The Horse Part 3 – Winter

There are some things you cannot un-see.

I was once shown a video of a man who was killed by a horse in the most unimaginable way possible whilst an onlooker helped and watched. The horror of it sickened me, how anyone could do this to an unsuspecting animal, how anyone could sit back and watch someone else die while they were “given the horse” in an act of perversion, bestiality and cruelty. It became a term of malice, and even a perverse cartoon. The irony and the discomfort of the humor were sickening, but to cope, I laughed, even if at first the laughs were just huffs or “har har har”. I went along with the jokes to protect myself, even instigating them to throw off the scent of mutiny. This was par for the course, and Stockholm Syndrome saved my sweet ass for a little while, until I realized that there was nothing about me that my Steel was not willing to exploit, demean, belittle, criticize, bully or find another way to be cruel about. If you have ever seen a copy of the Power and Control Wheel, take note of the kinds of threats and assaults that are mentioned. I was told by an expert in the field that because I am such an incredible person and magnificent catch, this is why every method listed was used, and then some of his own unique creation, to get me under his control. What a wild filly.

Click to access PowerControlwheelNOSHADING.pdf

The devil was the most beautiful angel, but he was an angel to begin with. An angel that had fallen away from God. I cannot believe in a God so unloving that he would allow any one of his creations to be cast aside for making a mistake, even a huge one. There is always forgiveness. There is always redemption. If you believe in the story of Jesus, then how can you believe that every mistake, every one could be forgiven, except that of Satan’s? Do you think that the sacrifice of God incarnate is not enough to redeem it? If so, then that is megalomania beyond megalomania, and that person will be doomed to be stuck in the hellfire of eternal damnation until he finally gets it right. Or, every religion is shit. Every single one.

There was and is no exception or limit to forgiveness. Repentance is required, though. There is no fake it until you make it. That bullshit is wrapped in cellophane, and can easily be seen right through. Until there is actual repentance, there is no forgiveness. One has to actually want it and do whatever it takes to earn it.

There are some that say Paganini sold his soul to play the violin so masterfully. Or are these just the kind of self-righteous, egotistical, know-it-all, malignantly narcissistic, borderline personality disordered individuals who threatened to blow up the Temple they claimed to love, cherish, and honor until the day they died only not to understand that one cannot cheat one’s way to Mastery? One needs to educate oneself, work for it, practice, and be trained by a qualified instructor well beyond their first level of proficiency. It takes more than memorizing what the seven liberal arts and sciences are to become a Master. It takes more than rote cleverness and recitation of a code. It involves learning the lessons. It also involves paying the price, should you not conform to the lessons, or of the obligation. Lessons of failure, embarrassment, shame, ostracism, tough love. One needs to be trained, to study, be tested, and use them in regular practice, with correct intent. This is what makes a Master. The secret is out.

“There is no secret ingredient.” – Po’s Father, Kung Fu Panda

“There are two types of people – trained and untrained.” -The Steel

I figured out the day that the Steel formally gave up. May 21, 2015. This was right before he broke up with me for two weeks. This was when I had said “Have fun with your training” and really out of ignorance not knowing what to call it other than words he himself had used. This was the day he stopped training.

“I am not training for anything,” he writes.

https://brokencovenant.wordpress.com/2015/05/21/what-are-you-training-for/

Ergo – if there are two types of people, by his own admission and logic, he is the type that is untrained.

I am classically trained. I started on viola when I was eight years old, and switched to violin after my children were grown. I am educated, I worked for it, I practice all the time – with my violin, without my violin, by reading music, listening and imagining myself playing, remembering lessons, applying what was learned. When  I started on violin, I went back to the very beginner books that I had learned viola with, and went through every single song until I could play it from memory. This is not just riding a bicycle. This is transitioning to an elegant, state of the art, highly sensitive elite motorcycle, more delicate and highly tuned, and in a different clef to boot. I did this knowing full well that it would be challenging and require blood, sweat, tears and a whole slew of other atrocities that they never tell you about in grade school. It would make the beginner frightened to death of trying.

They say all is fair in love and war. :0)

“Galileo’s head was on the block. His crime was looking up the truth. And as the bombshells of my daily fears explode I try to trace them to my youth. How long until my soul gets it right? Would any human being ever reach that kind of light? I call on the resting soul of Galileo, king of night vision, king of insight” – Galileo, Indigo Girls

When you are exposed to evil, the only way to scare the demons away is to laugh. Whenever I have been in an extremely agonizingly painful situation, I have cracked jokes to distract myself and ease the tension in the room, because “Why so serious?” I’ve done this with physical pain, emotional pain, psychological pain. I’ve taken to the phrase “Better a pain in the ass, than a pain in the neck!” That poor bloke with The Horse. That’s one I’ll not trade with, thank you very much. I’ve been given the horse one too many times.

Some people like horses. Some people like to give people the horse. I prefer to give the horse a carrot.

So today is the day that the Pirate Looks At 40. One of the things I learned from living in the South is how not to act. People down there would hate you so much that they’d bake you a cake. When you hate sweets. And it’s a thank you party. And they all know it. I’m not so callous. I still love the Steel. Today, I will bake one of my newly renamed world famous Annie Cakes.

Annie is to Horse as Horse is to Carrots, as Carrots is to Cake.

What’s remaining? Annie Cake. Because, math. Slice of cake, really!

I whipped up the luscious, finger-licking-good cream cheese frosting, hand shred a pound and a half of those lovely roots, toasted and chopped the pecans, spiced it to perfection, and finished it with all of the heart, soul, compassion, adoration, and love I have ever had for him. I will feed this delicious cake to my loved ones, who went absolutely crazy for it at Thanksgiving. None of them will understand that this cake is really about him, and I would not want to spoil it for them. It’s a shame that he will not be here to savor this delight, one of his favorites. They just do not understand that I will always love him. This is because, love does. I celebrated the love I had for him all day today. It was real, it was true. I am not and never claimed to be perfect, however I always work my hardest to be the very best I can be at anything I set my mind to. And that included my marriage with the Steel.

I love the Steel because I made a decision and commitment to love him, based on the man he showed me he could be. I can never love him in a sexual way ever again. Oh, not eros. Oh no fucking way. Boundaries! No touching. Not even a peck or a Christian Shoulder hug. That was lost after those monstrous hands went after my delicate throat.  (Olly olly oxen free – ready or not, here I come) Out of respect for myself, I will not have intercourse with anyone for at least a full year.

The Steel was fond of Justice. JustUs. At least, in the end, he surprisingly admitted that what he really meant was JustMe (meaning just him).

Happy Birthday. It’s going to be a long cold winter. Are you ready?

Winter is coming. Hajime.

 

The Horse, PTSDeux

I have Post Traumatic Stress Disorder.

The first time I was diagnosed with this condition was after a significant car accident that rattled my brain and strangled my brain stem, causing cerebral spinal fluid to back down my spinal cord and break it apart from the inside. The physical trauma from this left a myriad of physical anomalies that I have learned to adapt and work with the new normal, however the psychological impact of the traumatic car accident and undergoing neural surgery.

In the aftermath of the Audi-Mirage catastrophe, and had a very hard time getting into a vehicle, much less riding long distance in one. Walking into the surgical center and stripping off my clothes was as a walk of death, the scrub-green mile. I lay on a table while an anesthesiologist with meat hooks for hands attempted to insert an arterial blood pressure line in my arm. I smiled at him – it must have looked menacing, for he left and let someone else finish the deed. The next thing I knew, I was in ICU, throwing up said coffee into a pan, my head screaming with every heave. With no pain medication to dull, I needed to find another way to get through. I let go of my consciousness and drifted for 24 hours – not sleep, just letting go, hovering outside of my body so I did not have to be in the torrent of the river of agony, I could just sit next to it and observe it. Each time a nurse came over to check my vitals, I was sucked back in to the deluge in a paper cup. I had the ability to draw myself back out, but with lack of food or sleep, it became more difficult each time. At long last, they wheeled my broken body to a private room without any machines that went “blip”. The silence made it impossible to come out of my stupor, as I could not identify even one thing I could hear, nor make any sound of my own. It hurt too much to even cry.

By my bedside appeared my mother. Not my earthly mother, but Gaia, or Mary, or the Popess. Her robes were as celeste and cerulean, a mix of the cloudless sky above the plains and the deepest stormy ocean waters. Her presence was calming and soothing, and I lost myself in awe of her glory. She was not there to be worshiped – she was there to comfort and relieve my suffering. Her image is as clear in my mind today as it was that day almost 17 years ago.

I spent 6 months in intense physical of therapy before I could get into a car again without having an attack. In fact, I purchased the best possible vehicle I could manage to afford at the time that had Whiplash Protection Seating. In 2002, this was a new technology that appeared only on high end vehicles such as Lexus, etc.

“Yes, I used to be a real wild child,
But now I am a Volvo-driving soccer mom” – Everclear

I became a Volvo S40 Driving Soccer Mom, much to my ex’s chagrin.. While the lyrics of the song are not exactly accurate, the spirit was. My personality started to change after this. I took a physically demanding job to pay for it, starting part time, and working my way up the ladder to Regional Operations Manager running five stores in two states. This took 4 years. The vehicle acted as a placebo. It gave the illusion of safety while I worked on needing to check my mirrors 30 times a minute, and pacing myself at stoplights. The next year, I trained for a 10 mile race in three months, having never run anywhere except to the bathroom and to get the mail, and succeeded to run it in 1:45. The physically demanding job turned into my ticket out of a loveless marriage with narcissus, and the key to living independently for the first time in my life.

During the time frame when we lived at the base of the Lonely Mountain, our family had adopted a beautiful fluffer named Jake. Jake was a German Spitz, which is like a Pomeranian but with a foxier face. He was the most beautiful little floof that you could want.

When we brought him home, we found out something very surprising about Jake. He was petrified of the broom. I would go to sweep in the kitchen, and little Jork would dust-mop himself under a bed or the couch, shaking like a leaf. It was quite obvious that someone had swept him aside vigorously by his skittish behavior. I started slowly with him – laying down the broom in the center of the kitchen, and sitting with Jake in the next room barely in view of the broom, petting and cooing and giving him jerky treats. We repeated this ritual every day. Some days, Jake would see the broom and bolt. I would go and comfort him, and give him treats and all the love he could stand. Some days he just paced around. Eventually, we worked our way to where he would nose through the dirt I was sweeping up, looking for treats, and I could touch him with the bristles with no flinching.

Jake passed in the summer of 2016, his golden years spent being pissed off by having to share them with another gorgeous pup. I am not sure if he ever lost memory of the trauma, but he certainly learned to trust again after years of tender loving care from someone unrelated to his injury, wielding the weapon of it. This is a lesson I take to heart.

In October of this year, I was strangled. Strangled by the man who was supposed to be my Steel against Steel, in an act of rage and hatred. My trachea was crushed to the point that I think about the incident each and every time I swallow. Sometimes, I am yanked out of reality back into the incident hard. The panic attacks were severe at first. I was on. I was awake. A beloved friend and teacher came to help, and after poking the base of my neck, I became a puddle. That’s not the water they’re talking about being like. For nearly a month and a half I slept not more than one or two hours a night, slipping unexpectedly back and forth between the incident and reality, more there than here. Sleep is a bit easier these days, averaging four or five seductive hours per day, and I say per day for I take sleep as often and when it strikes. It is not striking tonight, but I’ve learned to accept and be calm and trust that sleep will come in due time. I’ve not felt safe, wanted to run, wanted to hide like the little bunny rabbit I can be. I’ve awoken to the feeling of his hand crushing my throat, heard voices and tapping and rustling, lived through technicolor nightmares. I see the future and the past and the present all at once. The countryside has appeared to me as a Van Gogh painting. My ancestors are calling – they are earth, and wind, and water. I commune with trees. Talk with cats. Caw at the crows. Have theological debates with houseplants.

“Basic elemental
Instinct to survive
Stirs the higher passions
Thrill to be alive

Alternating currents
In a tidewater surge
Rational resistance
To an unwise urge”

-RUSH, Prime Mover

It has not been all bad. I see those who are zombies and those who are awake – angels and demons alike. I am learning to discern those who are on different planes of awakening. I am bringing balance to the Force. Left brain meets right, and they become best friends. My violin skills have dramatically improved, and I am working on a new concerto. This is the true concerto of a warrior – one who can memorize eight full pages of music, dynamic, tempo, movement, key change, and work with another just as equally important player. I’m taking my time with this one. I have figured out who the best friends in the universe are. I have cut everything and everyone unnecessary or unhealthy out of my life.  I am exercising, eating what I want when I want, drinking as much wine as the Landlord can stock, and with the assistance of some Cetirizine HCL, developing a lovely relationship with two sweet puddy-tats. I have regular counseling with an amazing therapist, and am practicing some EDMR I remembered from the last time I was in physical therapy. I have goals I have set myself to attain, and work daily at as many as I can, trying to beat my own expectations, even if it is just by the count of one. No one can be harder on me than I can, however now I have learned that it is okay to be gentle with myself.

I figure, if the nice young men in their pretty white coats come to take me away someday, life will not be that much different. I do hope they allow visitors tho. I have a feeling I might be in good company.

“I remember, I remember when I lost my mind
There was something so pleasant about that place
Even your emotions have an echo in so much space

And when you’re out there, without care
Yeah I was out of touch
But it wasn’t because I didn’t know enough
I just knew too much

Does that make me crazy? Possibly..”

Crazy – Gnarls Barkley

Back to Annie. I know that with time Annie will learn to trust and welcome the touch of the Landlord once again, and will not run off at the sound of the snapping carrot. It’s so new though, still. We have to be slow and gentle teaching her. One day at a time, dear Annie. This horse can have all the carrots she can eat, and I’m going to give them to her.

PTSD can come from any severely traumatic experience – childhood trauma, being abused and cheated on, one too many hits to the snake. I recall the Steel recanting a few of his own traumatic stories, and while I will not publicly speculate, I will imagine that he has had a similar course of both psychological and physical trauma that have altered his personality. There was a reason he did not kill me on that day. He said to me, something/someone inside of him had ordered him to let me go.

Whoever or whatever that was, thank you for standing up for me. Thank you for protecting me, when no one else would. That was a brave voice. That was the voice of a hero. It takes powerful love to take correct action. Agápe love.