Toofy's Diary

Just a place for me to jot my thoughts. Most recent posts at the top. Full disclosure: this diary may contain potentially triggering content.

9/22/2020

Dear Diary,
Today, I am exhausted. After working hard for the magazine this morning, I had my two hour long poetry workshop. The workshop is always a joy, but of course, requires energy and care. Not only that, but a star poet whose work I admire visited our class today. We had the chance to read a poem to her, each of us, and get feedback. My heart was beating so hard that I could hardly hear what she said as I finished reading the poem I chose. Something about sound, place, form. I was overjoyed.

I still have to tutor a student later today, so the day is not quite done, but I am taking any chance to rest I can get. Emboldened by the star author's feedback, I submitted my poem, along with another, to a journal. Apparently, I'm confident enough that I even paid $3 dollars to submit. We'll see if they like it. In any case, I still need to write a poem today.

As I write this, I think about how line breaks are important in both poetry and web design. I wonder if there's something there, in the 80 characters and 24 lines that typicall fill a terminal. I'll think on it some more, diary, and let you know later.

9/19/2020

Hey Diary,
So like. I knew that Sh*ne D*wson had done some fucked up things. But I just watched a video about him grooming kids, and it was really triggering. Not just to watch the behavior, but to witness the number of enablers, including his own mother. It reminds me of my own abuser. It really makes me sick.

Everything to do with abuse, especially CSA, is frustrating for me. I'm angry it happens. And I'm angry about the way that people act when you talk about it. Everyone clams up in a way that makes me feel like it's something that should never be spoken about. Even if they say they're supportive, it obviously makes everyone uncomfortable. I feel like I can't even write about it because it makes people uncomfortable. Even in creative contexts, I've tried so hard to write about it without making it seem...I don't know... like I'm mutilating myself by doing so.

Why do I mention this? Because this discomfort that people exhibit is the reason why groomers like D*wson get away with grooming. People are so uncomfortable with CSA that they make survivors/victims feel gross for talking about it, & their discomfort with the subject makes it impossible for them to accept that someone's a groomer even when they literally admit it out loud. See: Sh*ne D*wson on the podcast episode where he talks about his "justification for p*dophilia" and the co-host basically begs him to stop talking about it because she KNOWS just how awful it is and it makes her HIGHLY uncomfortable. And yet... and yet...does nothing about it. I don't know what to do about this kind of problem...

Now, when I say watching the video about D*wson was really triggering, I mean that his behavior reminded me of the same behavior that my abuser enacted on me. & my abuser managed to squeeze five years of CP out of me. What has D*wson done that a random Gamestop employee in Ohio couldn't get away with? That's the dark question. If I were religious, I would pray about it. But I'm not. So I'll just seethe.

9/18/2020

Diary,
I woke up this morning at 5 a.m. with a splitting migraine. All my dreams featured the pain, so sharp on the left side of my face and body. I had to run to the mailbox to pick up my medication refills, which was unpleasant. But, y'know, at least I have medication. I went for a long time without it. To make matters worse, I didn't fall asleep until 2 a.m. Bleh.

So, because I didn't sleep through the night, I tried to take today easy. I had a meeting for work, but as soon as it was over, I returned to bed and just worked there. Maybe more slowly than usual, but I got a good bit of work done. I wrote a poem about rodeo, read a bunch of poems for the magazine, etc.

I actually spent most of my evening building this website. I wrote the first gif poem I've ever written, which is fun. RBG died today, which is not fun. I can't handle freaking out about the future right now, but obviously, that is the backdrop of the world.