Let’s have a mind and raise flowers.

“When I grow up, I want to be an astronaut,” said eight year-old Jack.
“Why is that?” asked his mother.
“Because I hate you and want to move as far from you as possible. I hope you die very soon and burn in hell, until I get there — then purgatory will do just fine.” Betty didn’t know what to do with her son. She imagined it was the influence of the new boy in his school, Ted.

Ted Kaczynscki Jr. hated the reputation bestowed upon him by the legacy of his father, the Unabomber. Ted was a sweet kid, each day bringing his teacher a candied apple, choosing the least athletic kids first in kickball, founding the first third grade Shakespearean Reading Group in the state of Kentucky.  Even though he donated blood regularly, and one of his retinas to a myopic sheep, his peers’ parents suspected him of ill will.

He went to see his best friend Sister Perpetua of The Cross.
“Sister, I feel so looked down upon.”
“Unibomb–er–I mean, Ted: I think that its all your imagination.”
“Really? When Jack’s mom beat me up yesterday she said she looked down on me.”
“That’s ridiculous.”
“She said it was because my dad was a ‘cabin living psycho murderer’.”
“That’s strange.”
“Hmmm. I see you’ve got a k.d. lang album here. She’s a lesbian right?”
“Never heard of that word. What? You’re crazy talking. Get outta here.”

Thirty years later, Jack was a famous astronaut who had pitched a perfect game in the intergalactic World Series. His mother, having died of a mysterious overdose of Tang, was in hell being tormented by the ghosts of her previously aborted babies.
Sister Perpetua had retired her habit and became an extra in the off-Broadway production of Caberet. Ted had donated much of his body to science and animal shelters, earning him the name “The UnaDonor”.

“The option of quitting has long been undervalued and underused. Advice like ‘Put your nose to the grindstone’ and ‘Give it time’ has all but supplanted the wisdom of frustration and impetuosity. The more-responsible-than-thou, more-ambitious-than-thou, tougher-than-thou attitude of anti-quitters intimidates potential quitters into shying away from risk and proceeding with the status quo. The cozy, smug security of the antiquitter is to be avoided at all costs. Quitters must not be frightened by the potentially cataclysmic outcome of a particular quit. Disaster beats stasis – better to be a rolling stone than a moss-covered rock.” (The Art of Quitting, 9)

It is not exactly clear when I began all this quitting. I am not sure how far back “the year of the quit(s)” actually extends. It could have begun in Seattle when I dropped a crazy crazy man-boy and a job and headed out to NY to go to grad school. I prefer to start the year when I “quit” dating Bipolars, which was maybe a month after the other events.

So here’s the list of all my quits not completely in order, but sort of:

• Bipolars – I will say it again and again!
• 35 y.o. men
• monogamous serious relationships
• feeling “nice”
• liking myself as a sweet white girl
• some really bad paper topics (I somewhere in here quit “seeing” my stepmom)
• a Colombian that always wanted me to talk dirty in bed and I half the time sucked at it
• long hair
• sugar and refined flour
• believing some people who I really believed a lot A LOT
• believing people who think politics are superior (prior, whateverhaveyou) to ethics
• believing that I can date in any sort of competent way
• GRAD SCHOOL
• Quit, quit seeing Bipolars
• Bipolars
• thinking of ethics in any sort of rule oriented way, almost completely
• feeling like I need to apologize in any way for my existence even when I don’t feel “nice”
• 25 y.o. men
• liking my existence as a non-sweet girl
• dating
• OKCupid
• trusting myself with any sort of decision making
• and among other things, casuality…

On the positive, I did start getting pissed off. And I currently am interested in the color pink.

1. [waterfalls] Who misses Left Eye?
2. [truth] If I were God would you believe in me?
3. [hammer] What time is it?
4. [human resources] Was Tony Danza a “good” nanny on “Who’s the Boss”?
5. [dead presidents] Does trickle down economics feel warm running down your leg?
6. [Dead Heads] Does that bong water feel warm running down your chin?
7. [socks] What is your favored masturbation receptacle?
8. [benefits of terrorism] Shouldn’t 9/11 prove to be an excellent marketing tool for the 911 emergency call line.

I feel no fear. None at all. I’ve spelunked underwater ice caves in the nude, wrestled a giraffe with an evil lepprechaun tied to its belly, played Russian roulette with a bi-polar support group, dug up a recently buried and still-decomposing body (an executed Texan “murderer” who was proven innocent postmortem via DNA testing) and cuddled with it for 72 hours, bungee jumped off the Sears Tower with the chord attached to my upper lip, ate dinner at KFC, and through all that, zero effect.

You know that inspirational story about that courageous guy who had a degenerative spinal disease who slowly lost use of all his body, but still loved life and continued to paint watercolors and volunteer his time at church? That guy is a fucking coward compared to me.

I’ve been told that I have a death wish by several people including my dominatrix, Castrato: Queen of the Night. I just laugh and drink a pint of Ganges river water.
They say what ever doesn’t kill you makes you stronger.

And as a failed abortion, I know that for a fact.

1. [ethics] Do you think happiness and hedonism are the same thing?
2. [sacriligious] If God created everything, who the fuck created God? Did he create himself?
3. [camping] Can I roast marshmallows on your hot flash?
4. What did the ghost say to the bumblebee? [boo bee]
5. [politics] Do you think your government loves you?
6. [bread of life] Did you just pinch a loaf?
7. [cereal] What is worse? Captain Crunch’s mouth lacerations or bloody diarrhea?
8. [backing that 'thang' up] Girl, who is you playing with?
9. [dreams] Since if you die in your dream, you die in real life, why is it that when you dream you don’t have impotence it doesn’t come true in real life?
10. [panic] In the event of a water-landing, your seat functions as a flotation device.  So do dead bodies.

Ricardo lost his marbles, which wouldn’t have been so bad except that one of the marbles was really cool and looked so sparkley that losing it made him sad. It was one of the larger marbles, about half an inch in diameter, translucid, sporting a sparkling azure wispy splash slightly off center. Ricardo rabidly searched his room for it, tossing his bed out the window, spilling out the contents of his dresser drawers (including his extensive collection of poems to his marble), screaming obscenities at the ceiling light fixture as if it were a sixty watt God. Maybe his marble rolled under the door and into the hall. Ricardo wandered outside his room.

Twinkles must have swallowed it thinking it was a mouse’s eyeball. Ricardo picked up the black cat and threw it at the full length hallway mirror. The mirror shattered the cat, whose organs lay strewn on the linoleum floor (bringing him 7 years of mediocre luck). Sadly, the stomach was empty, as Ricardo had been for weeks neglecting his one chore of feeding the cat.

Maybe, like a tapeworm, the marble snuck into Ricardo’s nut sack and devoured one of his testicles, replacing it. So Ricardo snagged a pairing knife from the kitchen and began carving away. After searching his own and several other scrotums, he was still marble-less and in very hot water with a eunuch-ed cub scout troop.

His hopes dashed, he began to look for for fulfillment in other things: enjoyment, relationships, and various religious endeavors. He got married, had three children and found a very rewarding career as a counselor and spiritual adviser to homeless youth.

“I love you, Ricardo.” said his beautiful wife Venus. “I also have some news. I just won the lottery again.”
“Oh, again? Well, that’s nice. We’ll use half of it to buy Trinidad and the other we’ll donate to Boy’s Town.”
“Oh, and Ricardo. You got some mail today.”
“Oh really?
“Yes, beloved. It strangely was a box with just a single marble in it.”

Ricardo slit his wife’s throat and grabbed the marble from her. He clutched it to his heart while he burned his house down with the corpses of his family inside.

That marble had definitely proved the axiom: “If you love a marble set it free. If it comes back to you, it truly is love.”

[1990 years ago]

Dear Everyone,

My name is Yoni.  As I write this, I am 17. I’ll probably never give this letter to anyone, because who would believe the Son of God is a dipshit. I know all the prophecies say otherwise, and maybe he’ll someday not be such a dick, but I’ve known Jesus since our days at Nazareth Grammar School so let me tell about your “chosen one”.

• Pride–He is always saying, “Let me pet your ‘donkey’ or I’ll get my Father to smite thee.”
• Greed–The girls are all about him, because he is a hunk, has superb genetic lineage, and there were rumors about the size of his dong (uncut, surprisingly). Jesus has a harem of our female classmates at his beckon, and he absolutely will not share, which has left the cubbard bare for the rest us and gives me balls so blue that B.B. King would feel sorry for me. Does Jesus care? He’s too busy magically making cabernet to notice.
• Lust–Jesus has an Oedipal complex. It makes sense because Mrs. Christ is sexy in her 2 dimensional Byzantine getup, halo, and she has that girl next door/milf thing going. And lemme tell you: Even after having a kid, that cherry ain’t popped.
• Sloth- He once gang banged a drunk three toed sloth down by the quarry.
• Wrath- Last summer, he sent thousands of Greeks, Buddhists, and a quarter million Confucionsits to hell because they didn’t believe in him.
• Envy- He keeps saying to me: “I like your goat hair shirt. It’s really cool. I wish I had one. Wow. That’s cool. I bet it would look good on me.”
• Gluttony- He once ate 2 figs in one sitting. Two! Fatass.

It’s hard to find a girl who’ll be impressed with your animal skin Valentine’s Day cards when Jesus has already healed them of their leprosy.

Oh well, me and Judas are planning to T.P. and egg his manger tonight and that’ll show him that not everyone worships the very ground he walks on!

Fatass.

1. [linguistics] If words didn’t exist, how would you answer this question?
2. [condiments] Ketchup or mustard on your watermelon?
3. [friendship] Would you lend me your car?
4. [abbr.] Q and A or T and A?
5. [animals] A hummingbird chorus and dance squad or pandas in raincoats having a bubblegum bubble blowing contest?
6. [your mom] Spit or swallow?
7. [bitches and ho's] Best way to get ‘yours’ 1) mackin’, 2) pimpin’, 3) college degree
8. [enemas] What’s love got to do with it?
9. [blind justice] Who would win in a courtroom battle of wits: Chewbacca or Gollum?
10. [love] When you said you loved me, was that you or the eighth of coke talking?

It is 4am and I am sitting on my bedpan wearing only a Spiderman tie and flippers. Something has to change, perhaps even my very concept of what ‘change’ is. I’ve tried everything, from running off with the circus when I was fourteen (the bearded pinhead woman constantly chided of my style of dress, which at the time consisted of Hawaiian shirts and tights) to mincing off my toes in a grain thresher (I got gangrene).

But nothing ever feels real. I want to feel alive, baby! Aborting the demon seed implanted in me by Lord Moloch didn’t give me a rush, and watching season three of ‘Lost’ was a let down too. I know that I should do what’s right and join Scientology. It’s just that I’ve got my ego and engrams holding me back.

I’m so conflicted. If my legs weren’t deadened by the creeping gangrene, I’d lift myself off this chamber pot and crawl out into the hallway of the ‘end of life’ hospice-care that I live in and scream to the nurse and Liver Damage Ted: “I want to live!” But maybe its for the best that I can’t.

Screaming in the hall is against the rules during quiet hours.

Open a bottle of Two Buck Chuck and get to know your soon-to-be clumsy sexual encounter.

1. The grass is always greener on the other side. Is that because they use chemical fertilizers? Isn’t this a problem a gallon of white paint and a spray gun could address?
2. Money or women?
3. Why haven’t scientists figured a way to harness the energy out of human excremental gas?
4. Assuming you have a fear of death, shouldn’t you confront that fear?
5. Do you think if we freed all the white doves from their zoo confinements we’d end the war in Iraq?
6. How do you smoke a pot?
7. Given the choice, would you choke a baby chimp to death or watch TV?
8. You are giving a Cleveland Steamer to a rodeo clown as you read your Hepatitis B positive test results. What do you do?
9. Favorite Biblical character: 1) Ahaz, 2) Zerubabbel, 3) Barnabas
10. Favorite White Privilege: 1) non-harrassment, 2) job promotion, 3) sympathetic jurors
11. Acid is to baby labia as Michael Bay movies are to ________ labia.
12. You turned the stove off, right?
13. Popping scrotal zits is: a) painful, 2) repulsive, 3) a necessary evil of being Reese Witherspoon