I'm trying had to dry my tears

I'd have to cry them first.

I really feel like going back to Bathurst is going to turn on a bunch switches.
Switches i`d turned off. And don't remember when.
Out of fear.
Out of hurt.
Out of anger.

For self-defense.
Against the entire world.

But i'm at a point where my life needs to take on meaning.
I need to let the world in.
Well, at least have the option to should i need it.

Finding Bryson again last year opened up a floodgate of memories.
I started making a bunch of connections.
Lights turned on again.
Back to life.
However i want it.

It started shedding light on some of the ghosts that have followed me all my life.
Time to let them go.
Time for them to move on, so i can move on.

It's about time.
After all that has happened.
I feel like i'm coming full circle with all this.

It may not answer all my questions or clear everything up, but it'll be interesting to see what happens to me after.
How it will change me.

But i have a feeling that everything i've hungered for in my life have been deep inside me this whole time.
And going back to see....just see....will unlock doors for me.
It will heal me.
I started saying it a couple of years ago before my surgery: i am ready to heal.
So, let's do it.

I just need to see the house. Perhaps even inside.
The school. Where we played, and ran....and got beat up.
To ride a bike around the old neighborhood.
To see the mall, the park, the sandpit.

I need to see me, us playing in the yard.
Coming home from school.
Playing in the snow.
Fighting.
Being.

I need to see my 12-year old self and tell him that everything's gonna be alright.an
Tell him he can't come with me.
That he needs to go.
That i need to go.
That he is loved.

Nobody can take his place.
He is and always will be number one to me.

Inside, i was a child

Going back to Bathurst in late August.
Haven't been since i was 14.

People ask me why.
Why, after all these years do i feel the need to go back?
What's there to see?
Who am i hoping to run into?

To tell you the truth, i'm not sure.
Apparently, there isn't much left to see and do.
Most people have moved away.

Well, after a few years of thinking things through and tracing back some of the key events in my life...and especially after finding Bryson again last year, i've felt this overwhelming need to go back.
To see.
Just to see.

To bike around the old neighborhood.
To check out the school i went to.
To remember.

I have denied and tuned out my past for so long.
For so long, it was hard for me to let go of things.
So i focused on looking forward and onward, not letting anything hold me down.

And somehow, pulling a 13-hour train ride to go back to a town where my ties are inexistant; where nothing may remain...just to see. Just for kicks.
Seems weird.

But part of me says i might have forgotten part of my childhood over there.
When my parents pulled me from that innocence, i might have forgotten pieces of myself behind.

I think it's time i go get those pieces.

Only when I'm dancing

I'm having second thoughts about this whole dance thing.

I was going on the other day about how i have surrounded myself with idiots.
I have also managed to create circumstances in my life where i find myself working "for" other people, and it annoys me.

It has annoyed me since last august when JoDee and i had our "discussion".

After that, my heart sort of fell out of Sweatshop.
It hasn't been the same for me since.

I need my own project. My own career. My own income, and staff, and projects, and decisions, and shows, and recognition.

Every effort i put into Sweatshop reflects back to JoDee.
It's her business.
She's made that quite clear.

I think she somehow thinks i was trying to hone in on it.
That i was trying to share the spotlight.

She's fragile that way.

Instead of creating a collaboration and allowing me to care the way i have since the beginning, she has, little by little, reduced my involvement in the studio.

Then she wonders why classes are so slow.
Durr.

Her energy is the only thing going into that business at the moment.
It's too big for her i think.

Instead of reaching for and accepting my support, she chooses to be solely responsible and accountable for its success.
And, from a business standpoint (if you want my opinion), its eventual demise.
...is she keeps making the decisions she does.

I just now realize that i know more about running a business and people than most others around me.
And when someone sucks away my drive because they can't share responsibility (or can't afford to pay me under pretenses that a certain amount of classes a week is something i can't handle), then i know it's time to move on.

I've also had my fill of working for bitches in my life.
Enough.

And the resistance she once told me she would get from Helen, probably came from JoDee herself.

Maybe my illusions were smacked around a bit.
Maybe i was a little presumptuous.
Maybe i don't give a crap anymore.

Maybe it's time i use the tools i've acquired in my management and dance careers for a worthy cause.
Mine.

I'm the only bitch i should be working for.

Waiting for your call

Hey!

This is a head's up to all you dumb-fucks out there who text while walking down the street, or order your coffee at Starbucks's while talking on the phone...if i find myself close to you when you pull such ill-mannered crap, i may or may not throw your phone as hard as i can.

If you are one of these people, you just need to understand that, for the time being, you need to go home, lock all your doors and windows so no one can see you, hide under a bed with some food, if you need, and hold your head between your hands.

When we need you to come out, we will let you know.

Those three words are never enough

Sure, they say they love me.
Now.

Where were they when I needed them?
Where were they when I moved out and headed for a new city?
Where were they when i was scared and lonely?
Where were they when Phil and I broke up?
Where were they when my happiness went up in smoke?
Where were they when I fell into drugs so hard I couldn't see my own life in front of my face?
Where are they now that i am making something of myself?

Caught up in their tears and heartache.
Caught in the eye of their destruction.
Unable to see what was going on.
What had been going on for years already.

Too busy caring about the other siblings.

And then they dare to say i have never known pain.
That it's easy for me to say the things i say and do the things i do when i have never suffered.

Fuck you.
Fuck you both really fucking hard.

You say you love me and have always loved and supported me now that you need to repair something.
Now that you feel guilty.
Now that you feel me pulling away.

You think this is something i am doing TO YOU.
How selfish and stupid can you get?
HUH??!!
How fucking selfish are you?
How DARE YOU say that??!!

No one has EVER asked me what all this has done to me.
EVER!!!!!!
What it continues to do to me.
The anger, the rage I feel toward you.
I acknowledge it now.
I set it free.
I accept it.
I let it go.

If i have drawn away it is because i can't stand being around you anymore.
Everyone who suffers less than you or doesn't wish to hear about it constantly is condemned to begin cold and inhuman and selfish and unworthy on your part.

Fuck you.

I walk alone now.
Without you.
Without anyone.

I go it alone.
Because i have been betrayed by people who were my friends for so long.
Because my family has betrayed me, my love, my trust.

Because every time I have instigated change in my life, and i began to make different choices, people judged me and assumed things of me.
No one helped me on my way.
Everyone put me down.
They are jealous, envious, boring.
Stupid.

So now, when people fail to see the light, i walk away.
Peacefully. Quietly.

And they hit still.
They hit.

The fuckers.

I have lost all support system in my life.

And whenever i make an attempt at reconciliation, or try to move in a little closer, i am faced with the grim reality that these people are no longer for me.

And i keep walking.

When i finally accomplish what i have desired in life, in retrospect, i will have no one to thank but myself.
I owe nothing to no one but me.

So keep hitting, fuckers.
One day, you'll get yours too.

As for them...i wish them well.
Without me.

I am free.
Let me be.
Just let me be.

These are my hands...

But what can they give me?

These are my eyes, but they cannot see.
These are my arms, but they don't know tenderness.

I get sick of hearing my own voice tell me lies.
Sweet little lies.

I constantly hear myself say that this is what i want.
That this is all i need.
That the rewards outweigh the dues.
God, i am full of shit.

I'm 34 and unsure of what i have to show for my life.

Life only deals you the obstacles it knows you can work through.
Life can suck it.

One of the problems i have created for myself is that i am perpetually surrounded by idiots.
By people who underestimate themselves.
By people who don't always see themselves in the best of light.

If I allow another alcoholic, addict, sex-maniac, passive-agressive, bi-polar, or Fido employee in my life... hit me.

Then again, what does that say about me?
I don't always set the best standard for myself.

It seems i allow myself to suffer fools.
To let people put me down when they should be encouraging me.
Especially when i have done nothing but encourage them, you'd think they give back, the fuckers.

Very few people support me in my life.
And that has made it hard for me to push forward with my ideas.

On the other hand, when you have no one else but yourself to fall back on, you find yourself guided by the ultimate freedom.
Either because no one "gets" you, trusts you, wants to be around you, or only wants to fuck your ass when they are high on cocaine.

In either case, I rarely give a rat's ass what people have to say about me.
Also being terribly un-apologetic in regards to that annoys the hell out of people.
I annoy the hell out of people.
I'm rigid and leave very little room for negotiation when it comes to people's ideas of me.

Their perception may or may not be way off from the reality of it all.
Irrelevant.

If they are going to challenge me, they better come ready with an arsenal of valid points and arguments. And cheesecake.

Until I decide a change is due, no change will be given.

People tell me that maybe I don't negotiate enough.
People tell me that maybe I'm too uptight. Too angry.
I tell people that maybe they should stick to their gardening and TMZ.
Go fuck your mistress, go home to watch the game with your wife and mind your business.

There's a reason I don't ask for people's advice: I have no use for it.
Something else people find irritating about me.

What works for them may or may not work for me, so why the hell am i asking?

So that I can sleep better?
So I don't constipate?
So I feel good enough about my choices i don't feel the need to do a line or empty a bottle of, oh i don't know, gin.
So that i don't feel so alone in my choices.

That doesn't work for me.
Most of the time.

The choice is mine to make.
The risk is mine to take.

Which brings me back to the beginning.
A very good place to start.

Freedom.
Why is the freedom i have fought so hard to obtain always cluttered with obstacles?
Why am i not using it more?
Am i chicken shit?

I have me.
And i appreciate that.
I appreciate the love and security i have in my life.
Oh sure, i'd love to make more money.
Shitloads of money.
To travel.
To teach.
To dance.
To create.

The furthest i have traveled recently is the South Shore.
Exotic.
Different culture.
People there wear white pants.
It's different.
Not what i have in mind.

The teach and dance thingys are limited to a package deal for the moment, as one implies the other.
I teach dance, and if i am dancing, i am more often than not, teaching.

And the only thing i've created for myself (aside from the circumstances in which i find myself today) is this blog.

Hot.
I don't know why some guy hasn't snatched me up yet.

I've always trusted my instinct.
And of the rare times I haven't, it has ended up being the wrong choice for me.

So what does my instinct tell me now?

That it's time to move.
To make a move.
Any move.

Anything different than six-step would be good right now.

There Was A Time When...

My parents were parents.
And i was a child.

Then, one day, my parents ran away from home.
And i was a child.

And no one was left there but me.
And i was a child.

I was a child, deep inside me.
And as a child, i wondered if they would ever come home again.

They didn't.
They won't.

Who will take care of me now?