:: Jhada Addams ::

This is the first thing I’ve written in a LONG time:

I watch as the bookshelf topples over onto a five year old boy, his arms raised in self defense before being crushed beneath the weight of it. A bookshelf that I pushed. Another spectral sin added to the list. I listen as he cries out, wailing for his parents. Parents who will never come because of me. They’re both dead upstairs.

It’s a horror show, this existence. I’m only nine months in, and there’s been so much death, so much violence.

We were all taught that good little girls go to heaven when they die. We were lied to. Death is just the beginning.

In the place of waiting, between blood and dust, there is a collector. A foul, vicious man that squats in the darkness between, waiting for strong, courageous spirits to cross. Some succeed. Those who don’t end up in a clay jar on one of his shelves, forced into service.

I never believed it, myself. I was always taught that those who did not serve Christ were wrong. That they would be crushed under His mighty heel. How laughable. I get it now that the creator, whoever he/she/it is, allows everything. There are no rules left. We’re ants in an insane zoo that’s been left unattended for bigger and better toys.

The boy is weeping now. He’ll die slowly if nobody calls for help. I am to stay in the house until he dies and then return to my taskmaster.

These are the terrible errands that I’m sent on now. There is a dark thread between me and the wicked devil that chuckles in the firelight, demanding my obeisance. I can almost feel his clawed fingers dancing against the surface of the jar housing my spirit as he whispers to it, his voice dry and cracking.

There are other spirits here, in this house. Some are locked in frustration, unable to move on for whatever reason. Others try to watch over the family; relatives long dead. There’s little to nothing they were able to do against me. The family had made a conscious choice to believe that dead was dead. That nothing existed beyond the flesh. Pity. If they’d propitiated them, given them respect and lifted them, they would’ve been able to keep me out of the house.

I can already see spectral outlines of the father and mother, standing beside me, frowning as they watch their little boy die. No fear, no anger; just confusion and sadness. There’s nothing they can do to help. In the first year after crossing, there is the time of only resting and learning. Neither of them looks tormented, so they’ll probably make it across – if they hurry.

I open my mouth to warn them but a savage jolt crashes into my body and my mouth slams shut. I can feel impotent tears coming but they never fill my eyes.

The boy’s parents fade away and I am relieved. I can feel anger ring through the connection to my dark keeper at the lost opportunity.

It isn’t my fault they’ve gotten away, you rotten prick, I think to myself angrily.

He’ll punish me anyway. It’s what he does.

And then he’ll send me out again. Until I’m all used up.

My family has forgotten me. There is nobody left to release me. I am in hell.

This coming saturday from 1pm to 6pm I’m going to be a Stumbler zombie somewhere in the woods for the Run For Your Lives 5k zombie infested obstacle course race Event out in Darlington, Maryland. I’ll get as many pics as I can

I’ve been a fairly ‘out of the box’ person, to utilize marketing parleyance, for most of my life. I remember my mother telling me what a serious little girl I was, that she feared that I’d have a heart attack before I turned 30. Still, I found time to look into puddles and see reverse-worlds on the other side – a place where all the cool things in my imagination were possible and I wasn’t a horrible little girl that was Hyper and had to be on Ritalin for 9 years in order to keep me from becoming a child tornado that wrecked everything in her path. I was diagnosed before the term ADD was coined, and I still consider myself Hyper. Hyper focused. Hyper aware. Hyper energetic. Almost manic at times. When I’m up, I’m WAAAAAY up. The downs used to stay with me for months of grief, but over the years, they’ve shrunk to days. Sometimes hours, for which I’m immensely grateful.

I never really felt like I belonged, which I guess was the social metronome of the kids back in the ’80′s that found themselves drawn to the punk crowds. I knew kids that had spent their 16th birthday strapped to a bed in a mental facility. Other kids shared horror stories of being molested by family members, if not assaulted and put in the hospital by them. I ran with teens that I knew had ties to the black market doing nefarious things – I never asked questions, because it wasn’t my business. I’ve had a colorful life.

As I’ve stated before, I didn’t really ‘find myself’ until I started going to Rocky Horror Picture show and met the glorious degenerates there that became my freak family. We all looked out for each other, as we could. After the movie, we’d all pile in cars and hit the Dunkin Donuts down the road and either spend the night in an abandoned house in Fairfax that smelled like urine and animal musk or head over to a friend’s house to watch amateur pornographic movies with the sound turned down and New Order blaring at top volume. Lots of Jolt and Everclear was consumed in those days. Good times.

Some of the people I met back then I’m still friends with, and very fond of. Some of that group moved on, some didn’t. Some are now dead – reckless lives spent in that bright burning trail that sputters out far too early, or they were just idiots. After RHPS, I discovered my next big social love – conventions. SciFi/Media/Fantasy – I was all over them. That’s where I met the second half of my ragtag family. I’m still close to most of the people I met through conventions, and still consider them family.

I’ve changed a great deal since my teens. I’ve since gone through two and a half months of USMC boot camp on Parris Island (received a medical discharge due to consistent heat stroke issues), worked at various computer and internet industry related jobs since 1989, run main events tech for CastleCon/EveCon and KatsuCon (in the early years), DJ’d and hung out at at BDSM events in downtown Washington D.C., gone to Cuba to be initiated as a Santeria priestess (Omo Yemaya), alternately wept and laughed with joy as my mother left this life to go to a place where she could dance and read again, published a full length novel, as well as a smutty novelette, have narrated many lovely, filthy stories for various authors and finally seem to have found my calling as a shaman/priestess/medium.

43 years, and a lot of it was spent waiting for life to happen. Sure, I took the bull by the horns at times, but it seems that I’ve spent a really large portion of my time on this planet waiting for awesome things to happen.

Over the last year, I realized that I stopped actively having adventures. I had stopped jumping out of my comfort zone. For the last month or so, I’ve started getting back into the groove – and man, is it invigorating.

This feels like a good starting point to take the next logical step. Maybe I’m feelin’ the need to sow some wild oats, as it were – although being that I have ovaries, I guess that’d be more like casting adrift some wild eggs.

In any event, it’s time to go have adventures again. Time to get back to creating my life instead of waiting for it to happen. My legs are itchin’ to start moving.

Time to get on the road and live somewhere else, finally. I am very much looking forward to getting away from suburbia – the city, and reconnecting to nature – mountains, streams, climbing, healing.

It’s the beginning of a vision quest of sorts.

I have been assigned to be a Stumbler zombie during the 1PM – 6PM shift for the Run For Your Lives Event on October 22nd out in Darlington, MD. SO! EXCITED!

http://runforyourlives.com/locations/baltimore/

So, we’re on the grounds of a church in PA, walking around in the dark woods at the edges of the property. The reason that we’re there isn’t important. We’ve parked just near a covered area where I’m guessing that the church has picnic functions and the like when it might be raining. We walk down into the woods and the ground is soft and mossy as we pick our way through woods that seem to be both welcoming and curious at about 1am. We find ourselves on a makeshift service road and start walking down it. Strangely enough, although it’s pretty damn dark, we can see enough to keep from killing ourselves walking around. We find a clearing and are just about to head in when back up in the parking lot, a car has pulled in.
Is it the cops? If so, clearly it’s time to explain that we just had to pee REALLY badly and couldn’t wait. As we head back up, I turn the flashlight on and hear somebody gasp and say, “There’s somebody back there.”
Nobody’s yelling at us to come out, and I hear what sounds like teenaged kids that may have just parked to freak each other out, like ya do. I’m walking in front, my friend behind. Two women clad in wierd clothes, covered with necklaces, hair in braids, dreadlocks and feathers. For a moment, I wonder to myself what I would have thought if I had encountered such a scene emerging from the woods of a church at one in the morning. Hell, I might have freaked out too.
I smile and keep walking as the kids move back to their car and get in. The car starts pulling away, and I stop to give my friend a chance to catch up with me. Then their backup lights come on, so I start creeping into the covered area, slowly, hands out at my sides. To my delighted surprise, I hear a couple of girls shriek, and the car pulls away to the safety of the road. I stand and watch as they seem to wait to pull out, and then crouch down, slowly creeping forward, then laugh as they roar out of the parking lot.
It occurs to me later that I should have acted like one of those fast forward, kickboxing zombies that movies are so fond of. As it is, they have a story to tell, and that’s enough for me.
Next time though? Totally doing the sketchy, jerky moving zombie shuffle/run.
Mischief managed.

Taking time to get back to some editing of my own work. I’m in the midst of some pretty overwhelming, good spiritual transitions at the moment, and it’s not always easy to turn my mind to writing/editing. The idea of another story is coming, and I’m making notes – writing down what I can, but they’re ephemeral. I suspect the more I care for my spirit, the more the writing will come.

May it be so.

This month, I give thanks and pay moforibale to Dos Aguas, Yemaya and Oshun as I step out to meet the Full Sturgeon Moon tomorrow night. May the silver light of the satellite that governs the tides shine and touch those who most need it. May we remember that there are good things left in the world to nuture and cherish – that there is hope to cling to. In these times of frustration and strife, let us have compassion for each other – family, friends and strangers – and let this connect us all and keep us and our spirits lifted. As we lift each other, we in turn are lifted, and the world becomes a little more bearable. I strive to focus on positive thought as often as possible, choosing to navigate around the whorls of chaos and violence reported daily in vivid and often misleading tales. I shall endeavor to lift, and be lifted in return.

We are the masters of our fate; we are the captains of our souls.

When you question, when you truly seek the answer that you very likely don’t wish to hear because it’s uncomfortable – and now that you’re aware of the answer, you actually have to DO something about it – this is spirituality. The search for truth – not the bullshit that you want somebody to sell you as truth, but the uncomfortable, necessary TRUTH for YOU to become a better person – that’s spirituality. When you endeavor to be painfully true to yourself, and then share that truth with others – you have CHARACTER and walk with grace. Walking in true grace is not easy, but it is well worth the effort. We all stumble, and we all fall – but when we get back up and walk with good character, conducting ourselves with grace and compassion – this is the truth that heals us all. It is the truth that heals the world.

Change comes one person at a time. Be the change you wish to see in the world.