Astrology, the Kamasutra, Male Chauvanistic Mutts and Feminist Bitches; Conversations with a Past Life September 28, 2011

I remember you mentioning not being interested in Astrology or something of the sort...  But, I don't remember hearing any super harsh words that caused a red flag saying, "careful not to mention the word Astrology..."  Well, I am a born again believer...  No.  Your reaction to astrology is much like my reaction to new agers and activists and new age activists...  Would it be unfair if I said I despised them...  Why despise?  It's a very harsh word.  I want to accept these super well-intentioned people.  But they seem to be so detached from the reality of the world...  But back to you.  You sound very angry today, especially towards your father... and his...  I don't like the word Yoni or Yani.  It brings me back to a traumatic experience I had with the Kamasutra...  Just kidding.  I studied Hatha Yoga at R.V.C.C., for one horrible semester or less.  The problem is that I have a short stubby body.  I'm being poetic.  My body is very stocky, with short arms, which means that I have horrible difficulty with those stretching exercises meant for long slim people...  So, you can imagine what my reaction was looking at the drawings of the sexual positions in the Kamasutra.  I never opened that book again.  But back to you again... No, I don't know biblio burro...

As you know, I didn't grow up with men in my house.  I don't know how my father would have been.   My mother was horrible.  So, I can't say that I get my "feminism" from her...  I am a man.  I am a man with those foolish male ego self-validation, virility needs.  I don't know if it's instinct or based on male socio-psychological problems that causes the man to need to be validated by strangers; it could be part of the male socio-political structure; hierarchy.  For a man to feel successful, he must attract women... Penis Power?  All that said, it angers me greatly hearing about a husband and/or father who blatantly or flagrantly cheats on his wife.  In Mexico there is a saying, "The married one is SHE" meaning his wife...  For awhile I stopped being "friends" with married men here who openly spoke about their girlfriends, as if it were normal.  And then they would talk about how their children were so important to them, their daughters are their princesses...  One of these "friends" tells his girlfriends that he is married, but "out of respect for THEM".  And I ask, "what about 'out of respect for your wife?'"  And how do the children feel? What do they learn? 

I hated being presented to their wives knowing that horrible secret.  But worse was feeling that she was "the fool"... Don't misinterpret that statement.  She was made into "the fool"...  By being friendly with their husband, by being friendly with them, while knowing the secret, I was participating in a horrible hypocracy. So, I prefered not knowing their wives.  I couldn't give them the respect they deserved; which in a very strange way translates into disrespecting them...  Holding the secret is a participation in the disrespect.  Respecting them entails mentioning infront of their husband and them the horrible game he is playing, so we could get into an argument so I could explain what is the duty of both people...  Respecting her would be telling her to get herself the fuck out of the relationship.  But, it's very complicated.  Who are my friends here in Mexico?  They are the people who also travel around in the giant and luxury state fairs with their businesses.  So, truthfully, we don't ever become so personal; there is no time or space.

As for my surgeries... my childhood... no one knows me enough.  All of the experiences are horribly isolating, alienating...  You know that most people don't want to hear about oppressive shit outside of the movie theater.  But, you know that the movie will end in a few hours and you return to your safe, calm world. Back during the summer when I was in the midst of writing all of this personal stuff, hoping someone would find value in it, I realized that the only people who will respond to my writings are people who have similar experiences.  But, I see myself as so much more than just the surgeries shit and the risk and varied connected discomforts.  Although much of how I view the world is connected with these experiences.  What I mean is that I don't want to be seen as one thing.  But, the stress, the discomforts, the concerns,  the frustrations... turn my body (or mind) into a pressure cooker.  Truthfully, I don't know what I would expect anyone to say if they were to say something. 

                                                                                                                                  

The person with a permanent ailment, disease, who has periodic surgeries or lives with disease, surgeries or death hanging over his head is in a world separate from those who don't know the personal hospital experience outside of the maternity ward... being a lab test animal, a dog put on the Veterinarian's table...  Frigid God-like doctors who treat you as a slab of meat, meaning that you don't feel.  But, they can't become sensitive or they won't do their job well. They won't tell you all the dirty details or maybe you won't have the surgery or maybe they believe that they will add to your discomfort if they tell you the truth...  I don't know. 

I don't have friends.  I have Margarita.  I have my brother-in-laws (I don’t consider them my friends; it’s more like a strange experiment).  My friends are at different ends of the world.  I've lived most of my life far distant from others because my mother was that way with me and because I was picked on for being "A Jew" and then a "Poorboy"... Being “Jewish”, having a genetic strangeness, having surgeries, shitting more and shitting differently is alienating.  I immersed myself in intense romantic relationships, probably for creating the illusion of connection with another,  of creating the illusion that someone else truly understands.  But no one can truly understand.  It’s not just very complicated, it’s supra personal.  And here I am writing you stuff that you aren't prepared to read, because you don't know me.  And it's true.

Would I read so much written me by someone I don't know?  I doubt it.  I don’t usually have so much patience.  I probably don’t want to get tangled up in other people’s problems I can’t resolve.  What can you say to ease your own stress knowing that the other person seemingly needs your assistance? 

So, why do I do it to you or anybody else for that matter? 

I believe there is something else going on with my writing; there is something else I’m trying to share.  I use these “conversations” as a blackboard attempt towards truly understanding the message I’m trying to get across.

My story is about overcoming horrendous obstacles, finding beauty and meaning in life from a life that began as a horrible quicksand trap.  Not only about overcoming obstacles, but about creating and overcoming additional, unimaginable challenges, about finding “god” or spirit or something way beyond what can be proven scientifically and about living alongside unmoveable obstacles…  And someday my writing you will help someone connect and better understand and better live somewhere down the road.  Astrology is part of this, because it helps us understand that somethings or many things have so little to do with you, including mental illnesses, including superstardome.  You didn’t do it.  Maybe your family’s money and connections helped a bunch.  But, for you to stand way out of the crowd, there must have been something else going on…  It’s a crap-shoot.  “Luck of the draw”?  I don’t see life as being about luck, good or bad.  I see it as chance.  Maybe “God” or the spirits or your ancestors connected with “the higher power”  decide you should have an Astrological make-up that allows you to stand ahead of the crowd.  But, maybe Astrology is just a formula for creating each new born baby’s distinct destiny.  Or maybe your soul (or spirit) decides that it wishes for a certain experience and decides to be born under a certain cosmic positioning…  For some reason it seems so much easier to administer using mathematics and maintaining organized accounts.  How can God keep track of so many spirits?  Yes, you are thinking that I am a born again fool…  If you don’t know about my surgeries, you can’t understand that I saw something about our existence you’ve never seen…  If you don’t see something, you can deny its existence.  But that does mean that you are correct and that it doesn’t exist, just because you didn’t see it…  As I’ve written earlier, I saw my small intestine.  I touched it.  I didn’t feel the touch.  But, my intestine responded to the touch.  It was like a snake or a slug or a worm and it retracted into my abdomen.  I was changing my colostomy bag hoping that the damn thing would be calm enough time for me to clean the area where I attached the shit bag and replace the damn contraption, that had the tendency towards coming unattached in the most compromising positions and place.  Well, the snake did not read my mind or respect my needs and it stretched its head back out of the hole and spit shit at me…  No, I’m exaggerating.  It’s nothing like a bathroom experience.  The small intestine is just moving the food waste along towards the end of the line.  It’s a movement I didn’t feel.  I couldn’t know when it would release more shit.  I could see it moving.  But, I couldn’t feel it moving.  The small intestine is not connected with the mind.  It cannot obey orders;  it’s not like the anus.  It’s not like the lungs, although the lungs will cease obeying your orders if they feel you are going to harm yourself… 

Now, if this is my body.  If I am the one who rules this entity, then why can’t I communicate with my small intestine?  Why does it and my lungs and my heart have the last word?  Why can’t I decide that I truly don’t want to eat and be able to tell my stomach to decrease the amount of stomach acid secreted into the stomach so as to decrease the risk of stomach ulcers?  The body has fat stores to protect you from famine.  But, what if I have too much fat stored and I believe it’s time to burn some of that excess fat and I tell my body, “look, if you need energy, burn the damn fat.  Look stomach, nothing is going your way for a few days, turn off the hunger alarm.”  ????

Your body is not yours damn it!  It is a vessel, “for getting you there…”  Where?  I don’t know where you are going.  I can’t answer that question.  It is not yours.  You are of your body.  You are trapped in your body.  Yes, you alter your body; but so superficially.  Don’t delude yourself.  You were placed in a body, with a family and within a class, within a society, below a status…  For what reason?  That is for you to figure out or not; it all depends upon you.  So, why not the body and why the spirit or the soul; your self?  Why yoga, why meditation, but why not Astrology?  Fuck all the pitiful offensive people.  You saw their trap, you saw their game.  Just because I don’t like certain vegetarians, doesn’t mean that I shouldn’t eat vegetarian food.  If I learned that George Bush Jr.’s favorite dish was Thai Mussaman Curry, it wouldn’t cease being my favorite Thai dish. 

In one of my first blog pieces I wrote about my friend José “Montaña and how he sees spirits or phantasms.  Well, a few weeks ago, my brother-in-law Nicolas presented his girlfriend Adreana to José.  One of the first things that José said to Adreana was “you are missing one of your grandmothers…”  Adreana said, “No, that’s not true.  Both are alive.”  Half an hour later Adreana received a phonecall from her mother stating that her grandmother had died that morning… 

José Montaña sends me messages through our cell phones saying, “In my session at the moment I have a Taurus—Aries with Moon in Scorpio.  What can you tell me about them…?”  And I tell him a bunch of garbage that comes to mind, since I am not an expert on Astrology, nor am I near that, nor do I have any books here for consulting.  But, he usually tells me that I was pretty much on the dot with my quick garbage statement.  José hopes I will study Astrology so that I can teach him.  He doesn’t read.  He has eye problems…  But he helps heal people.  But he doesn’t heal himself and he doesn’t listen to me about his health…  And I don’t usually say anything, since it is a waste of time for the most part. 

He says that he wants to go with me to New York City.  He says he wants to meet my family.  He believes he once knew my mother.  He says that he has dreams about New York City before the bridges were built…  Most  New Yorkers don’t think about New York City before the bridges were built…  New York City isn’t New York City without it’s monuments…  So, why would he say such a thing?

I see it as being on the same line as his statement about Adreana’s grandmother.  When Nicolas and Andrea returned to tell him what happened, José just stood there staring at Adreana.  He didn’t smile.  He didn’t gloat.  He didn’t say, “Ya see?  I told you so!”  He says that spirits attack him in the night.  They don’t let him sleep.  He says that they want to remove him from this world.  However, José said that when he returned to Guadalajara from Zacatecas Saturday night, he was able to sleep undisturbed for the first time in years…  They left him be…  We’re not talking about Schizophrenia;  Schizophrenia wouldn’t explain what he said to me 4 years ago and the appearance of my grandfather in my mother-in-law’s kitchen.  Schizophrenia wouldn’t explain José “knowing” about the death of Adreana’s grandmother’s.

Astrology can explain certain things.  But I’m interested more in what it doesn’t explain; and that is what comes before astrology.  I see astrology as how our characters/personalities/moods were formed.  It’s still our physical body in ways, although no.  I’m more concerned with our spirits; and I don’t believe in the Judeo-Christian-Islamic concept of God. So, when I mention God or Spirit it is because I am writing within the confines of our language and our imagination… 

We live within fantasies and illusions no matter how informed, educated and intelligent we may be…  Science could be a convenient illusion or delusion or smoke screen…  Believe in god or pay the consequences.  But if there is no god, there are no consequences.  But, what if I am wrong and there is a Judgement Day? And that is one of the many doubts built into the system of enculturation in all societies…  They teach you very early on…

But, my concern is that so many people have been murdered, exploited, neglected, abused etc and yadi because of the so many different systems of thought that explain the difference between US and THEM, justifying abuse of others throughout the history of humankind… 

We could say that everything that happens on this planet it God’s will, including your father fucking his secretary and Mexican men saying that the one who is married is the wife…  It’s God’s will that we rape and mutilate and disrespect and exploit and lie about others.  Maybe it’s part of male nature to have extramarital affairs and maybe it’s part of the female nature to fall and fall again for that type of man, since his virility his ability to play the game is what truly attracts women.  I saw that at Hampshire College with it’s 60% female and feminist population ragging on the “feminist” males as being SNAGs (Sensitive New Age “gag-me-with-a-spoon” Guys)…  Political power fantasies.  Very few of the activists truly want the relinquishment of the power struggle…  It’s about being an Activist.  It’s not about having a healthier world.  Maybe the men should fuck who they want, especially if the women are willing to give it to them…  Oops! Did I just say something wrong?  How about this:  The bitch doesn’t complain when the male dog leaves her side to pursue another bitch in heat…  If the guys hang out on the street corner like a pack of dogs barking in unison at the woman passing along the street, why complain?  Afterall, God made all of the animals similar in certain aspects.  And within our bodies we find a snake from our mouth to our anus.  The only thing missing is spinal column attached to our digestive tract.  But, in all other forms, the digestive tract moves food in the same way of that of a snake… 

My connection with you is not about Astrology. After all I don't like Cancers.  Ha! Ha!  No.  It's about the spiritual possibility.  And I don't like the word spiritual.  It seems like my own personal buzzword.  But, I don't have another language you can understand.  So, I assume that there is always the possibility of connecting with someone regardless of what is considered socially normal. 

I'm not socially normal.  I wasn't born socially normal.  Without opening my mouth, without lifting a finger I wasn't socially normal.  It's part of my destiny.  I couldn't prevent the death of my father and I couldn't prevent his passing on the gene to me...  It's enough to understand that this has nothing to do with character, attitude, world view or decision making.  Life or God or the Spirits or the astros decided for me.  And I spend my life responding within the situation.  Built into the situation is the reality that so few people could possibly understand what the hell...  From the very beginning of our meeting, wherever and however that may be, you and so many others will notice that I am different.  It could be very basic from the osteoma on my forehead THAT I REFUSE TO REMOVE IF I HAD THE MONEY, since I'm not so frivolous or shallow (I am very vane), to hearing how I talk...  You wouldn't become close to me because of a warning bell and I would be very careful not truly allowing you into my world if I didn't feel that we had some work to do together...  something truly to share...  I'm very frank and very candid.  But, in the real world, I keep you at more than an arms length... 

But, about "knowing" a person...  How many of us know ourselves?  Ok, that may seem like a popular new age question...  Fine.  How many of us truly know the person to whom we are married?  How many people know the true reason we hooked up and then made the decision to marry?  How many people know the true reasons why they make horrible mistakes or horrible life decisions?  Do you truly like what you think you truly like?

I think life is a crap shoot.  You make the best decisions you can and you live with the repercussions and hope that you are being clean and honest with yourself....  Hopefully we are truly intuned with ourselves, with life and with others...  That way we have a slightly better chance at not fucking up... 

You've gotta understand that I met Margarita without a common language.  And I remembered everything she told me about herself and her family when I was in my first weeks of learning Spanish with a dictionary in my hand and with my ears open trying to have a conversation in everyday life... 

I didn't know Margarita.  She couldn't have known me.  She does not know "my world", meaning that she doesn't know where I grew up, where I was born, how are the people, how do I interact with them and a hundred thousand more things. But, I know her world. I'm a semi-expert in her world.  She doesn't know English.

But, somewhere down the line she must have learned faith in me or in us...  I could leave.  I could disappear and she wouldn't have any way of seeking me without legal access into the U.S., without English, without money...  And I feel horrible for her, since that's a horrible thing to carry.  But somewhere there must be true respect and consideration within the relationship. And we must believe in the other person.  We must trust.

I wonder why I should trust you with all this information I share with you.  I chose you.  And that could be horribly stupid or foolish.  But, if you disappear, I don't lose anything, since you were never truly there.  If you were truly there, you wouldn't disappear, if you know what I mean.  It's a belief in spirit... or destiny or life's work. 

You can say anything. You can ask anything.  Language was created for exchanging information, for communicating--for sharing ideas and experiences, for knowing, for understanding.  Very few people have anything to share... nor do they truly share concerns...  If you lack that, it will just be another leaf floating upon the river...  But if you are different... Well, lucky me and lucky us...  Like I said, it's a crap shoot.  And then you die.  And then your body becomes organic crap shat out of a  whole bunch of other varying organisms.  But I am not just my body.  And I learned that through my surgeries...  Sometimes you must have alternative experiences in order to start understanding exactly what the hell is going on around you.  Maybe you've gotta have those experiences to actually begin truly interacting with the real world...

That's why I ask you questions about what happened in Colima, about your husband.  Because I believe something else is going on.  And I believe you know it...  Maybe you shouldn't have thought it special that you believe that you and I are the only ones from Branchburg who know of Evergreen and Hampshire.  In the bigger picture, this is actually very small.  But, it does say something about the other person and possibly their value systems.  But you will find a whole bunch of horribly materialistic, egoistic, super-privileged, status hungry Hampshire alumns who would make you nauteous.  I was different there too...  But something drew me to that school and that something has something to do with my style of living and my world or universal view. 

So, maybe, possibly you don't need to truly "know" me...  to know me, to ask questions or participate within the conversation.

Or maybe I'm incorrect.  And, no, I'm not that person in the café talking about who is a triple Leo...  Infact, I have very little interest in the astrology of others.  It helped me put myself and my life into perspective.  It helped me understand aspects of certain relationships.  I do think it can help people understand themselves more, accept themselves more and possibly understand their relationships with others.  But, that is a personal belief based upon experience and I don't spend my time within Astrology here...  I begin looking into Astrology when I am bored and have nothing better to do with my time, meaning that I don't have a book, am tired and don't have the space for painting, or the inspiration for drawing...  I go through periods of heavy reading and then periods of almost no reading.  I go through periods of painting and drawing and then periods when I don't paint or draw.  Reading usually is during the Autumn-Winter period and painting/drawing is during the spring/summer period.  "Autumn/Winter cocoons"...  I was just loving the reading spree of the past 3 weeks.  I don't have a book that grabs me at the moment and I've never had the patience for reading on the internet.  Astrology is easy, quick, sometimes very intriguing or momentarily intriguing as it was for a moment today. 

And there you have it, my response.



And now you probably think I'm totally nuts and it doesn't matter what else I say.  Read your message.  I am inspired to comment to something you wrote.  I re-read what I wrote and am inspired to expand upon what I wrote.  And then I realize that so much of what I wrote has so little to do with you, but has something to do with what I want to say to others, so I place it on my blog, risking you thinking that I had broken some sort of interpersonal/privacy code.  And then I decide to re-read what you wrote, since I am sure that I didn't adequately read or respond to what I read.  And here I am... not as nuts as you probably think...  


Truthfully, I don't understand why I woman should be looking at her watch or a clock when she is in the midst of giving birth.  My mother told me that I was born around 1pm.  That would have made my rising sign Libra or Scorpio.  In all I read about rising sign in Libra or Scorpio, I didn't see me.  So, I contacted the hall of records of the municipality where I was born and they sent me my birth certificate with the time: 10:45am.  Big difference making my rising sign Virgo, with all the hyper critical, perfectionist, prudish, analytical and isolationist social qualities...  I don't like parties.  I don't like small talk.  I don't like public events.  I don't like crowds.  While I work in giant fairs, I've never been to one in my adult life, with the exception of going with the environmental club to the 4-H Fair...  I love New York City and walking through all the crowds; but I'll repeat WALKING THROUGH the crowds, passing through them, not staying within them.  I'm not agoraphobic or xenaphobic.  I so much prefer large cities of isolated rural regions...  I don't go to parties; I've never thrown a party.  


But back to knowing the time of our births...  Only for Astrological purposes, I wish that all exact birthtimes were recorded; not by the mother, but by the hospital and saved within the hall of records...  But, that's only to say that the society believes in Astrology.  Otherwise, why record this information?


I can't understand your father's behavior as being embarrassing for your mother.  I feel that the word for describing her experience must have been much worse.  Then again, I don't know how he went about it and how he presented it or reacted to accusations and concerns infront of you or towards her...  I can understand how you would have felt embarrassed.  Afterall, it was your father...  But, having not been there to experience him and your mother, truthfully I can't near imagining, although I can imagine how your mother felt...  


Children do one of two things in response to their parents' behaviors: 1) they emulate them/repeat the same lifestyle; 2) they organize their lives and mentality around not repeating their parents' behaviors.  But, our first role model and the #1 educator/informer is our parent.  So, it is human to not being exactly as you wish you would be...  But, you must learn to truly accept you.  Saying that it is human not being perfect is just a throw-out phrase that probably makes you feel worse in ways, since it sounds like a cop-out.  "Who do... Who do you think you're foolin'"  Who sang that line and tell me more about that song...  I'm not pulling out any more of the lyrics; drawing a blank, although I know exactly who sang the song...  I see them singing it on the Muppets:-)


Truthfully, what inspired me most to write you one more time is your statement about not knowing me well enough to discuss such an intimate statement...  But, that's just the problem.  No one thinks they know another person well enough to discuss such an intimate issue.  Michael's wife M'nique surprised me and visited me in the hospital during the last surgery.  We weren't close.  She visited me alone, without Michael.  I imagine Michael visited me.  But, M'nique is strangely shy or timid or prudish (she's a horrible Virgo).  But she visited me, which was great.  I spent my last New Years Eve in the U.S. (and the only one that I actually celebrated in my life, since my father died that day and I was raised not celebrating it) with her (her invitation) in a Native American sweat lodge ceremony in Stony Brook, Long Island.  Michael was "abroad".  I believe he was in Sydney.  So, I went with her and my friend Milo.  None of my friends comment on my writings in my blog.  No one talks to me about this stuff.  Margarita is incredibly supportive and goes through stages of concern or worry.  But, I'm sure she senses my tension connected with the subject of doctors or examinations and she learns to not say anything, as I am with José "Montaña"...  She wonders what is going on within my body.  I wonder too...  But, maybe I don't truly want to know.  Or I don't want to enter into that discomfort connected with being responsible...  Or maybe it just doesn't matter, because I don't believe that any Mexican doctor can know anything about my "disease" and if they did know something, I don't believe they will be very adept...  So, why enter?  


I have my wife.  But, there is a cultural/language divide...  We connect deeply.  We develop an increasing understanding, love and respect for one another.  But, she is only one half of my reality; my other half is my former life in the U.S., my yearning for reconnecting with those people, with sharing with them, with returning to that lifestyle.  I yearn for having intimacy with true friends.  But, that is almost impossible.  And you can't just be intimate with just anyone at any given time.  And you can't be intimate because someone said so, that someone possibly being you.  I've learned a lot from life and a lot from relationships.  And one thing I've learned is that you shouldn't expect anything from anyone.  Whatever you've said to me that is intimate, is a surprise and has been inspiring or appreciated.  But, as you know, I don't ask you a question two times.  You share what you share.  And if you don't share anything tomorrow; well, that's absolutely normal.  


All this said, I don't believe I will return to the U.S.  I need a miracle that would say that it all would work out; and I won't abandon Margarita.  She is my connection to the me that I love and respect.  And I never met "her" in the U.S., if you know what I mean. But there is a cultural issue within me, and that is that I am not from here and I long for what I enjoyed there, that I don't find here and the most important of those things is TRUE AND ENJOYABLE FRIENDSHIPS.  Mexicans don't understand that...  There are cultural issues here that make it very difficult to find this type of friendship.  Here, the friendships are more political and reguarded with suspicion...  And as I've said before, male friendships revolve around alcohol and around the disrespect towards women..