ve had dip and collapse in five minutes flat! 

I am no whore and I am not constantly gagging for it with any Tom, Dick and Harry, no offense to any Thomas, Richard and Harold’s out there – however, I am not a person who is just all talk either, like most potential and actual lovers in my past appeared to have been.

I’ve had lovers who are look but don’t touch, I can penetrate you, but you can’t do a thing to me, I want you to suck me but I won’t suck you types.  Selfish lovers, lazy lovers… I am not like that.

I am a snuggle type too, I don’t like going off to my own side of the bed clutching a pillow and not touching my partner whilst I sleep – I expect to be snuggled most of the night or be touched in some way – I don’t like how people join and then separate so readily like they don’t matter to each other.  The only time this is marginally ok is if it is a super heat wave!

I don’t like the fuck and sleep aspect either, where’s the pillow talk and the extra tease?

Why is sex always rushed a two minute breast fondle, a five minute dip and an all-night collapse… what the heck is that all about? 

One of my exes once told me that my drive is too high, I need to get it seen to, it’s not right and it’s not natural.

I’ve been told so many times that “It’s not right or natural for a woman to like porn; it’s not right or natural for a woman to think about sex so much to the extent of writing about it or talking about it or drawing lewd pictures of people having sex as often as you do”, apparently.

It’s not natural for a woman to be overly sexual, talkative about being overly sexual and proud of it either and being very open about what she likes and dislikes regarding it. 

But the thing is it is; only few women do, because most aren’t brave to voice it and do it, because of backlash.

Because as women we are meant to be docile and discreet and good little girls!

The girl who talks about it a lot must be a whore, must be dirty, must be tarnished goods – they don’t believe that a sexual woman can actually be good and loyal and clean and not whores at all.

I’ve had many partners in my time who had their sexual pleasures with me, but not many of them ever actually penetrated me, surprise, surprise and not all of them have been same sex partners either.  Most of it was heavy petting and BDSM games without any vaginal penetration outside of toys.

If you think about how many sexual play partners I have had there would a few, but how many were penetrative and actually performed proper traditional sex with me?  Two consensually!  That’s all, two – but to think about my sexual experiences and the number I have played with, you’d think I was a whore, because you would have wrongly presumed they all put their member inside of me somehow and they hadn’t.

Primarily because I do not like taking contraception, but that’s a different subject altogether! 

Women will have a hard time believing that there are men in this world who can be around a naked woman playing with her bits and never being tempted to thrust into her within minutes, but in my experience they do exist and they appear to be quite common actually.

I’ve slept with several men who never touched me too, just sleeping with them and never doing more than just kissing a little and a hug now and again, women too.  Yes this can happen, no sex. 

Sex shouldn’t be taboo, it’s the most ancient activity in the world and we’ve been doing it for millions of years and if we hadn’t have, we wouldn’t exist, would we?

Societies are prone to trying to hide their most primal instincts and they shouldn’t – it’s not healthy, in fact it’s very mentally damaging.

I am contemplating getting a smaller bed in my bedroom so I can bring my art table upstairs so I can do more art – because as I am getting advanced in years, I am becoming much more shameless and a lot more embracing my true self and the art I want to produce is not really something for a thirteen year old boy to feast his upon! 

I want to write more sexual poems and I want to draw more sexual pictures.  I accidentally took the wrong sketchbook with me to the dentist a few years ago and dropped it, a woman picked it up for me and wide eyed saw the nudes and the sexual art I had done inside the book and she said to me – Oh my goodness, you are just like Tracy Emin only better!

At the time I had no idea who Tracy Emin was, but when I researched her, I liked her ballsy art, but mine does appear to be more graphic and doesn’t leave much to the imagination! 

When I was quite young, I was unprotected from the adult world and sex was thrusted into my face at most angles, my innocence to these sorts of things went when I was around four or five years old; things on the TV, sordid parties I observed through the bannisters my parents had all sorts of things and I often found things around the house that were quickly snatched from my hand only to learn they were mummy’s toys.    

A huge contradictive upbringing I had, devout religious parents who literally believes in beat the devil out of the child, spare the rod and spoil the child and children should be seen and not heard types – but at the weekends getting pissed in front of the said child and partying like we’re in Babylon!

Oh and don’t forget the small one serving bottles of babycham for the kids to make them grow up more human!  You get that from the age of five, after your fifth Christmas and every party thereafter! 

When I was a lot younger I thought I’d have healthy lungs to pollute so I can smoke, because I have a smoking fetish and I always saw myself as one of those ladies who had cigarette extensions and called everyone Darling and wore a red silk turban with a brooch in the centre and laughing like a kookaburra at cocktail parties.

I used to watch late night TV alone in my bedroom on my black and white TV, mostly looking for Godzilla but oftentimes there were adult movies and gameshows on channel 4.  I watched them as a child without a real bedtime when I was home educated and nobody bothered me after 2am. 

I’d watched all sorts of things that would make a decent parent cringe!  I was told never to reveal my favourite shows to people outside the family if they ever asked, because I liked things such as “Tall guy”, “the man with two brains”, “euro trash” and “band of gold” as my childhood favourites, the latter is a program about prostitutes! 

I remember sitting with neighbour kids and cousins some nights watching these shows and we used to have big discussions about it all and what we’d do when we grow up!  Some of those were suppositions of whether or not we would sell ourselves or not if we were adults! 

I fully planned to grow up having all sorts of cheeky things around my house like penis ornaments and big red lips leather sofas and all sorts of funny, quirky things just for a laugh. 

You’d be surprised of the imaginings of a 10yr old that was raised unprotected from the adult world!

I tried smoking as soon as I became of legal age and after just six weeks I gave it up because of a chest infection, I was sad, because I had only just perfected blowing circles and got into the fun hobby of blowing smoke into bubbles!

I always liked a smoky room until I developed asthma in my early 30s. 

How I got into talking about all of this when this post was meant to be about what I am doing with my poetry and art, I have no idea – but I am having fun with all these revelations and no I am not drunk.  I haven’t had a glass of wine since Christmas!

And you can stop the “yeah but what else have you had in the meantime?” snipe too, I have behaved myself, so now so should you – you naughty, naughty readers you! 

So there you have it – well you are lucky, lucky people if you do…

So now you know, that there is more to me than just snuggles and rainbows, there is a very passionate woman inside of me who is learning to embrace the idea of coming out in full fervour and using her passions for both sex and creativity to the fullest of its potential and to Hell with the prudish shoot downs from a society who is waiting to suppress my most primal expressions!

I’ve been trying to behave for decades and its boring as heck!  I am bored of men who just don’t have it in them!  When I want a pervert they are either excessively so to the point my stomach churns or they are just all talk! 

It takes a lot to make my stomach churn by the way, believe me! 

Now, does this mean that my poem about sodomy is going to get published now, right here, at the bottom of this post (no pun intended). 

No.

Spoil sport, I hear you say!

Sorry, maybe someday, but not today…

You’ll get some smut eventually, but goodness knows when!

Thanks for reading and remember… God said go forth and multiply!  I often wondered if that was translated exactly true to word?  was it actually “I deleted my true idea of the translation due to the idea that an atheist (Paul) heard it and though it was blasphemous for some people and I am not an atheist at all but found it funny, so I got into a flux and deleted it! 

P.S There is likely a similar and more edited version of this on my blogger account in a day or so.

My quiet dad

Today I am going to talk more about my dad.

My dad has hardly had much of a look in regarding my past, but I thought I should share some things about him, because he wasn’t part of the problem when I was growing up – he was like a cushion to the blow I could have had – if that makes sense at all?

My dad was always fighting to get me better things, to get me better socialised, to get me better educated and he was almost always ignored – but my dad did have some small victories now and again in regards to having choices about what happened to his child.

My mum made no secret about why she married my father; she let it be known to both him and I that she married him purely to keep her boys safe in case she died, because she had a health scare about a year before I was born.

Her arrangement was, I shall marry you Tom if you ensure that you will raise my boys as your own if anything happens to me!  He agreed and he would have done so too, however my dad said he was sad he would never have children of his own and he sulked about it for a time – my mum was terrified in having another child because the child she had before me was a breach of which she was more or less forcing herself to have naturally and she suffered for three days in labour until she relented to have a caesarean.

However, she told me she felt sorry for my dad and said that she would give him only one child to seal the deal and he was happy with that!

So I was born before they got married, they married in the January after my birth. 

My dad was a sheet metal worker shortly after this and remained in that job until I was seven years old. Then stuck to his next job until retirement, pun intended a glue factory foreman – where I got my first job as a labeller at the age of 15.

Before he married my mum he was a chicken farmer and a train driver before he went into the army to get a HGV license, but he stayed in the army longer than he had planned.  There is a family rumour that my mum broke my dad’s leg deliberately to prevent him attending his duties in the Falklands, but it was never proven.

My dad was a quiet man, who hardly spoke about himself and so I don’t know much about him in his own words, only the rumours from other relatives who knew him.  He kept himself to himself and often shut himself away to play on consoles in other rooms away from family.

Sometimes dad would cook, but mostly I cooked for the family when mum was on nightshifts from the age of 7yrs onwards, dad was a less fussy eater than mum and would be more adventurous in the food he ate – he would have been a healthier person if mum wasn’t so dominant about the kinds of food she bought.  He had very little say on what happened to the money he bought into the family and he only ever had £25 a week to himself for betting on horses only.  She didn’t like him buy what she called junk to fill the house up with, because my dad was a bit of a retro head.

My dad always wanted to be an entertainer like his sisters, always wanted to do stand-up comedy and play the harmonica in public and create his own funny songs.  He liked making people laugh, but mum told he she wouldn’t let him do that as a side hobby, because he embarrasses her and it’s not fair to her that he should do that!

Mum was always telling him she was embarrassed by him and he just took it on the chin and obeyed, he tolerated it because he loved her.

My dad was a Tommy Cooper lookalike and he had his style of humour and my dad often imitated him a lot at family parties and weddings – in fact he looked so much like him and could remember all his jokes that his sisters tried heavens hard for years to make him be a lookalike act at special events where they honoured Tommy Cooper after he died – but mum simply wouldn’t allow it!

My dad would have been very successful doing that!  Especially as my dad could also do the special magic tricks that Tommy Cooper could too!  My dad was a bit of a magician!

My dad taught me how to act too; he would often play and relive our favourite movies together.  As a child I knew the lines to almost every Laurel and Hardy movie there was, because we played it together the most and also Blackbeard the pirate!  We also liked Norman Wisdom movies, Carry on movies and George Formby!

I don’t remember too much nowadays as it’s been almost twenty years since I saw a Laurel and Hardy movie last, but I do have recollections now and again.

But my dad and I were definitely entertainers for the family at family events, which is why mum started to refuse a lot of the invitations from the age of ten onwards – because we were both embarrassing her, my dad for simply being who he is and me being a fat funny girl who was too highly influenced in naughty humour bought about by my love for the Carry on team and comedians such as Frankie Howard and Julian Clary.

I like saucy and naughty humour, naughty is nice!

My dad paid for a while for me to have singing lessons (opera to be specific) but mum put a stop to it when they decided I had talent and needed to go to talent contests etc. around the country.  Plus she hated the idea of the amount of money she had to lose in order to hone my skills.  When I lost the singing lessons dad fought heavens hard to get me tutored in playing the piano, because of my addiction to my grandmother’s piano whenever we visited!

My dad would not compromise on one thing in his life and that was visiting his side of the family, something my mother really loathed bout him.  She hated every Sunday, because that would be the chosen day each week my dad would take me visiting his side of the family!

She rarely went with us because most of the family were outside of her 3 mile limit and the anxiety of travelling was just too much for her!  My gran lived 25 miles away in Bedfordshire.

Other relatives lived in Berkshire, Luton, Cheshire, Wales, Southend and Canvey Island or West London, far too far for my mum – so she stayed at home most of the time.

My dad and I would often go rowing in the lake at Alexander Palace in the summer with my cousins and have a large picnic, mum hated us doing that because she didn’t like my cousins being called cousins – as despite my mum having a mixed religious and mixed race background herself (third generation), she hated the concept of me calling my mixed race cousins, cousin and was quite racist about it, to the extent my aunt who is very passive was pinned up against the wall by my mother and threatened simply because she felt that she was putting ideas into my head that were against her own!

My dad never tried to control my mum behaviour, never tried to apologise for it or make any comment or even seemed to notice it – sometimes he would sigh and look downwards and wait for her to finish so we can all quietly leave again and hear the rants in the car about how victimised my mother felt for her own actions!

My dad was bullied by my mum and sometimes that did include physically being bullied too, though he’ll deny it, because he loves her.  But I remember lots of times where my mum has slapped him, kicked him, pushed him out of the way, called him names and dragged him physically off somewhere!

I do believe that domestic violence can affect both genders; I have witnessed it growing up!

Whenever my dad was pushed to the limits and he would rarely stand up for himself and say something, mum always won because she would say she is going to leave him right then and there and would often storm out of the house and stay with her friends for the night to try and scare him back into submission.  I remember those times, she would come back in the house with a smile on her face and carry on like nothing happened and dad would be thankful she is back, but she would pretend she wouldn’t know what he was on about!

Even when someone proved to dad my mum was having an affair with a bouncer at a nightclub my dad’s reaction was a shrug and well she comes home to me doesn’t she?  He wouldn’t challenge her on it.

My dad was submissive and unassuming and incredibly patient.

I often questioned his reactions and said you are not often happy dad, why stay?  He would make all kinds of excuses, but the one that stood out the most was hearing at the age of nine your dad confessing that if your mother did die of her heart troubles, you’d lose two parents at once, because he told me at the tender age of nine he’d commit suicide if she died.  Which shocked me, because he promised my mum he’d look after her sons if she did!  His reply is, they are adults now Tina, done my bit.  I said to him, well what about me?  I was shocked and hurt to hear him reply, the deal didn’t say anything about me!

I told him, I am your daughter, and surely you’d think about me wouldn’t you? What would happen to me then dad? 

He said I would be alright with my gran!

It was a scary time for me, because this was the time mum left for two weeks to go on  holiday in Great Yarmouth with her sister and friends because of another argument, one of which my dad tried to prepare me to pack to go and live with gran with him.  So suicide was lurking around the house for too long, mum came back, no smiles this time and she was asking if he had packed yet and he said no, but Tina has – then that’s when mum sent me off again to another aunt for a while and the whole time I was scared dad would be dead!

Other than gardening and playing darts with me from time to time, there isn’t really much else to say about my dad, other than his addiction to horse racing and online casinos.

He is a teetotaller, a good honest man who works hard and got obese living with my mum on the diet she provided him and he has very little self-esteem.

He is funny, a good entertainer, but she knocked him off his pedestal as much as she did me.

That’s all there is really to my dad.

He tried hard to get me into clubs and learn things – singing lessons, music lessons, pushing me in my sports, but mum always stopped us.

Dad always wanted to take me on holidays, but mum didn’t like it, didn’t like travelling unless she was with her sister and so we never had a family holiday together ever!  Not once.

I had no birthday parties after the age of 7yrs, nothing special for my landmark birthdays and that hurts when you see your mother go all out on landmark birthdays for your brothers, 16, 18 and 21.  It was always made clear to me, I was not important, I was not really supposed to be part of her family and so I don’t get those things!

That was my life, she lives for her boys, I got the scraps.

My dad never hit me unless he was bullied by her, she would literally lay into him to force him – but outside of her, he never laid a finger on me, even when he was at his most angry! 

Thanks for reading!

Why am I open?

As I have mentioned before I am in an open relationship with Paul and this relationship is soon coming to an end, because he has found someone else.  The shift for him moving into another relationship with his new lady is going to be slow because he doesn’t want to put me into a situation where I will be alone.

So I guess with that being said, I am available.

When I take on a new relationship it is likely to still be an open relationship for the man, but not for me as I am settled in my mind that I just want to give whatever I can that relationship – however, I am still very playful by nature and bisexual so we’ll see how that will pan out, shall we?

Why do I want an open relationship?

Because in my mind they tend to be more honest relationships, as partners who tend to play around with your knowledge, are more honest about it to you.  I value honesty highly and don’t like surprises!

Also, I believe that the idea that a man should be monogamous is unnatural; it goes against the laws of nature and their base instincts; for a man should sow their seeds in as many females as they can to ensure his genes are successful, I know I lived under a rock up until recently and I know times are different now, but still.  An old fashioned belief I know, but that’s my belief. 

A female on the other hand need to think about stability for their children and keep to the protection of their one alpha male.

Feminists you have your opinions, let me keep mine.

Thank you for reading.

I am exhausted

For the past few weeks it has been a mentally exhausting time for me and my whole family; Some people from my past have been trying to contact me again and I have learned recently that two relatives on my side of the family have cancer, and understanding that more distant relations are also suffering loss; along with this I have been trying to manage my sons increasing anxieties and screaming matches between him and his father amongst other things, such as the house falling apart, quite literally due to storm damage and damp.

All of it has taken its toll on my physical health and unusually I have been sleeping eleven to thirteen hours a day and still unsatisfied with the rest.  Consequently for the past five days in particular, I have not written a word towards any novel and this is going to severely affect my chosen deadline.

Paul would like me to stick to my deadline but also understands that I should not push myself to do it by the deadline, because my mental health and mental growth is more important – however, I have people waiting for my work and that gives me a sort of pressure.

Also my perfectionism drives me to the point of insanity and if I make a statement about doing something by some self-imposed deadline, I am merciless even to myself if I fail it.

What is frustrating about all of this is the mental bashing has come at a time when physically I was showing big signs of improvement because of the high protein diet and small activities I have been doing as well as giving up the caffeine. 

It is almost like bad luck is queuing up, waiting their turn.

I told Paul recently that I feel like I am cursed, or that I have somehow cursed him because he had a wonderful family and a sort of happy life before he met me and slowly his life is going the downward spiral I have.

It’s like I am an unlucky penny.

I have to say, it’s one of the many reasons I don’t like to get close to new people, because I really do think I bring them bad luck.  However, take me to a casino and you wouldn’t believe it, I have been used as a good luck trophy at those places in the past for good reason!

My grandma in particular loved me tagging along with her at bingo and casinos, because she would regularly win large prizes and a couple of exes owe big wins to me too; but in everything else though, I seem to doom people who live with me to a hard life.

I noticed it only affects people I live with if the people are happy with stagnation, so maybe it’s not me after all?  I noticed people with an ambitious drive for life etc; seem to do better around me than those who are happy as they are.  I don’t know, but it does affect my confidence somewhat.

I need people in my life who is energised by positivity and excitement on a consistent basis, that the more positive energy and drive the person they live with has, the more they have – but I noticed some people are different, some people get the energy from me for a short time, love being around me, but to live with me drains them and then consequently they drain me.

It’s a strange phenomenon.

Paul is convinced I am an anomaly, that there are very few people like me who can have consistent positive energy without falling apart eventually.

I am drained by stagnation and people who make do.

Gosh I sound bad.

Well in any case, at the moment I am drained and I am finding it hard to keep my positive outlook and that is affecting productivity.

I am beginning to think that October 21^st was a bad idea, I should have kept with my instinct of the 23^rd of January, but I believe I got a little cocky, thinking that being firm with everyone in my household would make people back off each other and I could be more productive.  Instead, some people have used this against me in order to become worse. 

Henry in particular openly confessed to me he doesn’t want me to be successful and potentially famous because that would mean he would become famous too and he doesn’t want that.  This is a major reason why Henry has been trying to be sick from school a lot, even becoming bulimic in the process to be sent home from school because of the vomiting factor, and so he understands whilst he is at home I cannot write because of the screaming matches between him and his father, who is home all day too.

Often I try to diffuse the screaming matches to no avail, because it just seems to make things worse, no matter how calm and collective I try to be.  The both of them are as bad as each other and so often I sit there just watching them scream at each other, because most of the time they don’t hear me anyway.

It did work, me being in the bedroom writing on my laptop for a couple of days, but Henry started to scream louder to the extent he nearly lost his voice, just because he wanted to disturb me.  He then started to sit outside the bedroom whilst I wrote, in order to play his robot wars with the loudest commentary he could muster.  This is what I am trying to work around; I have little support from Paul who seems to be falling apart at the seams in every single way right now.

It’s exhausting because it is almost constant now.

I have learned to write when they go to Tesco’s forty five minute bursts every three days, not enough.

I am trying to get a handle on my physical health so I can go to a café to write, because really, even the nosiest café in town is quieter than here and this house is getting a reputation in the street in being the mad house, because neighbours can clearly hear what the yelling is exactly about, it’s that bad!

They’ve even asked if I still live there as they noticed I am the quietest person here and they rarely hear me!

I can’t afford to sit in a café daily, but even if it’s twice a week I’d get more work done there than I would here, but I need to walk there and I need a while to get strength back into my legs.  Because I have been bedbound and housebound sick for years, it has taken me nearly three months of small exercises to be able to stand in the kitchen for fifteen minutes, whilst preparing a fruit salad for myself.  So it will be at least another three to six months before I can walk to Tesco café.

I am not putting off the deadline that long.

But it does mean I have to do unsociable habits; sleeping during the day, so I can write at night.  Waking 11am sometimes 1pm to sleep by 2am only gives me ninety minutes a day, but it’s something.  But it does depend on how exhausting that evening has been.

I am trying hard to pull Henry away from the laptop and robots in order to do something with him that won’t provoke screaming matches between his father and him, but it’s a task to get the boy doing anything else.

I am thinking about going into credit again to buy a shed/office for the garden, but honestly I can’t think about doing that until one debt is completely paid off in March.  If I am still struggling by March, I would have to consider it strongly, so I can work on my novels.

It drives me nuts not being able to write as fast as I want to, even resorting to taking hearing aids out and sitting with cotton wool in my ears, they still manage to penetrate that and I am completely deaf in one ear and 30% hearing in the other; but as I said, they scream loud enough for the street to hear the conversations.

I really don’t say it lightly.

I am knackered.

Happy reading!

Shove me in a box…

“You can’t have and do everything, you’ve got to narrow yourself down”; Have you ever been told that by anyone in the past?

I have endlessly, particularly by Paul – he has constantly lived in fear since we moved in together that I am overdoing everything, stretching myself too thin and he has tried to endorse a cut version of me. Purely because he fears I will burn myself out!

I never realised until now, just how little by little, I have lost myself.  Around seven years ago I became severely depressed and suicidal; I couldn’t find joy in anything anymore.  I didn’t realise until recently, when I have been soul searching just why this might be the case!

Why am I no longer happy?

Why even when I was being badly abused in a toxic parent/child relationship, I was still happier then, in myself, than I am now that I am free?  Because I realised, although I was isolated and abused, I was allowed to have my hobbies and a lot of them!  I was able to skip from this to that and know that the house was always spotlessly organised and nothing needed to be cleared away and cleaned before I could use it.

Although my life with my parents was terrible, I had the environment perfect for creative growth.

My heart and soul sings when I am able to read books at the drop of a hat, write stories and songs and poems and practise any musical instrument.  I could do art and I always had a dog next to me, I was never without a dog when I lived with my parents.

I could sing anywhere from the hours of 9am to 9pm without being hushed, as long as I isolated myself in my room or in the garden to do so.

I could get the exercise I need without clearing the floor and vacuuming first and have the right music to motivate me to finish the work out all the way through!

I could listen to any music and watch any movie I so desired; although I was isolated, threatened, blackmailed and all the rest, I was free to hone my skills and entertain myself however possible, as long as I just don’t go out and as long as it didn’t interfere with chores or whatever my mother wanted from me, which were minimal anyway because my mother had OCD and everything was perfect all of the time around the house.

But here, I don’t have the same freedom.  In my own house, I don’t have that.

There is always a complaint at how loudly I sing, it’s ok to sing, but do you really have to sing opera or songs that reach a high note in jazz?

It’s ok for you to have these musical instruments, but you can’t have your keyboard constantly set up outside of the box, there is no room for it – let me bring it downstairs for you every time you want to use it and wait until we clear the dining table and you can use it there!

It’s ok for you to do your watercolour painting, but we need to clear your art table up as we’ve had lunch on it today, it will only take fifteen minutes and then you need to fetch it all down from boxes from the spare bedroom before you get going on it… is it any wonder half an hour later especially when I’ve had a bad day with my sickness that I decided after all of that nonsense I don’t want to paint anymore?

Especially when there is never any room to store the art to dry and the work ends up with piles of toys on it and lost for several weeks… there is no respect with my efforts. Nobody cares, but me. I have very little personal space and I am made to feel guilty when I fight for it.

I have a 4ft by 4ft corner in the living room with my desktop computer and a chair; I had to fight for that space and to maintain it as tidy as it is like it’s some kind of ongoing battle… and it is!

They can take anything away from me, but not this space!

And they do.

Sometimes I need to pee, but I get hemmed in this corner by fortresses of lego or robots, then they leave the room abandoning me to try and get out of it, because really, they don’t care.  Or they barricade me in this corner with an ironing board and baskets of laundry and I have to wait a few minutes whilst they rescue me out of it, just so I can go to the toilet.

It’s nice he does the laundry, I really appreciate that – but I need space to do the work and I have been struggling for two years now in getting Paul to help me set up the spare room as an office, because I am too weak to move the huge cabinets up there myself to make room for my desk.

The mess is depressing, the lack of freedom to just up and go anywhere in the house is… if you can understand it’s… it’s just… I don’t know.  It makes me want to give up, stay in bed and rot away.

The only place I can absolutely guarantee a clean and tidy place with the freedom to move un-obstructively is between my side of the bed, my side of the bedroom, the upstairs landing and the bathroom; but lately, the bathroom is getting obstructed as Henry is becoming a teenager and floods the floor, so I can no longer trundle from bed to toilet in fleece socks without seeping into a lake and sitting on a toilet with a wet bottom because for some reason or another, Henry doesn’t just wash himself, but the whole room!

Is it any wonder that I sit back and wish to leave?  That I can’t cope anymore with this kind of life?  Because nobody I live with uphold the same quality control of how the house should be as I do?

Because I was stupid to think I could change a hoarder.

“We’re not obsessed with everything like you are” is the response I get when I complain.  “We don’t have time, we’re tired, we can’t help it” is always the excuse I get and I am drained by the whining and then I don’t want to create – I just want to sink back in bed and hope that I do actually die of whatever is making me sick! It’s probably the black mould, I never had asthma before I moved in here!

I was offered a free writers retreat holiday the other week, I refused to go because I was genuinely afraid that if I went, I’d enjoy the freedom too much and won’t want to come home again.

I am a musician as much as I am a writer, I am a composer and lyricist, I am an artist and photographer – but I can only be a writer whilst I live here, there isn’t any room for the other stuff and I miss my piano and keyboard so much, the glockenspiel, recorder and kalimba are available easily, but the house has eaten my harmonica and portable electronic drum!

Oh I still have it, it’s upstairs in a box, but I can’t get to it, it’s barricaded behind loads of boxes of things we never use and I can’t carry it downstairs to use it, without thirty minutes of tidying up first and then there is the issue that I am disturbing someone.  Or that “they” want to play my keyboard too as though it’s some kind of novelty game;

I am thrilled in particular that Henry has an interest in playing the keyboard, though he never practises, but why is it always when I only just bring it down for me after months of not seeing it? 

Maybe I am just a selfish asshole, but I can’t help feel I am being boxed as much as the junk in the spare room is!

Sometimes I feel I am in the way, that if they could, they would, shove me in a box and put me out of the way.

How I miss my music.

I need to find a way out of all of this, before I grow old and bitter and become a mega bitch; it’s slowly happening, I used to be happy for everyone, never a glum thought crossed my mind – but lately, I am getting envious and I am starting to turn green and have ugly thoughts about things.

I feel like I am losing my soul!

Happy reading everyone!

Do they resent me?

When you’ve been bedbound sick for a while you learn coping mechanisms, to keep you going; especially when you start to believe you are failing as a mum because you can’t do the things a normal housewife could and should be doing.

You learn to release responsibilities to your husband so that you can heal, so there are less hospital trips due to you collapsing over exhaustion as you try to pretend there is nothing wrong with you!

You learn that there are things you can still do as a bedbound parent, but it doesn’t feel the same.  As a bedbound parent you learn to make the most of a small space, you learn that you don’t have to need a desktop PC and you can use a laptop in bed with an adjustable table.

You start to think that you are a burden, but you can’t help it.  I became this badly sick when Henry was 3yrs old – Henry hasn’t really known a healthy mum, he is twelve now and my health is stabilising slowly.

You start to believe that your rocky relationship with your son who is worried sick about you, will improve as you get better – but that’s a fallacy!

Since Henry was five years old, he learned that the best way to have time with me and play is by sitting with me drawing, reading or playing Roblox games every moment he is out of school.

I was wrong not to set tight boundaries about that, because in all honesty, I never believed I would get better – in fact I thought I was going to die before Henry becomes a teenager!

But now I am getting better, I am trying to make a life for myself – I have lost nine years of freedom from my mum since becoming sick and I want to make it up to myself.

I really thought my immediate family would be pleased I am getting better, but far from it, they resent it.  Paul feels less needed and is dropping things at such a rapid pace nowadays that it is leaving me feeling like he is sabotaging my healing process because he is afraid that my health may mean he’ll lose me.  Because he knows I am unhappy with the state of the house and unhappy with the morose behaviour the people of this house has!

Henry doesn’t understand that I need to drop the games because twenty minutes of fun always ends up with six hours of lost time.

I am trying to hone my skills as a writer, keep this blog alive, learn how to use social media, networking with other creative people, trying to learn how to set up a YouTube channel and how to get into screenwriting professionally and learning Italian because I want to get back to my Italian roots.  I am trying to do this by my own set schedule and goal and time is running out!

Henry’s behaviour has become sour since I seem to be getting better and in the heat of the moment he has screamed that he wished I would get sicker again, just so he’d have someone to play with all the time again!

There is no emotional support from Paul regarding this – as Henry storms off because I won’t play for longer, Paul runs after him telling him he knows how he feels and how mum needs to do this and that, but also how I really should spend more than just half an hour a day with him and he knows its not fair.

Proverbially slapping me in the face in the process!

Paul is tired of updating my friends when I am too busy, sick or absorbed in free courses – he has made his stance very clear to me. I ask him not to be rude to them, because sometimes he can be a bit too terse with people; he isn’t known for tact.

I am in this on my own.

It’s my fault I am getting better and chose to actually pull us out of poverty because I can’t hack just making do anymore, so I have to do it all myself now!

It’s abundantly clear and it’s a lonely place to be.

I have resided myself to the fact that perhaps this family doesn’t want me unless I am in bed all day playing games to keep the boy happy and out of Paul’s hair.  We’ve had this discussion and it’s clear, I might be moving away from them soon – we don’t know when – but it’s something that’s coming.

The prospect of complete independence is stomach churning.

I’ve never been alone before.

I’ve always been dependant on others, can I do it?

Who knows?

Am I being fair to them? I can’t help but feel guilty for wanting this!

Thanks for reading!

Songs that seem written for me

Ten songs that match my personality or feel like they were written by someone who knows me and below them explanations of why I think this, also a huge insight to me as a person! 

1. The lady is a tramp especially the Lady Gaga and Tony Bennet version!
2. Pain by Three days grace
3. It can’t rain all the time by Jane Siberry
4. Crush Em by Megadeath
5. Champion by Three days grace
6. Smile by Nat King Cole
7. Dollhouse by Melanie Martinez
8. Rose Garden by Lynn Anderson
9. Touch-a-touch-a-touch me from Rocky Horror Picture Show
10. Cry little sister by Gerard McMahon

The Lady is a tramp;

This song connects well to me because I will eat a couple of hours before a meal out, as I can never guarantee whether or not the meal will be enough… you know nouveau cuisine and all that – if I am hungry, I hate waiting around for food!  So to be polite, I tend to eat a little before I go anywhere! 

I won’t ever wear real fur, I hate the cruelty of it, though it’s pretty I tend to wear faux versions a lot and have a lot of faux blankets around the house.  Though I happen to like pearls, so that part doesn’t connect! 

One thing I can’t stand is gossiping with other women, it’s not my thing, hence why most of my friends tend to be men.

I don’t really like to make myself up too much to impress others if that means I have to be uncomfortable, but I do like to look impressive generally.  Clothing must always be comfortable or else I would rather go naked and being someone who isn’t an exhibitionist, that’s something I won’t do!

I like being fashionable though and I do like showing off a bit, I am a bit of a peacock – I think this is why I love Lady Gaga, I see a lot of me in her!

Pain by three days grace;

There was a time that I became afraid that I would never feel again.  My post-traumatic stress syndrome got so bad I became what they call Non-comprimentos, I don’t know if I spelled that right I tried to google it, but found nothing.  I wouldn’t speak and hardly ate for nearly a year, I became numb to everything.  Conscious, unlike people think I was, but numb.  I didn’t want to react, I didn’t want to speak, I didn’t feel a thing.  It’s a scary place, it’s like I gave up and didn’t die, but I was supposed to, if that makes sense?

It took a long while for me to get out of being such a poker face, so pan faced and unemotional, a very long while.  I wouldn’t smile for nearly four years and when I did smile it was at the irony that people were trying to save my life (due to mastoid infection) and all I really wanted to do was die; but I smiled because of the darkness of it all.

What happened?

I was a huge wrestling fan; in particular I loved The Undertaker.  I was afraid of becoming brain damaged due to the surgery and my mother came into the operating theatre to help settle me down for the injection which would put me to sleep – her comforting words came out without realising what she had said until she saw the horror on the anaesthetists face.  “Don’t worry, just think about The Undertaker” she said, smiling down at me.

I didn’t just smile for the first time in years; I full out laughed and then had to explain to the nurses around me that my mother isn’t mental, it’s my favorite wrestler!

But after that time, I did decide that if things hurt me, I’d rather feel it than be numb.  Strange I know, but if you have been there yourselves, you’d understand the loss and the loneliness of it all.

I soon developed into transferring that to physical pain rather than emotional after a while and entered the dark phases of self-harming, it helped me to cope and though the scars I have are bad, they make me feel like a warrior.

It can’t rain all the time;

That’s kind of my motto nowadays; there is always sunshine through the rain or after it, though the bursts of sunshine in my life are usually short, it’s best not to take them for granted and to recognise them when they are around.  It’s easy to forget the light side of life to the extent it becomes alien at times and you can often miss them!

Crush Em;

At times I feel like life is a war, you have to fight for who you are and what you stand for, because so many people want to change you or destroy you.

I used to submit a lot, but as I grew and suffered so much, I decided that if I am going to suffer, I am going to suffer in order to stay true to myself because living a lie hurts me more than I can bear!

I was suffering either way, really.  So it’s best to suffer to your own painful tune than somebody else’s.

I’ve had so much of other people thinking that other people’s lives are their business, their personality, likes and dislikes have to be critique within an inch of their lives to the extent I’ve had enough! 

I say and do what I want, but I am always ready to roll my sleeves up and start to fight and often times that leads me to gas lighting the other person, because I am not determined to just say my piece, I am determined that they can absolutely be themselves and they can absolutely hate me for being myself – but they absolutely cannot try to change me and I absolutely cannot try to change them, only enlighten them to the fact that all forms of hate is evil! 

My intention when I am in an argument is to shed light on the fact that it is ok to love and hate, as long as you accept each other’s differences and learn to live in peace.  If the other person isn’t being peaceful and won’t leave me alone after I suggest we agree to disagree, then they have to be prepared that I will defend myself anyway possible and that it could lead to problems.

Champion;

I have fought so hard to be where I am and who I am I have been dragged up and beaten up and bruised and battered in so many ways, not just physically – it is hard not to become something formidable after it all.

I have learned that the harshest of words and the hardest of beatings can make you stronger and in doing so, it can make a person become so strong that they develop into something that their haters and abusers can no longer fight – a true champion!

When a person tries to destroy another, it makes them feel strong when in fact they are weak.  Some people allow themselves to be destroyed, others learn to get back up and fight and I am one of the fighters.  Very little can intimidate me these days and I do not shy from throwing myself in front of others weaker than me, to take the hits!

Because I know I can cope and I can see that the world is full of weakness and it needs a champion sometimes!

I have a deep fire in me to teach the world, but also shield the weak from it.

I have even learned not to hide my tears anymore, I am no longer ashamed of them – though people may read that as a sign of a broken weak person, for me, it’s a sign that they’ve hit a nerve and with love I will show them what they’re doing, but carry on, I may feel pressured to fuel my fire.  I never say things lightly and I am a compassionate teacher, who gives other people time to think before I react!

But as they say, you can’t always help the stubborn.

Smile;

It took me a long while to get my emotions back; it took even longer for me to learn to put a mask on my face for the sake of the others who are much weaker or disadvantaged than me. 

I learned that the world definitely needs a champion, it needs compassion and love and tenderness and I leaned that it starts with me, my actions, my love, my care; yes don’t take on other people’s problems for your own, because it won’t help them in the long run, but you can hold their hand and give kind words to make them feel a little stronger in their battles.

It starts with a smile, then listening, then trying to understand and then holding their hands whilst championing them along the way, but never, ever let their battles become your own.  Stand back and let them do it for themselves, whilst quietly nodding and smile, you’ve done it little champ!

When I laugh at some people who try to do me down, it’s not mockery, its irony.  They are trying to be strong by showing the biggest weakness they have.  But I am delicate, I don’t laugh in their face, that’s not compassionate, my laugh is a smile and a small ha, I try to be amicable amongst the discord.

Dollhouse;

I really resonate with this lyrical line “I see things that nobody else sees”, for two reasons, one is that I am clairvoyant and clairsentient, the other is that I have seen the true faces of various people behind closed doors and I know the truth about a lot of things – many things, big, but they will never be exposed.

My life is like the twilight zone at times, but enough of that.

I often felt played like a doll in the past by other people who were always changing my shape and my form and personality to suit them and they isolated me in a little house most of the time.

A particular person in my life played me like a doll so much that it was almost like I was her ventriloquist dummy and her hand was up my arse even controlling what I said.  I didn’t realise until I went to a psychologist in 2012 that she used a lot of NLP against me, with little subtleties that made me behave a certain way – they made references to the Pavlov experiments in how she raised me.   If you are not familiar with these experiments here is a link. https://www.simplypsychology.org/pavlov.html

Like most paradoxes in my life, it is the very thing that hurt me to begin with that is helping me to heal.

Rose Garden;

I could never get over the fact that people want to be in relationships with people who accept their baggage and everything is going to be perfect, when the going gets tough, they leave each other!  I never understood this.

Love needs work and compassion, it’s not a given, you can’t just waltz into someone’s life and expect a picture perfect romance, because things like that may happen to some, but it never really lasts.  Love needs time and work. 

Most of my best relationships happened through friendship first and I know it sounds weird, but a long conversation over two or three picnics about what each other wants from life and each other and then almost like a handshake and business proposal we get together.

You have to lay your entire self on the table in front of them, reveal all; dark and light – then you make a decision on whether you are suited together or not.  Do you have the same life goals?  You see how many compromises you are willing to make with each other and if the BIG things don’t match, don’t go there, don’t choose them and start the process over again with someone else – life is too short to be unhappy with someone you live with!

When someone develops an issue with me it is usually because they were not honest in the conversations leading up to the relationship, because they wanted to tell me what I wanted to hear, rather than stay true to themselves!

You must never do this, because you can’t mould everyone!

So I always remind people, I am sorry but did I promise this to you initially?  It’s hard and I know I sound like a bitch, but I am only trying to save hearts from being broken in the long run, because I have a terrible guilt conscious.

You’d be surprised actually how many people hate people being so open like this.  But I feel it’s essential; you could be spending your life together some day – what have you got to hide?

I sound dominant but I really am not.  This is something that shocks people when they get to know what I want from life, because I seem so assertive off the bat – but that’s the point.  It’s to show each other your boundaries so you can live happily together.  I am not a huge feminist, I do believe women can save themselves and they can do many things, but I am super traditional and submissive in my best relationships that most feminists don’t find someone like me acceptable!

It’s a contrast I know, but as I said – it’s vital to be open with people.

Be strong enough to say “I need this, and I need that” and “don’t engage me with this, or that”, it’s important.

I welcome you to my garden, but I didn’t offer you constant sunshine, a perfect lawn and neat borders, I have brambles in there, some nettles for the playful butterflies and some beautiful thorny roses!

Touch-a-touch-a-touch me;

Self-explanatory really; I have been isolated most of my life that I get thrilled when people want to get close to me, even more so when touched.  I have been touch starved most of my life.  Though I can’t be called a slut as my life experience hasn’t reflected my inner most thoughts and feelings, I have the mind of one though.

I am not ashamed to admit it either.  I love being touched, I crave it, but I only desire it from certain people I feel are worthy!

This is not an invitation for anyone to come and touch me without asking first, but it is an invitation to ask if you could get close to me – I don’t mean to sound threatening but I will deck those who take advantage!

I am also very much proud to be considered a creature of the night, because my life has been filled with darkness and in darkness I found my strength, the light weakened me.  I am dark and to many people I resent to say, I am dirty – though I see it as cheekily playful and clean fun!  Dirty is a bad word when it is pertaining to fun pursuits and I don’t like hearing it!

To me the most sacred thing in life is sex, the meaning of life is sex and we should have more of it in our lives and we should spread the love ashamedly!

Cry little sister;

I have always wanted to spread love around the world and make it more acceptable and available to people I come across; I wish that the world was a more open place, a place where people are not afraid to be who they are and do what makes them happy without judgement.

I’ve always hated the lack of love in this world, particularly the kind where you can be free to touch the hand or a knee of a person in order to comfort them, without all this fear that surround’s physical contact with people.

I’ve never found it a healthy aspect of society, though I do appreciate the fact that it protects people from being touched by people they don’t invite into their lives.  I remember a time where I had to get the police involved because of a stalker who readily kept touching me up and I didn’t invite that.  But generally, when you know someone that is beyond a mere acquaintance, why is it still shunned?

I have seen pained expressions in male friends eyes when they see me crying and you know they want to put their arm around you and comfort you, but they are afraid of so many things if they do that.  Will I misinterpret this as a romantic interest?  Will his girlfriend misinterpret it as having an affair?  Will I take him to court for it?  So many things, so I sit there crying more or less alone, when all I want is the extra courage by having someone hold me tight; I wouldn’t care who it is, if they are nice and won’t take advantage of it further.  But most won’t even try.

A gentle touch can spark a healing energy and break the cycle of loneliness, breaking chains that bound us.

Happy reading all!

My views on Mr Perfect (not the wrestler)

I have mentioned before and I will probably say it again, I am not like other women, I don’t go in for too many romance scenes and weak female roles in my stories.  Yes, there are some love scenes in a handful of my works, but generally it isn’t all googly eyes and sweet nothings, it is usually love in a deeper sense or some kind of strange dynamic and understanding between the two in question.

I have never been a romantic person and in my own relationships I tend to fall into a sexual relationship with those who I have a deep friendship and connection with, because we understand each other and accept each other.  I don’t go around chasing for the perfect man in the perfect scenario and drive myself crazy with how perfect everything must be!

I don’t believe in chemistry in the usual sense of the word, I believe in mutual respect and understanding and a close friendship where you can be completely open and honest with each other – if you don’t have that, I really don’t understand why people waste their time bothering with each other, because the relationship is likely to fail eventually without those things!

That’s just me I suppose, I know my ideas about relationships are not popular ones, especially as I am so open about being bisexual and involved in an open/polyandrous/polygamous relationship.

I have never been a person who chases trends and normality, I am very bohemian in my ways and I truly believe the spice of life is variety.  Yes, I know, I have said it before – my stories have taboo themes in them, now you are beginning to get the picture – but those scenes are reserved for my adult audience pseudonym.

I have this belief where nature never intended for any creature to be monogamous, so why do we cut ourselves up emotionally when we try to enforce an unnatural law onto ourselves?

It doesn’t make us any better than the other animals in the world – it just makes us more stressed out and unproductive – literally!

Life is too short to be picky and waiting around for Mr. Perfect, life is too boring not to take advantage of the fun that is out there!

In my experience the more open and honest you are about your most deepest desires in life and talk about them without shame, the more likely you are to find your tribe, which think like you, the more likely you are to find your peace and your true love.  Just because I am in an open relationship doesn’t mean I value any less the people I am involved in, it just means I do not burden them all the time with making them my one and only.  That can be stressful on your lover, to make them feel that they are the only one for you, it is a big responsibility to live up to and it can put a strain on your relationship in itself.  Best to spread yourself around a bit, as long as you are open about it to everyone you are in a relationship with… don’t want heartaches and jealousy do we?  Be open!

That’s my two cents on the matter.

Happy reading!

What is a trope please?

I am not au fait with the majority of the vocabulary of the writing community as such, primarily because I have more or less isolated myself in recent years from the community due to a mistrust of old friends I once had in the community.

Therefore I have been trying to learn some of the technical speech other writers now use.  I only learned the other day what DNF truly meant “did not finish” in regards to the book reading community.

I should really make a DNF shelf on Goodreads, didn’t know that was accountable until now.  Up until now, any books I read partially on Goodreads but did not finish was either said as such in the review or just removed from the currently reading list.

The word trope confuses me slightly too.  I thought I understood what the word trope meant until I started to speak to a friend about tropes the other day who seemed confused by what I was saying.  She then said, those are not tropes, they are themes or settings; they are not the same thing.  So, what exactly is a trope?

I watched about eight YouTube videos last night trying to figure it out, hence why todays post is late.  To me, I did seem to understand what a trope is, my friends are never really ones to explain themselves or correct someone fully, sometimes I feel that they are just critics for the sake of criticising and yes, some friends, this one included already knows I think that about them, because I am very open and say what’s on my mind!  But still, it never prompts them to educate – some will feel that saying “Google it” is justifiable, but as a friend surely the idea of friendship is a sharing of ideas and opinions and to educate one another?  Isn’t that what socialising means?

To me it does mean that – but to people I know socialising seems to mean to them a complaining of their lives, a competitive stance on their life with each other, a woe is me and sympathy chasing, gossiping about others, usually venomously or merely grumping about the state of the world.

So what I believe a trope is based on YouTube research is in fact based on themes and events that happen in the novel – such as found family, a bunch of friends get together with a communal task, or the story has a circus, or a vampire, or the scene is set in snowy Alaska, or it is autumn in the book, or there is a love/hate relationship.  I think those are tropes, because some tropes are also themed.

But forgive me if I am wrong, can anyone help me?

If you can tell me what you think a trope is let me know in the comments below.

I was having a conversation with my friend about what I liked as tropes and apparently I am wrong, most of what I said was not considered a trope.

If I can find out the difference between tropes, a scene, an event and what have you, then I will make a post about what tropes I enjoy in the books I read and the kind of tropes that are in my stories that I write!

Happy reading!