2 January 2019 Electra's dictionary and film noir
There is a sense when you walk into Jörn’s place; a sense of walking into a cocoon as if descending beneath the earth
Even though there are windows. As if it is an alternate underworld with its own atmosphere
“Oh the quiet?” Jörn smiles looking up from making coffee using a French press, “I had all the walls soundproof insulated because of my playing...,” he shrugs casually and pours us coffee in the open plan kitchen. Everything is white, immaculate or of a natural, pale wood tone, “I did it when I first got the place.”
“Really?—so you can play as loud as you want all hours of the night if you feel like it?”
“Yes. And do. That is why I did that. Sometimes in the middle of the night.... when I cannot sleep....” he shrugs, “I always have been this way. I did it last night when you were asleep, did you hear?”
I think as he watches me.... but it was a dream.... I thought
“It was one the things my wife could not stand about me,” he smiles like a lecherous vampire; the kind that wraps you in and keeps you willingly there.
“Wait....” I say, “I heard you at the piano....? Or was that part of....” but then I remember my dream suddenly.... because it was so strange. I remember music.
.... I remember it was like some Bela Lugosi scene only —it was some place outside ....with the moon. It was such a strange dream. Yes, it was an early or ....late sky; a pale light ....outside—somewhere....cold with snow and something else that was odd. A fire pit of some kind. Like a kind of forge. And everything was gray. The sky and the frozen ground.... all the same
This makes me shudder now
He’s watching me in a strange way. He turns his head to look down at me and studies me, his head to one side,
“does my playing disturb your sleep?”
His question baffles me. I almost don’t comprehend his words. It seems almost like another language. And it is as if instead I heard him say something else —that makes no sense.... I try almost to hear —that instead.... he hands me coffee
And as I take the coffee....I know. It feels....like a flashback —I take it from him.... and our hands briefly touch.... yes it feels— like we have done this so many times before
The fire pit....
I look up at him now and remember the question,
“no.... it does not disturb....” I say this even as a warm shudder rushes through me
I think too of last night with him.... and how sometimes in sleep....we join.... it happens in sleep....it’s happened before—and it seems to mix with dreams. And scenes of memories like a movie I don’t know why I see. But he feels, every time, more and more ....like part of ....my self; part of a subconsciousness; shared....
Does his playing disturb....?
Yes, I remember him getting up in the night and watching his shadows on the wall. As if I expected him to....
“Your face reminds me of those Russian princesses,” he says this thoughtfully and walks over, “you have those cheekbones....” he rubs his thumbs across this part of my face and then holds my face in his hands, “you have such a different kind of beauty,” he stares at me; whispers, “and such juxtaposition....your eyes are dark mahogany flames but your skin is like snow. You look like your father, I see that as ....I’ve been looking things up about him....”
I know he is also bemused by something as well as I am about him.
“What did you mean the other day when you told me that I looked familiar to you when you first saw me?”
He tries to find words. I watch him draw his brows together and he begins to smile but it’s an awkward smile, he shrugs,
“like from a dream. Or a story.... that feels more like an old memory—blurry but real....and it is only real because of the strange emotions—emotions....? Is that what I mean....?” he looks into my eyes again and still holds my face in his hands and shakes his head,”I knew what your voice would sound like before you even spoke— at first I was going to ignore how curious it made me—but then I saw you again and.... this time your eyes briefly met me—“
I suddenly remember this now. It was a day with Nigel.... the day with Eliot.... I only saw Jörn in passing as we were in the lobby and he stepped out of the elevator. He seemed to be laughing to himself as he looked over at us and I remember feeling almost insulted by his expression of superior disdain and wondering what it meant. And why it bothered me
We both are at that moment together right now as we both think of this day in the lobby
I remember how my heart jolted when I saw him—and it was irrational to me ....I remember thinking. And strange too I was attracted to his insulting grin as he stared at me with those pirate’s undead eyes that burned like sparks of lightning.
He says now to me,
“I was reading the part again in your blog—the entry about when you had been approached by an investigator back in The Hague—and something about that really sticks out in my mind....”
“Why?” I ask why ....but I am really wondering how far back he has read. So many of my entries are meant to just analyze through streams of consciousness; so I find myself quite disconcerted
“Because —you said you had something happen to you.... some mystery about how your arm became suddenly paralyzed....?”
It is how he says this that makes me shudder now but I nod.
“Your legal father—“ but he stops himself when he sees me shudder again. He is analyzing my expression far closer than makes me feel comfortable. Instead he says, “he traveled for his business— did you say that one day he left suddenly on a mysterious business trip after —“
I interrupt him,
“the blood test —yes. I know what you’re thinking....”
Jörn sighs,
“your father’s business had to have been a cover operative and things don’t make sense about what happened after your return to the US. Why your assault was never reported and you were never taken to see a doctor....”
I pull away, I go to sit at the table and set down the coffee cup.
I don’t like these things about my past. I hate remembering them. I cover my face inside my hands. Close my eyes.
At first I feel him just watch me for awhile. After a couple of minutes he sits down too across from me at the table
“So you think you are piecing together clues,” I say now. “What is that about? Do you think there’s an old Cold War political plot?” I force a laugh
“No, min lilla duva, I think that your legal father was trying to have you murdered— what was the cause of the paralysis? Did they ever discover the reason? Some kind of virus was it? But then the doctor discovered you had a spinal injury from childhood....”
“Jörn—even if there is some kind of mystery there, do you really think it has any baring on the present?” I ask
“You say you are interested in learning about the purpose of each of our lives; existentialism; purpose and Truth; what your project you say is all about,” he continues holding me caught in his accuracy, “your blog ....you as you write you are delving through and searching for purposes of ones meaning or the significance of an individual’s individual identity.... why these differences in all of us have purpose—isn’t that what you said the other night?”
....the champagne on New Years.... I forgot about this conversation—evidently I became philosophical about myself and isn’t that always awkward the next day?
“The only way to look at truth, my tragic Electra, is by acknowledging the whole truth about who you are—do you understand the necessity of acknowledgement? Otherwise you are not really wholly conscious, are you? So how can any personal discovery hold merit as a Truth?”
“Ok—yes,” I hear his words but he misses something else, “how do I do that now when these crimes are too late to be put to justice—for this purpose of acknowledgment??”
“But is that not the whole purpose of your ‘dictionary’—defining, you are defining, yes? That is your proof that you search for. The one that gives you permission. You are caught in your own shackles and will run out of air unless you give the mermaid back her voice.”
“Only there is no way I can tell my story..... not here. Not in this country. You understand that don’t you? I mean why.... why I still have to keep my real identity secret.”
He does not respond right away but seems instead to search my face before he says,
“you are an artist haunted by a past and the only way to be released is through your work expression. Your work is necessary not for commercial success so much as the need to express this as an artist’s right for existence. The irony of notoriety and the need to be recognized....” he chuckles like it is a personal inside joke. He shrugs, “you need to get this out.....maybe you should do it in Stockholm....” then says in his language, as if only for himself:
“gör en svensk film. Det skulle vara en psykologisk thriller. Kallar det en modern Electra. Vad sägs om en ordlista på svenska? Kalla det konst.”
Only I don’t know what he is saying only that I sense ....as I always have: language is a good place to hide
a dictionary
4 January 2019 Dear Me, notes to a stranger
When I open my mouth to speak no sound is heard
People say ‘you can never really run away...’ or ‘you can never go home again...’
Maybe this is why I am lost
I search for identity. I search for myself .... only I am not really looking for myself
not exactly
It is meaning I search for. As in....regards to purpose. As in the individual’s purpose. So in searching for ‘myself’ it is more that I am searching for a personal brand of purpose as relevant meaning ....for some greater whole; universe.
Does that mean I am some kind of zealot? That I am deluded in thinking that there is any purpose for our universe? Any purpose to our universe?
The universal consciousness.... well, I don’t really care if anyone considers me deluded this way. For me, it is more necessary to search for this Essential Truth
Whether I make sense to anyone.... I have only become tired of searching for proof
Because I cannot quit myself, can I? I cannot escape my own thoughts. I have done exercises where I change my way of thinking or changed my narrow opinions of some matters I fall into being blind about as I know I am not perfect.... I do know that—but after sifting through the debris of my mind over years of discussion with all walks of life, studies through research and my own travels which this last few years I have done a lot of
....well, I have found that one cannot escape oneself nor one’s essential truths
They just haunt you
And chase you down..... to be true to the Self is .... the actual teacher. It is so easy to believe that the Self are the negative criticisms you find yourself guilty of
I call my alter ego Electra
Because at the center of my madness
....yes my madness..... because I realize that this chaos I live within is a kind of madness
I cannot live without my madness.... you see, the center is my father’s rejection of me from my earliest life memory. It devastated me as a child
It influenced my understanding of my own importance to the opposite gender. It was like having been told my own gender was not acceptably up to my father’s standards.... it’s an innate sense all the way inside of my own personal self value. I did not adequately measure up to my father, in my mind and so I felt emasculated of my feminine gender
and to compound this was the Oedipal secret that I am unable to speak of
Except here
through suggestion. The riddles. The themes. The themes.... which are the hints of codes to follow
It is a dictionary I write. A dictionary that lists my versions of meanings of words. My invented codes that let me hide my clues kept only for me.
Or the very very clever
I dare you
It is such a heavy .....shame—so Electra bears it
As I run away from Chris, my estranged husband to people that reflect with fun house mirrors warped reflections back to me
“Mirrors should reflect before throwing back images,” Cocteau said, and forgive me for loosely quoting him this way.... he also said, “there is nothing worse to a poet to be admired through being misunderstood....” his tragedy of a poet
I did not feel seen by Chris. I felt invisible to him. I don’t know why unless it was that I felt he did not hear ....what my heart was asking him for
It was to be acknowledged and to have this reinforced by expressing to me his acceptance —for all that I am.
To heal the rejection
It was wrong to need this from him. I suppose. But it was what I needed
You cannot run away from your essential self. This I have found. Even if I have tried the Pavlov conditioning to convince myself that my sense of gender is good enough for the opposite gender for which I long for.... I will never believe it
Electra’s dictionary is code for Oedipal’s dictionary, as in accordance with Heraclitus
When I look up at Jörn I see he has been reading this.....
He says,
“Your voice is lost here.... but maybe it’s the language.”
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