Magick

So, I've been thinking a lot recently about random things that I pushed off out of my mind a while ago, deciding that topics I will puzzle over and will never find the answers to are pointless.

However, one of those topics is magick and when you're unofficially dating a Gypsy, it's kinda hard NOT to think about it. And so:

Magick. I used to believe in it with all my heart as a child. I was that one girl who believed she was a witch, that one special child born with abilities many others didn't posses or didn't know how to hone. I'd take out books from the library on palm reading (yes, my elementary school library had an entire section on witch craft. Wow.) and I actually performed love spells that would bind me and the boy I liked together. Forever. I'm very happy those failed. I'm guessing it was because I put more thought into peeling the apple I was using for the spell than concentrating on the ACTUAL spell itself. Did I know the rules of wicca back then? Hell no! Our school just had spell books for kids (yes, I'm serious) with pretty pictures and instructions. Yeahhhh.

There was a lot more to it too. I remember going to the beach and singing. Seagulls would flock around me as if listening. They formed a perfect circle with me in the middle. My sister wondered what it was I was doing, but really couldn't care less because for once, I wasn't hanging off of her. Sometimes, I'd dip my feet in the ocean and sing there. I felt as if the ocean could hear me...was answering me. The last time I sang in the ocean, it was the fourth of July, this year. I was still buzzed from VKAM and Ameara told me to sing Mama Ocean for her, since she's landlocked. I did. And I blinked for a second and all of a sudden, there was a beautiful shell at my feet. Blue/gray with gorgeous brown snakelike patterns that look amber when wet. Something passed through my mind telling me that the ocean heard me, that it was responding to my voice, that it was thanking me for the few pieces of garbage I picked out of her a few days prior.

I didn't tell my dad or my friend about the shell. I just took it, thanked the ocean quietly, and left.

When I was four, I met my stepmom. I thought she was beautiful... she was tall, her cheekbones were predominant and high and while she could be childlike and fun, she was also wise and strong. Ambitious. She WAS the embodiment of Sagittarius.

My stepmom was the first person to tell me that magick was real. She told me stories of how her mom was a witch who used to do horrible spells in order to get her way, but stopped when she tried to hex another witch who sent it reeling back and caused her tongue to swell up in the back of her throat. She, apparently, learned her lesson.

My stepmother, B her name was, told me that she could feel things. When she was younger, she used an Ouija board with her sister and it amplified their senses. She told me she would wake up sometimes and see her sister, seemingly possessed, sit up in bed and begin talking to things that weren't there. She told me she had seen demons wait at the foot of her bed for her, holding her down with glares.

She gave me my first deck of tarot cards - a vintage deck from the 1930s (she had forgotten later on that she gave them to me. She still has them) and I fingered them as if they were the most beautiful things in the entire world. I did her reading. It was accurate. I felt as though I had found a new extension of myself. That all feelings I had prior finally had something I could channel them with to make sense out of all the mush. Then came the dreams.

I wasn't me in my dreams. I was someone else. And as someone else I didn't know WHO I was, but I had a different personality and it was just another day in life. Until I fell off a banister, or until a car hit me or until I got so drunk that I died of alcohol poisoning. I wondered why I always died in my dreams until I saw flowers by the sides of roads where I died in dreams from the previous nights. I must have been about 12... needless to say, I was freeked out.

I told this to my stepmother. She had told me that sometimes, before puberty, this happens to girls. I didn't understand what menstruating had to do with having visions of future deaths in your sleep, but no matter. A bit after I got my period, it stopped. The last thing I remember is that one night, I was an older version of a girl I knew and I had died from falling off the side of a fire escape in a city area. I am hoping that this, all of this... was just a child's imagination run rampant.

I'd feel things in my bedroom when I slept. I'd hear the pitter patter of feet running up and down the stairs. Once I woke up and saw a great black cat standing on my ceiling and looking down at me. He seemed started that I could see him (we made eye contact. His eyes were a beautiful gold - almost foxlike) and he quickly vanished. But again, I can cancel this out saying that it's because I am bipolar and again, my mind runs rampant.

Cats. I always see them. When I moved to New Jersey, my stepmother had already left. I hated it here. I still hate it here.

My first night in the house, I woke up and couldn't move. I felt as though there was something heavy on my chest, pushing the air out of my lungs. I thought I was going to die. I began panicking. It seemed like an eternity until I could finally sit up and breathe. This happened often and then one night, I looked forward and saw a cat curled up on my chest, watching me. I tried to scoot away but it was too heavy and I couldn't move. Finally, somehow, I managed and fell backwards off the bed. The last thing I saw before I blacked out was that cat peering at me from over the mattress. Staring at me.

I woke up in bed with the sun up as if nothing had happened. I had never seen that cat before. I doubt I will ever see it again. But sometimes... when I dance around my house and I am neither here nor there, I see many of them, cats I mean. All around the house, diving behind closet doors, sitting on sofas. I double take and then they are gone.

I have had more instances of sleep paralysis here. One time, I couldn't feel my body at all. I looked and there were.... creatures dancing in my living room. I got up and joined them, they welcomed me but I felt more like a stranger and a tricked victim than a guest. I rationalized that I was asleep and tried to wake up, but I couldn't feel anything. When I did wake up, I switched my location for napping and took the floor. Again, I couldn't feel my body. All of a sudden, I had a sensation of flight like I was getting higher and higher and higher and it felt so good, so right! But then I thought "I'm dying. I'm leaving my body - I'm not ready." and I woke myself up. I wonder what would have happened if I just let it be.

I don't feel things anymore.

I don't know when it started, but perhaps it was when my brother started asking me if magick was real. Our mother would always give me looks when he asked, and I will look him square in the eyes and say "Anything is real if you believe in it." He believed in faeries. It drove my mom mad.

I think I lost faith because I didn't have any answers for him. Yes, I felt things. Yes, I believed in faeries, I believed in mermaids, I STILL believe in mermaids... but where's the proof? How didn't I know that these feelings weren't just a fantasy to escape to in my head to get away from all of the bullshit? I began to put my faith into science.

I ignored everything I felt around me. Told it to go away, told it to shut up. Locked myself indoors, only came out to go for a drive with friends and stay at their houses. At one point, I forgot how to call upon that tingly sensation I'd sometimes get that would surround my body. I'm not sure but, I think that's magick.

But at the same time, it could just be a self awareness.

See, I can't tell my brother that something is real, because I feel like I'm lying. Where is the proof? I try my hardest to be an honest person. I dislike lying. I feel like the scum of the earth whenever I do because I do it so WELL.

The last time I felt magick, I had just finished saving up for a second hand keyboard at a thrift shop. I put all my soul into saving up for it, you have no idea. I was numb to magick at that point and just moved on. But when I got to the counter, they told me it was already sold.

The pain I felt... I had gotten my hopes up that I could FINALLY record, FINALLY write on a keyboard that WASN'T broken, that I could FINALLY reach my dreams, that all the struggling had paid off. But it wasn't true. It was another lie. And I should feel stupid because I fell for it again.

I felt a power inside of me, a burning. An anger, a hatred. And so, I went home and locked myself in my room. My mind was a tirade of chaos, calling upon all the magicks I ever did and did not believe in and told them that if they were real, they would not have let this happen to me.

I told them that they could not exist.

I haven't felt anything since then. Nothing. I feel... human now. Different, less magical then I did as a child. Mundane. A lesser being. Worthless.

But...

Whenever I am in a forest, I feel somehow connected with the earth. I cry whenever I see a tree cut down. I dive at bugs and save them whenever they are going to be stepped upon. I protect sprouts as if it's my life's mission. I never was this passionate when I still believed.

I feel as though I have a bigger connection with plants than I do with humans. Plants and animals. As if that didn't make me sound like a hippie.

I cry when trees die, I cry when I see roadkill. But I never cry when something horrible happens to the people I love. I didn't even cry when my friend Gabbi died.

Yesterday, I tried to astral project, but I got lost. It was pitch black and all I could hear was music. I think instead of going up, I accidentally went down into the deepest part of my mind. Neat, but not what I intended to do. I later scolded myself saying that astral projection hasn't even been proven and I was stupid for trying.

I miss the feel of being connected.

I'm stuck in the middle right now. I don't know what to believe. I do know though that I am scared and I fear the existence of magick. I got lost in it last time I believed in it. It took over my life. I was careless with my day to day living and started failing classes because I was too busy day dreaming about open fields and partially cloudy skies. Spells I would do when I got home. Soils I would ground myself on. No, I was never trained. I know next to nothing about wicca. But I could feel it. Or rather, I could feel SOMETHING.

Perhaps magick doesn't exist. But I do believe that there is something... alive about the earth. That we are all somehow connected with her. With the earth, with the stars (even scientists can not deny that we are all made of star dust).

The two things I still believe in are Mermaids and Astrology. I wonder why I can't be black and white on this subject. Why I can't rationalize anything here.

And this is what I've been musing about. I've been tossing and turning about it for the past nights. You see, I've been speaking to and hanging out with people who live magical lives as of late and they seem so happy...

I can summon that tingly feeling to my hands and it's stronger than ever. I just don't know what to do with it.

I've been having a lot of dreams lately in which I am raped or molested by older men.

At first, I didn't see the connection. I just had my third one in a row this morning and to be honest, I'm a bit hesitant to fall back asleep. But I realized as I was brushing my teeth that these dreams started when I picked back up writing my song about the time my 'friend' tried to rape me. Funny, when I think back on it I don't feel anything (probably because I try not to think back on it), but in my sleep, am I really that terrified?

It sickens me that something that happened four years ago can render me as weak as having problems just sleeping.

The only other connection between my dreams is that when I try and reach out for help, I can never receive it. One time, there WAS no help, another time the cops didn't believe me and this time, I was either too ashamed to call for help or 911 and 0 were down.

I wonder what my dreams are trying to tell me. They aren't vague dreams either - while they happen, I feel as though I am truly awake, which is strange because I am generally a lucid dreamer. But are they telling me I am ashamed? That I could have done more if I wanted to?

What happens in the attic... stays in the attic.

20's Fashion!

Upon request, I have been asked what 20's fashion looks like.

As I start writing this, I understand that this is easier thought of than explained, so please bear with me if my explanations are "WTF" or inaccurate.

ONE.

The flapper.

The flapper is, I believe, the most popular 'fashion' to ever rise out of the 1920s for women. I'm dressed as one in the picture above. Ideally, I believe they were thinner... not saying I am fat. Simply saying that they were those girls that were boxy, short, and had very few curves. Flappers were the girls who were tired of all the Victorian era rules. "Your dress has to be THIS long, you hair has to be THIS long... blah blah blah..." Like having short hair? Thank the flappers. They were the first ones to chop off their hair into a bob and then finger waved it. As for dresses; flappers would wear dresses that went up above or teasingly on their knees. The bottom part of their dresses was very loose and would flap around when they danced. Hence, they were called flappers. http://www.wikihow.com/images/2/24/A_flapper_625.jpg Wear heels, dangly earrings, red lipstick (Shiny, not matte.) Let the lipstick drift more on the dark red side, rather than VeVa red. Remember, she dresses up like a time period a little later.

Another good thing to go by is the musical Chicago. Yes, that's 1930's, but the prohibition was from the 20's - the 30's and I believe that is the theme for the Shanghi Mermaid.

Makeup! Black eyeliner black eyeliner black eyeliner! BRING OUT THOSE EYES. I do not believe they drew on the waterline just yet, however the top lid was a MUST with black eyeliner. Make it dark, make it deep. I suggest liquid eyeliner. Also, black mascara is a must as well, even if you are blonde. Flappers liked to keep their eyebrows very thin - some even shaved the damn things off and drew them on! Don't mutilate your face if you don't know how, though :] Their faces were VERY powdered and were often described as looking whiter than death. Or like vampires, even. Also! Cheek rouge is a MUST. If you want to REALLY look like a flapper, apply your makeup at the shanghi mermaid by looking in a compact to do little touch ups. Flappers were known for whipping their makeup out in public, which at the time was very scandalous.

I suggest looking at pictures of Greta Garbo from the silent age of films, before her work in the 1940's or late 30's. Also look up the black and whites of Jean Harlow.

Hats! One of the popular types of hats is the one I am wearing above. Shown here. Women would stick all sorts of pins in their hats. Jazz it up. Make it you. This was another popular hat cut. Sometimes instead of hats, women would wear head bands. I couldn't find any good pictures of women wearing them, but they looked like this.

Jewelery! Dangle, dangle dangle! LONG necklaces that you can wrap around your neck twice, if possible. Remember, we want things to flap! Long dangly earrings, bangles to go on your wrists.

If you want to cover up on the train, you can wear an old fashion coat. If you need more of an idea on 1920's female fashion, remember that it was brought on by the enthrallment of the orient. Oriental print was IN at the time, sometimes women would even wear oboes on their dresses. Here's another example I found. If you need help, google 1920's dress. I've done just about all I can do. Any questions, ask away!

AND ONE MORE THING.

Heels. Fuck. Just.... this will give you a good example of shoes.

MALE FASHION!

Easy. Wear a black suit with a white button up shirt underneath and a tie. I'd suggest a pipe, but I don't know if smoking is allowed in there, and if it is, I will hit you for joining in. I'd suggest looking up the black and whites of Ricardo Cortez

John Gilbert

Or Robert Montgomery.

All look the same to you? See? THE MEN HAD IT SIMPLE.

I'm so fucking stressed right now and my body refuses to cry.

As of late, I have become self destructive again. I've refrained from most self injury though. I will admit, I slipped up a week or so ago when I couldn't find my razor and I tried to slice my leg open with a sewing pin. But I'm terrified of needles and the feeling was violating if anything, so I only scraped and didn't draw blood. It was reckless anyway - I didn't even sterilize it. I was frantic from the loss of my cutting stash and was willing to do anything, anything to let my skin breathe.

Whenever I get the urge to break anything, I tell myself that those mountains in the distance will be tackled when the time comes. It holds off my stress for a while. And when it returns I tell it the same thing and it goes away once more.

But now I'm at those mountains and there are many cross paths interfering with one another.

1. VKA meet. Veronica still hasn't gotten back to me about the location of the shanghi mermaid - I had to find the time of the performance myself. So many people are relying on me for this. I feel like, if anything, a giant failure. And really, who could I blame? Veronica? She has her own life, I'm not her responsibility. While it is not my fault, I still believe people will think it is.

What's more, I'm terrified about my checking account. I'm low on money. I'm scared something is going to go horribly wrong at VKAmeet and I'll over draft again. I can't afford that. I can't. I think I just won't eat while I'm there. Sides, Dad tells me I'm fat. I can go without a few meals.

2. My dog. I don't live at mom's. Cleo loves me, but I can hardly see him now, as I'm busy at home. Mom's house isn't a good place. It scares him. Mom won't believe me. I feel like a horrible being for falling in love with my dog and bringing him to my place. My mother literally has a killer's instinct. I am worried for Cleo's life. After all, she almost killed her sister once, so why wouldn't she kill my dog.

3. College finances. I'm a vocal major. I won't have the type of job that will just pay off loans and I'm going to be 100K in debt after graduation. God, if only the entire world knew what it was like to always want to hang yourself.

4. Meds. I'm going to be put on them soon. I've heard enough horror stories to know all that can go wrong.

5. I've begun to hate myself. How arrogant I've become. I feel stupid. Uneducated. Disrespectful. Lazy. Pathetic. Pointless.

My mom.

It's no secret that I dislike my mother.

Today, my friend Pablo and I told his parents that he was transferring colleges and needless to say, they threw shit at hm. They refused to cosign a loan and refused to acknowledge the fact that they wouldn't be paying a cent for his college education.

When all hope seemed lost, he dropped me off at my place. My mom confronted him asking him how it went and offered to cosign for him. I was speechless. We shared a giant hug and things were going along great.

Then mom made a phone call and decided to have a drinking party at her friend's house. She then turned to us and told us to babysit my brother while she was gone.

Pablo said he couldn't because the driving curfew for provisional license holders is 11 PM and she'd be back after that, around 12 AM. Well, mom and I debated this a bit in Spanish and we decided that we'd take my brother job hunting with us and we'd meet her back at the house at 10:30.

Mom didn't call until 10:45. I could tell from her voice that she was drunk, if not only tipsy. I asked her where she was and her reply was "Oh, you didn't call me." Of course I didn't call her. Forgive me for trusting her to once be on time.

Anyway, she told us to pick her up. I asked where she was and she told me she was at so-and-so's house. I told her I didn't know who that was. She said it was next to another so-and-so's house. I told her I didn't know where that was either.

"Oh yes you do!" She said "You've been there before!"

"No, I have not."

"Well then, I'm NOT coming home." and she hung up. The fucking bitch hung up.

So, I called back and finally, she gave me directions. I hung up on her before she could ask for anything else.

So, we get to the house and my mom is outside in atrocious wear. Her eyes are glazed over and she is most certainly drunk. There is heat lightening flashing every 5 seconds.

Mom doesn't look happy at all. She refused to get into the car. She asked me "Where's Andrew?"

"He's at home sleeping. Get inside the car."

"No. Get out of the car. NOW."

So, I do and she begins telling me how I'm unreliable and how she's disappointed in me. I tell her that we're only a few houses away (for SERIOUS) and that she's left him alone for HOURS. This was only for a minute.

She wouldn't have any of it. She says she's not coming home and I brought this upon myself. She turns to leave when I lightly grab her arm and she fucking STUMBLES into me. I ask her how much she's had to drink.

She stops as if she really has to think about it and says "Three glasses". Which means somewhere around five.

I begin to plead with her to please come home. She asks me if I'm going to be there and I say "no."

"Well then, I feel VERY manipulated." And she gets into the back seat. She then realizes she left her keys inside the house and leaves the car, knocking on Pablo's window. "You know what? I'm very dissapointed in you too! To think I said I'd cosign a loan for you! You are a very, VERY disorganized person!

"I'm walking home! Goodbye!" And she walked away.

The car ride back was the first silent car ride Pablo and I ever shared. I was reminded of when I was younger and my mom was drunk all the time.

The most horrible part of this all is that mom is only this pissed because she's drunk. She's making mountains out of molehills. But tomorrow, it won't matter because she's in DENIAL that she's drunk, so there's no persuading her to think otherwise.

Pablo said he never expected her to cosign, really. That she'd bail out on him when he showed her the paper. I didn't say that I actually trusted her, only to have my trust trampled again.

I told Pablo I hated her today, and I think my little brother heard me. I can't hide how much I abhor her very well these days.

Mom kept calling me by my brother's name when she was drunk.

I wonder why I was born.

Goodbye Asylum.

So the Asylum has fallen.

I feel like I could quote a shit ton of EA's lyrics and throw them back at her, but I'm refraining. I WILL be mature about this, I WILL... lashing out solves little to nothing...

Why does this bother me so much? It's just html. It's just BBCode. Pretty, but that's basically it. I guess I felt as though we had finally achieved utopia. You know, the Asylum would have been just fine if she went and left it alone. But in the end, it's her house and we were all simply guests she invited in. Now she's taking her house back. I guess when she said 'we're taking back the asylum', she was talking about herself. Who knows? She could refer to herself in first person plural, just like I do.

This is hilarious. It really is. It's book worthy and I think I will do something with it. It's tragic, it's nerve wrecking. God, who cares WHY this is a bad idea for her, we ALL KNOW why this is a bad idea. But I won't be some bloody musician's plaything and financial support if she just reats me like SHIT. I'm stronger than that, I'm BETTER than that.

God damn, what have I feel doing. Idolizing a woman who can shred on violin and write good music. Yeah, you know what? She's good. But I'm good also. Hell, I could be better. What have I been doing, standing still in time. Going broke buying her shit when I could have bought a Korg by now.

The truth? When I become famous, I will NEVER do something so horrible to my fan base. I will treat them properly with the respect they deserve. NOT like pets. NOT openly using them for marketing purposes.

I am stronger than this. I am so much stronger...

Age?

There is a misery in being old that I never wish to understand.

My father and I went up to CT today, but stopped off to visit his Aunt and Uncle along the way. Aunt Esta and Uncle Wally are rich. Rich rich rich. They live in an upper floor apartment on Park Avenue and have servants. They tour places in Europe whenever they are bored. Of course they'd be members of a high class country club in Weschester county.

No car in that lot was under $60,000. Everyone was high class. Everyone. The place was real ritzy, the majority of the servers were from Europe. And they were ALL gorgeous. Two of the girls were even my type and made me blush whenever I looked over which is AMAZING because I am incredibly picky. One red head from France and a girl with Indian origins from the UK. (She even had a London accent!) But I get off topic.

Anyway, we were eating with my Aunt and Uncle. The entire time, Aunt Esta was talking about people who had died. "Well, my best friend had died from cancer last year in November and see that woman there? That's so-and-so and her husband died three years ago. And that woman there is So-and-so, I invite her to eat with us because she's widowed. This place has really changed. Back in the day, I would dine regularly with all my friends, but they've all died or moved to Florida to die." And so on.

After eating, they decided to lounge around outside by the pool. I was watching my Aunt tremble as she walked (for, she was diagnosed with cancer and the chemo has taken a toll on her) when we bumped into her friend Tippi. She joined us and we lounged around, the servers fawning over us, always checking up on us. Bringing us drinks and being amazing. I was shocked over how my Great Aunt and Uncle were complaining about the service - we were being treated like Kings.

My Aunt complained about a lot of things. The kids in the pool and the fact that Tippi wasn't covered by the beach umbrella - she called a server over there to adjust it a few times. Tippi finally said:

"You didn't have to do that Esta, I'm fine."

"I'm here for you, Tippi."

"I know, and I treasure that more than anything in the world."

"You have no one left, Tippi."

"Yes but, what can you really do about it?"