If Morrissey wasn't a celibate gay Catholic we'd be so perfect together

"Only stone and steel accept my love." Oh Moz, you're fine wine.

Why am I so Angry?

Well, the question has been a quest. I was raised up in a house with a mother who is of Scottish decent and a father who is Cuban by birth [as in he was actually born in Cuba, and my brother and I are first generation Cuban Americans.] My mother's upbringing held a silent tidal wave of communication -- anything that needed to be said was avoided at every turn, and the family was pretty much a collection of passive people.

My father, on the other hand, was raised by a family that was the polar opposite -- anything and everything was yelled, screamed, or otherwise doled out extremely clearly in tones that those of us who are Anglo would clearly classify as angry, or at least way too loud, way too emotional.

It is not my right to delve into what my father experienced as a youth, except to say that he lost his country. completely and without choice. unfairly and uncontrollably. If you don't know what happened to Cuba in the late 1950s, rent the movie "The Lost City." My father was shipped to the U.S. He was paired with a loving adoptive family, yet he spent much of his life in silence due to his inability at the time to speak English [he now speaks English better than anyone I know, and that's a HUGE mouthful.]

So many years of learning in silence, the death of his father in his arms, the reconnection with his baby brother who had ended up in another foster house, and working like a slave to afford university embittered him. He was angry. He had plenty to be angry for.

In my years being raised by my father, we had plenty of scuffles. Mainly because we were so similar. It was like looking into a mirror he wanted to crack -- and the feeling was mutual.

On Christmas, 1984, my father bought me a music box that played Edelweiss -- the anthem of Austria and a song from the Sound of Music, perhaps my favorite movie of all time. I had the music box until 2006 when it was destroyed when my garage flooded in Claremont, CA.

My anger is very personal, except that everyone who knows me deeply thinks that I am an angry person. I myself -- until recently -- have agreed with this assumption. But I am not angry. Yes, I have a short fuse, but much like the early years of my life listening to my father, all the things I have a short fuse about are just things that I yell about, that I talk shit about, that I unburden myself with by becoming vocal. After all, I have seen first-hand what NOT being vocal can do when you feel upset, over-stimulated, or stressed -- it's not exactly worth the payoff to make a vocally angry person convert.

I have realized that all the things that have made me extremely angry through the years have been diminished significantly. And though I have made a pact with myself to get completely naked on this blog, some things are sacred and not to be shared. Let's just say I had good reasons to be angry, and my time spent in anger felt right and served me well. It got me through high school and university, it got me through a lot worse. My anger was the cloak I threw around who I really was so that people could generally pigeon-hole me as "the angry funny girl." But I have come to realize that a lot of what I was angry about are not things I am angry about anymore, yet I cling to the short fuse and yelling because it's simply how I was raised. There's not really a lot of anger behind it, it's just a habit.

But I will always root for the violent upholder of the truth -- even though I love Gandhi, MLK, and others who believed in and practiced non-violence. I am the person people cannot believe is still alive because I simply have no fear of other humans [I am so afraid of scorpions I pee my pants when I see one but that's beside the point... sort of.] For example, when I lived on Crenshaw, more than once I came across characters I should have walked away from, called the cops on, not yelled at, or run away from at lightning speed. But I can say in all honesty that I never did, and I don't say this as a point of pride per se, but to make a point of who I am and who I shall always be. Thugs don't scare me. People who have just been released from prison don't scare me. The streets of LA don't scare me  [I lived in the HOOD, the real HOOD, not the "omg you guys, that was kinda scary, Heather! Hood.]

This is a blessing and a curse. But no one ever fucked with me. EVER. Even when a guy twice my size with teardrop tattoos on his face stole my parking spot I told that fucker what was up. He could have killed me, but something tells me he sensed my sense of self, and that at that time, I'd have sooner died [literally] than give in just because he was big and scary... to most people. When I looked at him all I saw was the motherfucker who stole my spot, and nothing else.

So yeah, my anger has served me because it lets off an aura of serious dominance, and even when a guy outside a liquor store tried to follow me as I walked home at 1:45AM, I turned around and asked him what the fuck he wanted, and he receded into the background. I assure you, if I had gassed it up the road he'd have raped me. NO fucking doubt in my mind.

But those days are over. I have a child that I will protect like a mama bear, and that means choosing my battles and not tangling with fuckers, unless they are harming her.

Perhaps the reason my Dad bought me that music box was because it was the gentlest song about loving your homeland he could find. He was/is so angry and sad about that loss, and he should be. Until you have held your father in your arms and tried to tell him that this place is good because he never would have met your mother, you can't tell me you know this pain, and you can't judge it even when it becomes absurd, even when you've heard the story thousands of times.

My anger is mine, my father is my Edelweiss, and I am his homeland. God bless the anger that preserved us, and God bless the will to let it go.

Creativity Robbed from Local Woman Upon Turning 30

We don't want to say it, saying it means it may have actually happened. Here it is (big breath in) ... I lost my creative juice upon turning 30. Everything I wrote was for this client or that, this project or that endeavor, never for myself, never for the sake of imagination.

Lucky for me, I have regrouped and here I am, perhaps not as good as I was, but getting there. How funny is it that life is supposed to make you wise and lodge all these insights into your brain, yet when I look back at what I wrote before I was even 20 it's leaps and bounds better than anything I can muster now?

Some would argue it's the dramatism. The punch of being young and feeling all sorts of stuff for the first time is enough to make a Picasso out of anyone, if they care to express. But when I think upon those "firsts" now, I want to vomit at having been so blind. Such is life for me. I hate for not being insightful, yet having become insightful I hate what it has rendered my words to be.

Stupidity and self-hatred have no bounds! I can remember writing poems about a boy I loved who I was sure I'd be with the rest of my life. I look at those every other year or so, sometimes they captivate me, other times I laugh at the pure teenager left there on the page, as if to say, "Hey, um, I have no idea what I'm talking about, but I will make it sound lavish and painful."

Too true. We all have that fledgling person inside us, perhaps this is the same idiot who makes us question every single thing we write or say; every single action we take is judged by this hater within us.

Get out your pen, get out your paper, write that sunuvabitch away. Tell her you'll miss her, tell her you'll read her poems once in a while, but for the time being, no matter how cool she might have been in the late 1990s, she's gotta pack it up, at least for now. Send your self-hating inner-teen to rehab ... doesn't mean you ever have to pick her up. Unless you want to. If you do, make sure she doesn't have keys to the family car.

magic eight ball :: use it to make the most critical decisions of your life

Years ago when i ran a little rag with Katie Pegler called The Sauce Open Forum, our dear friend and artist/writer Adam Hand wrote a piece called, "Magic Eight Ball-ism." it was a delight. a funny bit about how he'd gone from one superstitious method to the next in an effort to make decisions. of course now in my golden years, i would say, "hey! hey you! you have to make your decisions for yourself!" but then the path always veers, doesn't it?

this is the best part of any Magic 8 Ball. people see one laying around and say things like, "Oh, I remember these! How cute!" and then they ask it a question that could make or break their entire life scenario. don't fucking lie. if you've ever picked up a Magic 8 Ball you asked it a serious question or two. don't pretend like you were asking it how your hair would look after a good cut and color. you were asking it if you should adopt, you were asking it if your wife cheated, you were asking it if your mom loved you, and of course, you were asking it if you were fat. you were. you know you were. you wanted the Magic 8 Ball to say something else so you could sleep, or at least enjoy some pizza.

i bought a Magic 8 Ball. so far i have not asked it anything, though two others have. so let's ask one now! [LIVE ON THE MAGIC 8!]

question: "Will I ever have a huge bathtub?"
answer: "You can rely on it"

YES!!! and our first live via Internet Magic 8 Ball moment went well. thank god. i was concerned it would be bad. but then i didn't ask a super important question. let's get naked and crazy -- here goes:

question: "Will Jose and I have another baby?"
answer: "Concentrate and ask again"

[30 seconds later]

question: "Will Jose and I have another baby?"
answer: "As I see it Yes"

okay, this is informational. cool. this is cool. so excited. omg. this is great news. holy shit. holy shit. when?

aaahhhhhhhhhhhhhh -- the 8 doesn't say when. it only does yes and no. so yeah, i could ask stuff like, "will it be in a year?" and all that, but Magic 8 doesn't work like that. it'll say yes less than a month which is impossible because even if i was pregnant, i'm not pregs enough for that to happen. right?

by the way, all this is true, i mean the questions i posed and the answers are completely true, i swear.

but i have also tossed quarters asking them if my dog would die of leprosy, (which he really did have, swear to christ) and listened to one BFF say it was crazy while my other BFF told me that flipping a quarter was how she ended up in LA instead of NYC.

here's the thing. you can't pretend you're going to get a Magic 8 Ball for entertainment. you have to own up to the fact that you revere it in some spiritual manner, like a portal to the ears of the universe. and who the hell knows?

concentrate and ask again.

What's Janie's Deal with Bronson Already?

Anyone who knows me well by now knows that I am deeply fascinated by the life and times and personal journey of "The U.K.'s most dangerous inmate." I've been on it for a while now and people think it's crazy and they thought it was a phase and that I would eventually give it up. I spoke to dear friend Siobhan Lafave the other night and she convinced me to write a blog about it to put some bullshit to rest and try to help the folks understand. But, phew, this won't be easy to put into words as the intellectual connections and spiritual side of it is as important as what I would like to do in terms of an interview with Charlie (we're on a first name basis in the netherworld.) I want to spread his message across the U.S. by being an American journalist that brings his story to "this side of the pond."

So here goes, I'll give it my best shot.

A few months ago I watched the Bronson movie that somehow ended up at Blockbuster, which shocks me because it's not The Hangover or the Hurt Locker. It's super indie and was even paid for in part by the English Lottery, which didn't sit well with many officials and others. That's the Queen's money! I instantly loved the movie and watched it twice before returning it. I then went online and ordered a couple of the books that Bronson himself had written. It was here that I discovered that while the movie was gripping and moving, a lot of it was chronologically out of order, and some of the events were scrambled together like a chicken egg/ostrich egg omelet. It was kind of a pisser since I had loved the movie so much -- still do because Tom Hardy's performance is absolutely amazing.

While I could go on and on about the man's life in detail from what I know so far, there's more to my fascination than that. They did touch on in the movie the fact that Bronson was moved many times, but in his books you discover that he has literally been moved hundreds and hundreds of times -- insane but factual and documented.

Here's one of the big questions that everyone wants to know: is he really one of the most violent criminals in the history of Britain? A matter of opinion, though his proponents will tell you (accurately) that he has never killed anyone. Misleading though: he has tried to kill a couple of people and was either unsuccessful or ended up not going all the way through it.

A little background: as a young man of 22 (in 1974), Bronson was tried and found guilty for robbing a post office (armed) where he made off with £26.18. From there forward the rest is history, although for the sake of brevity I have cut out some details which you can catch up on at the Charles Bronson Wikipedia page as well as on the Free Bronson Website.

Bronson, formerly known by his birth name, Michael Peterson, took on the name Bronson when he was released from prison (the first time which lasted only 69 days) and became a boxer under the management of Lenny McLean who is depicted in the movie as totally fucking ridiculous and amazing with a certain swagger and way of speaking that is intriguing and hilarious.

Enough history. Back to why I love this man. I was obviously drawn in by the movie, the mustache, and every girl loves a bad boy, of course. But something deeper made me buy some of his books and I love them. He expresses himself fully and never censors his sins or his guilt for his crimes both in and out of prison. The honesty is enchanting -- I have always told myself internally and other writers I know that in order to write good shit you have to be willing to get naked on the page and be honest, otherwise it's a farce and not worth the reader's time. Charlie offers this in spades and it has endeared him to me.

There's his poetry, which I don't particularly care for because it all rhymes, which I hate in poetry. But the messages are clear: prison is a bitch, solitary confinement turns an already questionable character insane whether an inmate was as normal as you or I (minus the criminal acts, of course!) when they first entered solitary.

Between his mix-ups and constant moves, some due to bad behavior, some due to outside forces purposefully making an example of him and trying to keep him confused, he was sent to Broadmoor -- a prison hospital for the criminally insane that's been around since the days when people thought that epilepsy was a sign of a criminal element and a madman. This is where he was stamped certifiably insane and drugged with the types of pharmaceuticals that are no longer legal.

And now the part that perhaps draws me to him more than just about anything else, though it doesn't put him in the best light, and of course added months and sometimes years onto his sentence, nearly all of which have been in solitary.

The rooftop protests! Bronson has successfully pulled off eight of them. It's not that I approve or would stand behind any criminal for doing this. It's because of how he describes them himself. At one point in his first book, he describes his first jaunt to the rooftop. He notes that he hadn't seen the nighttime sky in eight years. He writes that seeing stars for the first time in nearly a decade settled his soul even though his stomach was empty and he was freezing to death -- as though this moment in his life will in some way always make him feel some fraction of peace within an ocean of regret and sadness. He describes seeing the nearby town from a bird's eye view, how some of the townspeople cheered him on while others called him names and, well, protested his protest. He came down eventually from exhaustion and hunger. He was forced to give up because of physiological needs and nothing else.

I'm obviously not a criminal, never been arrested, have no record -- by all legal accounts I am a good little girl. But life has not spared me moments of severe anguish, and a sort of solitary I've put myself into from time to time. I know it CLEARLY doesn't compare, but reading his work gives me hope -- if someone can survive more than 30 years in solitary and have the stillness of mind and intellectual presence to write about it, then goddamn it, so can I. It's the kind of thing that makes me look onto the reels of horrid moments in my life and have some modicum of hope.

And so yes, I am fascinated, and yes, I am intrigued, and yes, I want to meet him, shake his hand, interview him, and share a mutual smile with Bronson.

He's nearing the age of 60, and the clock is ticking. The Her Majesty's Prison system "uncertified" him insane and he now wears the label of sane in the records of his time inside. But he poses a great question in one of his books: how can you be certified mad and then uncertified? A pretty good point, but something I can relate to mentally. The events of my life have driven me crazy, and then I have walked away from those darkest moments and been born again. I guess you could say in some way I too have been uncertified in my own much more private way.

The opinions of others that suggest my fascination as an obsession will do nothing to sway me. Enough said.

Washing Dishes, Drinking Wine

There was a giant heap of dishes in the sink, it was 3AM and I couldn't sleep. I decide to do the dishes while I have a drop of wine...

Next thing you know, I'm standing over the sink doin' the dishes, and all sorts of thoughts and revelations start whirling through my mind. Most people hate doing the dishes. I am in that number. Maybe until this early dawn.

I have realized that when I'm doing "mindless" tasks, I can actively use my "higher self" to think about the things I'd like answers about in life. I scrub a pan thick with crumbs from Jose's tripas (ewww) and I think up how I can spend more quality time with Zea. I take a sip of wine, grab a plate and rinse, and realize I've been lagging on yoga and need to go three times a week to keep my mind straight. I wash out a cereal bowl and come to think of how life has become a whirling dervish filled with mysterious events that I don't yet understand the lesson in. The dirty dishes have become a magical portal to cogitation.

Do some dishes. In fact, wait until they pile up into a seemingly insurmountable task and then sneak attack them on a mission to answer some questions that have been swirling about your brain for hours, days, weeks, months, years. In my case, I have years of unanswered business that I feel I am owed some goddamned answers to.

So I'll do the dishes until I get more answers.

Nook | That wretched device being sold at Barnes and Noble

So you guys have heard of Nook right? It's that digital thing that seems as cool as the iPad but only gives you print media and nothing else. First of all, am I crazy? (Yes, I am but that's not what I mean.) I like to actually buy BOOKS or at least get BOOKS from the library or friends. Nook turns books into digital pages on a flat-screened situation. They sell all manner of ridiculous accessories, like your Nook needs a tuxedo and a cumber-bun before you can read from it.

So I ran into an old friend who works at Barnes and Noble and has since like 2005. He's a great guy and a solid human being. I asked him how work was going. He said it had been insanely slow since the launch of Nook, and that the booksellers were being forced to promote and sell the Nook. Essentially, he noted, booksellers at Barnes and Noble were putting themselves out of a job. He even insinuated that whispers of layoffs were in the air because how many people do you need to sell books when people are buying digital books -- which requires no assistance?

I OBVIOUSLY have nothing against technology -- it's how I make my living for God's sake. But I have a serious spiritual issue with watching someone read Charles Dickens from a Nook. I think I can honestly say I'd rather be in a snake pit than watch someone read Breakfast of Champions on a goddamned Nook.

I told my Barnes and Noble friend that I would start a protest with a slogan, so pass this along: "Don't be a Shnook, don't buy a Nook!"

Mexican Held Hostage, Forced to Watch Bridget Jones's Diary

It just dawned on me a couple of days ago that in like the first week of dating Jose we watched Bridget Jones's Diary. There is no way this was okay with him no matter what he may claim today. I also realized I had watched The Sound of Music with him sometime within the first month of our courtship. This is also not acceptable.

You see, there are some things we consider cultural barriers, and others we may consider barriers between genders (or lifestyle, whatever). When you combine both sorts of barriers, you're messing with pure insanity. It's worth it, though you can expect the Mexican man who watched Steel Magnolias with his (relatively) Anglo babymama last week to go straight to bed. Something about Fried Green Tomatoes does something to wilt the male sexuality, and most especially the Latino male sexuality.

What makes it so hilarious for me (not Jose) is that we're usually halfway through the movie when he realizes that 70% or more of the cast is female, the story is dramatic with estrogen-packed comedic overtones and ... he's been roped into a chick flick. Maybe even one from the 1980s. Maybe even one from the 1970s. But the cultural barrier has allowed me to get more than halfway through An Affair to Remember, Hair, Hairspray, and the Hanna Montana movie (you heard me.)



There's value in barriers. Take advantage of them to have some fun.

T.I. hasn't hired me yet, but I got my dog back!

several weeks ago i had to surrender my sweet pup Olive to a rescue center because she got a freak case of parvo (which simply doesn't happen to dogs her age). i had surrendered more than Olive at 3AM that horrible morning -- i had finished up with a seasonal client, had wrapped with another client who consolidated their entire marketing effort into a career opportunity for one person to work full time, and my last standing client fired me within 48 hours after letting Olive go... i had lost my dog, my income, and my mind was close behind. i had been told my other dog may not live due to some random lumps that has appeared on his ear, i had been an uber-stress case over both my parents going through surgery only weeks apart from one another, and on it went.

anyone who knows me can tell you the past several weeks have been a wretched rollercoaster. like, no amount of yoga and smoothies in the world would help. besides, i was on the verge of losing my yoga membership because that shit's expensive and i was about to shut it down!

so last night i got a call from a shelter that shall remain nameless... the person on the other end of the phone sounded like she was calling me from a broom closet... [whisper] "hi... is this Olive's parents?" ... "yes, is she okay?" ... "she's great... but we had to amputate her tail because it wags so much in her cage she broke it in three places." [OK, now i'm sadder!!!] and then, [again whisper] "listen, i am breaking all the rules here, but this dog will never get adopted and she's just not doing well in a crated situation... so if you come now you can have her back... i'm quitting anyway and leaving the country."

strangers leaving the country! getting my dog back! underhanded madness that sticks it to the man! count me in! within 45 minutes of this absurd convo, i had Olive in the car and we were heading home. i now know she's my good luck charm -- god bless Rigo -- he's the best dog ever (and thank you Rigo for not dying of leprosy) but he is NOT a good luck charm.

in other news, T.I. hasn't hired me yet, but i'm keeping my fingers crossed. he should at least have coffee with me before making any final decisions.

p.s. Olive isn't the only one who doesn't do well in crated situations.

first post on the new bliznog and the cubbies at yoga studios

first, let me welcome you all to the new blog. this will be my outlet for all things janie, janeway, reinless... me as a creative force rather than a professional writer. there will be no rules of grammar observed here except for what i feel like implementing on a case-by-case basis, essentially whenever the hell i feel like it.

now that we've covered that, i have something to say about yoga. there are cubby-holes in two places at my ashram (yes i used that word.) one cubby section is outside of the studios, and then each studio also has its own smaller set up cubbies. most people use the cubbies outside but some do not, bringing their "valuables" into the inner-sanctum of the studio where they will be practicing. this is sad to me, and also to my sister-best-friend-in-law. if you can't set your stuff down in a fucking ashram and feel safe about it, where the hell can you trust anything? yet from time to time, i see middle-aged women lurking, looking, grabbing their bag and their keys and their Guccis and with heads bowed to the floor, carrying their cargo to the "inside" cubbies.

here's my thinking. i always leave my stuff in the outside cubbies. i have to because if i don't i feel i will have lost all faith in humanity. of course, if one day MY Guccis are stolen from the outside cubby area, i WILL lose all faith in humanity and be forced to stop doing yoga, which will lead to something similar to Natural Born Killers, minus Mickey.

i can't bring my stuff into the studio -- if i have to do that, i won't have a reason to take MYSELF into the studio. dig?