#i cried like i just experienced the entire spectrum of human emotion all at one

[rainydays12]

listening to 'Butchered Tongue' by Hozier while reading Babel, crying uncontrollably

[askinkiskarma]

Illicit Affairs | Chapter VII: Hoax

Pairing: Neteyam x Human/Avatar!Reader

Chapter I Chapter II Chapter III Chapter IV Chapter V Chapter VI Chapter VIII Chapter IX Chapter X

Synopsis: Tensions erupt when Neteyam confronts you about something he saw. His secret comes out at the worst time, leaving you both in pieces. 

Warnings: (a little) smut (18+, Minors DNI), angst, mentions of blood mentions of death, injury, pills, pill addiction, opioid addiction, disease, cursing, some fluff + all the feels.

Word Count: 9,5k words (holy mother)

A/N: This is it, guys! Where tensions explode and secrets come come out, hearts are bound to be broken. I hope you enjoy this chapter, I put everything into it. I cried whilst writing it, I laughed whilst writing it, pretty sure I experienced the full spectrum of human emotions whilst doing this. Also, I have ignored my actual work to finish it, so if I fail my annual progression review, at least it would have been worth it. Let me know what you think, and as always, thank you for everyone who is reading is and asked to be tagged <;3

"My only one, my kingdom come undone My broken drum, you have beaten my heart Don't want no other shade of blue, but you No other sadness in the world would do"

“There are perks with being an Omatikaya, you know? You can make your bow out of the wood of the Home Tree… and you can choose a mate.” 

Fuck. 

“Lo’ak… be serious.”

“I am serious, Angel. You’ve been in my life for as long as I can remember. You have always been the only one to see me for more than just a freak, or a fuck-up, or a disappointment. You see me.”

The younger Sully boy gently cupped you face in his hand; he was caressing your cheek with his thumb. Using a little force, he willed your face upwards so you could look up at his face; you were surprised to see the intensity in his eyes. 

You placed your hand on his arm, and you hoped by slowly massaging it, it would relax him enough to soften your following words. 

“Lo’ak… I do see you. You are an incredible person. You have been there for me my whole life, and I will be forever grateful to you. You have been the only one who constantly chose the dark stuffy lab to the beauty of this world because the labs had me in it, you were closest to my mum and she loved you like you were her own. I think you are the most amazing guy there is and I think your mate will be the luckiest girl there is. But that’s not me, Lo’ak. You know that can’t be me.”

His hand dropped from your face and both of his hands took yours in them, squeezing them ardently. 

“But it is you. It has to be you.” 

“Kehe (no). Lo’ak, you are my best friend. I am your best friend. I love you so much, and I know you love me too, but the love we have for each other is not the kind of love one needs to be mated for life.” 

You spoke softly, looking at him pleadingly, hoping that he would understand your words in the way that you intend them. You can see his gaze drop and form deflate, being replaced by a meek one, a shadow of his former self. 

“Oh… I see.” He was now turning his back to you, trying to leave without looking you in the eye. You were not going to let that happen.

“I’m not letting you leave.” You say, keeping his hands tightened in yours. “We will talk about this, and you will recognise I am right.” 

Neteyam was having trouble seeing as he was manoeuvring his way through the forest. He felt sick to his stomach and every heartbeat sent waves of hurt through his entire body, like shards of glass gutting him from inside out. How could his own brother do this? How could you do this? He has spent more than two months with you, every day, sending touches and glances your way that were begging to be seen, begging to be acknowledged. He secretly prayed that you would call him out on it, give him a reason to finally tell you that he’s loved you since he was 10 and yearned for your touch since the second his eyes fell on you again after a whole year apart. He wanted you to finally give him a reason to tell everyone to fuck off and let him finally live his life by his own rules, with you by his side. 

Neteyam was shaking with tempestuous fury at the unfairness of it all. Lo’ak will always get everything just handed to him on a silver platter, won’t he? Freedom, to make his own choices, to live his life as he wished, carelessly and devoid of any forethought or responsibility. And now he got you, the woman of his dreams - and nightmares - and the future he used to fantasise would one day be his. 

His legs were moving without any conscious input from his mind, and before long, he found himself on the way to the clearing you and him used to go to all the time. Your place, just for his and your eyes to see, just for his and your hearts to experience. As he was nearing, he heard soft sounds emerging from the spot, and he slowly, carefully approached with a bow at the ready and all his senses heightened. 

“We were in the backseat, drunk on something stronger than the drinks in the bar…

I rent a place on Cornelia Street, I say casually in the car…”

Soft strumming and the most beautiful voice he has ever heard, a voice that he would recognise anywhere, for the rest of time, made him drop the bow he was gripping tightly. That song, Neteyam thought with a wince, and let himself remember.

“This piece of heaven is our Cornelia Street.” 

“What’s Cornelia Street?”

“Well, it’s a place back on Earth where one of her houses used to be, but in this case, it’s a metaphor. Cornelia Street is to them what this clearing is to us.” 

A month before your 17th birthday is the last day Neteyam saw you. He was coming to say goodbye. You didn’t know that, and, in your enthusiasm at seeing him after such a long time because of his training, or so he told you, you suggested coming here. Neteyam remembers everything about that day. He didn’t sleep that night, cried himself to sleep quietly in his family’s tent thinking of the possibility of not seeing you again, for a long time, perhaps forever. He had decided that his mum was right. Being around you was hurting you both, and maybe by leaving, both of you could heal and move on. He wouldn’t have to live with causing you more pain than you already had to deal with, and you wouldn’t have to go outside, something that you were only doing for him, it seemed. It was a win-win, he thought, and yet his heart was torn apart, coming apart at the seams of wounds that barely healed. 

You were sitting on the ground, resting your back on a rock by the river bank, with the same guitar in your hands you have had since you were young. Neteyam thought he probably heard thousands of songs being played on that guitar, countless hours laying just like he was now, hearing you sing. He did not like humans, could not understand them, their world, their traditions, their beliefs, but watching you strum that guitar and singing about your love, a love neither of you could ever say out loud except in this way, he realised humans did some things right. Humanity did you right. 

“We were a fresh page on the desk, filling in the blanks as we go

As if the street lights pointed in an arrowhead, leading us home”

Neteyam watched you intently, and was trying to assimilate the lyrics as best he could, knowing this was always your preferred method of communication, knowing that through these songs you are confessing your true, buried desires. You looked at him as you sang, giving him a big smile.

“And I hope I never lose you, hope it never ends

I'd never walk Cornelia Street again

That's the kind of heartbreak time could never mend

I'd never walk Cornelia Street again”

A year and a half later, inhabiting a new body, you were not smiling anymore as you were playing this, the strumming on the guitar slower and more sorrowful, and your voice sounded hoarse, like you had been crying. Neteyam couldn’t believe that you would come here, in his and your secret place and sing the song you silently confessed your feelings to, after what he saw. He felt his anger poison his body, as his heart picked up pace and made his heartbeat ring painfully in his ears, muffling the sound of your voice. 

“I never did walk Cornelia Street again after that day, you know? I kept my promise.” 

Neteyam freezes in place, a shocked expression marring his features. You heard him, even with your back to him, even while playing and with the soft hum of the river to dull your senses, you knew. Felt him, his presence that charged this clearing like the air before lighting strike. He, however, does not seem to hear the hint of sadness in your voice, nor the sniffling that accompanies it. 

“It took me a while to figure out you weren’t going to come back. It did not dawn on me right away. I thought you were just training hard, as you had been for years at that point, I didn’t think anything of it. I only figured it out a month after I played you this song, when my birthday came and you didn’t show. I waited all day. Way past eclipse, way past the point everyone else was gone and sleeping peacefully, I waited. I didn’t sleep that night. I was afraid I was going to miss you and no one would be able to let you through the door. It never occurred to me you wouldn’t show - not until the dawn of the next day. That’s when it hit.”

“I remember singing you this song, I was terrified. I mean, we talked around it all of our lives, I sang you songs, and I read you poems, and you’d sleep in my bed and let me attach myself to you in a way no friend ever would. But this song, I thought, would be the one. The one that would make us finally have to talk through it. The night before, I had watched an episode of Gilmore Girls, right? And it’s that episode when Dean pitches up at Rory’s school after she drops him hints that she’s in love with him, and he gets mad for one reason or another and then she screams at him “I love you, you idiot!”. And he drops all the stuff he was holding and rushes to her and kisses her, like really kisses her. And I remember thinking, I’m going to sing you this song, and this will be my “I love you, you idiot” moment.”

Neteyam walked slowly towards your form that was still turned around from him, and felt two forces tugging at him, ripping him apart. On one hand, there was the rage, and jealousy, the monster that wanted to scream at you, to hurt you for breaking his heart without even acknowledging it. On the other, there was deep sadness and grief, for the new information that he is receiving, for knowing what this meant to you, what he did to you, how he left you the day that you confessed, how that only strengthened his resolve. He didn’t know which was going to win. 

“I never had any expectations. I was never delusional enough to think that you would ever choose me. But I did have dreams. And in the dreams, you told me you loved me too, and that whatever it was, we would always be able to work through it together. That day after my birthday, I felt like something ripped apart in me that I’ve never recovered from. I’ve lost so much of myself throughout the years, every time something new came up. I’ve been in pieces, broken and shattered, my whole life, and yet somehow you managed to walk away with the biggest piece. Because I could never put you in a drawer at the bottom of my desk, like all my other pieces. You were never truly gone, you were just far enough that I could never reach you, but near enough that I could never heal. I mourned you, mourned the me that you took with you, every day for months. Losing you broke me, Neteyam. You broke me. I will never forgive you for that night.”

“Well I guess we’re both fucking disappointed with each other then.” 

Neteyam saw you shoulders hunch even more than they were and your head bow towards the ground. You hand raised to your cheeks and wiped something off your face, before you finally stood up and and turned around, facing him. Neteyam’s breath caught in his throat at the new sight. Your eyes were puffy and red, and tears marked your cheeks, so pronounced it was as if they would stain your face forever. 

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

He felt his own tears threatening to spill then, pricking at his eyes painfully, begging to be released. There was so much pain inside of him, pain you caused him, pain for the hurt he knew he caused you, pain that felt like it will never diminish. 

“You’re sitting here, talking about that night and this song, in this place that once meant so much to us, after giving yourself to another man, to my fucking brother, and you want me to feel bad?”

He saw your face slowly register his words, as if you were mulling over every word carefully, turning it in your mind, and saw how your face went from sad to cold and unflinching and a shiver ran down his spine. You rose an eyebrow at him, an expression only he seemed to have the power to coax out of you. 

“What did you just say?” 

“You heard me. I saw you. I saw you in the forest, his hands all over you, I saw you running your hand up and down his arm. I’ve known he has been sneaking in your tent for weeks. What are you doing with my baby brother in your tent late at night, Y/N?”

FIVE STAGES OF GRIEF STAGE II: ANGER

“You honestly have some fucking nerve, Neteyam.” 

“You do not get to come here, come to this place, or any place for that matter and demand an explanation from me. I don’t owe you anything. You fucking left, Neteyam! We’re nothing to each other. Whatever claim or right you might have had once to ask anything of me or from me is long gone.” 

Neteyam stalked towards where you were standing, your words echoing in his mind. He was mad, mad at you for what you did, but also mad at himself. Because he knew you were right. He had no right to come here after abandoning you and the relationship you two had and be angry that you moved on. And yet he was. 

He was so close to you now he could feel your breath fanning over his face as you looked up at him, panting with anger, lips slightly opened. He couldn’t help look at them, those lips he has dreamed about for years, the way they’d feel on him, their taste… your taste. It was driving him insane, being so close to you, knowing what he knew. 

“Why? Why Lo’ak? You could have picked anyone else.”

You chuckled bitterly. “Really? So if I picked Akoa or Tärze, you wouldn’t be here right now, wouldn’t be mad and looking at me like somehow I betrayed you?” 

“Or is it possible it doesn’t actually matter who it is, it’s not the fact that it’s Lo’ak… it’s the fact it’s not you.” 

“You see, I think deep down you know it should have been you. I think deep down it kills you that you are not in my tent late at night. You’re not the one that gets to touch me.” he felt your hand place over his bare chest and run it down his abdomen until it reached his red loin cloth, which you slightly tugged at. He felt his cock twitch in response. 

You don’t know what came over you. You came here to mourn, still reeling after your conversation with Lo’ak. You never expected to see him here, hear his presence while you sang the song that once signified hope and love, and now is just a bitter reminder of all you’ve lost. You definitely never expected him to question you over Lo’ak, or be so angry over something that would never happen anyway. 

You were furious with him, furious that he never told you how he felt for you, and now he was clearly showing it to you by his displays of anger and jealousy. This was not how this was supposed to go. 

You felt a sick satisfaction at his demeanour. You made him like this, this angry, nose flared and panted breaths, you had this power over him. Just the thought of you with another man drove him to this point, and you loved it. He deserved it, deserves much worse. 

“You should leave, Neteyam.”

You started turning your back to him, but he took hold of your arm and kept you in place forcefully. His other hand went to your neck, and you felt him wrapping his hand around it and squeezing. 

“No.” 

You were shocked at his actions, and even more shocked at the immediate reaction your body had to him. You felt throbbing deep within you, and squeezed your thighs tightly together to accommodate for the feeling. 

“I’m not leaving until you tell me. Did you fuck my brother, Atan (light)?” 

He was still squeezing your throat, and you felt your pulse quickening when he moved and took a hold of you jaw, forcing you to look in his eyes. He looked mad, sad, desperate for an answer that would either mend or break him. You felt his intense stare in every cell in your body and felt yourself clench around nothing. 

You wanted to lie, wanted to see him suffer at least some of the hurt he’s caused you. But you couldn’t, not with how he was looking at you, not with how he was holding you. 

“Fuck you, Neteyam. I would never do that. Fuck you for thinking for a second that something like would ever even cross my mi-“

It wasn’t possible for you to finish the sentence, as his lips roughly slammed against yours, and you immediately, as if your body needed no input from your mind, raised your hands to the circle around his neck, pushing him closer to you. 

You moaned into the kiss, and the sound removed any ounce of sanity or self-discipline from his being, and he opened his mouth to deepen the kiss and slide his tongue over your bottom lip, begging for permission. 

He felt his hand drop back around your throat, squeezing, loving the feel of your quickened pulse, knowing he was responsible for it, for your swollen lips and dilated pupils, for the way you were squeezing your thighs together. You were his, to love, to touch, to do whatever he wanted to. 

He was so hard now, his loincloth was constricting around him painfully, and he knew if he kept going, he was not going to able to stop himself until you were writhing underneath him, until he made you beg and scream his name over and over, all night long. 

“Pathfinder, this is Devil Dog, come in, over.” 

Fuck. 

Your body ached at the loss of contact, as Neteyam removed his hand from around your throat and his lips from your own. He was panting, and tried to steady himself before he touched the little button on the radio on his neck, sighing deeply. 

“I’m here, Devil Dog. What’s your post? Over.” 

You turned your back to him, and took a few steps towards the river, trying to compose yourself. What the fuck did I just do? This was bad, for so many reasons, it was making you dizzy just counting them all. You couldn’t hear what Jake was saying to Neteyam, but it couldn’t have been good, it was very rare Jake would use the radio to communicate with his kids, you’ve only seen it once when there was a hunting accident that needed everyone’s attention. 

“You need to get back to the village, now. We have a situation. If Y/N is with you, bring her back, too. Over and out.” 

Shit, this can’t be good, Neteyam thought to himself. He looked over at you and saw you turned your back to him, hiding. You were good at that, pretending, denying, avoiding. Pushing your feelings aside was your favourite defence mechanism, had been ever since your mum died. 

His eyes softened and he felt stupid for having doubted you, for spending so many weeks losing sleep over something that never even happened. Guilt also immediately pooled in his gut from the kiss, the confession, the implications of it, all of which things he would have to deal with sooner or later. The horror at the thought of the consequences of his actions made his skin crawl, but he didn’t have too much time to dwell on it, knowing his dad expected them to hurry.

“Hey… we have to get back, dad said to meet him in the village.”

You nodded weakly in his direction, and started making your way towards the village. Once again, he found himself having to clasp your arm by your wrist and turn you around so you could face him. You refused to look at him, so he cupped your face in his hand and raised you head gently so you could look at him. His thumb was ghosting over your lips, that were still swollen and when his eyes met yours, he saw a sadness so deep it made Pandora’s oceans feel like shallow pools. 

“We need to talk, properly talk.” 

You just nodded silently and removed his hand from your face, and the last thing he saw was your back, walking away. 

You were deep in thought as you arrived in the village, and were pulled out of your musings when you saw a big commotion happening all around you. You have never seen the village like this.

There was a crowd of people by the big bonfire, so that’s where you and Neteyam figured to look first. 

“…and no matter what comes next, we will stand and fight, together!” You heard big screams and ululating as Jake’s voice boomed throughout the village, above all the noise. 

You saw Norm and Max, all the humans and avatars on the right of the Olo’yektan. On his left stood Mo’at, Neytiri and all their children, plus Spider. Lo’ak was screaming and beating his chest, whilst Kiri looked concerned, and Tuk was almost crying, with a tight grip on her mum’s hand. You made your way through the mass of people, reaching the foot of the large tree stump acting like a platform. Jake spotted you and helped you up, and you saw Neteyam following you from the corner of your eye. 

Since the speech was done, people started dissipating, and Jake turned his attention to the pair of you. 

“Last night, Neytiri and I spotted a star in the night sky that shone brighter than it ever had before.” 

Panic rose in your chest at his words, words that you knew could only mean one thing. “The humans are returning.” you said, meekly. 

Jake nodded in your direction with anger flashing across his face, before he composed himself. 

“We knew this day was coming, but it is definitely different when it is finally happening than the image you had in your head.” you heard Norm pitch in from somewhere behind Jake. 

“How long?” Neteyam asked. 

“About a week?” Max said, and the man with such a kind and gentle face was scared, you realised sadly. Everyone was scared. 

“Fuck.” Neteyam’s face was unreadable. The war he trained all his life for was finally on his doorstep. 

“I need you to complete your Iknimaya before then. Tomorrow, you will go perform your first kill. You are more than ready. It’s time. When the humans come, I need you with me. With us.”

You couldn’t swallow the lump that has formed in your throat enough to speak, so you just nodded. You were not ready. The last time you were on an Ikran, you almost died. You felt the phantom pain on your left leg flare up, and you were terrified at the prospect of another flashback triggering as you were fighting for your life on top of the Hallelujah mountains, trying to make the bond. 

The crowd eventually dispersed and everybody went back to their homes. There was a heaviness in the air, no smiles or singing tonight, no communal dinner where people animatedly exchange stories and anecdotes; you saw Na’vi hugging their loved ones, keeping them close at all times, as if letting go would mean letting go forever. The war was upon you, and with it, the possibility of loss and grief settled in the bones of every one of the villagers. 

You felt sick to your stomach. A shiver ran through your entire body, and, at the weakness that enveloped your being suddenly, you knew the effects of all the pills you took to mitigate your symptoms have worn off. The dizziness you felt was more than just a weak headache you could ride out, but a sign your human body was fighting to maintain the neurolink inside the pod. You didn’t have much time. 

“I’m gonna go to bed. See you all tomorrow.” You needed to be in your tent when you passed out, otherwise it would raise suspicion immediately and you couldn’t afford that. 

“Hey, you can’t leave. We still need to talk.” Neteyam said, lightly tugging at your arm. 

“Not today, Neteyam.” You removed your limb from his grasp and left without giving him a second look. 

You were pulled out of the linkpod quite violently by your own body recoiling in agony. You felt a stupid ping of gratefulness at the fact that, although due to horrible news, at least no one was in the lab or adjacent hubs at the current moment. You struggled to get up, and found the walk back to your room excruciating, like no matter how much you walked, it was not anywhere in sight. When you arrived, you went straight to the bathroom and barely managed to make it to the toilet before throwing up, your body violently convulsing in on itself, trying to expel everything from your body. You haven’t had a proper meal in this body in months, so all your body was managing to get rid of was bile, bitter and acidic on your tongue. 

When you were done, you pushed your body weakly towards the sink, and gargled the bad taste away with some water and mouth wash. You peered up at the mirror, and were alarmed by the face that met your gaze. You barely recognised yourself. Your face looked ghastly, the palest you have ever been, the hollows of your cheeks looking like pits of shadows and darkness. 

Your under-eye bags gave away how little sleep you were actually functioning under, how little rest you actually got in the last few months. You looked truly sick, although you didn’t know how much of that was the virus and how much it was just you… ignoring your body like you ignored everything that you had to work through, everything that required healing and spiritual effort, and trading it for a easy-to-digest fantasy.

You made your way towards your bed limply and was comforted by the bottles of pills you saw on your bedside table, that will provide fleeting relief. You passed out on the bed soon after, happy that the suffering could be over for at least some hours. 

You woke up a couple of hours before dawn, with a raging fever and chills running up and down your spine, and instead of struggling back to sleep, you got up slowly and put some clothes on, making your way towards the labs. Today was an important day, and you needed to be focused for it, you couldn’t afford the same thing as yesterday take place. In the medical ward, you scrambled in the drawers until you found what you were searching for. The holy grail, injectable morphine. You hastily grabbed a syringe and a needle, measured out the amount needed, shook the syringe to remove any air bubbles, and directed it to your arm, where you injected it in your vein. Placebo effect or not, you felt immediate relief, and you knew this would put you through the day. 

Norm came to the linkpod to help with the neurolink, and he gave you a worried look as he watched you settle in. 

“I think you should be taking a break from this.”

“Are you serious right now? The humans are literally circling the atmosphere as we speak, I can’t afford to take breaks now, you know this.”

“What I know is that you look about a week away from collapsing in my arms, and your Avatar won’t work without you, Ace. You’re always in the village, and you don’t sleep. You’re always running experiments when you are here. Look, I love your enthusiasm, and I love that you’ve finally getting outside and enjoying your life, but there’s also too much of a good thing.” 

You were started to feel anger pick at your brain, much like the virus you were carrying with you everywhere you went. 

“You made this for me. You made me this Avatar. You guilt tripped me into taking it. Now you’re unhappy I’m using the Avatar. Why don’t you make up your mind and let me know, Norm? In the meantime, I have to go.”

You lay in the on the pod and placed the metal frame on top of your body, and you couldn’t miss the tear that fell on Norm’s face as he closed the lid of the pod. 

It was still before dawn when your consciousness woke up in the blue body you’ve come to love so much, and you couldn’t help feel immense guilt at the words you spat at Norm. He doesn’t deserve any of this; he has been a surrogate uncle for you ever since you were born. He made you an Avatar, he built you a guitar. He helped you go outside and live your life, he was always there for you if you needed to talk, or vent. He has always believed in you, in your capacity to help, to do good, to overcome your grief. You would have to apologise to him come nighttime. 

You saw Jake make his way to you as you opened the flap to your tent. “Hi, kid.” Tensions were running high, you could tell, as Jake did not smile or make light conversation, as he always tended to do. He would always take the time to check in, to make sure you are doing well, which you appreciated massively. You loved having him and the rest of the family around. It felt like you belonged, for the first time in your life. 

“So you, Neteyam, Akoa and Heesu will go and they will watch you perform your first kill. Early tomorrow, we will go take the Iknimaya, and then you will be able to join Neteyam on raids and scouting. How’s that sound?”

“Sounds good, boss.” You saw him crack a tiny smile at that, and felt better you could still make him smile, even in these circumstances.

Neteyam came out of the tent looking… so good it made your mouth fill with saliva. He was holding his bow tightly in his hands, and he was adorning new jewellery, you noted. A beautiful black necklace, filled with beads and impressive craftsmanship, his red and green cummerbund tightly wrapped around his ribcage, and his knife tucked on his hip, all came together to bring about Neteyam Te Sulli Tsyeyk’itan, the future leader of the Omaticaya. But what really drew your eye, was a bracelet. A green bracelet that he kept around his arm, whose every bead and stone was imprinted in your mind, for the rest of time. Why was he wearing that bracelet, why now? What was he trying to tell you?

Neteyam found his gaze drawn to the girl next to his dad, the only girl that existed, as far as he was concerned. He barely slept last night thinking of you, of that kiss, of your confession, of the song, and he knew he had to make it right sooner rather than later. The humans were coming, not one of them knew what their lives were going to look like in a few weeks, and there was so much to set straight, the thought made him nauseated again. He had to tell you. Your eyes found his and he saw many emotions passing through them, and was happy to see at least one of them was passion, and yearning. You looked at him like you wanted to do things Eywa would disapprove of, and he felt himself twitch in pain for what felt like the millionth time recently. 

Neteyam led the pack away from the village and towards the forest where you would have to make your first kill. He had no doubt in his mind you would do well, he honestly doesn’t know why it has taken so long to do it to begin with. You’ve been ready for weeks. After stalking quietly through the forest for a couple of hours, you found a herd of Yerik. Neteyam closed his gap on you and placed a hand on your back, smiling to himself at the way you shuddered when he did. 

“You’ve got this. We’ve been through this and you are ready. Remember, keep a knee on the ground for support. Good luck.”

You nodded without looking at him, eyes plastered on one of the animals peacefully grazing on a bush. He saw you, focused and determined, aiming the arrow with precision and power, and he knew then you were made for this. You were made to be here, as one of the people, you were meant to be Na’vi. 

You made quick work of the kill, and immediately got up from your crouched stance and made your way to the now fatally injured Yerik. You removed your knife from where it was placed on your chest, and repeated the words he taught you weeks ago. “Oel ngati kameie, ma tsmukan, ulte ngaru seiyi irayo (I See you, Brother, and thank you). Ngari hu Eywa salew tirea, tokx 'ì'awn slu Na'viyä hapxì (Your spirit goes with Eywa, your body stays behind to become part of the People).”

Perfect, just like he knew you would do. You were nervous, he noted, but you also seemed happy to have finally done it, after all this time training. All four of you made your way back to the village, the two men accompanying you carrying the animal by its legs. Neteyam wanted to talk to you, wanted to get you alone so he can finally tell you all the things he had to say, that he needed to say, the secret that has plagued him for weeks and that drove a wedge between him and his baby brother. Unfortunately, it seems like the universe fated you to never be alone with him again. Right after you arrived at the village, Jake took all of you to gun practice and through strategy meetings about how to plan an attack once the Sky People decelerated. Those lasted the whole day, and before he knew it, you left to your tent again, leaving him to deal with his dad on his own. 

“Neteyam. Stay, I want to talk to you.”

“Yes, Senpul (dad)?”

“Did you tell her yet?” 

“Not yet. I’m trying to find some time, but it seems like we are never together alone anymore.”

Neteyam saw his dad sighing heavily and was scared for the hell he knew would rain down on him sooner or later.

“Neteyam, you have to tell her. You have asked us to keep your secret, and we have. We have all participated in this, and I am getting tired of lying for you. The kids don’t want to lie to her anymore, your mother doesn’t want for this to be a secret anymore. She deserves to know.” 

“You will tell her by the end of the week, or I will.” 

Your body convulsed as your mind woke up in your human form, and you tried to hide it as best as you could so whoever was helping you get disconnected wouldn’t notice. To your disappointment, it was Max. 

“Hey, sweetheart. How was it today?”

“Good, made the first kill. Going up the Iknimaya tomorrow, which can’t say I am particularly excited about.” 

“Oh, honey, you shouldn’t worry about it. It’s going to be completely different than that dreadful day. You are going to be able to control it, you will be connected to it. Plus Toruk has never been spotted this close to the banshee rookery, so there will be nothing making your Ikran nervous.”

“Yeah, guess you are right.” You said, not wanting to tell Max that rationalising it doesn’t achieve anything except making you feel stupid for being scared. “Where’s Norm?”

Max looked agitated for a second, but tried to compose himself enough to appear nonchalant about the subject. “Um, I think he’s in his room, he told me he wants to read this book he still hasn’t gotten around to, if you can believe that. He's been here for almost 19 years, you’d think there’s be nothing new to do here anymore.” 

You hoped you weren’t as bad a liar as seemingly everyone you have come across recently, otherwise your illness is not as much of a secret as you’d hoped. 

“He told you.”

“Yeah…” 

“I was such a dick. I have to apologise. I’ll go find him.”

“Maybe give him some time? He looked really upset, and I think he just needs to lick his wounds by himself for a while.”

“I didn’t mean it, Max. I am just tired and stressed because of the Iknimaya and the humans returning, not that that’s any excuse.” 

“I know, honey. He will be alright, just give it time. Time heals everything.”

You could only pray that was the case, for Norm….and for yourself.

You woke up the next morning groggy, feeling sick from your illness and sick from all the pills you ingested last night. If this was starting to be a problem, it was a problem you were gonna have to deal with later. Pandora’s box can hold a couple more issues for the time being. You made your way quietly to the medical ward and found the morphine vial you used yesterday. Withdrawing a few more millilitres, you injected yourself in the arm with it, instant relief flooding your system. You sighed happily and thought this was probably the closest you’ve ever gotten to feeling euphoric. 

Your Avatar body looked ready to tackle the Iknimaya, in all new garbs and a new necklace that Kiri made for you recently, as well as Lo’ak’s visors. Tuk and Neytiri were braiding your hair fresh, so you were all ready to go by the end of the eclipse. Feeling how nervous you were, Neytiri put her hand on your heart, and looked into your eyes and she placed the last feather in your hair. 

“It will be alright, ma 'ite. You have done better than any other Dream Walker ever has. Even better than the Toruk Makto. I know you are scared because of what happened in the past, but you have grown so much since then. You are such a special child, a gift from Eywa. There’s light in you no darkness can snuff out, and you were made to be one of us. Do not worry.” 

You let out a small cry and hugged the woman that could have been your mother in these 9 years after you lost your own, who has loved you and protected you every chance she got, that wanted to take you in the village and raise you as one of the people, but who you pushed away out of fear, out of terror at the possibility of more loss, more pain. She never held a grudge, she never turned her back on you, even after shunning them from your life, she understood you and welcomed you back with open arms as soon as you felt ready to join them. She saw you. You will never be able to repay her kindness.

“We’ll be with you. Kiri and I will fly and bring Tuk on one of our Ikrans. Spider, Lo’ak, Neteyam and Jake will come on their Pa’li with you and make the climb. It will be good practice for them. We all want to celebrate with you. We can all join you on your first flight, so this way it will be less scary.” 

You were fully crying in the crook of her neck now, unable to believe the luck you had to having been born somewhere where the Sullys existed at the same time. There was a lot of pain in your life, but this family would always be your good karma, it seemed. 

The climb was the most excruciating thing you have ever had to do. Every muscle in your body was pushed to its limits, and you were beginning to wonder how you were supposed to fight a huge animal after all of this. You understand now this is why this was the ultimate test of becoming a hunter, and why there were not many hunters in the Omatikaya. The thought brought a gust of confidence to your mind - you were doing this. You. You’ve gotten so far, further than any scientist on Pandora ever has. You grew up in a lab with severe agoraphobia and unsolved trauma and you still made it here. You will do this, because you have to. Because you’ve come so far. 

It was taking every ounce of discipline to not continuously stop and stare at the beauty of the Hallelujah mountains, that you have heard so much about, but never experienced for yourself, and you realised you needed to swallow often to compensate for the dryness you felt from your mouth being stuck agape in awe at the beauteous miracle. 

You found yourself peering up at Neteyam frequently throughout the climb, and thoughts about yesterday made your already drugged-out mind even airier. There was so much to think about, so much to talk about, but you couldn’t handle it right now. You couldn’t handle the consequences of that kiss and the hurt that would inevitably emerge from your star-crossed fate. You were dying. Although you didn’t want to think about it, didn’t want to acknowledge the reality that your body was falling apart in front of you, it was happening. You probably had another couple of weeks before your heart gave out from all the strain the virus was putting on your whole body, just like it happened with all the other victims. 

As if he could feel you, Neteyam turned around and gave you a nervous look. You wondered what he thought of everything, how he felt. Was he happy about the kiss? Did he regret it? In his defence, he has been wanting to talk to you for days and you avoided him, unable to deal with him at the moment. He will just have to be another trinket in the Pandora’s box until you finished the Iknimaya. Making it to a large suspended boulder before you, he stretched out a strong arm for you, and you took it, happy to have at least some physical contact between you. His touch has always calmed your nerves, from when you were children, and now, as adults, that still hasn’t changed. 

He didn’t let go once you climbed next to him. Taking advantage of the fact you two were the last to climb, he took hold of your arm with one hand, and placed the other on your face, cupping it gently. His thumb found its way to your lips again, caressing them softly and you felt intoxicated from his touch. He brought his face close to yours and brought your foreheads together, breathing you in. You stood like this, staring at each other for a while, and it was like all the words you wanted to say to each other were spoken wordlessly. I love you. I see you. I’m sorry. 

“Are you guys coming or what?” You heard Spider screaming from a higher up boulder, and you reluctantly let go. He squeezed your arm one more time, and then motioned for you to climb in front of him. You weren’t far off now, you realised, and felt your heart picking up pace in your ribcage. 

Soon enough, you were there. You could hear thousands of banshees screaming and cooing, and you thought it was mirroring your internal dialogue quite well, loud and incoherent. Neteyam held a hand in front of your body as you made your way across a narrow ledge behind a waterfall, that connected the cave to the banshee nest. 

“Ok, kid. This is it. Are you ready?” Jake began speaking and you were trying to focus on him instead of the panicked feeling rising in your chest. 

As you were preparing to respond, you heard loud ululating from the sky, and immediately saw two beautiful banshees making their way to the mountain and settling in the cave you just left behind. You smiled at the view, excited that Neytiri, Kiri and Tuk could make it in time. They followed you to the nest and you brought your curled fingers to your forehead, greeting them warmly. I see you.

“Good luck, sister! I cannot wait to fly with you!” Tuk’s enthusiasm never failed to bring a wide smile to your face. 

You looked around at all the people who have travelled so far to come and be with you on this day. Your family, for all intents and purposes. You felt tears coming, but pushed them away with a sigh, trying to toughen your resolve. You gave one last look to Lo’ak, who was watching you sadly, the pain from yesterday still fresh in both your minds. You loved him so much, and hoped he would be able to forgive you in time. You touched his gift, now resting on your forehead, and gave him a grateful smile and a wink. He cracked a small grin and you knew then that your relationship wasn’t totally in ruins. 

“This is it, Atan. Now you must choose your Ikran. If it also chooses you, move quick, like I’ve showed you. You will have one chance. I will be behind you in case you need any help. Please don’t fall off a cliff, I don’t think my heart could take it again.” 

You laughed a little at his attempt of diffusing a situation. It wasn’t his best attribute. 

“Ok then, let’s dance.” 

Neteyam watched as you made your way through the Ikrans, and how they all flew away in fear at your sight - beautiful banshees that made him miss his own and reminisce about his own Iknimaya. You looked ready - powerful and confident, like you have always belonged here, with them. You were swinging your yìmkxa (mouth binder) and approaching each Ikran forcefully, hissing at them to hopefully provoke the right one. Eventually, a big banshee, bigger than his and most others he’s seen around, turns around to face you and does not remove itself from your path in the same way all the others had. It is a beautiful animal, white and gold with purple and pink wings and green stripes on its head, it looked different than any other in the village. Fitting, he thought. This was it.

He heard a loud hiss coming from where you were stood. The Ikran hissed back wildly and charged towards you. His heart was getting ready to exit his body at its speed and power, and he was panting in fear and anticipation, ready to jump in at any moment’s notice, in case you needed it. He saw you remove yourself quickly, skilfully, out of the animal’s way and wrap the yìmkxa around its mouth. Good, first step done. 

You then took a hold of your queue and jumped on the Ikran’s back, placing your thighs around its neck and squeezing with all of your might. The Ikran wrung its neck in an attempt to escape you, but you worked on this for months preparing for this day - you were not letting go. Neteyam saw the banshee make its way towards the edge of a cliff, and you wrapped the arm that wasn’t holding the queue around its neck for more support. 

Neteyam felt like he was going to pass out from the stress, and saw the next moments happen in slow motion, just like almost 7 years ago when you fell mid flight: the ikran managing to drop off the cliff, his wailing scream and immediate desire to join you, the hands of his mother and father wrapping around him keeping him in place, his own ikran dropping from a cliff at the sound of his call, him removing his parents’ hands forcefully and running towards his banshee, scrapping his arm painfully on the rock and the stabbing throb that followed, the feeling of a fresh injury and blood spilling down his arm, and yet still, no other thoughts in his mind than the need to save you, to right his past wrongs. 

He makes the bond quickly and before anyone could stop him, he’s in the air, flying around the rock and beneath it, trying to see where you could be. He was shocked to find you still on your ikran, holding for dear life while the animal was flying upside down, shaking itself furiously to get rid of you. He saw you drop the arm you were using to hold on to it, only managing to hold on by the strength in your thighs, and connected the queues with a loud yell.

“STOP!” He heard you scream. “TURN AROUND, NOW!” 

He couldn’t believe his eyes. You made your Tsaheylu, upside down, mid-flight. He watched as the banshee turned around and made its way back to where his family was, and he still had no words he could say to explain or describe what he was feeling in that moment. It was beyond words. He felt his arm twitching painfully and he quickly looked at it and saw the deep scratch that was leaking blood and staining his loincloth where his arm was laying. 

You did it. You actually did it. This little prick came at you with all her might and you still held on to her. You learnt a lesson or two from riding a banshee as a 13 year old defenceless human, and the most important lesson was: hold on for dear life. Good to see it came in handy. You also made it a point to thank Neteyam for making you hang upside down in trees to shoot down targets, you can see now it helped. You landed at the base of the rookery and watched as every one of your family members was smiling and yelling, cheering loudly for your accomplishment. They looked so happy, and you couldn’t help shed a small tear and the sight. 

These were your people, for the remainder of this short life, and you were happy you got to do this before you went. Happy you got to see them together, for you. You looked around at Neteyam and couldn’t see him, but then heard a loud, excited yelp from behind you. He looked so happy and proud, your heart swelled at the sight. This man would be the death of you, you knew. You loved him so much, and you knew it was time, time to talk through it. 

“First flight seals the bond.” he screams over the noise of the banshees and the waterfall. “Let’s go.”

The entire family called for their ikrans, and in less than a minute, you were airborne. You told your banshee to fly gently and straight, and held on tightly to her neck while you tried to adjust to all these new overwhelming emotions. The feeling of flying was incredible, so much more so than you remembered. Maybe because this time you were in control. The feeling of the Tsaheylu... Lo’ak was right, it was so much stronger than the Pa’li, the connection you had with this animal. You knew you were bonded for life, shared a kinship and bond no one could break until one of you died, maybe even after. The feeling of belonging, as you watched 5 other ikran fly alongside yours and help you through your first of many adventures in the sky. You felt grateful and happy to have made it so far before the inevitable end.

You made it at the village soon after eclipse, laughing and dancing while you walked back, hand in hand with Kiri who was rolling her eyes at you but joining in anyway. Tuk was holding your other hand, and you lifted her up and carried her all the way back while she played with your braids. 

As you arrived to your tent, you saw the rest of the family go into their own, with the promise you’d join after dropping all of your stuff. Neteyam stayed behind, closing his distance to you and only stopping when he was so close to you his chin was touching your forehead. It was only then you saw his arm, dried blood spilt everywhere and marring his beautiful blue stripes. His loincloth was also red, you noted, and saw the gash that was the culprit, high on his arm, still red and bleeding, although not enough to justify this much blood. It must have been bleeding for a while.

“What the hell happened to you?!” You said with a panicked voice.

“It’s nothing, don’t worry about it.” 

You raised and eyebrow at him and rolled you eyes, and pulled him to your tent by his uninjured arm. 

“Sit. I will clean and stitch it and then we can go for dinner.” 

He did as he was told, quietly sitting on the ground while you gathered supplies: some gauze, disinfectant, numbing cream, stitches and a needle driver, as well as some forceps and scissors. He squirmed at the sight, and you rolled your eyes again.

“You drive me crazy when you roll your eyes at me, you know? I would kill to be the reason your eyes roll in the back of your head at night.”

You blushed at his words, and sat next to him on the ground.

“You have to stop, Neteyam. We can’t do this again.”

You turned your focus on his wound, and began cleaning it slowly so as to not injure him further. 

“I can’t stop, Atan. I can’t think of anything else. I have so much I want to say to you, so much I need to get off my chest.”

He sounded sad, desperate for you to hear him out, his eyes pleading and pained. 

“How about we talk, after dinner? This time, you can be the one sneaking in my tent late at night.” you said sarcastically, not having forgotten his outburst from earlier and realising you were still angry at him for it. 

“Yes, please.” 

You sat in silence the rest of the time, as you worked with skilled, focused hands. You stitched his wound carefully, so as to not leave him with a scar. When you finished, you smiled up at him, and reached your hand to touch his face, moving a strand of beaded hair from it and pushing it behind his ear. He was so, so beautiful. He brought a hand to your chin and was pulling you closer, when someone entered the tent without making their presence known, making you both jolt back in shock. It was a girl. You’ve seen her before in the village, she was a healer in training. Beautiful and skilled, she was a good singer and a good craftswoman, making a lot of the clothes the Na’vi hunters wore. 

“Oh, Great Mother, here you are! Your mother told me about your injury, and I had to come find you so I could help!” She kneeled down on the other side of Neteyam from where you were sitting and touched Neteyam’s chest, moving him around looking for the bleed, that was no longer there. 

“Oh, it seems much better now than what was described. I guess it’s true what they say, you really are that skilled.” She turned her attention to you and smiled. 

“Thank you. I don’t think we’ve properly met.”

“You’re right, my bad! I’m Tiongli. Neteyam’s mate.” 

It was so quiet in the room now, you were sure they could both hear your heart break into a million pieces. 

Tag list: @nuhteyam @eywas-heir @fanboyluvr @mashiromochi @puffb4ll @sassy-persona @simp4ff @mommyneytiri @k----a27s

[staring-at-my-keyboard]

Haven pt 1

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The beginning of the main arc of @torturingpeople and I's Salad Spinner AU, when their tender pathologist officially starts living with my Atlas and Thomas! Although... a lot happens that leads up to his leaving the hotel.

This ties into the rivalry Dr. Hanna has with the Manager, so while I do recommend reading "Rivalry" all you really need to know is that he despises him and the Royal Beth for very petty reasons.

OC intros

POV: Tender Pathologist

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Hurt

Angst

TWs

⇾ physical abuse

⇾ psychological abuse

⇾ temporary character death

⇾ violence

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I still recall when I was swept away from the Hotel for good like it was yesterday. It is possible that I experienced almost the entire spectrum of human emotion, terror and regret and grief and relief and a daring happiness swirling together in this neon cocktail of glaring memory. And it all began when I was especially unwise in my comportment, with a slip of the tongue when feeling dangerously at ease.

“You know,” I chucked to Dr. Hanna after finishing the latest assignment he had given to me. “You work me so hard I might have to go to the Royal Bethlehem if I want to actually relax in a hotel.”

It was only a joke, you must understand. It was meant to be nothing more than a joke, as I had no intention of entering a hotel entirely populated by the mad.

Dr. Hanna, however, did not see it that way.

Before I could blink, or so much as take in a breath to announce my lack of seriousness, there was a hand at the side of my head driving it into the wall.

Pain exploded in my skull, but not enough force was used to knock me unconscious– a purposeful thing, as Dr. Hanna then leaned close enough for the breath of his low, threatening speech brushed against my cheek.

“If you do anything of the sort, doctor, as much as I am fond of you, I will send people to find you. and they will find you. They will find out exactly where you are, they will beat you nearly dead, and then they will drag you by your ankles back to me so I can have the personal pleasure of vivisecting you for disobeying me so severely. Is that cle-”

The fingers digging into my hair were quite suddenly removed, and a familiar voice began shouting.

“Just what the bloody hell are you doing to him?!”

I managed to catch myself on the wall just before slumping to the ground from the lack of support, and turned to find Thomas stood between Dr. Hanna and I, gripping his wrist harshly and all but yelling in his face.

My eyes widened; I had never seen Thomas in such spirits, and as I recount this I realize that I had believed it to be impossible for him to lose his composure so completely. 

The look of bewildered offense on Dr. Hanna’s face almost made me forget how severely Thomas had doomed himself by stepping in and treating the doctor this way. Almost.

I could only watch, frozen in horror, as Dr. Hanna’s face slackened with what anyone else would have interpreted as an absent neutrality, but what I knew was abject fury. That signature smile dropped, the doctor not even deigning to keep it as a means to bare his teeth. Thomas, ever oblivious to the danger he was in, simply continued ranting.

“To attack someone in such a manner, especially someone who relies on you for employment and shelter! Who could not lift a finger in his own defense! Utterly disgraceful! You should be-”

Dr. Hanna’s free hand came to slap against Thomas’ head fiercely, palm hitting directly against his ear. The man cried out in pained surprise and released him, only for Dr. Hanna’s fingers to close around his hair. The doctor twisted, slamming Thomas’ head on the ground repeatedly.

I could have, should have, come to his defense- this was the one man that saw me, that cared, and he was the lover of what could very well have possibly been my only best friend. But you must understand, place yourself in my shoes; could you bring yourself to attack, to physically harm, the man that had provided you with favor and shelter over months? Who looked down upon you with such a regal countenance and divine benevolence that you could not help but feel immune to the horrors that would be inflicted upon others?

I remained still, come what would, and mentally wished for a forgiveness I knew would never arrive.

Eventually Dr. Hanna straightened and violently stomped on Thomas’ face, twisting it to the side and causing a sickening cracking noise to ring out as the grounded man fell limp.

I choked back a sob.

“I hope this provides a lesson in associating with anyone else.” The doctor said to me with a sneer, before sweeping off, leaving me and the corpse of one who made the fatal mistake of caring.

[1/3]

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[the-mira-life-project-mtf]

Gender Dysphoria

                                   Intro To Gender Dysphoria

     Gender dysphoria is described and experienced as the mental distress due to discomfort with one’s assigned sex at birth, and they desire to live either as the other sex or a mixture of the two. The condition of gender dysphoria is common among LGBTQ individuals, although it should be noted that being transgender is not itself a condition or mental disorder, nor do you need to be gender dysphoric to be transgender. Not all LGBTQ people have gender dysphoria or experience their dysphoria in the same way: some are uncomfortable with their assigned sex, their body, their presentation or privilege. (PERSONAL NOTE: My dysphoria seems to be focused on my body and the presentation, however I have no issues with my assigned sex. In the last 10 years, society has certainly gave me time to think about my white privilege and have punished me for who I am.)

     The most common symptom of gender dysphoria is that it is linked with our gender as society announces it and our biological sex assigned at birth. The distress of dysphoria might make the individual feel ‘trapped’ inside their own bodies, ‘disconnected’ from reality, ‘alien’ from what they look like on the outside, but what they should be on the inside. (PERSONAL NOTE: When I look at myself in the mirror or I look at my body, it is like looking at a stranger, looking at skin that I could not be in. Inside, my mental image was gender fluid~shifting from male dominate to female dominate. As my image solidified, I appeared more female then male however, my eyes only see a male with a few feminine characteristics.)

                         Diverse Experiences Of Dysphoria

     First off...the understanding of gender dysphoria is best described: Incomplete. So what exactly is dysphoria? Outside of gender dysphoria, it is hard to find a useful definition to describe what it exactly means. Gender dysphoria is actually a whole spectrum of mental and physical disorders: Anxiety disorders, personality disorders, depression, bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, insomnia, PMS, stress, white male privilege, autism spectrum disorders, bullied, misogyny, homophobia, PTSD, sexual trauma, autogynephilia, peer pressure, munchausen disorder, needing to please a parent, parental divorce and discomfort of body changes during puberty.

     Understanding the causes of dysphoria isn’t anywhere close to expressing what it feels like. The question you should pose to yourself: ‘How does it present to you?’ You will not find an official symptom list used my doctors or find much information on the internet. Wikipedia describes it as ‘a state of feeling unwell or unhappy; a feeling of emotional and mental discomfort.’ According to the Australasian Psychiatry regarding dysphoria: ‘The current semantic status of dysphoria is most unsatisfactory. Its definitions are usually too broad or too simplistic and, therefore, not clinically useful.’

      Those who are in distress; who want to understand what exactly they are experiencing finds that the definition of ‘feeling unwell’ or ‘mental discomfort’ are not very useful. They already know that they are not feeling ‘well’ and their brains can’t seem to understand the mental discomfort that causes the personality to suffer. To label Patient 1 as gender dysphoric does not mean that Patient 2 exhibits the same reactions, thus making the diagnosis invaluable to the patient. For example, my girlfriend who is bisexual claims that her dysphoria is due to autism, bipolar disorder and schizophrenia. Whereas my dysphoria is due to parental divorce, anxiety and peer pressure. We both suffer from gender dysphoria, however our symptoms are entirely different.

     Once we identify that we are suffering from gender dysphoria, we have to make the difficult task to understanding it and determine if transitioning is something that could help us cope. Do we transition by the process of just labels, mental changes or physical changes.

                    Importance Of Recognizing Dysphoria

     First! How do you know that you are actually experiencing gender dysphoria? How do you distinguish something that has no set symptoms or tests to measure your likelihood that you are suffering from dysphoria? It is easy to mistake gender dysphoria for who you naturally are. You might think it’s part of your innate personality or physical characteristics and is just something you will have to learn to cope with. This internal struggle can delay recognizing that you are actually LGBTQ. (PERSONAL NOTE: My lifelong struggle to even realize I was gender nonconforming was delayed by my upbringing, social lifestyles and accepting my thoughts and anatomy for what it was. Religion and family added further blocks. When I felt dysphoric, I just thought it was just me; a natural phase that everyone went through. The real extent of my gender dysphoria became clear during the transgender movement here in Washington State which forced me to reflect my deepest struggles. By the time I was in my 20s, my desire to influence physical feminization and prevent masculinization grew to a ‘sickness’ that made my anxiety worse. It was only then did I realize I was gender nonconforming through the aid of my bisexual girlfriend.)

     Once I realized that my internal image wasn’t matching my physical body and I dreaded my masculine side due to my abusive father; this lead to mental feminization as I desired to correct my biological and anatomical mistakes. It was only in the last three years did I realize I was experiencing gender dysphoria as I failed to recognize it due to three blocks: Ignorance for homosexuality, Religion and fearing of going to hell and Family expectations and their vocal hatred for the LGBTQ community. The longer I tried to pretend it did not exist only made my anxiety worse, fear of intimacy with another and soul sickness.

     Doubt is something that all LGBTQ individuals seem to have in common. They first doubt that they are actually transgender as they don’t recognize the symptoms. They might face a great deal of confusion and anger as to why they feel this way and find that medication does not help to relieve the mental anguish. They might doubt their feelings as they are afraid of what their family and friends might think. Nevertheless, doubt always seems to be the one symptom that will plague a LGBTQ individual through their initial gender dysphoria, post ‘coming-out’ and even into transitioning. 

     Even right now, you can’t run a diagnosis on just doubt, discomfort and unhappiness. It is much more. Those who suffer from gender dysphoria; reading this article, might agree with only 50% of the symptoms and have symptoms never even considered. Gender dysphoria, like any mental or physical condition changes and evolves from patient to patient...however, simply acknowledging it is the first step to understanding the condition.

     Again, as mentioned earlier in this article, not all trans individuals will have all or any of the signs of gender dysphoria. Some might not even have a single sign of dysphoria...they might have been simply born into a LGBTQ environment or society. Some people have more obvious gender-related symptoms whereas some people have more obvious non-gender-related symptoms. Also, you can suffer from gender dysphoria and not be transgender; but fall in a new spectrum of LGBTQ that defies the current understanding of transgenderism. The only thing that seems clinical about gender dysphoria is that once it is treated accordingly, the symptoms seem to resolve or lessen in severity.

      The overall dogma of gender dysphoria has been tabooed by society which has lead to many cases of gender dysphoric trans doing self-harm like turning to alcoholism, drugs and death. The ‘fear’ of the unknown has made transgenderism a disease to those who oppose it and law to those who welcome it...birthing a new form of hatred that has been divisive around the world. Science and research will not study the phenomenon out of fear of offending either group of people. And politics and religion continue to use the LGBTQ as pawns and control. Like any idea, written word might one day help cis-people understand how damaging gender dysphoria can be if left untreated and how important it is to treat it as you treat any condition.

                                   8 Signs Of Gender Dysphoria

1) Continual difficulty with simply getting through the day.

(Personal Note: As humans, we are social creatures and make a life around family and friends. Imagine finding this hard to maintain as any form of stress can trigger the dysphoria. I found myself being unhappy with my life. Everything I did seemed to be in defiance to who I was. I felt out of phase, spending more time inside myself where I felt complete and being irritable and annoyed with the real world. I had to write stories to release the stress to get through the day and even tried to mentally impose the image of my gender nonconforming self over my male form which made me uncomfortable and overall disgruntle to do anything.)

2) Your emotions feel misaligned, disconnected or estrange.

(Personal Note: I would find myself crying whenever I was being reprimanded or called out for failure. I would be called into my boss’s office to be informed of my performance and I would tear up which made me angry as ‘men don’t cry!’ I would have to hide away as I cried hard and I did not understand why. I called it a weakness, a hormonal imbalance and punished myself for it. Besides crying, all my other emotions seemed turned off; I did not laugh when a joke was told, I did not cry when my grandfather died right before me. I did not show much compassion to the patients I oversaw. However, the smallest things would make me cry and I hated it as I felt depressed for the rest of the week as I had to hide my feelings.)

3) Feeling you are just going through the motions in everyday life, as if reading from a script.

(Personal Note: Some days I would walk through life feeling like I was in a dream...as if I was in a made-up world. I even wrote many articles on dreams as the dreams felt more real then the real-world. I would look at myself in the mirror and it was like looking at a stand-in for me. I could see some characteristics I recognized, but the body I possessed felt...fake. I began to identify myself as ‘we’ in my writings and verbal language as it was the only way to express myself without feeling disconnected. To do anything as my male-self felt wrong and I found joy in things that my family considered feminine like nursing, caring for children and just being an avid listener. I disdained military-life, labor-centered jobs that required muscle strength and mathematic-dominate jobs. All jobs that the men of my family held.) 

4) Life seems pointless, and there is no sense of any real meaning or ultimate purpose.

(Personal Note: It look a lot of effort to find hobbies and when I found one, I did not really enjoy it...I was just killing time...trapped inside my thoughts. I went through life marking off the calendar...death even seemed inviting as I wasn’t thriving, I was just living. I wanted purpose, but I found nothing but failure. I learned a lesson: If you are not comfortable with yourself, you are not comfortable with anything. Having a terminal disease had me thinking: Is this all life has to offer? I want to be comfortable! I want to be content with myself and only then can I make a difference. As I merged with my feminine side, I began doing more things for other people to change their lives and it gave me purpose. I began to do the things I liked as I was no longer retreated inside my head, but living life outside.)

5) Knowing you’re somehow different from everyone else and wanting to be normal like them.

(Personal Note:  As a child, I did a lot of observing and wondered how they could just go throughout their days talking, laughing, calm and happy with everything. At one moment, I feel like I should play rough like all the other boys, but also show compassion and emotion that had me bullied as a child and caused making friends almost impossible as I was ‘weird’. I knew I was different! How many boys had tits? How many boys hated sports and preferred the arts? Singing soprano until I was 21 years old also did not help my case! I purposely removed myself from social interactions as I was afraid that they would see through me or question my true self that did not match the skin I was dressed in. By the time I was in my late 20s, I began to wonder: Maybe it isn’t me that is different...it is the world! The more I acted like my true self, the happier I was and I noticed people seem to enjoy the quirks from time-to-time.)

6) The symptoms escalated during puberty.

(Personal Note: Prior to puberty, I did not really care about what gender or sex I was. I played with both Hot Wheel Cars and Barbie Dolls with no care in the world. Due to the medication I took, I developed in the chest; but paid no mind to the sexual organs I had from birth. That however all changed around the age of 13 when I began to question my existence and gender. I saw myself as a combination of the two genders and expected puberty to deliver those results; however it did not. My mental image did not match my physical image and I tried to adjust. With my radical emotions and social upbringing, it only made my dysphoria worse. My family upbringing to hate gays and lesbians as they were a disgrace in the Lord’s eye and spawns of Satan only scared me. Why was I having these thoughts, why did I desire to be seen more as feminine than masculine? Was I possessed by the devil? Would I burn in hell for denying the person the Lord wanted me to be? It only made me struggle with accepting that somewhere on the LGBTQ spectrum...I fell.)

7) You attempt to fix this on your own through coping mechanisms.

(Personal Note: Even to this day I would never admit out in public that I’ve been down this road when my dysphoria went bad! It is always much easier to talk about this via writing-prompt and I can honestly tell that I’ve done my share of coping mechanisms to ease the pain of dysphoria. Many turn to drugs and alcohol to ease the pain...I did not...as they were not available to my person at the time and built a fear of booze and drugs to keep me clean. For many years, it was my writings that got me through it, then it was writings and art. When my desire to appear more female then male hit me, I would wear breast forms to give me what I was missing. However, when my family found out...it nearly lead to suicide as I took a handful of pain meds which luckily only made me vomit and damaged my liver in the process (if you are considering suicide, please seek help. It is a lonely road and leads to pain and suffering of you and the ones that love you!  National Suicide Prevention Lifeline 1-800-273-8255). About 9 years later I left prosthetic’s behind and turned to hormone replacement therapy to slowly correct my body.)

8) Consider resolving these symptoms through either Hormone Replacement Therapy (HRT) and/or Sexual Reassignment Surgery (SRS).

(Personal Note: Transitioning isn’t something you should take lightly and consideration is needed prior. Try transitioning by dressing up, appliances or mental projection before taking drugs or going under the knife. If you move to quickly, you can end regretting your decision. My first form of transitioning happened when I was 13 years old as I needed to find something safe to wear that would not label me as ‘gay’ so I wore robes as a dress and it helped me great through high school...but wasn’t a solution as I was just a man wearing shower robes. When I entered collage, I identified that one of my dysphoria’s was the lack of breasts and I bought a breast form and wore them at night as I slept as I could hide my transformation from my family. When my family found my molds, I was greatly punished and threatened to become homeless and found that this transformation was too obvious and I began to hate myself and tried to kill myself, but failed. After recovering and feeling the dysphoria grow, I began dating a bisexual woman who allowed me to be who I was and our relationship went as far as my dysphoria would aloud. By the time I was 33 years old, I received my terminal diagnosis and decided that the only way I can escape this fog was by chemically transforming through the aid of HRT. Lately, I have began to consider SRS, but find that my family will not accept and as long as I live under their house...I can’t transform...but will make this transformation (hopefully).)

                                        Analysis Of H.R.T.

     The consideration of hormone replacement therapy wasn’t lightly. I had considered it for three years and even tried bovine ovaries to see if I could adjust. BO was a terrible idea as it did nothing but made me sick. I tried to ignore the thoughts and desires to transform, but when I turned 33 years old, I made the decision that the only way I could stop the depression was through the process of H.R.T., but I had to be careful to not let my family know I was trying to transform. For three months, nothing happened...I lost almost 30 pounds of weight as my disease nearly took my life and I was off H.R.T. for almost 2 months and began to doubt my actions.

     I found that to stay dedicated to HRT, you need achievable goals. I found satisfaction in taking hormones and felt that I was bridging my genders to what they are suppose to be. My attitude and demeanor changed greatly as I found that I could smile and laugh. I cried when appropriate and felt emotions that I’ve suppressed. I became willing to form relationships and emotional.

     When I was conducting my HRT, I felt my symptoms dissipate and I desired to transform further. At first, I wanted to do 6 months of hormones, then I wanted to go 50/50 and then wanted to become more female and less male. The longer I was under the illusion of HRT...the more I wanted to complete my change. I wasn’t certain if it was the drugs or the idea of taking them.

     As mentioned if past articles, it might have been both. HRT over time will influence the brain and transform it. However, taking the pills also is a ‘hope’ that the discomfort and feeling unwell will end. And to be truthful, it did! Taking hormones is the greatest indicator that you are suffering from Gender Dysphoria if the symptoms go away...however, the more obstacles you have in your way, the unlikelihood you will continue it.

     At six months of HRT...I felt peace...I felt like myself. I no longer was hiding from myself, I could cry and feel appropriate about it. People called me by my name and I felt it was me. I became connected to the person in the mirror as I was slowly merging with my mental image. I felt that there was nothing ‘weird’ about me and went out to parties and made new friends. With my testosterone lowered and my body developing, I felt like I was gaining back years dysphoria took away from me.

                                                  Conclusion

     In conclusion, please note; these signs aren’t shared by all LGBTQ. Every person’s dysphoria is a little different, and transitioning can have different effects on each and every one. But it seems that a significant portion of trans people, whether their dysphoria is clearly gender-related or non-gender-related. Since gender dysphoria can not be labeled or treated as a condition at this time. It is up to you, the patient to make the decision.

     The great thing about Gender Dysphoria is that considering transitioning is usually the only goal and most LGBTQ individuals never turn back to what they were prior to transforming...even if they give up on their HRT regiment or deny they fall on the spectrum of alternate genders. Gender Dysphoria, in the end, is treatable and you do not have to suffer any longer.

[whitestonetherapy]

Window of tolerance...

A client of mine experienced a very traumatic incident a few years ago and still deals with the effects of it today.  She has difficulty in reconciling this event with her life both before and after the trauma.  It just doesn’t fit. The memory of the incident is not like other memories at all. Instead of a regular memory her recollections are fragmented, they feel like they belong to someone else, and are combined with deeply uncomfortable feelings involving flashbacks.  The question of why it is she feels this way has come up and I wanted to write something about it here.  

Biology, the mechanics of the brain, and the quality of our relationships all have a lot to do with this.  Start by thinking of life as an uninterrupted sequence of experiences – from the moment you are born to the moment you die.  From your first breath onward your brain starts the process of ‘communicating’ with the adult that holds you.  You can’t talk, and wouldn’t understand words even if you could, so this starts with your brain communicating your immediate needs (the right-hemisphere takes the lead at this early stage).  You’ll probably cry loudly at this point.  Hopefully someone will hold you close and make some noises that are intended to be soothing and loving.  You have just begun the lifelong process of communicating your needs, feelings and desires to those around you.

What happens in response to your crying matters a lot.  By responding to your cries with soothing noises and tender touches your parent has engaged their own brain (again, their right-hemisphere) and begun a long process that will literally shape your brain, helping it to develop and learn to cope with all sorts of situations.  You begin to learn how to manage how you feel and, eventually, safely experience the full spectrum of emotional experience.  

This early example of mutual regulation between adult and child, where your needs are communicated, understood and then met by an adult, will play a small part in widening your ability to deal with physiological and emotional stress.  Neurons fire and proteins are coded, and your brain develops. Even as a baby you’ll come to understand quickly that certain things you do are likely to elicit certain responses.  That certain emotions you have can be shared, and that certain things are likely to happen around you if you share them.  You’ll learn this from crying at first, and then through playfulness and experimenting.  What parent isn’t familiar with the great repetitious game ‘I’ll-take-off-my-sock-and-throw-it-on-the-floor-for-you-to-pick-up’?   You’ll hopefully learn that parents can be relied upon.  As an infant your brain will start to categorise responses from other humans into a general set of rules (schemas) - these rules will be based on the consistent responses from the people around you, depending on what you do/ what you communicate.  This is the start of the complex scaffolding that’ll allow you to start to make automatic predictions about other people and the world.  You start to predict the future and generalise - but, also, very importantly, you start to see the world through the lens of your predictions (very important if early care is not adequate and your predictions are thus negatively skewed - a blog for another time).  This mental scaffolding gets more complex as you grow, and it will depend in large part on how you are treated, at least at first, by your family (badly, or well).  That’s for the future though, because at first babies are just concerned with the person holding them.

With consistent sensitive care over time, the autonomic nervous system of the child develops.  This is the facility that controls the level of physiological arousal the child has when he experiences new situations and is closely linked with emotional states.  Daniel Siegel (The Developing Mind; 1999) describes a “window of tolerance”, a kind of goldilocks-zone in which there can be arousal of the sympathetic and parasympathetic nervous system but without severe emotional stress.  The sympathetic nervous system manages bodily functions (heart rate, respiration, perspiration etc) and the parasympathetic system is responsible for calming you down – for de-arousal.  The two systems usually work well together, and we give them a good road test every time there is, say, an England penalty shootout, or jump-scares when watching a film at the Cinema, or when something more seriously shocking and frightening happens.

Parents play a vital role in helping children expand their window of tolerance.  By introducing a child to new experiences that are towards the edge of this window of tolerance, and by making sure they are socialised properly, children will gradually expand the capacity of their nervous system to handle arousal.  This helps them become resilient - they become strong even if they are not entirely safe.  Good news for parents who are very concerned about keeping their children safe at all times - by letting children take some risks we help them to cope much better with handling strong emotions throughout their lives.   Children will do this all by themselves anyway with games that seem reckless to an adult eye.  Last week I watched an Instagram video of my 10-year-old nephew in a New York park, clambering in ‘monkey bar’ style about 15 feet up from the ground.  He was using a section of a climbing frame that was obviously not designed for the purpose at all.  It was impressive, but I would probably have yelled at him to stop if I’d been there.  My brother is made of sterner stuff, being well used to his son taking risks, and he didn’t bat an eyelid.  The designer of the climbing frame just hadn’t factored in either my nephews excellent ninja skills, or the reality that children will always look at what equipment is available then immediately start to work out how to take further risks.  In fact, the maximum risk possible thank you very much!  If you walk by any park you can always find children doing something dangerous while a parent hollers at them to stop.  It’s not easy being responsible for kids behaving like that.  I remember looking after big groups at my sons birthday parties and there would always be one or two who would not stop, whatever the game, until they were pushing the limits of dangerous behaviour.  If someone climbed 10ft up a tree, these kids would climb 20ft and hang onto a branch by a finger.  It’s part of how children grow and begin to individuate, developing a richer experience of themselves and the world, but it’s not easy being in charge of a pack.  So expanding the window of tolerance is a good thing, and in childhood we seem to be biologically compelled to do that too.

Sometimes things can go wrong and our window of tolerance can be exceeded dangerously.  In the most extreme examples (e.g a serious accident), if the trigger is severe enough the memory schemas on which we’ve learned to predict the world around us are temporarily blown away and cannot cope.  When this happens the prefrontal cortex goes offline with all power diverted to the subcortical regions of the brain (limbic system, brain stem).  This is the way the brain responds to situations when urgent action is needed.  The parts of the brain responsible for rational thought and autobiographical memory are powered down.  In traumatic situations areas of the brain such as the Hippocampus may become paralyzed altogether. Because of this, the traumatic event that is unfolding is not written to the mind as a normal, ‘regular’ memory.  Instead it imprints directly on the limbic system of the brain, and so memories may be fragmented, incomplete, or context free.   In these cases ‘memories’ can take the form of sensory flashbacks, outbursts of emotion, nightmares.  And so we are left with recollections that feel different and dissociated from ‘the rest of us’, and not fixed in space and time.  This set of thoughts, emotions and impulses can be deeply troubling and can take us over (literally) long after the traumatic event has finished. This is common with PTSD.

Moving inward from the extreme of PTSD, many people experience extreme anxiety and fight/flight/freeze physiological responses in situations that seem ‘normal’ to others. It doesn’t take a serious accident.  Often this a result of our tolerance window being too narrow to begin with.  When this is the case even ‘small’ triggers are enough to drive us to full blown anxiety attacks.  I’ve known people for whom ordering a drink from a cafe would induce a state of frozen terror, or responding to a “hello” from a passerby in the street would be enough to cause physical symptoms of full-blown panic. I’ve known people who struggle to even consider as a ‘thought experiment’ being assertive (say, with an unfair boss at work) without taking themselves out of their tolerance zone.  I’ve met people who’ve stayed in bad situations for far too long, too fearful to take action of any kind to help themselves.  I could go on.  Such people feel trapped, alone, overwhelmed and out of options.  Sometimes this also comes with a sense of shame, leading to compensatory behaviours in other areas of life.  At the mercy of their situation, people may look for ways to achieve a sense of control in at least one area of their life, to quieten their mind, to block out the outside world.  Things such as food, exercise, drugs or self-harm behaviours might then be used to stifle all these difficult emotions and the horrible physiological symptoms of extreme anxiety.  Often a temporary relief is achieved but at the cost of compounding the root cause of the problem.  It’s a vicious cycle.  The medicine starts to cause the illness.   

Because the capability of our nervous system to handle arousal is something that first develops as we mature, we have to consider what conditions in childhood may have been absent or unbalanced in some way.  Scenarios where adults might have failed to provide the conditions necessary for us to grow resilient in our childhood.  Perhaps our caregivers were absent or too erratic in their care.  Perhaps they were harsh and emotionally remote (”buck up!”), or perhaps too overbearing, drowning us in a flood of their own uncontrolled emotion and anxiety at too young an age. Maybe, even more dangerously, both. Whether through traumatic incidents or repeated ‘traumatic experiences in our relationships’ our nervous system can be taken well outside of the comfort zone.  This often leads to panicked states of hyper-arousal (fight, flight) or hypo-arousal (a frozen numbness and even dissociation from the event). 

How likely you are to have experiences outside your tolerance zone depends on many things, but I’ll mention two here.  The first is your own ‘window of tolerance’.  This is particular to you, and will depend on everything that has happened in your life up until now.  As above, were the conditions right in your life for your own tolerance level to widen?  The second is the force of the traumatic experience you encounter.  If your window of tolerance is narrow then many encounters may lead to the kind of hyper-aroused flight/fight response described above.  Equally, it might lead to the type of dissociation and disconnectedness we associate with a ‘freeze’ response. Dissociation is a way of compartmentalising something that is too difficult psychologically or biologically to process and work in the therapy room to integrate these things can take time.  

My client and I are working with her memories and emotions of the traumatic incident, finding words to describe as closely as possible what happened to her (bodily, emotionally, spiritually).  By pulling them into order, and in particular working to reduce the intensity of flashbacks, we’re reducing the automatic fight response that accompanies them.  A part of therapy work with many other clients also involves trying to widen this window of tolerance.  This is sometimes happening explicitly and we might talk about it openly, but more often it happens implicitly as we go about other things, and so I put it in a big box called “what actually happens in therapy while we are busy doing other things”.  

Through talking about emotionally charged experiences we gradually develop our ability to hold uncomfortable feelings in awareness and to begin to share them with others.  Some people have never been able to do this, having had to deactivate the innate drive we are born with to seek attachments with people and share difficult feelings.  The skill has to be learned (or relearned).  In therapy, one aim is to begin to see difficult situations and dangerous emotions as being understandable, shareable, and changeable.  We might then feel less trapped, less prone to the ‘psychic-equivalence’ of equating our negative feelings or negative self-talk as iron-clad ‘facts’ about either the world or ourselves.  We start to have options as to how to react, and this can be encouraged by experiments in between sessions too. A better ability to reflect on our experience allows us to recognise that our internal world is not the same as external reality, and it becomes easier to put some distance between triggering events and our reaction to them.  With this flexibility, triggering situations that once overwhelmed our nervous system can begin to come more under control. 

www.whitestonetherapy.com 

[offlawsandfaith]

The Making of a Mother

I’ve always been fascinated with birth stories. Each one so unique, such a different yet similar experience & in some way it’s kind of a mother’s war story. A badge of honor if you will. It’s no secret that having a baby is one of the most terrifying, painful, beautiful, exciting things a woman can go through. & just from experiencing it myself, words can’t articulate what it’s like. But, I’ll try. Here’s my war *cough* I mean, birth story. Read on if you’re interested, otherwise I won’t be offended if you hit the close button, because this will probably be long.

My pregnancy was not the easiest. Morning sickness in the first trimester. If Kody made eggs, the smell would send me running as fast as I could to the bathroom. Still not a fan of them. & wow, tired doesn’t even begin to cover it. Is a 7 o’clock bedtime too early? It sure wasn’t then. By the 2nd it was easier, more energy, those first flutters of baby movement, first ultrasound. Everything becomes much more real, specially when you feel that first firm kick to the bladder. Enter week 28. Ended up admitted into the hospital with dehydration & pre-term contractions 2 minutes apart. We honestly didn’t know if our little man was going to make his debut then & we were absolutely petrified. As great as our doctors were, 28 weeks was no where near ideal for his arrival & also dangerous. 3 days in the hospital, IV drugs that made me feel like the walking dead & strict orders to drink lots of water & I was in the clear & released. I had a few more stints in the hospital with pre-term contractions after that, but no where near as terrifying as that day.

Fast forward to week 38, Friday morning, September 8. Woke up about 7 with horrible cramps & knew immediately I wasn’t going into work that day. Called all the necessary people, grabbed my hospital bag & my aunt packed me in her car & off we sped to Spectrum. Benefits of Kody working downtown was that he beat us there, had the wheelchair out & ready as soon as we pulled up. Got checked in, looked at, white knuckling the hospital bed sheets as contractions rocked my world & sure enough, “Dialated to 5, you’re having a baby today.”

Now I had every intention of doing this labor without an epidural. I had issues with low platelets during my pregnancy as well so an epidural wasn’t a garuntee for me anyways. I did take advantage of the Stadol, which makes you feel like you’ve had one too many at happy hour & kills the pain for a WAY too short 20 minutes. & you’re only allowed 3 doses. What kind of sick joke as that? I pride myself on a high pain tolerance, but this... this pain is indescribable. My whole entire body was shaking violently while I tried to handle the pain. Most of the time I just clung to Kody & tried to ride the contractions out. I finally caved & got the epidural when I was dialated to 9 & felt like I couldn’t take it anymore. The anesthesiologist said he’s never seen someone hold so still during such intense contractions. All I knew was I had heard horror stories of women getting paralyzed from a faulty epidural & I would be damned if that happened to me because I couldn’t hold still. 10,000 chainsaws tearing into my uterus or not. It took beautifully, only needed to press the dosage button once & the next thing I knew it was time to push.

This part got a bit scary. My doctors & nurses were fabulous & kept the environment very relaxed & even had me laughing a couple times. But somewhere in there I heard the words “baby’s heart rate dropping” & that’s enough to induce panic in any soon to be mom. Umbilical cord was pinched in the birth canal so I knew I had to make sure he got out soon. & I was so determined they ended up strapping an O2 mask to my face because I damn near passed out from pushing so hard. In the end I tore & was cut & ended up having one hell of a repair but Noah was born with a perfect little cry. Placed on my chest & taken away 10 seconds later from the NICU team because he was still grey & breathing was labored. Meconium & he had inhaled amniotic fluid. This is not an uncommon problem, but when it’s not dealt with immediately it can be fatal to a tiny newborn. He was rushed to NICU while the doctors worked on me, & what I expected to be an emotional, heartwarming experience actually had me shutting down with fear. The next 2 hours was a blur of scrubs, medical equipment & loved ones concerned faces but I barely registered any of it. Kody was my rock this entire time, never leaving my side & handeling everything with such calm, I fell in love with him so much more that day.

Noah’s chest x-rays came back clear of meconium. But he was kept on a ventilator & tube fed for a day & a half. I knew these things were assuring my son would get to come home happy & healthy but seeing him like that shattered my heart a million times over. Leaving him to go eat or sleep was devastating & I cried more in those couple days than I probably have in my entire life. He was eventually weaned from everything as was able to be discharged at the same time I was as a happy, healthy 6lb 8oz baby boy. The day they told me that felt like the weight of 1,000 suns was lifted off my shoulders. We strapped this tiny human into his carseat, probably took us a good hour as first time parents, nervous to get it exactly right, & brought our son home.

Which leads us to where we are now. A 5 month old, 16lb baby boy rocking in my lap. Laughing, rolling, discovering his toes, & filling us in ways we didn’t know we were empty. I became at peace with every single thing I’ve ever gone through in my life, good or bad because it all lead me here. To holding this perfect innocent life in my arms, blue eyes like daddy & dark hair like his mom.

He is our soul in human form. & my war story ends in victory in every way.

[iceprincesseu]

[incorrect squad quotes]

(99% CONFIRMED)

Yixing: you’re cute

Hyorin: what

Yixing: what

Hyorin: i’m kidding i heard you, when are we getting married

~

Jongdae: you made me watch all 8 Harry Potter movies. I don’t even like Harry Potter.

Hyorin: that’s ridiculous, you love Harry Potter! You’ve seen all 8 movies!

~

Tao: wanna bang?

Tao: haha *hang, stupid autocorrect!

Sanghee: this is a verbal conversation

~

Saehyun: hey hyorin, how was your weekend?

Hyorin: good! I watched tv for 14 hours

~

Hyunjae: so saehyun’s a sleep talker

Aejung: yeah?

Hyunjae: “mitochondria is the powerhouse of the cell”. Right. In. My. Ear. AT 3 AM.

~

Sanghee: how’re you feeling?

Aejung: i’ve been experiencing a bad headache lately that seems to come and go…

Kris: *entering the room, wearing circular glasses* aejung!

Aejung: it’s back again

~

Sanghee: what’s the signal if something goes wrong?

Hyunjae: how about “oh shit”?

Sanghee: that’s good

~

Hyunjae: My boyfriend is too tall for me to kiss him on the lips. What should I do?

Hyorin: Tackle him.

Aejung: Kick him in the shin.

Saehyun: Punch him in the stomach. Then, when he doubles over, kiss him.

Jaehyung: NO TO ALL OF THOSE. JUST ASK ME TO LEAN DOWN.

~

Hyorin: what if the “g” in “gif” is silent?

Aejung: Hyorin please go to sleep

Hyorin: what gif i don’t want to?

Aejung: fu-

~

Tao: wait you like me??

Tao: for my personality??????

Sanghee: i know i was surprised too

~

Hyorin: tell her about the birds and the bees.

Saehyun to Hyunjae: they’re disappearing at an alarming rate

~

Yixing: sorry i'm late, i was doing things

Hyorin: *enters the room, noticeably disheveled, smug* i’m things

~

Hyunjae: i’m stone cold. unbreakable. a true ice princess.

Jongdae: (smiles)

Hyunjae: i’m melting. breaking. a real mess.

~

Sanghee: literally name one thing that’s better than a dog.

Hyunjae: TWO dogs.

Sanghee: SHIT, YOU’RE RIGHT!

~

Kris: (throws rocks at aejung’s window)

Aejung: (loudly) you have your phone for a reason!

[loud crash noise]

Aejung: (opening her window) DID YOU THROW YOUR FUCKING PHONE AT THE WINDOW?

~

(hyunjae as a supermarket cashier)

Hyunjae: (over the intercom) to the owner of the beige toyota sienna, your window is open and your golden retriever smiled at me. Please come to cash register 7 and tell me what his name is, because i love him.

~

[loud crash in the background]

Saehyun: what WAS that?

Baekhyun: uh...my shirt fell

Saehyun: sounded heavier than a shirt.

Baekhyun: ...i was in it.

~

Aejung: I don’t get paid enough for this.

Luhan: For what?

Aejung: (vague hand gesture that encompasses everything)

~

Hyorin: I can’t believe we’re at Hogwarts!

Jongdae: ...no, that’s Buckingham Palace.

Jongdae: Hogwarts is fictional. Do you know that?

Jongdae: It is important to me that you know that.

~

Sanghee: Has anyone seen my boyfriend Kyungsoo?

Person: what does he look like?

Sanghee: (tearing up) ..Beautiful.

~

Aejung: Do you want to talk about your repressed issues?

Hyunjae: No, that’s why they’re repressed.

~

Sanghee: Get me your finest fruit drink, please.

Waiter: Well, we have our 1979 pinot-

Sanghee: No no no. The good stuff.

Waiter: Miss, our wines are-

Sanghee: The brand name stuff. Caprisun.

~

Saehyun: (wakes up next to Joonmyun everyday)

Saehyun: (everyday, softly) ...holy shit…

~

Hyorin: i only take pictures of things that are beautiful.

Hyunjae: your entire camera roll is filled with pictures of Yixing.

Hyorin: exactly.

Hyunjae: fair enough.

~

Baekhyun: (about Sanghee and Tao) You guys are so cute together!

Sanghee: Baek, I’m cute together with everybody.

~

Aejung: in light of everything in the past week, you may cuddle me for 4 to 5 seconds.

Kris: 45 SECONDS???

Aejung: NO! 4 TO 5 SECONDS!

~

Yixing: Do you have the time?

Hyorin: For you, Xing? Are you joking? I would always make time for you. My time is precious but you are more so. Yixing, you… you are a shining star in a sea of darkness. I would do anything for you.

Yixing: No, like, what time is it. But thank you.

~

Joonmyun to Jongin and Hyunjae: You talk as if your dogs are people.

Jongin: Of course.

Hyunjae: They’re better than any other people we know.

~

Jongin: You look stressed.

Saehyun: Thanks, it’s the stress.

~

Hyorin: (gets papercut)

Hyorin: i welcome death with open arms

~

Hyorin: Saebaby, what color are Joonmyun’s eyes?

Saehyun: the warm chestnut of well-worn leather when the sun comes out after days of rain.

Hyorin: what?

Saehyun: i said brown.

~

Sehun: there’s a lot of love in the room!

Hyunjae: not for you, sehun.

~

Sanghee: Me and Tao? I don’t see it.

Aejung:

Sanghee: Oh god, now I see it.

Aejung:

Sanghee: Aejung, I can’t stop seeing it. 

~

Kris: Come on, I didn’t drink that much last night.

Joonmyun: you were flirting with Aejung.

Kris: So what? She’s my girlfriend.

Joonmyun: You asked her if she was single…

Joonmyun: ...and almost cried when she said she wasn’t.

~

Aejung: I love it when you’re drinking citrus drinks and you can’t feel your tongue and your entire face starts sweating it’s so cleansing!

(2 days later)

Aejung: Guys, the doctor says I’m allergic to citrus.

~

Sehun: Can the sarcasm.

Hyunjae: Please. I always use fresh sarcasm, never canned.

~

Hyorin: If we are walking together, please take into consideration my tiny legs. I can’t keep up with you. Please think of my tiny legs, I don’t want to be jogging to keep up with your leisurely stroll, you TITAN.

Chanyeol: Just get a pair of roller skates and hang onto my sleeve, we don’t have all day.

~

Jongdae: What are you thinking about, Jae?

Hyunjae: I just thought about how glad I am that dogs can’t read the “no dogs allowed” signs.

Jongdae: ...why?

Hyunjae: They’d feel sad and left out and I don’t want that.

~

Kris: Name one thing you want to try in the bedroom.

Aejung: Getting a full 8 hours of sleep.

~

Hyunjae: Every time you talk, I get this warm and fuzzy sensation inside of me. It’s bothering me so stop.

Jongdae: Warm fuzzy sensation? Oh my God, Hyunjae, do you have feelings for me?

Hyunjae: What the fuck is a feeling?

~

Sanghee: (rolls over in bed and whispers softly to Aejung)

Sanghee: I ate 75 chicken nuggets today.

~

Saehyun: I decided to come out and enjoy nature.

(a few minutes later)

Saehyun: (sees a bee and runs away screaming)

~

Kris: In your opinion, what is the height of stupidity?

Saehyun: How tall are you?

~

Hyunjae: You know everything about me?

Minseok: Yep.

Hyunjae: What am I allergic to?

Minseok: Soy products and the full spectrum of human emotion.

~

Joonmyun (about Kris): You beat him in a dance off?

Aejung: No. I destroyed him.

~

Hyorin: Yixing and I slept together.

Sanghee: And?

Hyorin: I thought you would be a little more shocked.

Sanghee: Oh, sorry.

Sanghee: (in a shocked voice) And?!

~

Saehyun: Are you flirting with me?

Baekhyun: Have been for the past year, but thanks for noticing.

~

Aejung: That pokemon looks cool!

Hyorin: Sure, but its attack stat is shit and not to mention its ability makes it worthless. Its move pool is so shallow, it can’t even learn good tms. Not to mention that it’s 4x weak to fire.

Aejung: He goes swoosh swoosh and it’s cute.

~

Jongin: I’m sorry to have to tell you this, but-

Hyunjae: You’re getting an atrocious haircut again?!

Jongin: What? No!

Hyunjae: Oh, thank God. My heart's still racing. (Places Jongin’s hand on her heart) Feel that? That’s fear.

~

Sanghee: I’m going to the store, do you guys need anything?

Hyunjae: Food

Aejung: Sleep

Saehyun: A cure for exhaustion

Sanghee: Yeah I got like...2 dollars.

~

Joonmyun: When you said “magical in bed” this isn’t exactly what I was exp-

Saehyun: (holds up 8 of hearts) is this your card?

Joonmyun: (in awe) Holy shit.

~

Hyorin: I’m Yixing trash.

Yixing: As someone who cares deeply about the environment, I am obligated to pick you up. Is 6 okay?

~

Hyunjae: (in a sing song voice) You like him~

Aejung: I just think Kris is kind of alright, it’s not like I’m up all night thinking about him, okay?

(Later that night, 4 am)

Aejung: well fuck.

[parniarazi]

questioning the rules of the ‘culturescape’

It’s hard to believe summer is nearly halfway over, and so is the year. In terms of spiritual growth, I’ve felt more inspired and open than ever and had some new thoughts/ideas/knowledge I thought I’d share. I’ve been diving into my summer reading, meditating for 5-10 mins almost everyday, journaling a few times a week, as well as microdosing with acid over the last month. All of these things have helped me learn an incredible amount about the world around and inside me. Most of all they made me realize that the norms and beliefs society enforces are total bullshit. I mean, especially as an avid and educated feminist, I mostly knew this, but I didn’t realize how much I was still subconsciously following society’s rules (or as the author of the book I’m currently reading calls them, brules - bullshit rules). On some levels, I feel exhausted to be living in a world that constantly feels like it’s clashing against me. But I am also grateful to live outside of the bullshit of the ‘culturescape,’ the mainstream, whatever society has decided is normal and acceptable and good. I see it consuming people around me, I see selfishness, self-hatred, and feelings of never being good enough in my coworkers, in friends, in my parents. I see un-awakened and unconscious people all around me, who live by the rules, who are full of fear, and who are entirely unaware of the higher state of being that can come with something as simple as shifting your thoughts. 

I’m definitely not perfect, and like I mentioned, I am still in the process of becoming aware of + unlearning a lot of bullshit that’s been ingrained into my mind. Here are some specific brules I felt inspired to share/debunk as I’ve been expanding both spiritually and intellectually. 

1. Drugs are bad. 

Who decides what is classified as a drug or not? Does it make sense that a plant, an herb, can be illegal and severely punishable? While we have drugstores full of pills that are much worse for our bodies and minds? Do you remember being taught from a very young age to ‘resist drugs’ or ‘just say no’? Do you remember negative stigmas and stereotypes being connected to drug use repeatedly in media? So where does this belief that ‘drugs are bad’ come from? Is it an inherently, scientifically true fact? Or something you genuinely believe on your own or know to be true via experience? Or has it been ingrained in your mind by (possibly biased) outside sources? 

Using cannabis and LSD regularly has changed and improved my life in endless ways, it could be an entire separate blog post. Without these tools (which is what I see them as rather than drugs) I can elevate my consciousness, I can dig deeper into my own mind/soul, I can see the world in a more colorful and beautiful way, I can feel more deeply, I can shed anxiety and fear and pain. Of course, there are people who use these things as a way to numb their minds and bodies as opposed to using them to become more in tune with them. That is another mini-brule here: that drugs are an ‘escape from reality.’ Instead, they are most useful when used to see reality in a different way. There is no point in using these things and they can definitely become harmful if not used mindfully. They don’t help you ‘escape from reality,’ they show you a different level of it. These tools have helped me be better person, be more calm and make better decisions, decrease my anxiety, sleep better, connect with nature/earth, and open my mind to other states of reality that can exist outside of the ‘culturescape.’

2. Get a useful degree so you can have a good job so you can make lots of money so you can be happy. 

Imagine spending the majority of your life, from about age 18 to 65, doing something you have little to no interest in or passion for. This is absolutely insane, and a huge waste of your energy and gifts, to buy into. Yet sadly, the majority of people live this way. We all have something (in my case, many things) that call your soul, that move you, that give you a deeper sense of passion and meaning. Why should you stifle your natural gifts and interests with something that has little meaning to you and thus you will probably be mediocre at doing? It’s a little cliche and worn out, but it’s really hard to see people still constantly buying into this anyway. What’s the use in having a ‘good job’ and money if you spend the majority of your time doing something you dread? It’s really difficult to overcome this ingrained idea of what defines ‘success’ (money, power, status) and how we think this ‘success’ will directly bring happiness. It’s a trap, and it drains our world of the creative, caring, passionate minds we so desperately need. I have a lot of personal/family conflict around this issue, and I’m still working on finding my path when it comes to how I want to make money. But I do know buying into this brule is a lot more likely to lead to a mediocre life than to happiness. Question why you are studying a certain field or going into a certain career. Is it because it makes you excited and you love it? Or because it’s what you’re supposed to do to be ‘successful’ and ‘happy’?

3. Emotions are bad, they make you weak and lead to feeling hurt.

We’re taught to stifle our emotions, to not cry (especially if you’re a guy), to not ‘come on too strong’ when you like someone, to not allow ourselves to feel the very things that make us human. And that make life worth living. I’ve always thought that one of the most beautiful things about being alive and being human is our ability to experience such a vast spectrum of emotions. When I was younger (and to some extent even now) I found myself afraid of attachment, of liking someone too much, because I would just end of up hurt or rejected. Like many people, that bullshit belief held me back from creating deep and meaningful relationships, even if they would be temporary and maybe even end up causing some pain/loss. Emotions make people uncomfortable.  Actually, we’re conditioned to feel uncomfortable with emotions, both with ourselves and others. One of the things that made me fall in love with my boyfriend was the first time he cried in my arms about something that had been causing him pain and sadness. That release not only helped him, but it brought us closer and deepened our relationship significantly. It can be difficult and scary to feel emotional, it’s a whole lot easier to ignore our emotions, not talk about them, drink/use drugs, and pretend we’re fine. However, that will hold you back not only from experiencing your own humanity, but also from developing stronger and more meaningful relationships, from being present in your daily life, and from being your best in your work/learning. Let yourself feel overwhelmed - both on your good and bad days. Journal. Meditate. Talk about it. Let yourself cry, laugh too much, scream, sleep in, run, or whatever else your body is yearning to do. We are human. Embrace your full spectrum of emotions, let yourself feel deeply, it will only improve the quality of your existence and help you feel more at peace in the end. 

Sometimes we spend years learning and conforming to the rules, just to realize they’re hurting us and holding us back, and we still aren’t happy despite doing everything “right.” These are 3 major brules I’ve been seeing everyday around me, and I’ve been working on actively unlearning so I can be my most real, happy, and best self. Question everything around you. Question the ideas, beliefs, and norms you/your society hold. Dig deeper. Think for yourself. Find yourself by dusting off the bullshit rules and creating your own instead. 

[davidaolson]

The past is a place of reference, not a place of residence. ~Roy T. Bennett

With the sale of the family Summer Estate in Central Wisconsin in March of 2018, the second to last vestige of my childhood goes the way of the final Dodo bird clubbed over the head by a sailor for food. Death. Extinction. The last vestige is my childhood home, a red brick bungalow still housing my Mother. It is the saving grace connecting me to my personal history. A place I can visit and feel connected to a youth characterized by reckless stupidity, a youth experiencing more joy than any one person deserves.

This travel blog will be different than most I have written. It is an amalgamation of experiences occurring in chunks as small as one day up through a maximum of two weeks occurring over 45 years compressed into a single offering. It is the story of yesteryear, a memory filled yesteryear with my last memory painted a few yesterdays ago. I am trekking deep down memory lane living mostly in the time before mobile phone, the land before internet, the world before nearly every human was connected by six degrees of separation.

This blog is longer than most and possibly too long to keep the average person’s attention. I am ok with that. I wrote it for myself as both a celebration of 45 years and a cathartic experience to release my pain into the collective consciousness so to begin the healing process.

I had a rudimentary plan for the farewell blog one that saw me deep dive into a sea of memories, study all the offerings, then surface with those carrying the weight of ages for sharing. It did not work out that way. I fell into labyrinthian memory corridors without Ariadne to guide me back stumbling my way through a memory fog bumping into remembrances I had completely forgotten existed, people whose faces I hadn’t thought about in decades who may no longer be breathing.

The vignettes contained herein are those that allowed me to see them giving me comfort during a challenging time. They chose me. Each is both an anchor grounding me in my youth and a springboard into my unknown future. The two may appear to be conflicting, anchoring and springing, but they are harmonious dualities, complementary. This duality is not good balanced with evil as in the Western tradition but the harmony of Mother and Father, yin and yang. To maintain the harmony of my subconscious, I laid them out in the same sequence they spoke to my soul.

Many remembrances echoed from the depths of forgotten time during the drive from my home in Chicago the Friday before my last ever visit. I foresee no reason to ever return. Long solo drives are enjoyable. I set the cruise control a nickel over the posted speed, slide into the right lane, settle into a mantra of sunflower seed, preferably David & Sons brand, eating…pop a handful into my mouth, crack individual shells and eat the seed, spit the saliva drenched shells into an empty soda bottle. Repeat.

It is a meditative process where my mind wanders only interrupted when a thought I want to explore further is spoken into Siri for a note. Most of the time, the notes are garbled, sometimes too much to be of later use. Or a song reaches through the speaker and grabs my attention but I always fall back into my sunflower seed rhythm where my mind, uncluttered, senses the echoes before they become full-fledged remembrances.

The drive is 250 miles and takes four hours, three and a half if you push it, four and a half when taken leisurely. My dad had the ability to stretch it into a solid eight hours. Granted, the speed limit was 55 in those days, a number he held tightly. Eight hours inside a van full of camping gear, six restless kids, a dog or two, and not a lick of air conditioning to abate the August heat.

We always left just before dawn. The first stop was a mile away for coffee and donuts. The next stop 90 miles later for a restaurant breakfast at the Clock Tower in Rockford followed by another 120 miles and lunch in the horror show known as the Wisconsin Dells. Then 25 miles up highway 13 to friendship for yet another cup of coffee, at which time the passengers were ready to stage a violent revolution, before the final 19 miles to the land.

Some events echoed clear as the day they happened and I was able to write with assuredness as if I was taking notes from a film reel playing in real-time. Others were apparitions, shadows steeped in thick fog allowing near blind glimpses leaving a trail of unresolved emotion I tripped over skinning my soul.

I am not sure if any vignette is my singular experience, a fusion of various experiences, or recitations of other’s experiences that sublimated into my mind taking up residence as my own first-person stories. My understanding of reality rises and falls with the color of the sun, waxes and wanes with the phases of the dark moon, fluctuates with the intonation of the voices carried in the wind. Their essence remains if not the exact facts. Facts don’t speak whole truths anyway. Statistics are facts and most of them are used to support damn lies. There are still other incidents so hidden by the mists of time, if I don’t receive the help of others to clear the clouds, they may never again illuminate my personal history. I weep for those losses.

And so it goes…

The End is Nigh

At 4:41 pm CST on Sunday, 04 March 2018, the siblings, siblings-in-law, and the grandchildren received a group text telling us the sale closing on the cottage was imminent and our help was needed to ready the house for the buyer. My first tear fell the next day during a flurry of texts planning a final visit to clear out the home, gut the fish and leave it for dead, slip a thin, sharp knife in the soft underbelly of my youth ripping forty-five years from stem to stern scraping the vitality of youth to be tossed in a pile of decomposing offal. I am officially old.

When Mom informed us last Fall it was being sold, I was indifferent. I had not been there for five years and that last time was only for one night on the way back from a mountain biking trip a couple hours further North. I did not want to drive the remaining four hours home to Chicago and I was with a hot lass. Drive home in the dark or spend the night in a wooded forest cabin with the hot babe? It was an easy decision. It was a decision that made itself. As for future trips, well, none were anywhere on my horizon. I have come to enjoy international travel and prefer to spend my leisure time immersed in unfamiliar cultures that bombarded the senses and obliterate my understanding of reality.

The Summer Estate had become the dying limb on a tree, a drain on the financial health of my mother. Better to sever the limb than allow it to siphon off resources needed elsewhere. Since my dad passed, it had become too much for her to maintain. She valiantly held on to it for 10 years thanks in large part to my brother-in-law who helped her open and close it year after year. Looking back, I have to say he is somewhat a hero.

We dubbed the upcoming event a reunion, a euphemism keeping the pain at bay for as long as possible. The first stage of grief is denial. The euphemism helped me deny the coming loss for a couple of weeks. The actual reunion/cleaning day was filled with stories, multiple trips to the dump, laughter, photographs, and a tribute. It is amazing how pain can be dissipated when it is countered with love.

What can we throw away?

Lunch

Cleaning the Main Quarters

Paul Bunyan

Boat is Frozen

Cleaning the Shed

Worky, worky

The Fire Pit

The Fire Pit & Home Made Benches

HUH???

Dousing the Flames

The Address

Herstory/History/Gender Fluidstory/Gender Neutralstory

The land, a small heavily wooded pine and oak copse within scent range of the freshwater lake, was purchased in the Winter of 1973. It was young and vibrant then but, like us, it aged not so gracefully. Today, there are fewer trees in the area. A blight took many of the oaks. Pine trees were removed to build the house and by others purchasing lots on either side of ours. What felt like a forest now feels closer to a suburban subdivision.

It was bought at the behest of my dad’s best friend, Bob, who had his own plot a short traipse through the tick-infested woods. I didn’t know it at the time but Bob, the consummate outdoorsman and storyteller, was destined to become a second father figure to me. After my father died, Bob’s stories unwound from the reel of his mind while we fished the Canadian wilderness brought my dad back to life. He repeated the same stories endlessly yet I never grew tired of hearing the tales.

I grew to love Bob, was distraught when his children didn’t tell us he passed in 2017 until months after he was laid to rest and then it felt like an afterthought. I would surely have made the 500-mile round trip to pay my last respects and immerse in communal grief which disperses the pain so no one person has to carry the entire burden. Instead, I cried alone, bore the loss alone. One only gets so many fathers in life, for some the count is none. I was lucky to have had two.

I was 12 when the land was purchased, immersed in little league baseball as were my brothers. The Vietnam conflict was still littering bodies of both sides over the lush jungle landscape pockmarked by unrelenting bombs dropped from heaven. I can’t recall if my father and I had already had the disagreement we never resolved about the moral corruptness characterizing America’s role in the fiasco. We existed at opposite ends of the political spectrum. Even in my 50s, when most people seem to have long ago navigated toward conservatism, I have not budged an inch toward the center. To be so would make me feel complicit with the evil perpetrated by our lying government. The war never directly influenced our lives. We kids were simply excited to know we would vacation in Wisconsin where we could fish and swim.

In the beginning, we tented. We built a compound, the Olson compound. Three tents set up in u-shape, a sleeping tent on the left with eight double bunked cots and thick cotton, brown sleeping bags. The storage tent lived in the center with the portapotty. The final tent, the screen tent for eating insect free to the right. A canopy connected all three tents ensuring we could walk between them and keep dry during the rains. One just had to avoid the rivulets falling between the gaps. Every night before bedtime, the tent was sprayed with Raid to kill off the creepy crawlies.

One late night, we heard scraping at the cooler in the food tent. We peeked out with a flashlight and saw a skunk trying but failing to pry open the cooler. We immediately turned off our light and quieted into to bed for fear of startling the skunk and suffering uplifted tail umbrage. Another time, a brother who will remain nameless…for now, jumped up on a cooler and screamed when a tiny mouse ran through the screen tent.

The worst tent vacation ever occurred the year it rained every day for the entirety of our two-week vacation only clearing up after we broke camp and started driving home. During sunny weather, the sleeping bags were hung to dry every day on lines stretched between the trees. Sleeping bags absorb body moisture. Two weeks of rain meant the bags never dried. We were forced to sleep in increasing dampness the entire vacation. The lodge, too far for us city folk to walk, had 25¢ showers along with ice cream, soda pop, a pool table where quarters near the slot reserved the next game, and pinball machines on the lower level. It was a nice place to hang out during the rains.

I love tenting. In the old days, they were massive canvas beasts. Heavy. They required many aluminum poles fitted together, anchor ropes without which the structure would collapse, were cumbersome and required multiple people to erect. Consequently, we only enjoyed ‘The Land’ for a couple of weeks each year with those two weeks squeezed between the end of baseball season and the beginning of football season. Then came the luxury of the camper. The camper rolled in during the Spring, was taken away to storage, per the property owners association rules, in the Fall. The relative ease of a camper increased our time spent at the land.

The ultimate abode was a small, prefab house was brought in two halves on flatbed trucks and slapped together. The back half was two bedrooms and a bathroom, the front half a combination kitchen and living room. Ever the builder, my dad soon added a deck. Years later he removed the deck and built a new one with a large screened in porch. I loved the porch. It allowed me to sit outside on those nights too rainy for the campfire. The patter of rain while reading is comforting. Also with the house came TV. It always felt blasphemous to have the contraption spoiling the wilderness.

Having a house meant visits increased significantly for all of us. Being older with our own vehicles to travel as did the allure of the lower than Illinois drinking age. Wisconsin allowed 18-year-olds to purchase alcohol, the same age as military service. I always thought it hypocritical that one is believed adult enough at 18 to die for the country in a war but too immature to consume alcohol. I should not be too surprised. 18-year-olds drinking can’t put nearly as much money into the silk-lined jock straps of politicians as does the kickbacks they get from the war machine.

There were many party weekends in Wisconsin where the music played from early morning until well into the night. Somewhere there is a music video we created with dancing. People were on the porch and on the roof. I would love to see it again. The music continued for years…until some people wheeled in their own camper next door and complained that we were too loud for their younguns. It did not matter to them that their kids were running around screaming while many of us tried to sleep in the morning.

Ironically, as the years wore on, I slept in the house less and less often. It was too crowded, too noisy. And I enjoyed sleeping outdoors. Instead of the house, I popped up a tent with the opening directly looking toward the fire pit. My tents were the much lighter nylon versions, stand-alone with a screen roof for ventilation that could be set up by a single person in less than ten minutes and in the dark. My preferred bed was a comfortable Thermarest mattress and a down-filled sleeping bag. I slept well in the cool of those nights.

The Memory Vignettes

I wish I had chronicled the decades bounded by ownership of ‘The Land’ become ‘Summer Estate’ allowing me to read back and relive the many life-enhancing, some life-defining moments experienced on that 1/2 acre. Alas, my drive to write had not yet kindled into the raging fire it is today which sees me scribbling every morning. There are some moments that emoted into my mind leading up to the weekend and while we, as a family, emptied the house. They surfaced like bubbles when my mind was fixated on the road heading home forcing me to stop before the memory dissipated or call out to Siri to capture fragments. A few times tears rolled down my cheek. Still, I catch myself tearing up for memories lost.

He knew that forgetfulness was the most painful death. ~Jaume Cabré

The Sacred Bonfire

The indigenous peoples (is it right to call them Native Americans being they thrived on these lands long before they were dubbed America by European invaders?) made/make use a sweat lodge in purification ceremonies to prepare for divine intervention and God’s blessings. It is one of the seven sacred rituals of the Lakota people, a spiritual experience reconnecting participants with their oneness, with the universe, with nature.

Similarly, we had nightly bonfires…weather permitting. The quest to build a raging pyre with a single match was a skill a few of us mastered. It meant spending significant time with the hatchet splitting pine logs into slender, tender splinters. These are set in the middle on top of a loosely crumbled wad of dry newspaper. Next, a slightly larger, mini-teepee of thicker pine slices is built around the flimsy strips forming a chimney which, when the fire starts, pulls in oxygen from below to feed the flame. When the fire is strong enough larger, quartered pine logs are added and finally, the dense oak logs which burn hotter and longer ensuring an outstanding fire for many hours requiring minimal care and feeding.  The other methods, a blow torch, a cup of white gas, were easier but much less satisfying.

We shared hours upon hours, hours galore in a lodge made of smoke, smoke keeping the raging mosquitoes at bay, buzzing vampires, seeking to hold a rave with our blood as the centerpiece of the revelry. Our blood, their sacred communion. We shared hours drinking under legal age, shooting the shit frequently until sunrise. The faces changed repeatedly over the years. Some visiting once, others regularly featured. A few now flash before my eyes, most are obscured by the mists of time. My soul weeps for those I have forgotten.

Bonfires were a time, a rare time in my life where I felt an intimate connection with people. I never wanted the nights to end and would hold on tightly to those moments fending off sleep as long as possible. I think I feared the isolation I would inevitably return to with the dousing of the flames. Dark of night, shadow descending upon my soul. I would stay awake with the anyone not ready for bed. Stayed awake until the sun rose and the birds burst into a conflagration of song, a chorus of mostly sopranos with some altos, the occasional tenor, the rare croaking baritone of a heron seeking an early breakfast, a cacophonous symphony lasting less than an hour then finally to bed once the sun shot its orange wad over the horizon.

I realize, now, the bonfire time evolved into a sacred ritual, a spiritual experience connecting me with the universe, with nature, with people. If I could reside in any one moment of my Wisconsin history, it would be fire time. Better yet, string them all together into one long film reel where I could jump in and live them over and over again.

Oh, what have they done to my song, ma?

The end of night ritual was for the boys to drain the weasel one final time directly into the fire. The logic was we were dousing it so it would not spread while we slept and start a forest fire. As Yogi says, “Only you can prevent forest fires.” The reality. We enjoyed the sound made when our streaming piss hit the white-hot embers.

On this trip, my son and my brother stayed at the house the Friday before the cleaning, braved the cold and slept in the cottage. Had I not already paid for a non-refundable hotel, I would have joined them. They built a fire which burned deep into the night and through our reunion time the following day. Our final act before climbing into our vehicles and driving away was to douse the flame…with snow. It made the same sound as pissing the flame into submission.

The Pissing Tree

When you are male, the world is not only your oyster, it is also your bathroom. Every tree, every nook, every cranny, every dying fire is a potential place to discreetly, if possible, obvious if necessary, let the dachshund out for a walk. We have the anatomy to take advantage of zipper fly clothing allowing the one-eyed snake to stick it’s head out and spit anywhere and everywhere without exposing the rest of the anatomy to prying eyes or, worse, biting insects. The more talented are able to write their name in the snow. My willy was once attacked by a mosquito. Shaft sting, not head probing. It was painful, mainly itchy requiring lots of hand time in the pants to relieve the irritation. There is an unwritten rule with men. Shaking it more than three times means you’re playing with it. There was a party in my pants. It’s not an experience I want to repeat.

When you live in tents and there are eight of you and half are little girls there tends to be a line for the portapotty. Worse, the portapotty is not tied to plumbing so must be manually emptied when full. It is a stinky job so it is advantageous to drain the vein in places other than the portapotty. What better place than the outdoors?

Outside the tents, a few yards into the woods, there was a natural clearing and a small tree, perhaps it was a deer bed during the fifty weeks we were not at the land. There was enough bramble ensuring we could not be seen from the road during the brightest part of the day nor from the screen windows in the tents. It was not too far that it was scary to walk into the woods at night for that final piss before crawling into the sleeping bag.

We all, the three boys and our dad, migrated to the exact same spot multiple times each day. It wasn’t planned more evolution along a common path. At the end of two weeks, The piss smell became daunting. The grasses had yellowed and the tree was wilting. It, the oak, never recovered and we returned to a standing cadaver the following year. On the plus side, it was fuel to feed our nightly bonfires.

Skinny Dipping

Before the house years, showers were only available at the lodge. If you were male a shower came in at $0.25. For the womenfolk, it was upwards of $5. The showers operated on a timer with incremental time added per quarter. Us dudes could get two showers in for that twenty-five cents while the girls carried in a bucket full of quarters.

But the lodge closed around 5 pm necessitating a shower before dinner or going to bed nasty sweaty. And as we aged and our bodies physically matured, a day of playing hard in the heat, we worked up enough sweat to fill that quarter bucket to overflowing. We boys were as rank as a half-eaten deer on the side of the road a week after it had been run over by a vehicle. The insect riddled, decaying deer smelled like perfume compared to teenagers.

What to do?

Take advantage of the freshwater lake, obviously. After dark, we would run down to the lake, out onto the small pier, disrobe and skinny dip in the pitch of night, skinny dip with a bar of biodegradable Ivory soap to clean ourselves without upsetting the fishies we would be catching the next days. An added benefit to Ivory soap is it floats so we could throw it to the next body and without fear of losing it in the depths.

In the early years, the only light was thirty yards away, a back porch light attached to the lucky sods who owned the house butting right up to the water. The light was just bright enough to see what we were doing but not so bright that our birthrights were readily visible. Then the house was sold, the new owner put a streetlamp style light right at the water’s edge. It was bright, a sun on a giant corn stalk. Glaringly white. Intrusive. Still, we swam at night so as not to stink and for potential viewing pleasure.

Our skinny dipping, sometimes, was co-ed, so the new light promised advantages for a boy with raging hormones. This was pre-internet so porn was not ubiquitously available on the yet to be invented mobile phones. The only time we saw hooters was when one of our friends happened upon an old Playboy or Penthouse and were kind enough to share.

My sisters had some hot teenage girlfriends. Even the not so hot friends had shapely girl parts. So, I was hoping, we boys were hoping while swimming sans clothing our eyes would enjoy a flesh feast.  This was in the pre-pube shaving days so it was unlikely we would have seen much more than a black beaver patch glistening in the moonlight. Still, we played tricks like throwing the soap just out of reach and a little high so a girl might get caught up in the moment and reach exposing some forbidden skin. Perhaps, one would climb out of the lake ‘Birth of Venus’ like and their long hair would slip exposing boobage. Nothing. Not a once. The girls were much to smart for the boys. Girls are much smarter than boys.

To my teenage frustration, I never did see side boob or a perky nipple or, the holy grail, the furry little kitty. God knows I tried. The only clams I fondled were of the non-bearded variety laying just beneath the sand filtering small organisms and algae from the water. Those I threw along the surface of the water watching them skip with the aplomb of a smooth rock.

Losing The V-Card

The romantic in me would love to say I lost my virginity on a Wisconsin beach by the light of a full moon with an incredibly hot babe as we lay legs immersed in the gently rolling waves, that I busted-a-nut in a wild country girl with the leg strength to crush a mechanical bull in one of those honky-tonk saloons and emerged from my boyhood chrysalis into a fully fledged man. But it would not stand up in a court of truth. Fantasy? Yes. Reality? Not even close. Well, I did come close once and only once. Sigh. Double sigh.

She was either a year-round local or a Summer girl spending the months between the end and start of school at her parent’s lake home. I forget which. Their multi-story home was built on a lot with direct access to water. We had to walk a couple of blocks from our place to see the lake. My mom had a dread fear of people drowning so wanted ample distance to ensure safety. Little did she know we frequented the lake unsupervised many a time.

Her family had motorcycles that we rode, illegally, in a large depression across highway 13. She and I were on the same bike. Me pretending to be in control despite rarely being on a motorcycle while she sat behind with arms around my waist, a setup causing me to tingle in the loins. These were the days I was still immortal. Helmets were not mandatory riding attire as they became when I eventually purchased my own street bike decades later. We went down once. The rear time slid sideways in the loose sand on a decline and we eased down our legs still wrapped around the bike.

The depression in which we were riding was clear-cut in the forest that was in the process of being dredged later to be filled with river water eventually becoming the bottom of Lake Arrowhead where decades later I took my son fishing for the ubiquitous bluegill. The lake homes surrounding Arrowhead tend to be larger than those built around our Lake Camelot, also a manmade lake, with the whole area feeling more upscale. But those homes came much later.

Her name was Karen. My friends, Bob’s kids, year-round residents, referred to her as Karen QF. The QF standing for Quick Fuck which, I was told, meant she was quick to fuck not too fucking quick to catch for a fuck nor having jackhammer hips making the act of fucking literally quick. She may truly have been quick to fuck but I wasn’t quick enough to fuck…her. I waited one day too long to make my move only to be thwarted by nature’s cycles. My little man didn’t take a dip into the pink.

She was a brunette, a long-haired brunette with brown eyes. Perhaps the frustration with not hitting a home run is why I am still attracted to brunettes tending toward raven black above all other hair colors. Though, the blues and purples and pinks are alluring. It may be that I never recovered from the strikeout and am still trying to make up for the one that got away by knocking as many as possible out of the park (hitting for sixes for cricket fans). Or, maybe the adage blonds have more fun is poppycock and it is the ravens that are ‘funner’ to play with. Whatever the case…I struck out….yet again.

One Is The Loneliest Number

As deep as I can see into the sootied waters of my past, I see a person more comfortable being alone or with a one or two others than in a group. A person craving human connection but keeping everyone at arm’s length for reasons I still don’t fully fathom. This was definitely a truth in my twenties. It may reach back further but time has yellowed many of those movies either from the effects of an aging brain or my soul protecting itself from needless pain.

These days, I get great satisfaction from alone time and seek it out with increasing hunger. Back in the day, it seems to be the natural outcome of me not being particularly socially adept or a foundational arrogance preventing me from seeing my own faults digging moats none dare cross. Perhaps, I did not realize I needed to change my ways to make connections or there are some reasons not yet dredged from my psyche. Most likely, a combination of many.

I was in my late twenties, a gorgeous evening. Of course, there was a fire with lots of drinking and talking and drinking. Family friends outnumbered family members which was often the case. I was mostly listening to conversations waiting for an opening to shine my brilliance before retreating back into my head. Or I was mesmerized by the ghosts floating up from the dancing flames becoming lost in my own thoughts, ensconced in a world no one, not even my then wife, was able to penetrate to any meaningful depth. Again the dichotomy…wanting to know and be fully known yet walling off anyone seeking understanding.

Years later I was dating a woman who shone a light on this same predilection. We were having a conversation over dinner and I remarked that I was pretty much an open book for the world to see. She stopped midmovement from putting a fork full of kimchee into her mouth and said, “Seriously? Almost all I know about you is surface. You never let me inside.” I stared back trying to hide my grinding teeth, my tell in times of stress. It wasn’t long after she decided seeing me was not worth her time. This tiger was unable to change its spots. I have since wondered if I subconsciously kept her at bay or there was simply nothing below the surface worth knowing. Was as shallow as the Platte River, a mile wide but only an inch deep?

Some of us went for a late night swim. Afterward, all but one returned to the house and the bonfire. The one being me.

I stretched out on the wooden pier listening to the night voices, insects, the purr of waves against the shore, watching the waning Moon against a blanket of stars. Millions of stars and solitary Moon, a celestial body without the ability to generate light so cursed to reflect the essence of Sun, a satellite revolving around Earth yet never touching her. A being in isolation.

My guard dropped allowing a crack for emotion to enter and implode. I felt the pain of isolation. Loneliness gnawed with the ferocity of the walleye beneath the black water clamping sharp teeth into unwitting prey sucked into a gullet where acids attacked and slowly dissolved the body. I pulled out my pocket knife. I always carried a knife. I carved the letters O-N-E into the pier weeping all the while. It was my code for one is the loneliest number I will ever be. A cry for help? Maybe.

Eventually, I went back to the house. I had been there for at least an hour and I don’t think anyone noticed. Did anyone even care? I can’t say. That is a question requiring vulnerability. I lacked the courage to be vulnerable. So, I grabbed a drink, never being a beer drinker it was probably a whiskey and seven-up, and pulled up a chair by the fire. I watched everyone, talking, laughing. I remember wondering if I was cursed to be Moon forever isolated from the stars and Earth.

Buried Kegs, Panty Hats, & Stinkweeds

The big Summer weekend at the land was Frolic Weekend in August. We usually planned an event spanning the weekend plus a day or so at either end. Driving home to Chicago on a Sunday evening meant heavy traffic especially at the toll booths which were still insatiable mouths feeding on quarters. The lodge hosted a party with music, beer, more beer, brats, beer, grilled corn, volleyball tournaments, ski shows, and beer. They had a penchant for selling alcohol to minors then washing their hands when those same minors were ticketed by the PoPo resulting in a return trip for a court date with parents. I always thought the two were in collusion. Money to the lodge from beer sales. Money to the city in fines.

A few of us guys went up early. The WAGS (wives and girlfriends) followed a couple of days later. My brother and a brother-in-law bought a keg and buried it in the sand to keep it cold. Only the tapper stuck above ground. There was cold beer at the fire, cold beer at lunch, cold beer at breakfast. The beer was cold until the keg was tapped out a day or so later. So, I’m told.  It was likely they purchased a second but I don’t clearly recall. If I was betting man, I would wager on yes.

The second night, the girls came up well after dark. When they arrived, we were seated around the fire drinking, cooked halfway to roasted by the flames and toasted by the alcohol. The brother and BIL were wearing women’s underwear, their women’s underwear on their heads. This was a day or two into their stinkweed contest so what greeted their girls was two stinky dudes wearing panty hats. Funny and repulsive at the same time.

Why stinky? The two of them, for some reason I will never grasp, decided they would have a contest to see who could go the most days without a shower or swimming or washing of any type. Day one, not a big deal. Day two, erm, they were given more than their normal share of personal space. By the third or fourth day, we couldn’t get near either of them and, I imagine, their ripeness offended their own nostrils. My brother caved at the behest of his girlfriend. The BIL won. He was officially the stinkiest of the stinkweeds.

Fishing & Other Animal Stories

Wisconsin stories would not be complete without animal stories. Animals, primarily scaly fish, were a huge (yuge) reason we boys were excited to visit The Land. For me the priority was fishing followed by swimming, I think. If not in the early years then soon thereafter as I grew increasingly fishing obsessed.

Hook, Line, & Sinker

Fishing. Ahh, fishing. We are a fishing family because of my dad’s friend Bob. The same Bob who talked my dad into buying the plot in Wisconsin. The same Bob who felt like a second father. Bob taught my dad to fish when he invited him on annual trips to Boulder Junction for Muskie and the Boundary Waters for monster pike. The love of fishing has moved through the generations. We are all connected by a proverbial stringer.

I remember hot days standing in the shallows casting toward a sunken tree for bass while everyone else splashed around. I remember setting overnight lines and running to the pier in the morning to see if we caught bullhead and, if so, were they still alive since they typically swallowed the hook deep into their stomachs. I remember fighting mosquitoes in the night while we fished for bullhead and were surprised by the rare walleye sometimes big enough to legally eat. I remember the sheer joy of catching tiny bluegill after tiny bluegill for hours on end. I remember fishing in the sticks with my brothers, a place near the start of the lake where the feeding river flooded a woodland drowning the trees leaving them naked carcasses and prime habitat for bass. It felt like we had traveled into pre-history. We became spooked when a few large Blue Heron took to air from dead branches looking like Pterodactyls on the wing hunting meat. I remember standing in the water fishing by the upper spillway later emerging with leeches on my legs that I scraped off with the knife always in my pocket. There are three fishing memories larger than all the others combined. They involve Pumpkinseeds, a Largemouth Bass, and a shit load of crappie.

Nine Inch Pumpkinseeds

My daughters were probably three and four when this memory was created. I had taken the two of them for a long weekend in Wisconsin for some Daddy-Daughter time. I was recently divorced and wanted to make sure they had ample daddy time now that I was not seeing them on a daily basis. The weekend necessarily included fishing time. I bought them each identical Orca reel fishing poles from Sportmart which were very easy for little ones to manage and inexpensive.

The weekend was overcast with intermittent rains meaning most of the time we were stuck in the house. We took advantage of a lull in the weather and walked down to the lake. Each of the girls wanted to carry the tub of worms. Rather than have a battle, I gave each their own worm to carry, a worm they petted as they walk. As was her norm, the younger said her knees hurt and she wanted to be carried.

I was already carrying the fishing poles, the worms, and a Mountain Dew so there was no space for her plus I wanted her to kick the habit of always whining until someone caved and picked her up.  At the time, she was frustrated because her hair was not very long. It was then I dreamed up a solution to both problems. I told her the more she walked the longer and faster her hair would grow. Her eyes lit up. And, by corollary, I told her if she walked backward it would get shorter. The plot worked and anytime she asked to be carried, I reminded her of walking and hair length. Carrying her soon ceased to be an issue.

They each caught a few small bluegills, the first fish of their young lives. Every fish caught inched the smile on their faces wider. Then we hit a slow patch and the girls began to lose interest. Suddenly, Sammy’s bobber was pulled deep, unlike the tittering from the smaller fish nibbled at the bait, and the pole was ripped out of her hands and pulled under water. I saw it flashing in the weeds and thrust my hand in to pull it out. I let her reel it in and she landed a Pumpkinseed. They are an aggressive member of the bluegill family with a shiny orange belly patch showing like a bursting sunrise. It measured nine inches from lips to tail. While dehooking and measuring, Stephanie also had a strong hit. She had a tighter grip on the fishing pole so there wasn’t a repeat of a pole in the water. She, too, landed a nine-inch Pumpkinseed.

The rain started so we packed up and headed back to the house. I carried everything to hurry them along in case the drizzle became a downpour. They walked with their faces up, mouths open catching raindrops while laughing hysterically.

A Not So Lucky Largemouth Bass

A few years later, I was fishing with all three kids. The girls and I were on the same pier they caught the Pumpkinseeds but Brian decided he would fish from the pier on our beachhead. He was highly coordinated so was already able to cast with ease and accuracy. It was difficult trying to manage all of them at once and attend to the inevitable snags, hook baiting, and removal of hooks set deep in the fish internals.

He called saying he was snagged and needed help. I looked over and saw the fishing tip bouncing with ferocity and immediately knew he had a substantially larger fish than the bluebill and perch we were landing. I ran over to the pier by which time he had walked off the pier and was standing on the shore. The monofilament, a 10-pound test, was stretched across the pier and the fish was still dancing. How the wood slats did not cut the line I will never know. I took him back onto the pier and helped him land his first Largemouth Bass.  I would normally throw the fish back into the water for future growth. But, it was the legal length and the kids wanted to eat it so I cleaned it and cooked it for a dinner.

If I was to hazard a guess at the same time he landed the fish, fishing set its hook deep into his soul. He has been an avid angler since that day.

A Shit Load of Crappie

Fast forward a decade. My son and I are fishing at the spillway. The spillway is a concrete structure funneling water from the upper to the lower lake. There is a constant flow of aerated water through the deep channel spilling into the lake. The depth varies from ten feet in the channel and becomes shallows once outside the concrete walls and the direct influence of the water flow. Thus the area has a variety of environments attracting many types of fish. It is a prime fishing spot.

Over a couple of nights, crappie were actively hitting on white plastic tubes. Other colors attracted a few but white was the primary color triggering their attack instinct. Once we mastered the proper technique, waiting until the second hit in a short sequence to set the hook, we would pull in one every few casts.

One evening, we headed out before dusk loaded up with bug dope to keep the skeeters off so we could fish in peace and carried an ample supply of sunflower seeds. We had a small tackle box of plastics with extra whites knowing white was the color of the day but included other colors just in case. Fish can be finicky and it pays to be prepared. I don’t know if there was some magic in the way the stars aligned or we just lucked into an aggressive school of hungry crappie. They hit like psychos for at least two hours. We were catching fish on most every cast. By the time the frenzy quelled, we had caught over 180 between the two of us. It was the most insane fishing experience of my life.

White Tails

There were White-Tailed Deer galore which we loved seeing…mostly. We were fishermen, not hunters, though big game hunting in Africa was a parttime fantasy of my youth along with being Tarzan swinging through the trees. We never participated in the annual Deer Hunt, the religion most common in Central Wisconsin. If you don’t hunt, the high priests will not allow you to be a congregant of the Most Holy Church of the White-Tailed Deer. Although, the will serve you venison communion hoping to make you a convert.

When I was older and driving on my own from the Dells to the house just after sunset, I counted 40 deer over a 40 mile stretch in the ditches along the road. And those were just the ones I saw. I can’t imagine how many were lurking just beyond the reach of the high beams. Each was a potential weapon of mass destruction if it was spooked and took flight across the road at precisely the moment I was cruising by. Wham! Bam! Thank You, Ma’am. Wham…car slams into the animal. Bam…extensive damage and likely totaling the vehicle. Thank You, Ma’am, for crashing through my window and crushing me into the seat so I didn’t fly through the window.

Ant Wars

It was a party weekend. We were in our twenties, upper for me. ‘Back when I was in Nam‘ Steve who was younger than me and never a pincushion for bullets fired by the Viet Cong from Soviet weapons but liked to use the tag was bored as was blonde Andrea, pronounced On Drea who had an unusually high voice and was not afraid of insects. It was a sunny morning, too late to still be snoozing in a tent heated by the sun, too early to be two-fisting beers around the campfire. What to do before the action begins?

Wisconsin is home to a plethora of insect life the worst being the vicious mosquitoes swarming in any bit of shade to butterflies flitting between flowers on the sloping side of the earthen damn separating Lake Camelot from Lake Sherwood. Steve was watching some ants he found and placed in the dished underside of a white frisbee. This intrigued Andrea and they watched together.

One of them thought it would be interesting to add other insects to the mix. The two of them found another ant species and placed them in the same frisbee. The two species each threatened by their other’s pheromones and emboldened by their own fought to the death. It was a microcosm of almost every self-important politician’s wet dream sending youth to die in a senseless war.

Turtling in Lake Sherwood

Lake Sherwood, the lower lake from ours was continually filled by the spillway. Think of a spillway as a drain in a sink where excess water falls into the pipes and those pipes emptied into a lower lake on the other side of an earthen damn. The waters were lower in elevation, protected from the wind by thick stands of pine trees and walls of land descending from the road beyond the trees to the lake level. These waters were shielded from the wind, tended to be placid, conditions conducive to rafts of weeds forming along the shore. A semi-secure haven for small fish, frogs, and turtles.

We saw the turtles while fishing. Sometimes they were sunning on a dead tree branch. If you cast near them, hey would quickly slide into the lake with nary a splash. Mostly, we saw tiny turtle heads, black with yellow lines, poking above the water their shell a shadow hovering just below the surface intimating a chimerical flying saucer. Something you think you see but are never quite sure it’s real or it’s size. They were too far from shore to reach with our short nets.

On a sunny afternoon, some of us boys dragged a boat over the dam and launched it into Lake Sherwood with the idea of catching a few. What to do with them after? Young boys tend not to think that far into the future.

Our tactic was to row toward a head and, if it didn’t dive outside our reach, throw the net over the top. It was a tactic catching naught but weeds, weeds we had to clean out of the net. Mostly, the turtle dove well before we were within reach.

Through trial and error, we learned if you looked straight at the turtle it dove early. If they did not see you staring at them, they lingered until we were closer. We revised our strategy to approach at an angle and to monitor them from the corner of our eyes. The better proximity allowed us to realize when threatened the turtles did not dive forward in the direction they were facing but moved backward, quickly turn around and swam down toward the bottom for safety.

But they were still too far to catch. We fastened the net to a pole. We then thrust the net into the water targeting behind and below the turtles. Using this final stratagem, we pulled a good dozen from the lake. We brought them back to our tent compound where they were kept in a large bin with enough water to cover them but not enough they could escape. A day or two later, we released them back into the lake.

I only ever remember turtling the one time. I don’t know why we never went again. Maybe because dragging a rowboat up the damn was difficult requiring a few of us to push and pull. I guess, the difficulty outweighed the fun.

Tweeties

There was a season in my life, I was into all things feathered including bird watching. I had binoculars, a spotting scope, and a recording of a screech owl. I would take early jaunts around sunrise when every bird ever born seemed to be singing in a grand chorus and sunset when they stopped hunting and went to roost until dawn. Each new bird spotted sent tingles down my spine and a tick mark in my birding book.

I used the screech owl recording a few times. I set up a tape recorder near a tree on the land and hit play. I would describe the sound as a staccato burst or a trill or a tremolo. Each segment lasted a few seconds. Had I not known who was making the call, I would not be able to identify if it was from a bird, insects, or some animal hidden from my view.

When you are prey, it behooves you to know when a predator is lurking. If not, talons are much more likely to pierce your body and your final vision is a hooked beak tearing at your innards. The birds knew the call meant danger. The forest sentinels, Blue Jays and others, flew in to spot the owl and attempt to shoo it into another territory. They ignored me and I was able to add a couple new entries to my growing list.

Being a bird fan, I collected feathers. My preference is to see a plume flutter from the sky and catch it before it touches Earth. But that has yet to happen. I found them occasionally and only rarely could identify the species. I still kept them for their delicate beauty. A couple of times, I found the plucked remains scattered after a predator feasted. This was how I collected the yellow-tipped tail feathers of a cedar waxwing discovered near it’s bloodied skull.

The surest way to find feathers is to monitor the sides of higher speed roads for those losing their lives to cars and trucks. I once found a deceased Turkey Vulture and took the entire wing. Driving North on Highway 13 with my daughter, I found the intact remains of a Grey Catbird. It was on the other side of the road forcing me to make a U-turn. It was freshly dead without stench or oozing liquids, not even blood marred the otherwise splendid grey body. I wanted a few feathers but my daughter wanted to bring it home and keep it as a pet. So, it made the trip back to Chicago with us sometimes in her young hands, other times in a plastic Ziploc bag. A couple of days later, body fluids were oozing into the bag and it received a proper burial behind the garage.

Crawdaddies

Fishing at night near our pier, we carried flashlights so we could bait the hooks and remove the bullhead without having their spiny fins stick us. Those fins were as sharp as needles requiring care when grabbing them or a towel in which to wrap them. The towels grew to stink like hell and were eventually trashed. They were strong fish and wiggling bodies could stick a spine deep.

With the flashlights, we discovered crawdads scouring beneath the pier and near the shore for morsels to fill their bellies. Crawdads also known as crayfish or crawfish, look like miniature freshwater lobsters down to the segmented tail used for explosive backward movement and pincer claws to grab food and feed themselves. They easily fit into the palm of our hands. Of course, we deemed them a must to catch them. Why? The same reason people take arduous hikes in the desert or climb mountains. Because they’re there.

The pincers can cut human skin so catching them requires care. The technique we devised was to slowly move the hand into the water behind the critter, place the index finger onto the carapace and press it into the sand. It seems their eyesight was very poor and they may react more to changes in water pressure than seeing our hands. Thus immobilized, thumb and middle finger picked it up. We were safe from the pincers which, limited by the exoskeleton, could not reach us. It didn’t stop them from trying and their claws flailed in the air. We tossed them into a bucket with their brethren. Once they were cooked and eaten with butter. I wasn’t there that time.

Other Notables & Wish To Have Seen

For a short while, there was a herd of captive Bison near the intersection of Hwy 13 and Hwy 73. I stopped to marvel whenever I drove by. They are massive animals, an anchor to the American past, the sacred beast of the plains Indians. Once almost hunted to extinction, they are making a comeback in pockets across the plains. I have long longed for a Buffalo blanket for cold nights in bed or lying in front of a fireplace. I never did find out if the owner of this small herd sold them.

In recent years, wolves and black bears made their way into Central Wisconsin. The one verified Wolf sighting I know of involved a collision between a Harley rider and a wolf on a country road late at night. Neither survived. Kind of ironic that a one percenter killed another one percenter. Black Bear are spotted North of Wisconsin Rapids usually by garbage dumps. One man’s trash another’s treasure. We never saw any down our way. Just knowing both large predators existed a stone’s throw from our vacation lot excited me.

On my final trip to the land, I saw a couple of early migration, sandhill cranes sporting russet caps reminding me that I was and will always be a ginger no matter if my hair blooms white. They were standing on the side of the road, perhaps a mating pair. Quite a few Hawks were perched in trees and on the wing. Seven to ten deer were in various states of decay in the ditches along the road. Wisconsin DNR no longer collects the deer when killed by vehicles. They scrape them from the road and toss them into the ditch where Nature will perform final absolution and let her many children purify the bones. It’s the same process I wish for my bones to be liberated from my body, my soul forgiven for the untold sins of humanity committed against Earth. The dead deer felt apropos to the theme of our final weekend.

Jaws

No history of the land would be complete without the Jaws story. Jaws the movie came out in the summer of 1975. Quite frankly, it was terrifying to all of us but none more so than middle brother. As was our tradition, we were at ‘The Land’ in August so the movie was very fresh in our minds. We were playing in a rubber raft near the pier. Every so often, we would purposely tip the raft causing us to fall into the water then start yelling Jaws, Jaws. The fearful brother swam to shore with the speed, if not the flair, of seven gold medal winner Mark Spitz. We tormented him with ‘Jaws’ for most of the trip.

The Final Curtain – So long, Farewell, Goodbye

Dad’s Closed Face Reel and Cork Pole

When all was said and done, the mementos spared the fire or excused a trip to the dump were stuffed into cars along with a lot of sentimental junk that will either gather dust in attics or be given to charity. I took nothing, wanted nothing. Not even one of my dad’s earliest fishing reels and the poles bearing the scars of fish fins and the hard edges of boats. The only mementos I hold sacred are the memories.

We all gathered around the fire pit for pictures, dad was present in a large photo and in our hearts. We sat on the benches we made from the scraps when the first deck was ripped out for the newer, grander, porch. There was the Dan/Diane love seat and the two larger benches we angled in the middle to ensure proximity to the fire from every seat. The three benches are at least twenty years old and still solid as the day we made them despite never cozying up indoors during the cold and wet seasons. I expect the next owner, not knowing their history, will either burn or consign to the trash heap. Come to think of it, those are the souvenirs I would have liked to bring home. I would like to have replicated the sacred bonfire in my backyard using a cast iron fire pit.

Mom brought some of my father’s ashes in a vial for a closing ceremony. She spread some on the land itself in close proximity to the deck stairs. We then walked en masse to the beach, four generations interconnected by blood or marriage, with the photo of my dad held high. The pier where I carved the word ‘one’ is no longer there having been removed by the bureaucrats from the property owners association for some bullshit, legalistic reason.

The rest of the ashes were scattered in the lake with mom almost falling into the water. We laughed some more. Took a bunch of group photos then headed back to our cars and the drive home. I expected pain during the ashes ceremonies, the resurrected pain of loss but it never came. I don’t handle people leaving my life very well. Being there with family dissipated the pain in a jovial atmosphere.

Mom & Dad

The Originals

All of Us – Color Fading

The Fischers

The Son-In-Laws

The WInstons

Campfire Stylized

Ashes on The Land

Marching to the Lake

Ashes in the Lake

Ashes in the Lake After Almost Falling In

The First Family – Feels Like Sepia

They say catharsis with the rapid release of negative emotions is liberating. Not for me, not this time. I drove back to Chicago feeling bound and ball gagged by my internal dominatrix lashing my soul with a leather strop.

Afterword

If any of you out there in reader-land were among the hundreds that visited the Olson Summer Estate, I would love to hear your reminisces in the comments section…

Don’t You Forget About Me by Simple Minds Hey, hey, hey, hey Ooh woh

Won’t you come see about me? I’ll be alone, dancing you know it baby

Tell me your troubles and doubts Giving me everything inside and out and Love’s strange so real in the dark Think of the tender things that we were working on

Slow change may pull us apart When the light gets into your heart, baby

Don’t you, forget about me Don’t, don’t, don’t, don’t Don’t you, forget about me Will you stand above me?

Look my way, never love me Rain keeps falling, rain keeps falling Down, down, down

Will you recognize me? Call my name or walk on by Rain keeps falling, rain keeps falling Down, down, down, down

Hey, hey, hey, hey Ooh woh

Don’t you try and pretend It’s my feeling we’ll win in the end I won’t harm you or touch your defenses Vanity and security

Don’t you forget about me I’ll be alone, dancing you know it baby Going to take you apart I’ll put us back together at heart, baby

Don’t you, forget about me Don’t, don’t, don’t, don’t Don’t you, forget about me As you walk on by

Will you call my name? As you walk on by Will you call my name? When you walk away Or will you walk away?

Will you walk on by? Come on, call my name Will you call my name?

I say (Lala la la lala la la) Will you call my name? As you walk on by

My Childhood Was Auctioned off To The Only Bidder The past is a place of reference, not a place of residence. ~Roy T. Bennett With the sale of the family Summer Estate in Central Wisconsin in March of 2018, the second to last vestige of my childhood goes the way of the final Dodo bird clubbed over the head by a sailor for food.