I have always been a writer, but I didn’t really think of myself that way until after I learned to type. The way I learned to type was by imitation. I watched my friend Luke touch type for months, and being able to see how he did it long term just transferred. But it wouldn’t have happened so quickly without Internet Relay Chat. I wouldn’t have needed an impetus to learn how to type quickly and without errors if I wasn’t trying to keep up in a conversation. I learned to chat with people all over the world before I learned to write for them. I am sorry for all the broken hearts I left in (insert your country here).

My friend Luke was also the person who set up my first blog, on his server called “Darkstar.” The server ran WordPress, the very first version. Eventually, I moved from a local copy of WordPress on our server to WordPress.com, for which I just got an 18th anniversary notification. So, most of the changes that have come through my work on this blog have to do with the way the backend operates. I feel that the “new” block editor limits my creativity because I cannot use as much HTML as I know….. it will break the block system.

I try to keep technology out of it. If a picture is wonky, so what. If I had more control over the design, I’d take it. There are only so many things I can perfect, and the way Automattic writes its software is not on the list. I use the JetPack app because I don’t have to code anything. I sit here and type, then press one button. At no point am I trying to make sure things line up. Remember CSS positioning? Good times. (Narrator: they were not, in fact, good times.) I can’t be on both sides of the fence in terms of talent. Do I want my creativity to go into the design or into the writing? What do I have more passion for?

I chose the writing part, because I’m an okay web developer, not a great one. I enjoy studying design, but I’m better at talking about others’ work. WordPress is actually a huge machine that allows me to do nothing but be creative, because before databases were a thing, I would have had to hand code every link to every entry. I know because I’ve done it. You get lazy and your index.html is eight months old and you don’t care.

There’s no way I want to go back to that level of detail. Technology works for me, not the other way around. I just prefer longer essays to sound bites when I’m reading other people, and thought, “I could do that.” Now, I’ve been doing it for 20 years. Unfortunately, only the last 10 are on this domain, but I’ve searched “The Wayback Machine” for the entries that meant the most to me on “Clever Title Goes Here” and imported them.

It wasn’t technology that tanked that blog. It was me. Being popular for my observations was not fun at home. I had a very thin skin, and didn’t think I deserved to take up space in the world. I stopped writing, and when I came back, the blogging landscape had changed around me. But I was also older, and a little more fierce. I began to realize I had something to say, and other people joined me.

The more I went through personally, the more I needed this space to process. As WordPress grew in whatever direction this is supposed to be, I ignored it. I use a plain text editor and copy it into the app. Everything you read here is supposed to dance in your head, with very, very few pictures to accompany the waltz.

I want it to be that way. I want for Bryn, Zac, Supergrover, The War Daniel, Cora, Lindsay, and me for us to look like whatever you think we do. I think it would be hilarious to hear people’s guesses.

Just don’t forget that both The War Daniel and Zac are in the Navy.

(All of the sudden I had this image of a little kid’s drawing of my family and I fell over with laughter.)

As Marshall McCluhan has said, “the medium is the message.” I have done nothing with technology beyond use it to transmit text. I hope it lifts you from your world into mine, and returns you mostly unscathed.

My big news of the day is that Magda and I got the house we wanted. No technology needed to imagine the crying and hugging. Such a relief.

I lived in Oregon for so long that my favorite weather had to be rain, because that’s what you get 280 days a year. It actually rains more in Portland than in does in Seattle. But now that I’m in DC, I have a new favorite kind of weather…. cold and sunny. I love it when it’s between 40-60F and the sun is beating down. Perfect weather for “the Portland uniform,” which is jeans, a t-shirt, and a fleece or hoodie. The only change in my Portland outfit is something they would hate. I now own an umbrella. Please don’t hate me too much, it was a gift.

Although it comes in handy here where it wouldn’t in Oregon because the type of rain is completely different. The reason that we say in Oregon that “umbrellas are for tourists” is that it’s not really raining. It’s misting. There’s no need for an umbrella because you’re never really going to get that wet.

Unlike DC, where the sky opens up and we get real rain. The first eight years, I was too proud a Portlander to break down. I’m still too proud a Portlander to break down, so it’s good I got an umbrella as a gift. Otherwise, I would still be walking around the city looking like a drowned rat.

But honestly, I still don’t use my umbrella unless it’s a thunderstorm where, when you step outside, it feels like buckets of water are actively dumping themselves on your head. I use my umbrella a lot more in the snow. It’s great when it’s dry, not so fun when it melts.

We had one huge snowstorm in Portland while I was there. I think we got 18 inches in a weekend or something like that. Still never saw an umbrella, but lots of cross country skiers and snow-shoers.

Oh, wait. We had another memorable snow storm in Portland a few years later, and that was much easier because by then I had a Jeep Grand Cherokee. In the first, I only had a Ford Focus. Now, the Ford Focus is one of my favorite cars, especially as a stick shift. It does not do snow well, however.

When I moved to DC, after a couple of years my sister sent me her old car because she was getting a new one and hers wasn’t worth much. It was a Toyota Yaris hatchback, and it was fine in all types of weather because it was a stick shift. The Focus was an automatic, so I didn’t have as much control. It’s also not the same kind of snow in DC.

Occasionally we get dumped on, but I can only remember two years that we got as much snow here as we got in Portland. Most of the time, it looks like regular rain, not ice blowing sideways. In fact, for the last few years, it has snowed, but there has never been more than an inch of accumulation, and sometimes it was an inch of accumulation across three storms, not all at once.

The first time I saw a blizzard of Portland magnitude, I was in DC. It must have been 2002, because it was after Christmas…. I think. But anyway, we were snowed in for several days, and teleworking was not a thing you could do.

Teleworking and Zoom have both erased the idea of having a snow day. Sorry kids.

I do like going out and about after it has snowed. It’s hard being out when the snow is actually blowing, but if you get out there just after it has stopped, the cars haven’t had a chance to make a mess of it.

The monuments in DC look objectively better with snow, or that’s my story and I’m sticking to it.

The thing I hate most is summer, because the temperature swings between indoor and outdoor are LARGE. My autism freaks out when I wear shorts in the summer because I’ll be outside and having a good time, then go inside where there’s air conditioning turned down to Jack Frost and I’m miserable. I wear pants all the time, and keep a hoodie in my backpack because even when it’s 95 degrees outside, it’s still 70 in all the museums. 70 is comfortable for most people. I need to feel wrapped up like a burrito.

I have found this is true of a lot of autistic people, both hating the swings in temperature and needing soft and warm clothing/blankets every day. I wear silks or leggings from Uniqlo a lot because in the cold, it helps to have an extra layer when you sit down, like on a bus bench. Wearing jeans over them is for truly cold weather, but I like fitted jogging pants better. The kind with a waist and hemmed, open cuffs as opposed to elastic…. although Zac got me a pair of sweat pants from the Pentagon that do have elastic at the ankles, but it’s more of a sleeve that goes around my ankle. It feels nice, and I have running shoes so that they don’t look weird when I wear them.

I don’t run, but I could.

Since it’s spring, it’s a good time to tell you that I buy all my winter gear from Uniqlo. There’s a store in downtown Silver Spring now, but before that I ordered online because the company is from Japan. I have tried everything in their HeatTech line, and I won’t buy anything else. I would advise against getting long johns in white, though, because if you drop something on them, good luck getting it out. I need to get all my whites together and bleach them, but I’m very afraid of bleach and washing machines. I have never put bleach in the washer before and it makes me nervous.

I have had good luck with OxyClean, so thanks for that, Billy Mays.

Anyway, Uniqlo makes charcoal gray leggings and long-sleeved shirts. It’s what I wear 99% of the time. I have also found that gloves, a hat, and a scarf are just as or more important than your coat. If I am wearing my HeatTech gear, I just wear a hoodie. No coat needed as long as I have my gloves. The hat and scarf are generally stored in my bag, because if you are walking, you don’t want to start out with everything you own piled on top of you. You’ll go .3 miles and think, “I have made a terrible mistake.”

It’s why my favorite weather is cold and sunny. I don’t have to worry about dressing as if I am taking all my bedclothes with me.

I will say, though, that when it gets overcast, my memories of Oregon dance in front of my eyes.

Daily writing prompt

What tattoo do you want and where would you put it?

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I go back and forth. There are so many things I’ve wanted over time that haven’t stayed with me long enough to want to add more. There’s also the obvious. I got my emotional abuser’s favorite insect tattooed on my back, and I don’t know if it serves as a warning or whether I’d feel happier getting rid of it ASAP. Tattoos are supposed to tell a story about your life, so perhaps I will do something that integrates the design rather than trying to cover it up altogether. “Life is pain, Highness. Anyone who tells you differently is selling something.” Tattoos mark significant events in my life. I got that tattoo in Houston after I’d already left Portland because it was just for me. She didn’t have to know about it. Then, I moved back and I spent like eight years not wearing a bathing suit in front of said emotional abuser.

It was a long road. I met her when I was 12, I didn’t get the tattoo until I was maybe 30. It was saying goodbye, not saying goodbye, not “hello.”

I also wouldn’t mind having a sleeve of some of my favorite female spies over the years. Julia Child, Virginia Hall, Harriet Tubman, Mata Hari, Jonna Mendez, Valerie Plame, Tracy Walder, etc. And, in another place, Tony and Jonna’s signatures because you can’t have one without the other. I want them to have their own space and not have Tony lumped in with all the women unless I suddenly decide that Frank Wisner and Wild Bill Donovan need to be on it to round everything out. I also need to find out if my friends Stephen and Judy Johnson ever served as Chief of Station, because Judy was there when I was born. Her parents, Pete and Lillian Rhodes, were members of my dad’s church when I was a brand new infant (Emory, Texas). So, this woman from East Jesus Nowhere got a job in the State Department and her last job was at the Court of St. James, one of the most coveted positions at State because it’s in London.

I am not sure whether Steve or Judy were CIA, I only know that as a career diplomat, there’s a TON of crossover, so I don’t think he was ever truly an operative. However, I do believe that both Steve and Judy were on task forces with them, as I have learned that task forces here work. We even work with spies from Mi-6 because our relationship is so strong. I know because I tried to go on a date with one and let’s face it. I wimped out like a bitch. It just affects my life too much here. I haven’t asked him, but I believe that me dating someone from a non-American intelligence agency would be a straight up problem for him. I met her years ago, but the outcome is the same. I realized I didn’t want to know about a human trafficking task force at CIA. Those pictures, even in words, are unforgettable because what your mind makes up is eleventy thousand times worse than what will actually happen. Except pissing off CIA. Then you should feel free to shit your pants at any time.

That’s because CIA’s charter doesn’t cover the United States. They only work overseas. If you piss off CIA, you will be contacted by the FBI shortly….. if you’re an American citizen. If you’re not, you’re in a bigger world of hurt than I ever will be. If a case officer has promised an asset something and they don’t deliver their part of the bargain, they can say goodbye to everything that would get them out of their situation, like an ex-fil. Again, if you’re going to step in front of a bus for someone, you’d better know they’ll do the same for you. I don’t think assets feel that way, because they’re the ones that aren’t trained in tradecraft and get overwhelmed easily at having to remember covers most of the time. No one likes a mask that makes them look uglier, particularly men.

So, the way CIA works in the shadows, particularly the women who are becoming more and more valuable in the Middle East because no one cares what they have to say……………………… except us.

The quicker you make the connection that most spies look like Margo Martindale in “The Americans” is the closest you’ll come to getting it. Matthew Rhys is amazing, but invisible women run the world.

Which is why I want a tattoo of all of them.

I have almost invariably found that the very feeling which has seemed to me most private, most personal, and hence most incomprehensible by others, has turned out to be an expression for which there is a resonance in many other people. It has led me to believe that what is most personal and unique in each one of us is probably the very element which would, if it were shared or expressed, speak most deeply to others. -Carl Rogers

All INFJs are built to work in the world like this. They are driven by self-improvement because it leads them toward the utopia that lives in all INFJ brains.

My relentlessness in taking myself to the mat resonates with people because I take no prisoners. I will cut myself, over and over until I’m bleeding…… because if I don’t feel anything, you won’t, either. If I am an emotionless robot, that will be my writing voice, too. I get out of it what I put in, and art imitates life just as easily as it does the other way around…… because my art might not change you……… but the writing down of the world around me in my own voice so that I can look back on my memories differently than almost a hundred percent of the world? Priceless.

It’s more valuable than anything I’d make from this site, which is good, ’cause I don’t make much. I have a PayPal button where you can donate if you wish, but there’s no subscription fee or charge to look at the back catalog, etc. I don’t have a big enough audience to make that a sustainable reality. Being talented and being well-known are two very different things. Deserving money for art is valid. Having enough patrons to make it a reality is difficult, especially when few people know who you are (relative to Wil Wheaton, Dooce, and The Bloggess, my contemporaries). The reason I’ve specifically started saying things over again that readers who keep up with me would know is that I’ve had a huge influx of new readers.

So, I remember to say things like Zac is private intelligence during the week and Navy intelligence in the Reserves. That Lindsay works in Washington but lives in Houston. That Bryn lives in Oregon. That my family still lives in Texas. That Supergrover is, essentially, my castle on a cloud…. but in our story the last chord is definitively major.

To people who read every day, my writing isn’t all that confusing because they have context. For people who drop in and out, they don’t know the cast.

It’s great to have new readers, sometimes hard to gauge how much I need to back up because I do have a stunning amount of reader retention because I notice the same user ids popping up. For instance, purpleraysblog has come up for a solid nine or 10 years. They’ve been with me since the beginning. And they’re not the only one. I love OG fans, especially the ones who’ve been with me since “Clever Title.” They quote me to me, often in order to make fun of me…… it is both frightening and hilarious how much they remember of what they’ve read.

Like, I just write the blog. I don’t actually read it. Psh. Kidding. I remember a lot of what I write/read here, but not everything. So, when people quote me to me I’m often caught off guard….. because the way they quote me to me is not to tell me it’s me until the end for dramatic effect. So, the words sound familiar and I’m scrambling to figure out where I read what they’re saying because I know I’ve read it before……… and have never once assumed that anyone would quote me for anything, Jumping to the conclusion that I didn’t read it, I wrote it is just too arrogant.

Therefore, I am often surprised at how much I’ve learned, because I think I’m a wonderful writer when I don’t know it’s me.

• From Zac, it’s saying that reading my writing inspired him to start writing every day. He says all the cute and funny boyfriend stuff, too, but this really stuck with me because I am not known for my consistency, much less consistency lasting long enough for someone to notice I’m doing something consistently.
• From my readers:
  • “You sound like a 15-year-old boy……. and his mother.”
  • (On my marriage article) “I didn’t know the writer was gay until the end.”
  • “Thanks for reminding me that I’m not alone.” Said by many, but it’s my rocket fuel. How do I do that more effectively? How did I speak to them without knowing them beforehand? That’s the compliment. I did.
• From Supergrover, it’s “I know you were authentically yourself and she took advantage of that.” The “she” doesn’t matter in this equation. The fact that SG! knew I was authentically myself was the compliment. That I am authentic enough that other people see it, because it’s one thing to hope authenticity comes across in communication; it’s wholly separate as to whether the message is received. Having someone who sees you is fantastic.
• From Bryn, it’s that when she reads, she hears me reading to her in her head. She knows my voice so well that to her, “Stories” is an audiobook; she gets lost in her own memories (we met in 1997, and it’s been a few years since we’ve seen each other. She’s coming to visit in May.).
• Margaret Cho and Martina Navratilova gave me a compliment just by giving me airtime on their Twitter feeds, but I also got virtual hugs, kisses, and hearts from Margaret when I said, “thank you so much for reading. Having you read me is like Goliath reading David.” I can’t remember if she’s religious or not. I just couldn’t think of a more universal illustration than that. Apparently she got it.
• From family and church members- “that voice! Where did it come from?” I’m classically trained and don’t sing often, but when I do, I tend to raise eyebrows because I don’t look like a soprano (unless you mean little boy choir). I have a very large opera voice in a compact wrapper.
• It’s always nice to hear after I’ve preached that I should go into ministry, that it’s literally my calling, that I was on fire that day, and every single thing that anyone has said to encourage me in that direction. Though it’s not really a part of my life right now, I’m glad I have that skill set. It has helped me tremendously as a writer, because a lot of the time what works on stage in front of a crowd also works in an essay from the first person perspective……… or as Lindsay would say, “Dad….. was that true, or were you just preaching?”

I am certain that there are a million others, but these are the ones that came up today. I’m sure this prompt will come around again soon, and I’ll think of 20 more.

The link is to me singing Rutter, because of course it is. I look like a little boy soprano. 😛

I have driven back and forth from Portland, Oregon to Houston, Texas three times, two of them completely alone. If you have never done it and road tripping is a thing you do, driving from Sacramento to Portland is just about one of the most stunning things you’ll ever do in your life and you’ll remember it forever, particularly the part where you have to go around Mt. Shasta. The day I did it, it was total whiteout conditions. I couldn’t see the road in front of my car. But then the snow let up and I was in this beautiful valley and I’d never seen anything like it. I was very lucky that I didn’t have to chain up that day, because it was late October the first time.

I have a soft spot for Oregon even still, because Bryn lives there and the first time Supergrover planned a trip with me, she wanted to go to Coos Bay. We didn’t get to do it, but when I think of Coos Bay, my heart does this cute little flip. I think it’s here to stay because that memory is so precious. Since I lived in Portland, I would have been “Driving Miss Supergrover,” here to take her where she wants to go.

Actually, that’s a dream and a half. As if Dana would have entrusted me to drive for that amount of time (laughing). She was the football coach driving instructor every time I was at the wheel. It was so ridiculously annoying and yet I did need help. Just not a Dana amount of it. I wrecked my last car and chose not to replace it, but before that it had been many years since I’d been in an accident. However, I did get three red light camera tickets in DC because I didn’t see the lights. They were only on one side of the street and not overhead. That’s what I mean about needing help. A second set of eyes. Normally, I’m fine. But it doesn’t take much to create a big problem.

It’s also been 15 or 20 years since I got a speeding ticket………….

While driving from Houston to Portland, Oregon.

So, nowadays I’d love to take a train on any trip imaginable. I would rather ride the train than drive anywhere, and DC makes it possible. Plus, since I’m moving soon, I’d like to see if I can get closer to the train station and cut out the time it takes to get there….. which is only 10 minutes now, but that’s by car. I’d like it to be a 10 minute walk, but that’s so desirable that I doubt I’ll find it. But I’m trying since I have such a wide net. It doesn’t matter which station. It could be SE Waterfront or Huntington.

The house that I’m looking at now is about three minutes from here (and three minutes closer to the Metro). It’s owned by a doctor, and the room has a glass door that looks out over the garden. I don’t know whether it will work out or not, but I’m glad that I have 59 days to find a place and I already have one solid lead, as well as others I need to call today.

But as of right now, my mind is thinking about trains. Because I’ve driven across the entire US (I’ve been from DC to Houston with my dad), I’d like to go from Union Station to Central Station, then find a train into Canada. Ottawa or Montreal, doesn’t matter. Then, I’d like to go all the way to BC, or maybe Alaska.

Ooooh, yes. Alaska, because I’ve never been through the Yukon and Denali is at the end. I also would like to see Nunavut after hearing about it for so many years….. and laughing, because “Three Dead Trolls in a Baggie” did a song about it….. “one fifth of my country….. is also Nunavut.” The jokes just write themselves, folks.

I love cold weather as long as I’m prepared for it, and mostly that just means “wear lots of layers, and keep moving.” I have to keep moving because I do not generate enough body heat for the layers to absorb otherwise. Sometimes if I have a drink it helps, but not as much as it seems to do for others (or they’re exaggerating).

I’d like to do a train trip around Finland/Scandinavia if that area of the world stays cool long-term. I’m afraid that Putin is in it to win it, however. Why stop with Finland when he could push all the way to the coast? So great that Sweden joined NATO, btw…………

My friend JL lives in Norway, and he’s told me I’m welcome to come and visit. He’s the type of guy that means what he says, so I know I could make it a reality because we get along so well online. It would be cool to just fit into his life for a little bit, meeting his family, cooking together, etc. I met him through my professional author’s page, so basically he makes me look good. See? I can hang out with REAL authors. 😛

Part of my train trip would invariably be turning myself into a real writer as well.

I think as you age, you realize that there is only one type of confident person. It’s the kind of person who thinks they know everything. The person that has a suggestion for everything, even when it’s blatantly wrong. It’s the person who can’t learn, because they think their ideas are already pretty great and need no correction or instruction.

Everyone else becomes confident in their subject matter area, and leaves the rest to other people who also know what they’re talking about. I tend to “jewel the elephant” in stories to make them flow, but it is a low-level “Southernization,” not a retelling. Everything I have said is true, but there has to be a tiny bit of poetic license so that a sentence actually flows. I could say, “she walked from here to there,” but it’s not getting to the heart of the matter even though it’s factual. In fact, I think I do less smoothing than I do cutting out the filler. You don’t need to see me driving for fifteen minutes, you want the conversations I had in both locations, for example.

There is a complete difference between telling a story to someone and having a conversation. In a conversation, you are expecting someone to talk back. In a blog entry, it is all self-contained. I have left out bits, but not because I’m trying to make someone else feel bad. It’s that their choice as to what to leave in is different than mine…. and they’re free to tell their own story, even in the comments so that it’s immediately visible to those who just read mine. People don’t, but they could and it would make my blog a thousand times more interesting.

There’s also a difference in my confidence when I’m writing and my confidence when I’m out here in the world. I am master of my own domain, literally. It’s like 20 bucks a year for theantileslie.com. But, when I leave this space, I am no longer in charge of anything. I do not treat the whole world as if it is mine, just this tiny little piece of it. I have to be the most confident person I know on this web site, because there aren’t any other narrators of my own story.

In my actual life, Supergrover, Bryn, and Zac (as well as my family) are also narrators, and I am responsible for listening to them as much as talking and letting them know how I feel. They don’t get the “God” version of me because I am not narrating my story in their faces, I am asking for their input. It’s just that Supergrover sees less of the conversational side with me because she hasn’t had a conversation with me in eight years. We used to chat where we were both in front of the computer, both paying attention to each other, so it was harder to get off track than always being async.

Not having conversations made me a narrator in my e-mails, when she was looking for conversation that wasn’t there because it wasn’t. The tautology is real. I cannot think of it as a conversation if you aren’t there. I will always think of it as a letter you’ll pick up in your future, whenever that may be.

I am very good at watching other people go confidently in the wrong direction because it’s not my place to say anything. It’s also my place to stand there and take it when I do tell people flat out “I think you’re doing something wrong.” That’s because it’s not my place to say something and I deserve it, but I also bear the responsibility as a good friend to stand there and take it because that person needs to chew on something. At the very least, they need to think about it and say “I’m going to do what I’m going to do, get used to it” or “you’re right. I didn’t think of that.” Then, it’s my job to sit on that answer, and to love people even when their answer is the worst possible outcome.

I’m not judgmental. I will still love you through whatever you’re going through, even when you’re a hot mess. That’s because I know there’s a difference between surviving and thriving. Survival mode doesn’t give you any higher function. You have to save yourself.

Some people do this by hurting others. Some people do this by hurting themselves. Some people do this by hurting others and not realizing how much watching that is going to hurt them.

For instance, I’ve never once been as angry at Supergrover as I have been at myself. I hurt her and I watched the fallout, because the hurt was unintentional and I felt sincerely helpless to “fix us.” I would if I could, but I can’t, and I have shown myself that for many years. She hasn’t held that wrong over my head so much as praising me for being an amazing writer and then holding my blog over my head. But even that could be redirection from what she’s actually mad at, and I won’t know until she tells me.

I am satisfied with not knowing, because I know how our relationship goes when she doesn’t want to talk about something. It becomes inauthentic, a shadow of itself, and it hurts me. I am sure it hurts her, too, but I cannot speak to that. I feel like we lanced a huge boil the other day, which has led me to believe that I’m going to be okay whether she is or not about our situation. The only clarity on her questions comes from me, and if she’s not interested enough to work on them, I’m confident enough to believe that there are other people out there who do want an authentic relationship.

She knew I was always going to be a blogger, because she was a fan first…. one that fed my ego and made me feel amazing about myself. Now, it’s the bane of her existence. I’m done, because I manage to piss her off and move her, but the only things worth mentioning are the things that piss her off and not what keeps her coming back. It makes me look mean and vindictive, when if I wrote that someone was an asshole to me that day, they probably were. That’s because if someone is glorious, I’ll write that, too, and my writing changes as fast as we do.

My dad has this kind of confidence, but I had to learn it from other women. He planted the ideas, but they made them blossom. That’s because women aren’t really taught to be confident in this society. We are taught that men are more capable than we are, why it was so devastating for my mother to find out I was queer. For her, that came across as me losing EVERYTHING. She couldn’t even have her own credit cards until three years before I was born. Of course that’s going to skew her vision of my future. And that’s before we start talking about AuDHD and physically disabled.

I’ve always been attracted to Type A people (mostly women) because they’re confident, and I’m trying to learn how to do that. And attraction covers an entire spectrum, because a lot of my partners have been Type A, as well as my friends. It’s not something I’m reacting to in trying to please/enable them. It’s trying to figure out how they work so I can get it together, too. It’s never happened, but there’s always hope.

I love what makes my people feel confident.

For Supergrover, I believe it’s her dogs and her books. She gets lost in both, taking her to a different world with its own language, an alpha dog who commands her pack while also inhaling an enormous amount of fiction.

For Bryn, it’s definitely animals. She can run a room of primates (including humans) as easily as she can have full conversations IN ENGLISH with her own dog, because her dog probably has the largest vocabulary I’ve ever seen in a canine outside of fiction. I’ve tried using how Bryn talks to Pippi with Oliver, who is a dog, and it works.

Zac, Oliver can understand English in full sentences, don’t let anyone tell you differently. 😛 I love saying to Oliver, “pick up your toy and lay down over here.” Yes, he can handle sentences with conjunctions. I wouldn’t have thought of that if Bryn hadn’t done it first.

For Zac, I think Oliver keeps him grounded. Oliver will tell him the truth when no one else will, and that truth is that he is beautiful and beloved and everything he needs all within himself. There is nothing that Zac could do that would make Oliver stop loving him, and he knows it. I hope he takes Oliver’s belief in him and uses it on himself, because Zac is indeed magic. I just don’t think he knows it. He displays confidence about so many things, because he’s intelligent and works in intelligence. Therefore, he knows more about the world than most people because he sees a bigger chessboard and is smart enough to analyze it. Being smart enough to analyze it breaks your heart.

It breaks mine and I don’t know a tenth of what he does, because I only read news articles and he’s been in the field since he was 18. He feels confident that he’s risen to the level where he wants to be, because he’s very good at his job and it allows him the time to think about other things. It also gives him enough time to be a writer, because he’s not stuck on a steep learning curve at work. He gets confidence in all areas of his life because his work is stable and reliably outstanding.

So, overall, if I had to pick the most confident person I know, it would be tied three ways. The people I know who are the most confident are the people I chose to do life with. I wouldn’t have it any other way, because we all have our own subject matter areas.

My childhood was a series of stuffing down emotions, both positive and negative, because I was in show mode. So, until I was about 17, I didn’t have any coping skills for getting angry. I didn’t have any coping skills for other people being angry at me. Sometimes when I’m in meltdown, I still don’t, but I have a better shot now than I ever have. Mostly because I’m old enough now not to react just because someone says I should.

Sometimes, when people are angry, I dissociate now. It is easier than feeling myself get upset because I don’t like me when I return fire. It may look like I’m not standing up for myself, but I feel like I get a lot more accomplished just by letting people say whatever it is they’re going to say and “holding my applause until the end.” That’s because even if the problem is me, the solution is not going to come from me.

The solution is going to come from letting them have their feelings out, making them feel heard, and validating that what they’ve said is emotionally, if not factually true. Emotions are not logical, yet none are invalid. It’s a tough road to walk, but easier than getting defensive. I have a fragile ego and a stunning vocabulary. I don’t need “short fuse” added to the list because no one needs my anger. It’s hard to get people to listen to you when you’re not angry, impossible if you are.

People don’t see passion about something if you’re angry. They get defensive and double down. It’s much easier to get what I need if I wait until they’ve had a chance to get whatever it is they need from me off their chests. I stay quiet until the yelling is over, because people are extraordinarily pliable after they’ve yelled at you. The emotional energy in the room feels lighter because their anger is gone. They’re in a space to actually talk.

A lot of people use this pliant stage to manipulate people into getting what they want because they know the other person feels guilty they got angry. I use it to be able to talk in the quiet instead of in the heat of the moment, because I’m not going to get another chance where your ears are this open….. at least, until after the next blowout I don’t want to have.

In essence, while I sat there and waited, you wore yourself out enough to be vulnerable with me and I know it.

It reminds me of Supergrover’s letter, honestly, because in the beginning she really let me have it. It was the best thing ever. My girl was back. She took me on like a prizefighter, and I let her because she needed it. She’d saved up all her negative feelings for years and just blew me away in one page…….. and then she started talking about why I e-mailed her in the first place, and all her anger melted into the woman I know and love. The velvet hammer. Outset Boudreaux has nothing on her.

So, was it more important for me to respond to the part where she was angry at me with fire? Or was it more important to realize that she’s angry and to let her have her moment? Be silent. Take it all in. As I told her in my reply, “I find that I have more questions than anything else- that it’s time to listen and not to talk.” I don’t know what will come of it, but I know I used the best coping strategy for negative emotions that I have- which is just to let go.

I don’t know what’s going to happen in the future because we both want the safety and security of knowing what’s going to happen without doing anything to help it along. We’ve wasted more time than we’ve gotten along and I’m so tired of it.

Our personalities are so opposite because I want to talk about everything. I want to know why my writing hurts her, because until I do, I can’t fix anything, thus limiting my ability to make her happy. It’s better that I don’t know how to make her happy, I think, because if I did, I’d lean toward it, perhaps even without realizing it….. convincing myself that this was my blog when really it’s “everything I do to walk on eggshells.” I’m not having that relationship ever again….. with her, or anyone else. I was able to pick out the pattern because I’ve been in it so many times. Nothing about this relationship is exclusive to her, because I know how I work in relationships and a lot of this is my fault.

We’re just not using our strengths. For instance, our age is nebulous. She does not see me as older than she is emotionally, but I am…. by a lot. I don’t see her as older than I am chronologically, but she is……. by a lot. It’s not a slam, it’s inversely proportional. I got emotional tools she didn’t. She got logical tools that I didn’t. We make a good team, but we’re armed to the teeth without any trust left at all.

Except there will always be a bridge where I stand and work on my negative emotions; I cannot think them through with the hope that my beautiful girl will see what I’m doing and respond. What I can do is recognize that working through all these things will prepare me for something else down the road, and who knows what that might be? I need her to listen to me. She’s dead set on that not happening. So, when she doesn’t listen to me, I do what I do best.

I listen to me.

It’s how I deal with negative feelings.

I am not superstitious because I can read a room. I don’t do rituals to try and keep things from happening, because nothing can stop the random dice from rolling. I do feel all the emotions in a room at once, though, which feels like ESP. A lot of the time, I can pick up the undercurrent of a couple’s relationship before they announce their breakup publicly. I didn’t know it, I felt it. Energy swirls around me and it comes in the form of being able to see relationship dynamics while being in a crowd. I take in most information by sight, and my body reacts. My nerves can sense when I’ve walked into a room with a couple who is in an argument, for instance.

Those moments are when my autism blossoms. It’s not my pain, but my pain signals are going to tell me to hurt, anyway. This is also not license for anyone to walk on eggshells around me. I actually take Tylenol to turn that sensory input down. Tylenol dulls both emotional and physical pain signals, in case that is a thing you needed to know. It’s my responsibility to manage me, and I’m sorry for every moment I haven’t been able. Processing disorders and mental illness are so hard. This is not to garner sympathy, as if any of it excuses my behavior when it is genuinely bizarre. I’m saying it as a patient. Mental illness is so hard. It’s relentless. Every feeling I have has to be thought, then analyzed to see if it’s real or not.

As in, “is this my real emotion, or is this my depression telling me a lie and I’m falling for it?” This is when I am talking to me about myself. I am generally good at picking out what is going on with everyone else. Generally bad at saying anything helpful or useful because I’m autistic. Likely, you’re not going to hear what I say due to the translation layer…… and whatever it is I think you need right now, it’s not an autistic amount of it. Other autistic people will probably laugh at that, because we all know what it means to think about something “an autistic amount,” and how that is so exhausting for other people. We learn to laugh about it, but it’s yet another thing that makes me too much for most people.

I don’t have communication issues in terms of receiving the emotions under what people say and I can predict group dynamics early. What I cannot do is then imitate it successfully so that I can convey to you that I understand (or don’t). I know what’s going on by the way it makes me feel, but fail in the execution at describing those feelings to other people.

People get so, so, so angry at me for things “everybody knows.” All of the feelings that I should have had in advance because of the social rules I should know. I am not a sociopath, who doesn’t have emotions and just imitates them, my blog a slam book because I don’t care about anyone else’s feelings. I’m autistic, which means that I feel every bit as deeply as you, I just process it differently….. and the way I process it is to write it out. I often don’t know how I feel about something until I’ve had a chance to take a step back from my emotions and craft the narrative that is going on in my head by squeezing out all the noise to find pure signal.

I create my own future by looking at my past. I don’t know how to predict other people’s behavior, but I’ve got 10 years of entries telling me everything that made them blow up previously. If someone won’t take the time to explain the rules, I will explain them to myself. I’m often wrong, but I’m not afraid to be wrong. I’m afraid to be unheard.

I sent Zac a message asking him for a scenario I could work from, like, “take a real conflict and make it fictional by changing around the countries or something. Just bare bones………” I haven’t gotten it yet because I said “everything goes to shit in a paragraph,” and he’s 1350 words in….. apparently I sparked his creativity when I asked him to spark mine. However, he could come up with eight of these scenarios before breakfast, so I don’t think it’s a competition. I think I just said something that stuck in his head, and I’m glad to be there. It honestly means more to me that I said something I said really resonated with him. If this turns out to be his magnum opus, I want you to know that I am entirely responsible. If it doesn’t? Totally his fault for not putting the material in more qualified hands…… laughing….. we’re not competitive, mostly because we can’t be. The kinds of writing we do are so different that there’s no comparison.

It’s just nice to have someone in my life who is also dedicated to the craft and understands that push/pull. Do I want to be with my friends or do I want to be with my characters? You pull yourself into your own world and at times struggle to resurface.

I notice more of the worlds inside me than I do my outside environment- I only understand the former, with no ladder to the latter.