Pink Wedding Shirts, Flower Picking, Cats, Sea Monkeys
Upon viewing, the wedding photo from Tiger King instantly downloaded into my psyche under: beautiful images. I am excited by how this picture, later revealed to be on many levels a falsity, a staging, lays so decadent on so many thresholds- gay/ st8, alive/ dead, in love/bribed. And how within a staging there is sincerity, and then when I think about it hard enough, a sincerity might even be able to be seen as the dough of any facade, depending on your perspective. In my perspective this image holds an undeniable warmth, attention to detail. Three men coming together in formal clothes, standing in a line. Is that pink ribbons on the officiant’s gown? A stable indoors, Joe is obviously the centerpiece here, though the archways center remains curiously empty minus straw halo and candle that also looks like it could possibly be a bottle of lotion, on pink tiger print rag. Something sorrowful. Travis looks happy. Betrayal and manipulation often favored as documentary topics over affection, which is un-blamable if one consider kind of horrible things like the show Love Is Blind, but I blame that shows stuffiness for my disinterest, not the affection itself. What I imagine my dream Las Vegas wedding to be like. I have lived it almost 1,000 times in my mind. And here it is! Irl! In Oklahoma! When I go to sleep at night I sleep with one pillow on each side of me, one I pretend is my lover, but who is the other? Dorian Electra- no- the nature of our completely one sided fantasy relationship does not go like that. Someone else, who is completely different, but then when my sleepy mind gets tired I just think of it as the pillow, something to support, and fall back into a light- arm tingling sleep. I wake up most nights at similar times, around 2:50 am to the sound of what sounds like footsteps in my back yard.Though in the morning light I know this to be completely untrue, in the night I succeed in convincing myself that these footsteps are from a person who has decided to hang out behind my house in the night time. I have made peace with her, deciding that if the steps ever come too close I will run as fast as I can to my hatchback- you can sleep in there, I guess if I ever needed to.
To escape the stuffiness of my small home I go for walks and jogs daily. When I am on these walks, sometimes being ultra-disciplined telling myself how weak I am, and sometimes drunk in the evenings, I see plants and flowers. My favorite are these different siblings of sage plants (I think?) that grow in my neighborhood. The other evening I saw a particularly nice one, long thick stems with gray leaves, blue flowers on each side. Senses candy. All at once I was like I have to have one! And reached out for it, abruptly stopping myself, a cacophony of lectures emanating in my mind, “You can’t pick flowers because then you kill them. You kill them and take them all for yourself you selfish asshole. They don’t even have a chance to flourish thanks to you now because you took them. And now the bees and the hummingbirds that were once all over will never come back all because you decided that you need to own this flower for yourself.” Thank god I have been doing my morning 10 minute meditations or else this thought would have appeared to gel with me as a being, instead I read it as light blue text on the black screen of my mind. How weird I thought, that I feel so guilty about this, as I walked past it, still not taking one.
My solitude within quarantine- that like many, is more or less the same without, has led me to imagining life with a quiet presence. One that’s more than imaginary, that needs me to feed it. That I can pet. Like a cat! But then even considering this decision brings up so many concerns for me. All of the sudden, I feel 12, something about roles, authority, caregiver. I think about this as a substitute teacher but - at home? What if I want to stay out all night? Also cats aren’t allowed on my lease. I start thinking of alternatives, when I was a kid I bought sea monkeys at the Science Center, I took them home and put them in the fish tank, then the next morning they were all gone. I think the fish ate them, or they crawled out? I comforted with myself by telling myself that it’s okay because I’m not sure exactly what sea monkeys are and that they’re more like a bacteria that can’t feel pain. I don’t think that is true.
