"WHAT'S IN THE FUCKIN' BOX?!"

Somerset: "We're talking about everyday life here. You — you can't afford to be this naïve!"

Mills: "Fuck off. See, you should listen to yourself. Yeah. You say that the problem with people is that they don't care, so I don't care about people. It makes no sense. You know why?"

Somerset: "You care?"

Mills: "Damn right."

Somerset: "And you're gonna make a difference?"

Mills: "Whatever."

Se7en.

Mills: "Do you like what you do for a living? These things you see?"

Massage Parlor Proprietor: "No, I don't. But that's life."

Se7en.

******

John Doe: "Do you hear me, Detective? I'm trying to tell you how much I admire you…"

Se7en.

do you peoples know how much i admire you? you're an astonishing bunch. every day, you link us to updates, news of the world, or personal tales of trials, travails, fervently hoping that, in their names or for your—our—sakes, we understand, laugh, take action: hell, sympathize. of all aforementioned truly yours, it's the sting of your powerful, personal swings—triumphs and downfalls—which ring 'round one, mismatched, face-off:

a swift but soft landing smack.

a bee-ware butterfly before the uppercut: let's box.

beat bloody, blind I: Kerouac.

come to seeing brilliant yellow stars, fireflies of awe and "Awww…"

your gut punches strike this sucker dumb—and founded.

John Doe: "Wanting people to listen, you can't just tap them on the shoulder anymore. You have to hit them with a sledgehammer, and then you'll notice you've got their strict attention."

Se7en.

Mills: "Honestly, have you ever seen anything like this?"

Somerset: "No."

Se7en.

California: "Somebody call…somebody."

Se7en.

******

John Doe: "It seems that envy is my sin."

Se7en.

envy gets a bad rap.

admiring, envying you, my remarkable friends, does not within me stir the desire to behead you. i like your heads! they produce said stories, thoughts, compulsions to act in the name of justice, righteousness, emotion, confession and, honestly, when i look upon your heads set squarely beside your admirable words, i think, "What lovely, lovely heads they are! Cellar-door beautiful, in fact!"

heads… in boxes…

John Doe: "I didn't do that."

so yes, i envy you admirable folk and your stupefying, everyday feats. you may not recognize them as such but, oh, i do. you played with your son today and, after audaciously plucking from your child's hand his prime, Optimus Prime placement, your boy transferred back said Transformer from your ignorant hand, curtly informing you, "Daddy, you don't get to be Optimus Prime. I do. You are Bumblebee." or you successfully battled a migraine without the aid of opiates and, royal miracle, upon your weary, woeful crown i gently dub you Queen of Pain for i know that Sting all too well and fuck the rest, they who don't understand untreated suffering: you are majesty, you are majestic. or you, bleeding out your poetic, prosthetic, prose-etic vains and, in turn, receive a return shot, an onslaught of misunderstood bullets and what poetic injustice: their aim, unfathomably untrue. yet, you do not fall. you shed for them not one drop of red.

i envy you. you and all the rest of my friends. i admire you so.

John Doe: "You should be very proud."

the expression made sincerely, genuinely for you should: be proud. pride within carries no sin. (so long as you don't cross over into pretense, arrogance, hubris…basically, don't get all big-headed.) however, pride poses a question: am i sinful, admiring and envying you wondrous beings living and loving and meaning in your everyday doings?

Mills: "Who knows? So many freaks out there doin' their little evil deeds they don't wanna do… 'The voices made me do it. My dog made me do it. Jodie Foster told me to do it.'"

no. there's no sin in admiration and my envy is pure, unwilled of ill, no evil intention: both, for you, seed, root, grow, and flower from my heart, bloomin' love.

******

Somerset: "Apathy is the solution. I mean, it's easier to lose yourself in drugs than it is to cope with life. It's easier to steal what you want than it is to earn it. It's easier to beat a child than it is to raise it. Hell, love costs: it takes effort and work."

Se7en.

Somerset: "Ernest Hemingway once wrote, 'The world is a fine place and worth fighting for.' I agree with the second part."

Se7en.

California: "This isn't even my desk!"

Se7en.

John Doe has the upper hand. i've hit a bottom today, a low so depthless i cannot see light. saltwater stings, blurs, blinds everything—details are unimportant. within, a flicker, an enzyme of hope zooming aimlessly around my heart but directionless, disabled, blind to my brain's pathway: my head, cut off.

Mills: "Awwwww, what's in the box?"

i assure you, it's not a bisected head: nothing bipolar, manic, depressive. this, always, the first conclusion jumped upon when people know your mind is halved but know that mine is whole, attached and the poles, aligned.

but, on the other sleeve, my heart is hole.

so weary, exhausted, overwhelmed, overcome, overtaken. the hormones, you see, i'm awash in them, they tsunami an insanity unlike anything chemicals could ever imbalance. the essence…i'm so whelmed over, eating is not only a chore, worried upon me by my anxious mother, but now, to eat? an impossible feat.

the antithesis of gluttony: unwilling starvation. does that mean i'm up for canonization?

my poor mother. this morning, my stepfather encountered me in my standard, black-before-break-of-day repose: outside, lawn chair seated, laptop lapped, fingertips tapped, coffee capped. after exchanging our perfunctory "Good morning," greetings, he paused at the car door, sighing, "Boy, I think your mom has had it with those dogs. They're driving her nuts! She's just plain mantic!"

and i laughed until tears ran. not to mock my stepdad and his occasional breakthroughs of verbal dyslexia, but because the word was so apt. "Mantic." yes, manic, frantic—this, the condition my current condition wreaks upon not just stupid, sickly me, but those i love—those who, every day, desperately, frantically, wit-endingly, exhaustively extend when helping and caring for stupid, sickly me.

that…is a sin: willfully or, through no fault of your own, creating within your loved ones hindering, overwhelming, overpowering, mantic states. sinful, wrestling them with wrath.

mantic: adj. Of, relating to, or having the power of divination; prophetic.

that, not the state sickly, stupid me summons. oh, were that it was… to know what is coming, what's for sure, what will happen, if all will work out and, finally, be…okay.

John Doe: "You will accept my apology, won't you? I feel like saying more, but I don't want to ruin the surprise."

"The surprise." I'm not sure what it is, but the rest applies.

Mantic: what divinity divine must be! to prophesize!

"I didn't say I was different or better. I'm not. Hell, I sympathize."

******

Mills: "Whatever. I don't think you're quitting because you believe these things you say. I don't. I think you want to believe them, because you're quitting. And you want me to agree with you, and you want me to say, 'Yeah, yeah, yeah. You're right. It's all fucked up. It's a fucking mess. We should all go live in a fucking log cabin.' But I won't. I don't agree with you. I do not. I can't."

Se7en.

***

Mills: "Fuckin' Dante… Poetry-writing faggot pieceofshit motherfucker!"

best line of the film, despite the awful homophobic slur. true to character, though, which is essential to good—great—writing, and after this incoherent babble? thought you could use a bit of great writing. (if you'll please excuse the homophobic slur.)

the following? couldn't resist. oh-so John Doe apropos. McBrilliant, if i do say so.

Anne'd i do.

John Doe: "It's more comfortable for you to label me as insane."

Mills: "It's very comfortable."

John Doe: "I'm setting the example. What I've done is going to be puzzled over and studied and followed…forever."*

*Quote referencing Annie's blog. Image showing: Annie's blog.

FACT: One In Four Fucktards Will Misread This Blog

FACT: One in four women can misread a traditional pregnancy test.

FACT: One in four women is fucktarded.

Did you pee on the box and not the stick? Do you suffer from an undiagnosed visual impairment that challenges the discernment of single from double lines? Or, if you ponied up the big bucks for the "fancy" digital test that actually spells out in big letters YES or NO, did the test malfunction and burp up a maddening NESYO?

Orrrrrrr is one in four women simply fucktarded?

"What the... Two lines?! What the First Response does that mean? I know the instructions say it means that, sure as sugar, I'm sweet sixteen and knocked-up like a foul ball into the left field bleachers, but that can't be right! I'm not pregnant! Yes, I had unprotected sex 57 times last month—58 if you count Bobby which I don't—but I'm not pregnant! This test is wrong. Oh, I'm so confused! It says right here: Clearblue Easy! I don't... I do not find this test neither clear nor easy!"

What I'm thinkin' is this: one in four women is not fucktarded; rather, the keyword, "traditional," is overlooked. "Traditional" pregnancy tests make me think of the chemistry sets women of my mother's generation were made to use, which were veritable bathroom-based science experiments. Women were not only likely to misread said results, but might well blow up the house in the process.

The e.p.t test of 1978 was described to the public in Mademoiselle: “For your $10,” the article notes, “you get pre-measured ingredients consisting of a vial of purified water, a test tube containing, among other things, sheep red blood cells…as well as a medicine dropper and clear plastic support for the test tube, with an angled mirror at the bottom.” The test took two hours, and was more accurate for positive results (97%) than for negative (80%). A Thin Blue Line: The History of the Pregnancy Test Kit

Yeah, I think I'd misread those results, too. Because it's difficult to read what's been blasted clear across town, shattered into slivered smithereens, 'cause that's what happens when you load vials, tubes, mirrors and THE SACRIFICIAL BLOOD OF INNOCENT SHEEP into a shoulder-mounted grenade launcher, blow it sky-high and ain't that some sweet emotion right there, honey! Call that baby airborne, Air Jordan, call you an Aerosmith as you walk this way singin', "Can't catch me 'cause the rabbit done died!"

Yes it did!

And so did the sheep!

By the bye: Why is a man in a collared neckline siftering and inspecting my at-home urine?

Perhaps why one in four "traditional" test results were misread...

If I'm looking too deeply into the clear blue (how unlike me), then I'll be the first to say it...again: One in four women is fucktarded. Then again, I took me lots o' literary theory and criticism classes and a few courses on pop culture, and minored me a wee degree in Women's Studies. I likes to analyze. And methinks the word "traditional" be a clever ploy, one meant to snooker us into believing 25% of all women are fucktarded, incapable of properly discerning between one line and two, the words YES and NO.

Why am I writing about this today? Because of my impending hysterectomy? Or is it due to this morning's burst of the ovary? (Yes, say it with me, friends: "Again?") Blame the freakin', flappin', what-the-happenin', "Watch me grow a beard riiiiiiight...now!" hormones?

Nope. Well, maybe a little bit, okay, but not really.

FACT: I see that commercial constantly and every time think, "Then one in four women is fucktarded. I really need to write about that..."

FACT: I had to pee on a stick today! Ha HA! Didn't see THAT one comin', did ya'? But not an at-home pregnancy test stick. (Duh. That would be funny though. "So I'll talk to you later. I'm headin' out to buy a box of pregnancy tests. Just for funsies. Hey, man—you never know! Look at Mary Mother of Jesus! I ain't sayin' I'm, like, a virgin. I'm just sayin' The Holy Spirit works in mysterious ways!")

Back to reality...

Checking to make sure I haven't become diabetic in the wake of all of this hormonal hell. The extreme weight loss despite gorging is more than a little worrisome, so I peed on a strip. I am not diabetic. Which blew my mind like a traditional pregnancy test from a grenade launcher because, sweet Mary Mother of Jesus, I got every other auto-immune disease known to the medical world! FACT!

But NOT diabetes. FACT.

Unless I misread the test results...

FACT: No rabbits nor sheep were killed in the making of this blog.

FACT: Okay—one in four rabbits and 25% of all sheep used in the making of this blog were, in fact, killed.

They pissed me off.

A Mother's Day Retreat: Let Me Show You To Your Womb...

Happy Mother's Day, Ma! How's about an oral contraceptive with your freshly squeezed OJ?

May 9th is the 50th anniversary of the invention of the birth control pill. I ain't makin' this up! Google that shit! This Sunday may serve as the greatest example of irony in the history of the ironical. Theater and writing teachers, take note! "Example of irony, example of irony . . . Ah, yes! How about the 50th anniversary of the invention of the birth control pill — that medication which prevents pregnancy so, therefore, sex yields no children which, thereby, brings a screeching halt to the creation of mothers — falling on the same day as . . . tah-daaaah! Mother's Day, 2010! Oh, that was a great day for irony lovers across the land! Some say Alanis Morissette wept."

Of course, that's hyperbolic example. Most women don't take the pill their whole life-long so they may never have any children and never be mothers; rather, they take it for the convenience of choosing when they will or won't get pregnant — when they will or won't become mommys. However, some women take definitive action when they swallow the pill, having decided at some point they didn't want to have children; that, for whatever reasons, surgical intervention was not for them nor any other method of birth control prevention. And to be able to make that choice — to have the ability to daily take a pill because now is not the time for a baby, or to stop taking said pill and say, "Now is the time to have a baby, I want to have a child now." — that easy for so many women! — what an awesome ability that is.

Still, the irony. Oh, ya' gotta laugh. I gotta laugh. Or else you'll cry. Or else I'll cry. I cry at the drop of a hat these days. I cry at the drop of a hat, drop of a sock, drop of a shirt, a pen, a pill — really, there's no need to drop anything because I cry for no reason at all — not sure why I necessitated the dropping of a hat to begin with. Silliness. Madness. Mad Hatters? Hormones.

Q. How do you make a hormone?

A. You kick it.

Oh, so terrible, so terrible, offensive on so many levels but so funny, so funny and ya' gotta laugh, I gotta laugh or someone's gonna drop a hat.

HORMONES.

Not one word of a lie — wish I could video record while writing — after boldly typing "hormones" with the intent to draw a laugh I stopped, stared at the word and cried — laughed but cried, hands held up in the universal "What the fuck?/Search me!" gesture.

And thatfast — the tears dry up. But that salty wall still pushes impending behind my eyes, sinuses — all the time. It's so stupid. It's such silliness. It's the unending dropping of hats.

Madness.

It is pointless to tell you

It is now and it will continue to be pointless to tell you when I'm made to pull over for breakdowns. Repairs are quick affairs, usually: oily hormones clog the machinery, the engine overheats, leaks and fails. These are delicate works, cannot be forced, roadside rest must be taken, pulled over before attempting reigniting, at finding the lost spark, then shift into neutral, sit idle, and soon enough I'm again back on the rocky road. There's a destination ahead, The Mother's Day Retreat, and I aim to get there, breakdowns be damned.

So throw it in reverse and burn rubbers, 'cause this is a retreat — a retreat from the mothers.

From madness.

Hyster-(o): from the Greek meaning uterus; hysteria.

Socratic, sexist bastards.

Explains a lot, though.

Gotta laugh, gotta laugh . . .

This Mother's Day, Sunday, I'll be here at my mom's, likely laid up on the couch; Ova Marie warms-up her . . . pipe . . . alla agiato, affannoso, promising ostinato ovations for the weekend. Oh, she's such a diva-bitch.

But I'll listen, keen — cry myself breathless over the melancholy music played by my little internal organ and the knowledge that it's the last time I'll ever hear her discordant anguish.

Hysterectomy: meaning uterus, hysteria, removed.

Mother's Day: meaning . . .

There are other hopes, other meanings, other means but — if you please — don't ask she, still stuffed full with the hysterical, to focus on such right now. The hats are dropping and should you point out future potential chance or "luck" those hats will drop mad.

Some other hysteria palpated within my weird womb remains unnamed, unknown so we'll see. It's funny (seriously, it is funny — well, I had to laugh, anyway) when the doctor examines you, palpates your right side, stops dead and awkwardly asks, "Um, Anne? Didn't you say they took everything out of your right side?"

Keep in mind, Doc's got one hand all up in my mamma jammas, the other pushing on my belly, I'm doing everything I can not to look him in the eye and all-hell hurts like a motherfucker but it shouldn't because—

"Yes, yes they took everything, everything OUT!"

"The right side?"

"Yes!"

"Ovary, fallopian tube, appendix, too?"

"YesyesyesYES!"

"Huh. I'm palpating a mass over here and it's about the size of an ovary — small lemon-ish size—"

"I know and it hurts! What is that?!"

"Well, could be a wad of scar tissue, could be something . . . else, we'll have to get a better look later. Let's check the left side now. I'm sorry, I know this is going to hurt."

"I'm sorry, too but just do whatever you have to Doc I want to know what all's wrong so go ahe— ohmygaaaaaawwwwwwd."

"I'm so sorry, I'll go as quick as I can—"

"No don't — just take whatever time you need just do whatever you have to find whatever you have to — it's okay! Really it's okay!"

"Some masses over here, too. Might be cysts or scar tissue. I know — just hang on, Anne, we're almost done. You've been such a patient lady. Okay, we're done. Okay."

Okay.

"I grow scar tissue like kudzu," I tearfully informed him afterwards, postured painfully in Quasimodo hunch on the edge of the exam table.

"Oh, I'm sure, after 7 surgeries, I'm sure you do, and the surgeon will find out exactly what those masses are and — that's the only hiccup — I don't do hysterectomies anymore — but I've got 3 people on my staff here who do, so I'm setting you up for a consult with one of them. Next week . . . Tuesday okay?"

Okay.

And it is okay 'cause the thing is, I know it's all scar tissue — it grows in me like kudzu — my mind isn't consumed with preying masses. There's the money, or lack of, I should say; unassured as one uninsured but there's help, assistance for the unassisted. Junk: dope, narcotics, drugs — terrifying for the recovering addict who just last week celebrated two years clean but y'know, not so terrifying as I thought it might be. Twenty-four months of sobriety, sanity, chronic pain suffered without the aid of painkilling . . . all of this time to reflect on what's really tolerable and what isn't . . . I know I'll come through shining.

I know I'll be okay.

Okay.

But I'm still going to lament the loss. I'm going to cry myself to sleep each night from now till then — the day they take my unknown babies away — when I let them show me to my room, show to me my womb and I make my final retreat: wave bye-bye . . . bye-bye . . .

It's okay. It's time. I've held on so long. This battle . . . I fought as gods and monsters and whether anyone else knows the truth of that matters not: I know it. This is not a surrender. This isn't even a retreat.

This is a peace-offering.

I offer up to Hecate my hysteria that I may reclaim my Life — my sanity — my peace — myself.

I cannot raise another of her artificial sprites.

Time has had with me her druthers,

And please believe — that is okay.

Celebrate your children, Mothers:

My birth is that of better day.

*****

HECATE: Hark! I am call'd; my little spirit, see,

Sits in a foggy cloud, and stays for me.

Macbeth. III.v.34-35

******

Forgive the awful writing. Mad hats dropping . . . everywhere, endlessly.

Please — no advice, however well-intended, or stories of hope, hang-in-there, been-there-and-had-success-if-you-just-try-this, do-that, etc. I know what I've endured. This is my decision. I'm so tired. I'm not living; merely existing, and not well. I'm done. Well-done.

I'm one who's done well.

Thank you, Mark Sleiter, for unobfuscating things for me when really, you had no call to do so. You are the most awful, terrible, horrible mean man. You should be clubbed with a baby seal.

My ovary is in the mail. I N L O V I N G M E M O R Y.

Scary scrawl.

Thank you, Mark. In all seriousness. Seriously.

But ya' gotta laugh . . .

Seriously.

:D