Love, Honor....Death

Pumpkin died on thanksgiving.

The story is brief and painful. After fighting what looked like diabetes, pancreatitis and liver failure for months, his kidneys finaly failed. He stopped producing urine, and stopped eating. I caled his dad, who came to the house, and we spent the last hours petting Pumpkin, pushing pain killers into him so that he was happy and comfortable. That I sucsseeded at, keeping him kitty high and pain free. Eventualy the pain killers helped him sleep deeply in his dads arms, and he fell asleep. I made certain he did not wake up.

On post mortum, because I had need to know...

Pumpkin died of cancer. Everywhere. His pancrease was a mass of hard balls of abnormal tissue, there was no normal tissue left- his liver was long dead, both his kidneys were dead... and he was bleeding inside, everywhere.  Dead kitty walking... for however many months.

So my fight to control his diabetes was a lost battal at the instant of diagnosis. Pancreatic cancer is a no-win, never win.

Be we fought hard, didn't we? Pumpkin had every minute of good times, and died with kindness, love and 'family' around him.

Ths house is empty without his medial regimine, although it is still filled with living pets and activity. It is weird to not have to sleep on the couch next to him, be awake at midnight, one, five and so on to give meds, to never sleep more than a few hours here and there..... I still react to high pitched soft alarms as if his blood sugar monitor is calling me.

And Boogar, his paralyzed party boy buddy is sad.

Peace in your travels Pumpkin.....

Love honor death...............

Instant Experts... a rant

I am mystified by the need for people to become 'instant experts'. I have noticed in the BDSM community, that a new person often falls one of two ways- far to scared and shy to act, insecure in explorations and looking for all the knowledge and expereinces that they can (this is not bad, not at all) OR... the instant expert.

Imagine a Dom, or a Submissive, having never expereinced anything in BDSM, in the course of a few months go from someone clueless to someone claiming to know everything, from all the terms, to all the fetishes, to all the how to's and so on. Imagine being so solidly into this concept that all community resources were rejected- no peer review, no support, not even reading books or anything to expand understandings.

This concept effectivly cuts a person off from any challenges, self challenges, learning challenges- and cuts them off from growth and experience- and if they are 'loud' enough about their expertise, then it may cut off those who associate with them as well.

I see instant experts everywhere. The new puppy owner who 'just knows' how to raise a dog, the just com eout of the closet little gay girl who 'just knows' all there is to know about realtionships...

I don't know. I am well edjucated in lots of things, but I crave more knowledge, and I desire social support. I don't care if I fall into a 'know it all' stance, I still want to know what you know- because it makes for interesting conversations... and

knowledge, real knowledge is power

silly me

I forget instant experts might be so insuce in their desires, abilites and internal balance to even challnege themselves with the concept of ...wow, there might be more to this than what I thought...

So to all those instant experts, thos uber-doms and wonder-subs, those temper tantrum driven 'gimmee gimme' but hell if I know what I am asking for....

Go read a fucking book on the subject, then talk to a few peers and get over yourself.

I'm going to go think about cruising imaginary little goth girls now and wait for the sun to go down.

friends

I am digging through my concept of myself, and of my ‘value’.

I have noticed a pattern, and best I tell it with a story…

Quite awhile ago I met a group of people in the pagan community and made friends with them. They were sort of a Renaissance fair offshoot, and a few of them went on to the BDSM community as I have noticed the typical crossover between these alternative groups.

One of the people I met was David.

Now David and I we, made friends. We hung out- although not frequently, and we talked- about women, life, sushi, good food, jobs, women, and how we really needed to go burn some meat and paint on caves.

Each of us lived out life, went through jobs and lovers, homes and circles of friends, had all the normal ups and downs. I hid out much of the time, as I often do. I worked, raised kittens, did my stuff and generally lived my isolated and sometimes very lonely life.

Dave got sick. No one knew what was wrong with him. We talked, I would throw myself into his arms and crawl up his body and give him huge hugs. We lamented that some of our friends had mainstreamed and vanished. Dave worked at something he loved, and went on adventures- wine making in Australia was one of his favorite. He’d call and tell me about his friends, fads in wines women, working out and of course, if I pestered him, he’d talk about the medical mystery bullshit he was going through.

Dave got sicker. We didn’t see each other much. I always figured Dave had a billion other ‘real’ friends and I was just one of his oddball distant talk to when no one else was around friends. Sure, I adored Dave. But I didn’t expect that adoration/ friendship returned.

Dave got sicker, and after 6 or so years, ‘they’ figured out he had cancer. He fought with his insurance company, his was a rare cancer, and the insurance company classified the treatment as experimental, so denied it.

His treatment was approved a week before he died. He’d called me all excited because his treatment had been approved, and I asked him ‘do you want me to come?’ and he said no, he was cool. We talked about being afraid the treatment might not work, and he might die. He talked of his lady friend. He was so jazzed, because this treatment worked… and he could finally be better.

I called on his first chemo day. No one returned my call. Oddly, the day before my computer had blown up, as had the vacuum cleaner and an alarm clock all at the same time, as if a massive power surge had ripped through the house. I’d thought ‘huh, funny- I wonder if that is Dave calling me’.

About a week later I got a call that told me David had died before his first chemo treatment.

I reluctantly went to his memorial, feeling so out of place with his pretty friends from the wine industry. I didn’t want to meet his girlfriend, figuring she’d do the ‘ew icky’ at me, sorta like ‘happy bunny’ says ‘you made me throw up a little’.

She was gracious and kind, and I made my rounds and went away.

A few weeks later she called, needing someone to talk to and me, compassionate me talked to her for hours. Apparently few of David’s friends would talk to her. Many did not approve that she’d married Dave in his last week.

I asked her why she picked me to call, and she said “I was reading David’s journals, and you have always been his very best friend…”

I was stunned. Me, David’s best friend?

I had no idea he valued me so…. Or rather, I didn’t believe that someone, anyone could bond to me as I bond to them.

Now, this is a repeating pattern.

I have several people who I love so dearly. They are- in my mind, my comrades, brothers, sisters, family beyond blood forever and ever into the stars. Recently one of them has been telling me he wants me to know that I am one of his best friends…

I struggle with this. I love him. I would kill for him and hide the bodies- but not believing in my own self worth, I have stayed in the shadows, not called out to him, because I do not want to dump my odd little self on him…

And I’m wrong to de-value myself that way.

So here I sit, teaching myself to try to stay in contact with my beloved ones, to ask if I can visit, to call or email and tell them I love them, or I need them, or just hello…

Because I do not want to find out I really was someone’s best friend after they are dead, and beyond my functional reach (hello Dave, I feel you in the room, I see you)

So D.B., this is for you my friend. I love you. I miss talking to you. Thanks for telling me you value me. I’ll be asking to visit… and if you need a hammer swinger, creative dark décor person… here I am.