Jax Burgoyne Writes

"When did you last want to celebrate being right about something?  Or do you currently feel 'in the right' about some matter?  Write it out."

I find it very difficult to feel right about things.  My memory of facts is essentially non-existent.  When I pitch an idea the poor guys at work have to put up with me saying, "You know there's this thing with some stuff and something sort of happened I think, but I'm not sure what it was."  (Yes, always with the 'you know', or some sort of equivalent.)

And then I backtrack, rapidly.

My history teacher at school (one of them - Mrs Powlesland) called me Janus - the two-faced God.  But not as in two-faced (although I can be that too), but as in seeing both sides of...most things.  Even if my emotional side is being unbelievably biased there is usually some corner of my rational brain going, "Yeah, but, you know, what about...?"  (Hopefully.)

And do you know what?  It is very hard to win an argument with someone when you are like this - you say, "You're right, but I am too," and somehow they don't hear the second bit or can't be persuaded of the validity of MY argument, even though WE ARE BOTH RIGHT!  This doesn't feel fair - losing arguments because my opponent is either too thick or irrational to see sense.  :(

(Am I bitter?  Yes, I am.)

"To which fairytale do you feel connected?  The creepiness of 'Little Red Riding Hood' or the magic of 'Cinderella'?  What makes it special to you?"

​So Goldilocks just needs to stop being so picky.  Life isn't like that.  You just have to learn to like what you get.  (Ok, maybe there's something good in her not wanting to settle.  And something rather me.  But seriously, Goldilocks, it is just porridge.  Porridge that you are stealing.  #brattheif )

​Little Red Riding Hood - I want her to deck the wolf.

​The 'magic' of Cinderella?  Girl gets accessories, is beautiful, gets pretty dress, finds handsome man who stalks her because she was so beautiful, and she probably did little other than simper the whole evening.  FUCK OFF Cinderella.

​I feel connected to The Pied Piper.  There's the slight feeling, as a writer, of being one who leads and others follow, who makes the tune and others dance.  And the darkness works too.  I mean I want to use my 'powers' for good - to lance the pain, reveal the fears, join us together in our mourning....  But there is a sense of 'puppet master' as a writer.  And of being the metaperson, outside of the story.  One day maybe I'll invent a religion that tells people that in order to get to heaven they have to volunteer at least 2 hours a week, stop buying pointless stuff, stop driving and flying everywhere, only work 4 days a week, and try to learn.  :)  I'll tell everyone it's a lie, but hint at its 'deeper truth' - I will say, "I am an atheist myself, so I cannot support the idea of a religion, but this book, this text ​just came to me.  It poured itself through me."  (And so people will believe.)  I will be the unwilling prophet, who questions her own prophecy and, certainly, says don't obey it except that these seem like maybe they are good ideas.  I will drop hints that it is divine truth and make it seem truer by denying.  It's been done before (obviously) but, you know, why not again?

Meh.

​Anyway obviously I also feel a kinship to Hansel and Gretel: SWEETS, YUM!  And to the witch: Jax Does Not Share Food!!!

"What do you think of the term unconditional love, what comes to mind?  Try to be as brief as possible in your answer."

My first, instinctive reaction, and all the subsequent ones, were a little...worrying...for me.  Here is what I wrote:

Prison.
A loss of all agency and self-control.
A loss of all critical facilities.
A death of any love for myself - I would no longer matter (no longer come first).
A lack of self-love so I must find someone 'better' to place my affections on.)
(I assume it's not actually a zero-sum game, but when I think of the love of a partner or a child, these are the thoughts that come to mind.)

Also, I think love should be conditional.  Even self-love: if you universally accepted yourself what would drive you to become better?  What would you say about your flaws?  Would you just love them too?  Should I love the fact that I am so jealous?  So angry?  Or should I not love those bits and try to improve them.  I know self-hatred is bad, and unproductive, but then, on the other side of that, uncritical love, even uncritical acceptance, leads to stagnation.  And an acceptance of crap.

Yes, my friends who mean the most to me accept me as I am.  Flaws and all.  I know there is nothing I can say to them that would stop them being my friends.  But they will still say if they think I'm being an asshole, help me try to improve....  

It all depends, really, on how you define things - how you define unconditional love.  Many people would say that it is loving always but you don't necessarily have to like.  So, with your child, we all agree - I think? - that unconditional love is important, maybe vital.  But that you also somehow have to have the 'that's not ok.  I love you but that's not ok.'  Or maybe 'I don't like you right now, but I still love you?'/'I don't like what you are doing,' is I guess the best....  These are, though, all references to conditions.  So is it, basically, conditional love except that we are all too afraid to admit that we do have conditions on our affections for people.  For our children, for our friends.  There must be some things.  There should be some things.  For example if I continually attacked and cut down even the best of my friends - if I didn't like them, then I hope they would stop loving me.

And this is my fear of love - the unconditional, unrestrained, wholly-in love.  That it doesn't have those boundaries.  I sort-of loved someone and I was treated with utter scorn, and yet I put up with it.   I was ripped down to my own shaking skeleton and loved him through it.  Largely, admittedly, because it was unreturned love, and yet my whole being depended on him loving me....  

LOVE should be conditional.  There is a part of me that thinks it's not real if it has conditions - if you're not all in.  And that my failures have been because of my holding back.

BUT it should have conditions.  It should.

Don't rape me, don't hit me, don't psychologically abuse me....

"Think of a major city.  Now think of a decade between 1850 and 1950.  Now do a Google Images search of that place at that time.  What photo grabs you?  Let it spark today's entry."

Seville, 1870s.  Fiesta di Primavera.
"I think that man was just killed by that bull!"
"What?"
"Yes, killed!"
"Are you sure?"
"Well I'm pretty far away, and that bloke keeps...oy...no...oy...no, he's definitely been gored.  Look, they're covering him over."
"I thought people were cheering more than usual."

The crowd's lust (for blood) has swelled to the peak of a tsunami-sized wave.  It briefly holds itself until the three men trying to drag off the dead toreador look up to see no-one has actually restrained the bull.  It stamps, it runs, and then gore, gore gore - the blood-wave crashes down with orgasmic frenzy: this audience must be vegans.

"What is the smallest room/space in your home?  Can you create a story set in just this space?"

I've noticed a snail living INSIDE our vegetable recycling bin.  I'm not sure whether to take it out or not.  It gets food, liquid, shelter from the rain...air comes in when we open it....  But no light, except that odd bit.  I guess it's used to the swing of the lid it sits on, waiting, upside down, for the next breath of air.

So, story.  I'll do first person because I'm a fan of that :)

I didn't know whether to move to a more sunny location.  I'd got used to the head hanging down position - in fact it seemed to increase the efficacy of my thoughts, all my sludge being pulled down to there.  There was, also, a continual banquet of deliciousness, both liquid and solid.  Various, and with no other claimants of my own kind.  The flies weren't great, but didn't eat that much, and after a while you zone out their constant chatter.  I'd got used to the once-nauseating swing of my platform being pivoted to allow the deposition of the yums (the sludge whooshing wildly in my brain), and the humans didn't seem inclined to throw me out or crush me or cover me in salt.

But I missed the sunlight.  

I was as nocturnal as anyone, but it seemed like something - something big, something that was 50% of life - was missing.

I used to find a rock or something to hide under to sleep, so that was dark too.  (Not a lack of sleep problem.)  But it was at least out there then, a sliming away.  That yellow/white gleam.  Available.  Rather than being chained to the excretion schedules of larger beasts.

But, you know, rotting cabbage.

It was a tough call.