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three things not in anyways connected, other than the fact that it's me:
1) i got a weird haircut last night.
2) i just have a vivid dream not 30 seconds ago
3) in my spare time i'm reading the novel "the color purple" by alice walker.
now, there's something about getting a haircut: like samson, perhaps i not only lost some of my earthly powers, but also some of my status. and lo and behold, today i am unusually spent and my brain has been on a lunch-break since yesterday.
the cut is self-described as a modern take on the 80's skater-cut, but with less hanging locks and more short shaved sides with a fade. it looks silly, but then again, have i ever had a 'normal' haircut since i was 12? i think not. ask anyone that's known me for that long. it's just a long string of off-kilter cuts, for the most part self-administered.
i have no regrets.
ok the dream: i was going to a movie theatre that i have been to many times in my dreams. although this time, they moved this massive cineplex/stadium to bangkok, and not only that, but it now is in the slimmest alleyway ever. very strange. how do they ever get the doors open, if they only open out, and the alleyway is so constricted?
stranger things have happened in my dreams. in any case, i was going into the movie, following a very very lucid re-encounter with the real-life memory of an afternoon i had with my ex...which is odd in of itself.
i was rushing into the dimmed theater, and the curtains were billowing and red. the usher said hi to me, and as i turned, i noticed that it was a friend of mine. i wanted to ask him so many questions, but couldn't get it out because the movie was beginning. with all of these questions on my mind, i entered the theater confused and displaced, then woke up.
the burning sensation on the heel of my left foot signified that indeed i had received a mosquito bit. so now, not only am i all confused in my waked state, i also can't forget the dream and the fact that there's a mosquito bit on my heel. when looking at the time passed, i was asleep for about two minutes.
finally: the 'color purple' is a very very engaging book published in 1982. i have a xeroxed copy of the book from Thammasat University in bangkok, and have been reading a few letters a day for the past months or so. if you haven't read this book, get up on that.
written entirely in letters-written-to-god form, we are left to experience every since happening through the descriptions of a woman who's life is hard, sad, and completely absorbing. the bulk of the passages speak to the feelings of being contained, owned, misused, maltreated, and demeaned.
there are however, moments of true and blissful freedom scattered throughout, and those usually come in the form of simple discoveries and thoughts. they are the most powerful things about reading this book.
thus, below i am ending today's odd-duck post with a particularly touching passage (located on page 68-70 of the 2001 edition published and bound in great britain by cox & wyman ltd, reading, berkshire), which speaks louder than all of the other painful passages, in that there seems to be an open door for every thousand closed, and that her happiness is perpetually short-lived.
"
Dear God,
Now we all know she going sometime soon, they sleep together at night. Not every night, from Friday to Monday.
He go down to Harpo's to watch her sing. And just to look at her. Then way late they come home. hey giggle and they talk and they rassle until morning. Then go to bed until it time for her to get ready to go back to work.
First time it happen, it was an accident. Feeling just carried them away. That what Shug say. He don't say nothing.
She ast me, Tell me the truth, she say, do you mind if Albert sleep with me?
I think, I don't care who Albert sleep with. But I don't say that.
I say, You might git big again.
She say, Naw, not with my sponge and all.
You still love him, I ast.
She say, I got what you call a passion for him. If I was ever going to have a husband he'd a been it. But he weak, she say. Can't make up his mind what he want. And from what you tell me he a bully. Some things I love about him though, she say. He smell right to me. He so little, He make me laugh.
You like to sleep with him? I ast.
Yeah, Celie, she say, I have to confess, I just love it. Don't you?
Naw, I say. Mr. ____ can tell you, I don't like it at all. What is it like? He git up on you, heist your nightgown round your waist, plunge in. Most times I pretend I ain't there. He never know the difference. Never ast me how I feel, nothing. Just do his business, get off, go to sleep.
She start to laugh. Do his business, she say. Do his business. Why you, Miss Celie. You make it sound like he going to the toilet on you.
That what it feel like. I say.
She stop laughing.
You never enjoy it at all? she ast, puzzle. Not even with your children daddy?
Never, I say.
Why Miss Celie, she say, you still a virgin.
What? I ast.
Listen, she say, right down there in your pussy is a little button that gits real hot when you do you know what with somebody. It gits hotter and hotter and then it melt. That the good part. But other parts good too, she say. Lot of sucking go on, here and there, she say. Lot of finger and tongue work.
Button? Finger and tongue? My face hot enough to melt itself.
She say, Here, take this mirror and go look at yourself down there, I bet you never seen it have you?
Naw.
And I bet Albert never been down there either.
I felt him, I say.
I stand there with the mirror.
She say, What, too shame even to go off and look at yourself? And you look so cute too, she say, laughing. All dressed up for Harpo's, smelling good and everything, but scared to look at your own pussy.
You come with me while I look, I say.
And us run off to my room like two little prankish girls.
You guard the door, I say.
She giggle. Okay, she say. Nobody coming. Coast clear.
I lie back on the bed and haul up my dress. Yank down my bloomers. Stick the looking glass tween my legs. Ugh. All that hair. Then my pussy lips be balck. Then inside look like a wet rose.
It a lot prettier than you thought, ain't it? she say from the door.
It mine, I say. Where the button?
Right near the top, she say. The part that stick out a little.
I look at her and touch it with my finger. A little shiver go through me. Nothing much. But just enough to tell me this the right button to mash. Maybe.
She say, While you looking, look at your titties too. I haul up my dress and look at my titties. Think bout my babies sucking them. Remember the little shiver I felt then too. Sometimes a big Shiver. Best part about having babies was the feeding 'em.
Albert and Harpo coming, she say. And I yank up my drawers and yank down my dress. I feel like us been doing something wrong.
I don't care if you sleep with him, I say.
And she take me at my word.
I take me at my word too.
But when I hear them together all I can do is pull the quilt over my head and finger my little button and titties and cry.
"
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