Any Sex This Year?

I just awoke around three O'clock in the morning. I had a nightmare. It was strange and frightening actually. I was in an old run down theater with a woman and a man and we walked down a long hall to where the floor finally sloped up to the ceiling. We stood for a minute, staring at this strange construction, turned and went back the other way. Doors lined both sides of the corridor, and when we reached the end of it, it was terminated by a door.

We passed through this door into a similar corridor. This one was shorter with fewer doors lining the walls. This one also ended with a door with no knob. That was when the woman tried one of the doors against the wall, finding it locked, but unleashing an inhuman howl from the other side. In the center of the door was a mail slot, through which I peeped in and could see nothing but black. But I could feel a rushing wind as something approached rapidly, and when I did let go and step back, something large crashed into the door, causing it to tremble violently.

Suddenly, more howls were heard, causing the blood to freeze in my veins. Then, all of the knobs on the doors turned and rattled angrily as whatever they were, were suddenly alerted of our presence. The man with us dashed to the door through which we came and I ran behind him, leaving the woman trailing behind us. The man slipped through the door and attempted to shut if fast behind him, but I had reached it and drove a leg into the threshold up to my thigh. I yanked the door from him and held it open for the woman to race through and just as she did, the door at the end of the hall tore open.

The thing that came though it was covered with blue hair, tall and gangly with long talons and teeth. It stepped out, looked about and noticed me at the door, standing in mute horror. It closed the distance between us before I could slip through the door and close it. It grabbed the frame in both hands, holding the door open, mouth agape in an obscenely wide grin. I drove my foot into its chest, knocking it back from the door and onto the floor, then slammed the door shut and locked it.

My heart was pounding in my chest as I awoke, still hearing the howls of the creatures and the rattling of doorknobs. FUCK ME. I looked around in the dark and found everyone else fast asleep. No matter what, after that shit, I could not find sleep. My body refused to return to the nether land of slumber. I thought to give up, get up and take a much needed shower. But no, I didn't want to get out of bed. If I did get up, I might never go back to sleep, which would make me miserable tomorrow. I thought to read, but my glasses was in my bag under the bed. So I put on my MP3 player and threw the blanket over my head. It was of one of my recorded therapy sessions.

I awoke at the end of the recorded session. It had finished at I was awake to the lights of the dorm. Meaning it was past Six AM. People were getting ready and I could not get up. Once again, the TRAMADOL doing its magic. I worked my way into a sitting up position, and set up my laptop for work. I emailed and wrote poetry and haiku and looked for quotations and researched my article.

It was soon time for me to head to my Doctor. The Incredible Dr. A. That's what I should call him from now on. The man told me that as long as I took that damn COLCHICINE the pain of my gout would go away, and damnit it's gone. Even the TRAMADOL is dealing with the pain in my shoulder. I'm feeling good for a change. I hit the Way and stop off at a Starbucks before going to see the Doc.

He checks my blood pressure and gives me a clean bill of health. I'm fine except that I'm overweight. This I'm aware of I just wonder how I'm going to lose the weight. "Just exercise," he says. Yeah, I have to start that up again. I've stopped over the week. "And eat some brocoli and brussel sprouts. They're good for you. Even though you may not like brussel sprouts." I happen to like brussel sprouts in butter sauce. I think about it for a moment until the thought bubble bursts. I'm homeless. When was the last time that I had control over what I ate? My meals are planned by others or made a catastrophe by me. "Things look good," he says. "Since you did so well and took your medicine we won't weigh you today." He opens a desk drawer at his lower right. "But now it's time for a blood test." He slaps the form down on the desk. He looks back at me, another form in his hand. "Have you had any sex this year?" Oh come on, doc. The homeless life is a celibate one. He sits up and begins filling out the form. He puts an x in the box to test my testosterone level. Hmmmm

I shoot out from my Doc's to go to Madison Starbucks where I see Electra who gives me the immediate task of watching her homeless bag as she walks about the city without it's weight on her back. I continue to research my article, whipping myself up into a frenzy, getting it the fuck done as soon as I got the seed for the article. I built the outline quickly and with very little pain.

When Electra finally came back for her bag, I was done with the outline. With a pause I would write the article.

I am proud of myself. I had beat the deadline by an entire week almost once more.

I go to the library.

Hobobob

Have an adventurous weekend.

Have a fun weekend, my lovelies, and enjoy these posts from around the web...

A great way to carry your books--straight from Tokyo.

Jenny's new haircut is really pretty.

Ballerina birthday parties!

After a flurry of comments over this week's Obama poster, it's nice to have this calm photo. P.S. And this effort is also good.

Remember this book?

Spooky!

Moran is one cool dog.

Loving Mav and Stephanie's year of mornings.

Hungry? Win a Jamie Oliver cookbook.

Wouldn't you like to wear Lorick's new collection?

How lovely to tuck a little photo into your typewriter.

My Steven Alan wish list. (I am especially in love with this dress.)

This photo feels like a deep breath.

And, best of all (of all!), Nie Nie is out of the woods.

Have a fun weekend! xoxo

(Photo via Perpenduum)

Private. Keep Out!

I stared at the paper for a few minutes until I see what I'm going to talk about as I sit on the edge of my bed. Privacy. It's been four or five years since I've had any. The sweet nectar of privacy. When my wife left me I had tons of privacy. Although I think I was pushing my chemically imbalanced limit at that time. I was pounding down Jack Daniels like it was water. It sent me to the hospital with heart failure. Chain smoking didn't help either.

Then my brother moved in, and that spelled the end of my privacy. That spelled the end of my laying around in my apartment on the couch, naked, watching television, with a plate of food on my belly. It spelled the end of my bringing foreign women home and banging away all night, or as much as a drunk can. It spelled the end of a great many things.

When I lost my apartment, it spelled the beginning of my using public restrooms, public bathrooms to wash up, and sleeping on the streets. Two years at the Hotel, with Sith Lord and Mike meant people around even when I lived on the streets. When it became too cold to sleep outside any longer, and I did my stint inside Port Authority, and Penn Station, I had Electra there as a close companion. Sleeping all night in a Starbucks or a waiting area was not private.

And now I'm living with twenty men, and there is still no privacy. I have to admit that just the thought of getting my own place has made me excited. I've spent a year thinking about it, planning on it, being an exemplary inmate in the Box. The thought of privacy, something that I took for granted at one time, is heady.

Just the thought of using a toilet not shared by scores of people, by hundreds of people, is a sobering thought. You wonder just how tough your ass has become to disease and infection. Even if I move into a room, it would be a room of my own. SRO means SRO, Single Room Occupancy. That is fine by me. As long as it has a door and a lock, you've got my attention.

That's very little to ask for, but it's so hard to attain in the city. The city where every penny has to be pinched because things cost so much here. You have to be rich to move about freely, buying this and that. That's why the homeless get along so well in the city, and that's because they don't want nothing. In the summer months, all they want is a bench or a sidewalk without a lot of pedestrian traffic, and they are in heaven.

But in the winter, they pay a mean toll. The winters are brutal sometimes in New York. Sometimes there are Noreasters, and brisk, blistering cold weather. But there's still hope yet. With the enormous greenhouse emissions from the increased population, the greenhouse effect is starting to take a hold, giving New York the mildest winters on the Northeast coast. Ha ha ha. I learned that from one of the articles that I researched. But with this being said, there still may be some hope for the homeless from freezing this year.

Bloomberg has no real plan for these people. He has no real idea what the homeless go through. All he sees is a blight on the streets of his fair city. His master plan for the homeless in the cold? To have the police round them up, and give them only two options. One, a drop in center or two, jail. Now this is what I wish: for fucking Bloomberg to spend a night in a drop in center, just once. He'd probably choose jail. Drop in centers are the biggest joke here in the city. They are the living pits of Hell.

Be that as it may I wobble on the edge of my bed, the TRAMADOL taking effect. I'll retire early again tonight. I put away my baby and crawl into bed, ready for another night's sleep.

I'll deal with all of tomorrows troubles tomorrow.

Hobobob

There will be blood....

I just can't quit with the Halloween costumes! Check out this ridiculously rad one: Hollister Hovey and her sister Porter dressed up as Daniel Plainview and his son H.W. from the movie There Will Be Blood. Genius.

Feeling Smitten...

My dears, here's a weekly round-up from my Glamour relationships blog, Smitten, if you're interested...

Would you rather have Gisele's body or a million dollars?

The official length of the honeymoon period.

"My boyfriend wants to take a two-week trip to Europe with his best female friend. Allowed?"

What are your favorite baby names?

Dating Confession: "My ex made me pay more for toilet paper."

The three best romantic movies. (Plus, those cute old couples from When Harry Met Sally.)

How much money do you spend as a bridesmaid?

A sweet married couple reveals the secret to their (relationship) success.

Red wine makes me crabby.

Found! Inexpensive engagement rings.

How did your parents tell you about sex?

Thank you! xo

Welcome, November Sponsors!

I'm very happy to present Cup of Jo's November sponsors, which you can now see on the left. Please feel free to visit their lovely shops. xoxo

P.S. A wonderful web programmer, Caroline, put up the new ads and widened my blog. If any of you are interested in that (or other blog/tech help), email me and I'll gladly pass along her info! xo

A mini ventriloquist's dummy

Another ridiculously cute Halloween costume. What are you going to be tonight?

Where The Wild Things Are

Awesome costume, little dude! You look just like Max. And happy halloween, everyone!

Hold On Baby

Snap Quiz: What do you do if you can't hold on?

Answer: Baby, you tie your ankle with the end of the rope and then let go.

Don't let life get you down, any of you. Times are tough and are going to get tougher and soon the punches will begin to fly, and I can promise you, you can only duck and block so many. All good fighters say, don't let a punch land on you, but if one does, be able to take one.

There's nothing wrong with being knocked down, there's no shame in even being knocked out. The shame is in if you don't stand up right afterward its over. Things turn dark and your options can dwindle, but that doesn't mean shit. Because everything, no matter how bad, is survivable.

There's no need to go into the rec room of your expensive home and open the gun box and tear through your home and family because there is no other alternative to the streets. The streets will not kill or finish you. It will make you harder, tougher, but not dead.

I worried about the streets. I worried about the future. I plain worried. But in my experience, things answer themselves.

With that being said I got up late this morning, by the insistence of one of my roommates, and had to call a forklift to get me out of bed. I seemed to have managed. The TRAMADOL at night is very strong. It had knocked me out so early that the lights weren't even turned out before I was unconscious.

I headed out and downtown to Wall Street and crossed over to the West side where the Southstreet Seaport was. It had been a very long time since I was there, and it was amazing how very little had changed. The walk was pretty long and halfway through it I could feel the stirrings of gas to pass. Panic crashed together with fear as I realized that it was not gas at all, but something more, with substance. I pinched my ass cheeks together and headed to the piers. Now let me describe the seaport. A big, covered pier wherein there is a shopping mall. This was good. Every mall has a public restroom.

But I also felt control of the situation, as I stood there, snapping away with my camera. I was not going to go to the bathroom until I got the pictures for my article, due today. This is no fun. Today is the coldest day ever in New York, primarily because of the blustery wind. The wind, which whips around like a naked blade, slicing through clothing. Shit!

Still, I get my pictures, and then raced upstairs into the seaport. I find and follow the familiar symbols of the man and woman together, around corners and shops until I reach the men's room. Once there, I see a long line of stalls, closed, except for three. A gentleman on the other end of the bathroom, after seeing me, dove into one, leaving me with two. That's fine. I went to the first one, and did my check of the toilet tissue and found that with two dispensers there was no music roll.

Fine, that left me with one more stall. But this one would not close, for the life of me, I could not get the door to close shut. I was about to put my all into it but that's he last thing that I need, for the damn door to lock shut and leave me with the option of sliding under the bottom to get out. That would not be fun. Upon leaving the last stall, a user emerged from one clear across the line. I dashed towards it and dove in, like the man that I met earlier. I need not tell you what happened next.

Afterward, still stunned by the actual act of having to use the bathroom, since I had done so this morning and wondered what else did I have within me, I headed back, across the frigid landscape of lower Manhattan. Yes, it was indeed cold out, but in the sun it was still warm. This is what is crazy fall weather.

I went back to the Box for a brief meeting and then grabbed my hat and headed out again. This time to the library, I checked to see if my therapist wanted to have my session on Friday via email, and lo and behold, yes she did. I'll have to deal with her again. She's getting warmer and less combative as we go along, perhaps she reads my frustration with her. She probably also knows that I can drop her at anytime and find another therapist. Probably no big deal for her, she'll still get paid and still get billable time, but her prestige might be hurt. Who wants to be a therapist that chases away patients?

Remember, when you get to the end of your rope....

Stay strong.

Hobobob

Home Inspiration: The Selby

Loving the new action-packed photos on house-tour website The Selby. Todd has an awesome way of capturing people in their regular lives--giggly, goofy, smoochy and dancey!

Pumpkin Parfaits

Yes, please! My English cousin Olivia arrived today for a two-week visit, and I think I will make these as a welcome treat. (Seriously, why is pumpkin so good?!)

P.S. And don't you love these lacy pumpkins?

Yellow Wedding Shoes.

Cute.

(Photos by Studio Nouveau)

The World's Largest Beatles (Ferris Bueller) Sing-a-Long

Check this out, New Yorkers! This Friday at 7pm, at the New York Halloween parade, a secret group of friends are planning to recreate that fabulous Ferris Bueller scene, where Ferris inspires a Chicago parade to sing Twist & Shout. They already have 1,000 volunteers, balloons, sound equipment and an entire marching band!!! You can join them here. HOW AMAZING!!!!

(Via Jenny)

Two different pretty ladies

This morning, I'm feeling inspired by the beautiful images on Vanessa's blog. Those bangs! Those lips! That dress!

Also, Lauren's blog. Beret + belt + cheekbones to cut glass = fabulous.

Something Down the Pipe

Wouldn't you like to have it your way for once?

I mean, seriously, wouldn't you like to have all the pieces fall into place at one time? Maybe a couple of times in your life. Just boom, just like that. But instead you have to be a fireman. Running from one emergency to another. Do you think that it's because of our personal makeup, the circumstances of the life we're living in, or is it just dumb, blind life.

I think about it as I think about my future. I'm staring at a long time ahead of me, and quite sadly, much more of it might be spent right here, in a homeless situation, being shuttled from one shelter to another, or even more likely, back out into the streets. Is it treatment like this, I wonder, that has made skeksies the way that they are? They take everything that they can get, with a certain relish, flourish even, and take it all, not caring to leave some for another. Probably because they know, down the line, there is nothing, absolutely nothing coming later.

And if my earlier hypothesis is correct, then there is nothing good coming down the pipe.

And dealing with government services, like Waverly and Public Assistance, and Social Security and their soup kitchens is an exercise in futility. An intentionally engineered operation to be difficult, uncomfortable, and stressful, so as to make it a deterrent. So bad is it that social workers, who've went to college to render aid, no longer want to work with a system that doesn't want to give it.

What you have left is a Hell on Earth, an existence where you have to wait for the proverbial 'miracle', the once-in-a-lifetime opportunity, or blind chance to lift you up from here. You are trapped in a mire thigh high, and there is no easy extrication. And honestly, why would anyone care if there was.

Isn't it so much easier to tell someone to go get a job than to have our lawmakers look at the process, the actual steps for people who are seriously disadvantaged to take to make it out of the situation that they are in? Then it would be easy to say to someone that you see laying on a sidewalk, as if it was the better way to live, to get up and get out of the hole that they're in. How many people, though, are one paycheck from being in the same situation. They have some money saved up, sometimes none, and whatever they do have saved up, the debt on their maxed out cards far outweigh. I had a friend of mine talk about how I ended up here and how she would have done anything, and I wonder how far anything went, but done anything, max out her cards, go to her parents, live with friends, anything, not to end up on the streets.

Well, the mad spiral is not that easy. Think about friends for a moment. You have them and you are no doubt one to many. But have you ever seriously thought of who you would live with for a period of time? Now when I say period of time, I heard it said that it takes at least two months, maybe even more, to find a replacement job. So think about at least staying two months with this person, or having this person stay with you. Sometimes your options dwindle seriously. Some of you might not have anyone to fit that bill.

So before you strain your friendships, scratch out that option from falling into the streets. The other one, 'go to your parents'. For those of you whose parents are still alive and have this option, I know that I do, this sounds like a viable solution. But in my case, it wasn't. My parents are extremely judgemental individuals, and although they could have easily helped me, they instead wanted me to learn a lesson. Whatever lesson this is I don't know. Maybe that living in the streets is no fun. But the point is, that they decided to render no aid to me. The door to their tender mercies were closed tight, which would also rule out moving out of state to live with them, something that I wouldn't want to do in the first place. I love this godforsaken city too much to do that. I would rather live on the streets.

Max out your cards. Max out my cards. My cards were already maxed out. In fact, I had creditors barking at my door about the condition of my cards. I was barely making the minimum payments and keeping up with the rest of my bills. Chasing the American Dream is not all that prudent a behavior.

So there dries up all of the options I was a given. The only option I saw was the streets, and my brother, thank the maker, was present when I went down, and once here, I decided that if I was going to be here, I might as well rebuild my life from scratch. I would devote my time to my writing, and fuck a boss. I would live in the streets as long as I can. And I did, until I became a Shelt. Looking back over the year, I don't know how good an idea this was. It gives you something to lose. When I came here all of my possessions fit into one bag, along with my baby. Underwear, socks, toiletries. The bare minimum. And I didn't want to come here. I didn't. I felt it was a sham, a fraud. I was betraying my initial plan, to live in the streets until I bettered myself.

Sounds crazy right. But then again, with the brutal winter, and my living in Penn Station, I had grown tired. My resolve needed a break from the constancy of survival. Every day being a trial. As I said to my brother, who would go down South to live with his mother for a spell, just to recharge his batteries, you have that option. I needed a break like that from the streets, and I guess I got one. I became an honest to goodness Shelt. For those of you who don't know what that term means, it's a homeless person that lives in a shelter.

I've become the people around me.

Has something bad come down the pipe?

Hobobob