the circle of fathers
i started to place this post under, "the dumb broad show," but i canae bring myself to leave this group of profoundly gentle and wise men in the same grouping as the cast of cackling hyenas who made my engineering talents into such a nightmare. they are the mentors and supporters who helped me get as far as i did as a failed equal opportunity experiment. today i wish to add two women to that circle of fathers. thank you, gentlemen, for widening the circle, gentlemen. thank you, ladies, for not insisting we change the name of the group to reflect your membership. would you like to share your opinions of the value of name-changing? a turd by whatever name is still a turd.
my feather babies are under attack by a new set of predators. the delayed completion (4 years) of the farm restoration project is dragging on ominously and i canae protect the birds without access to the old farmhouse the coops were designed to be protected from. the new house which was built during the domestic crisis of 2019 is too far away for guard duties. the rescuing angel who moved into the old farmhouse in august, 2020 as a temporary measure is looking ever more permanent and emminently content in the house. more and more, i feel like an intruder when i attempt to work with my chickens there, especially given that she doesn't much like chickens.
the conundrum has triggered quite a stir in the warring factions of the dumb broad show in my head.
"her husband will never allow her to finish."
"she didn't really do the 3 finished buildings on her own."
"girls can't do that work."
"all her problems will be over if she will just change the name to reflect her reproductive parts."
"you're just a child prostitute with no degree."
"you've been a not-working bum since 1995. you have no pay-stub validation."
! ! !QUIET ON THE SET! ! ! those puppets can cackle endlessly, echoing opinions accumulated from more than 60 years of not being able to get comfy in girlie costumes. no disrespect intended, folks. i just can't seem to resist the urge to get my hands dirty. yes, lady work has plenty of opportunities to get your hands dirty and i donae feel diminished by that work, but please don't ask me to hang curtains or spend my free time at the spa.
during the same period where i began organizing my intrusive thoughts into puppet shows, i was also forming my theory that my flashback psychoses(pl) werenae designed to punish me with torture, that they were my subconscious effort to recall important details which had been buried in the mindslides of child prostitution. just breathe and go where the memory takes you. the theory has rewarded me with some real gems. it turns out even a child prostitute has golden moments worthy of remembering. let's not throw babies out with the bathwater.
the current round of flashback psychosis has led me to the quiet voices of the circle of fathers. they speak too softly to be heard over the warring factions of women's lib. no, i donae count myself as a women's libber. neither side of that great debate holds wisdom or appeal for me. i just working with what nature gave me, lady parts and all. i'm still a bit mystified over what genitals have to do with torqueing nuts, but that isnae the most confusing part of gender politics for me.
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was "mister henderson" the first member of my circle of fathers? i put his name in quotation marks because i am far from certain i am remembering right. he emerged during the first rounds of taking amnesia therapy seriously in the late 80's/early 90's. memory of him didnae emerge directly. the very first body of memories to emerge during that therapy was of my transition, c. 1964, from retard to gifted. my delayed early development was such that i started school as, "retarded." as i was shuffled from school to school however many times i was shuffled, the academic classification shuffled with me until 3rd grade when i walked into missus murphy's class mid year and she countered, "retarded, my eye! ! !" her name doesn't need quotation marks. her reign of terror was so fierce that even the most alcoholic of my siblings hasnae drunk enough to forget missus murphy. her tactics would be illegal in today's school --for good reason--, but they worked in my case. by the end of third grade i had learned a enough to be at a true third grade level in order to avoid missus murphey's wrath. not even the most apathetic of the school office workers was willing to argue the wisdom of changing my official classification.
proof unavailable, but i strongly suspect i was tag-teamed. i actually stayed in that school long enough to complete 4th grade with "missus henderson" as a normal kid with a speech defect. i was able to start fifth grade in the same school with "mister henderson." in my mind's eye i imagine that missus murphy had spotted the family problems and was conspiring with her co-workers, the hendersons, on how to best help. they did a damned fine job, but mister henderson's decision to place me in the still new and controversial gifted math and science program was a road to hell paved with good intentions. the local populace was still divided about wasting money on a gifted program. a girl in gifted math and science set up controversy this barely verbal child was ready to handle. the gift is math and science, not politics. can i go back to being a retard now?
it was too late to retrieve the lost simplicity of being retarded, but i was hugely relieved when the parental units got back on the road and we moved to a school district with no gifted programs. they did have a speech therapist, for which i was truly grateful.
true? false? proof unavailable, one way or the other. but for the sake of the psychotic puppet show in my head, i want to honor mister henderson as the founding member of the circle of fathers. whatcha think, mister henderson. should we widen the circle for missus murphy and missus henderson?
((arfie)))
I can't imagine your torture Arf
I was molested by my best friend at the time's father
One time!!
I never went back and it messed me up
I didn't want any adult male to hug or touch me in any way after that for years and I mean decent men
It just messed me up
What you have lived through is unimaginable for most of us thankfully
It pains me to know what you have suffered
I'd like to cut all of their 'parts' off
Huge hug Arf....Bless you...xo
on the other end of grievous injury lives the joy of healing. some days i feel i am near.
the abuse i suffered at the hands of women have been much harder to heal because of the cultural denial. all bad guys are male, right?
Whomever was involved in these terrible crimes should pay for them
I know now they won't ...Just like my molester won't
I'm glad that your tnerapy has helped a great deal Arf
I just ordered the Al Anon book Courage to Change and I received it today
I hope over time it can help.me as well
I know that the AA 12 steps has saved a lot of lives
Hola Arfie,
Here with you listening. My dissociations here & my words aren’t so good lately but you have my support for sure
Big hugs <3 <3 <3
my father did end up serving hard time in two states for these goodies. the **win** in court might have been more traumatic than the crimes with everybody dancing on my head to celebrate the wonderful victory.
"judgement is mine, sayeth the lord."
i find it much easier to trust god's justice system than humanities just-ice.
thank you, missy. personally, i see more love in humble best academically validated hoopla.
you have been through so much and have triumphed in such and extraordinary way!! though the painful memories of the past can be sometimes easier to hold onto in the face of blank future, try and decide on choosing to be happy with yourself. choose happy -
choose the extraordinary good that you are!! You are VICTORIA!!
Sometimes society tells us we have to have graceful lives.....well YOU get to choose what that looks like!
Appreciate you I do! I hope you appreciate you too!
I didn't mean any offense.... My confused way of supporting I guess.... xo
gosh I am sorry arfie. my comments must seem so over simple. we're with you in spirit. peace.
you do do inspire my evil grins, markus museous. . . during the era where the smoking reform (which i supported mightily) was morphing into the smoking prohibition (which i despise), i often threatened to "go victoria" on some of the more vocal prohibitionists. "going victoria" was a tribute to england's queen victoria who was one of herstories most notorious anti-smokers. it was a threat to blow literal smoke into someone's face. calling me, "victoria" could carry a double entendre. good thing you're currently at a safe social distance, huh?
your direct simplicity is what i truly admire about you comments, my inspirational friend. i tend to over-complicate EVERYTHING! ! ! since simplicity is so hard for my hyper-active brain, the inspiration to K.I.S.S. is priceless.
not even close to offended, suncloud, but i often believe i need to find a more effective channel for that body of yaddah blahs. even pro therapists haven't been able to help me with that one because they, too, herald court victories as healing triumphs. yet another place i'm just an ideological freakazoid, i reckon.
i theorate that it is my prison family birthright that keeps me from feeling triumphant and healed over that "victory." my sibs call prison, "the family alma mater" because it is where we go to receive our higher education. i don't much approve of the curriculum and can't find a shred of faith that just-ice is going to fix more than it breaks.
is it healing progress that my nieces and nephews are calling prison, "the alternate mental health system." some of them are "just getting help" and not finding the primary mental health system any more justy than i have. the secondary mental health system is far easier to institute.
as the "SB4 Incident" wanders its way toward closure, the clamoring from the civil rights factions within the puppet shows in my head, i may be discovering that the circle of fathers has been busy taking advantage of all that noisy distraction. of course they have strong and well informed opinions on the immigration issues, including how to keep that enormous body of debates from derailing the project at hand. methinks they have been quietly guiding me through the business of child and LLC development, despite urgings from the civil rights puppets to negotiate peace between all the warring factions of global injustices.
a particular round with the circle of fathers has been floating through my mind during the current transition from the academic year to summer vacation. in 1994/95 there was one particular high rise office building which held several job sites i worked. 32 floors of office space can hold allot of remodeling job sites simultaneously. this particular high rise was far from the only or the tallest high rise in the urban center.
nobody wants to try to work next door to a remodeling job site. a remodeling crew willing to work after hours can pretty much write their own ticket with far less stress and SNAFUs than one can expect from navigating the intense hustle and bustle of a thriving urban center. i wanted to work a night shift crew and was campaigning fairly hard to establish one. several site superintendents and crew leaders were onboard but change don't come easy. our culture cherishes those banker's hours. convincing corporate headquarters and laborers to mess with that holy grail is puzzling, at best.
a site superintendent called, "don" had suffered a psychotic break and was working his first job after the break when i first worked with him. he very much wanted to work after hours instead of fielding the never-ending neighbor complaints, traffic SNAFUs, etc.