4 am club
The 4 am club seemed cool when I heard about it, but being in it for years now without a captivated audience hanging on every word I say, the allure has really worn off. I wouldn't mind a whole night of sleep the way other sleepers have. I imagine some people are still out here just living their regular old lives. From like before the pandemic, before people were being snatched up from their homes and extradited, extrajudicial renditions. Before Gestapo stealing away children and murdering people in the streets. People sleep through the night now the same as they did five, ten years ago, insisting that nothing's happening. Insisting that the problem is me mentioning problems. I hope they enjoy their rest. I hope they sleep well and enjoy the relative safety of their lives while they still have it. Enjoy, loves, enjoy.
Even at 4 am, I'm grateful to have some time and space, though I'm a little salty about things not going exactly how I'd like them. I see folks having their four and five figure days and envy shows up, that's true. Despite the initial clamoring for my adult-only sites, I haven't been receiving tributes. I know I'm not supposed to take it personally. One of the girls told me to give it six or seven months, that's how long it took before she started seeing any benefit, but look at her now. Now she is free. Now she can do whatever she wants. No W-2 job, no hiding her personality away and she's got subs tied up on the floor begging to be kicked in the nuts.
My current circumstances prevent me from going live ever, I hardly have room and time enough to myself to put two thoughts together. There are fantasies and then there are fantasies. My heartfelt wish is still spaciousness and I do have it when I dream, but what I'm not doing is making clips and changing fits to be constantly selling, marketing myself to someone else's desire 24-7. Those ladies can be as bratty or as goddess as they want to be, more power to them, but the fact remains: any hustle with demands that high leads to burnout. It's not sustainable. The only thing that really works, long-term, is alignment, resonance. I do what I do because it is what I am, I can't stop and I wouldn't want to because it's my nature. This is me returning my life, my gifts, to all of life, embodying my authenticity, my vulnerability. I'm just here breathing like normal people do, from the diaphragm, instead of like the hyperventilating chest-breathers forever trying to become what they are not.
It's always a family reunion. Forever a family reunion. Like any reunion, there are going to be people you don't like. Neighbors you thought you'd never have to see again, people from down the block and across the way who have it in for you. I can't listen to them talking shit about each other. It's as though there are not even words coming out of their mouths it just sounds like emotion to me. I hear the emotion: frustration and anger wadded up into a sticky mess that has stories slapped on to it, papered over trying to convince others of their point of view. Desperate to have others see what they see and feel what they feel. Arguing their case to get others on board about what a bitch she is or how useless he is. It's always someone else who is disagreeable— there's always judgement, always a story to be convinced about. Whatever the problem is, it's always over there, external to the person complaining about it. I find it exhausting. I don't want to hear anyone going on about someone else's failings and how deeply it hurt or disappointed. Stfu. That really whiny complaining tone that sounds so shrill to my ears, I think it might be like what a dog whistle is to dogs. It's really a piercing noise, all that mood, pitch and tone makes me feel incredibly uncomfortable. I have to get away physically or plug my ears when these people who blame others for everything start talking.
They'll be there though, at the forever reunion, along with the people who swallow their words, and the aggressively posturing ones who take up too much space and claim authority. The sword rattlers with the statistics and expert quoters. Sat down in a room together, they're going to maybe try to have what they call civil debate. Sometimes they say things like "I see your point" but mostly it'll be "yeah, but" with a more aggressive push for their own view. It's so weird to me because they really seem to be convinced of themselves. They believe and engage with everyone around them like what they say is true. As if the words out of their mouths are the meaning, that words are sincere, honest. That's not all that's happening when people gather together in a room, it's not even the most interesting thing. It's certainly not the most important.
Are they not aware of our energy bodies? The spirit bodies, the diamond light? They don't see and feel how we interpenetrate energetically, all emanating from and returning to Source? I suspect they may not. They've really got their panties in a twist about something trivial and want to use their speaking voices to prove a point and be right, win favor. Or demand tribute or be denied their own power, whatever it is anyone wants at any given moment. People live and die whole lives like this without ever seeing or feeling what's happening beyond the densest levels of vibration. Pity.
Perception and deep feeling sometimes limit my participation with groups because I can't take it. My family makes fun of me and stays a little suspicious. They've never liked my quiet because they can't tell what I'm thinking and they feel judged. Feel whatever you feel. That's not me judging you, it's the mirror effect of relationship. These hours in the dark– 4, 5, 6– are the only times I come near to having quiet enough, room for reflection, space without input and demands from others. (I say that, but there's a helicopter low in the sky just outside my window right now.) While I don't get to sleep as much as others, this time nourishes me maybe more than sleep could. I have a low tolerance for all the noise and smell of being with other people all the time, but that's what it's like here– full with an intensity of feelings that rise and fall in me reflected back in all these relationships. I too fill with anger and rage, scream my head off, cry quietly in the corner, lash out in disgust. Everything in everyone else is also present in me. I accept that and try to gentle and compassion my way with it, but it's exhausting.
So we're all at this family reunion again, like I said. What are we going to eat? That's the big question. Who's going to cook? Everyone has different opinions about what good cooking is and isn't. Not everyone's had to cook for crowds before, never mind crowds with different dietary restrictions, flavor preferences. Catering to them is difficult because someone will always be angry. Someone will be disappointed, object to the offering. It's not flavorful enough or it's too spicy. The portions are too small or not to their taste. As someone who's labored in the kitchen for hours in addition to spending lots of time thinking about and planning menus, tending the garden, growing food and being generous enough to prepare it, not having the offering appreciated stings. Still, I humbly accept your ingratitude. May my offering nourish you and bring you health and happiness nonetheless, bitches.
I'm not going to keep cooking. It's too much of a hassle. Maybe when they have to feed themselves and everyone else they'll start to understand how hard it really is to get everything together. They can fight amongst themselves about what to cook and who will cook it. I retired to a front porch where I had a pile of books to read, thin volumes. Not all poetry, but some of it must have been. I don't remember the titles or authors, just the pleasure of the opportunity to climb up on a long bench after watering the potted plants, with a stack of new-to-me books to read.
I hadn't been there more than a minute or two before a few people stopped by to comment on what I was reading, tell me they'd already read most of it and had opinions. They're already experts in whatever it was, everything— needing to feel smart. They dressed themselves in concern, said they had noticed I wasn't at the table and wanted to check up on me to make sure everything was ok. They're not concerned for me, they want to know why I'm not going along the way everyone else is. They're trying to see if they can put me in order. People still like it when everyone goes along together, as if they've never seen an individual before. Maybe they haven't. I'm one of one. We all are, but that hasn't been the background frequency. That changes soon. More and more people are growing empowered enough to do their own thing. When all the systems fall, it will no longer be a choice, it will be a necessity.
They don't like it when I talk about things like that though. They want me to join in on some group activity. Telling me that "everybody's going" isn't the incentive they seem to think it is. I'll be staying right here, thanks. The white people with the bird in their house started gathering up to go visiting neighbors in groups, so weird. They can do whatever, just leave me out of it. Stringy, overcooked eggs was what they could manage cooking on their own. I don't know if everyone can even eat that. Who else left or got left out besides me?