to think of my task is chilling/to know I was carefully building the mask I was wearing/for two years, swearing/I'd tear it off./I've sat in the dark explaining/to myself that I'm straining too hard/for feelings/I ought to find easily./Called myself Jezebel./I don't believe.

I got lost, somewhere out there. I've been doing that lately.

I pretended I knew where I was going. It's the wisest thing to do, after all. I was lonely and scared, but if i pretended everything would be all right, it would be.

And after a while I started believing in my own lies, a little. It's necessary to believe in them, you know. They aren't convincing, otherwise.

Unfortunately, the only person I needed to convince was myself and the lies were so outlandish that even i had difficulty believing them. But I had no map, having left it behind, and the territory was unknown and yet terrifyingly familiar.

And then I came to the crossroads. Live or die, it whispered.

I chose to live.

But I'm a shadow, I'm only a bed of blackened coal. Call myself Jezebel for wanting to leave.

And now, my feet on an unfamiliar road, I am still without a map. No compass except the ones engraved on my ankles, and they aren't much help either.

The biggest problem is that, after a while of wearing a mask, you start becoming it, believe that it's actually your skin. Even though you know it's not. I've forgotten what my own face looks like, who i actually am when I'm by myself. I'm getting a better idea, slowly, but there are experiences I need to have, places I need to go.

I'm not sure who this girl living in my skin is, these days. I know what she wants. She wants girls, but i have no idea if she's a lesbian. She wants to taste the edge of the flogger, but I don't know if she's a sub. Sometimes, my desires spring from my self-image, but in this case my self-image is being carved by my wants.

But it's frightening, to realize how little self-knowledge I have these days. I only have these masks. Which I am shedding, one by one, and leaving them behind me like snake skins.

I am shedding all of my skin, trying to reach the source, trying to see my original face in the mirror.

I'm not saying I'm replacing love for some other word to describe the sacred tie that bound me to you. I'm just saying we've mistaken one for thousands of words.

And it's Samhain. The beginning of the lightless season. The time when the seed is dreaming, when all things are made anew.

I will begin again.

(all lyrics from Jezebel, by 10,000 Maniacs.)

"just stay"
you said "we'll build a nest"
so i left my life
tried on your friends
tried on your opinions.
so when the bridges froze
and you did not come home
i put our snowflake
under a microscope
after all what was i really looking for
and i wonder when will i learn
maybe my wish knew better than i did
and i wonder so strange now
i'm finally in
the party has begun
it's not like i can't feel you still
but strange what i will leave behind
you call me one more time
but now i must be leaving

--strange, from Scarlet's Walk by Tori Amos

Tori always comes out with albums right when I need them. I needed this album very badly. It isn't particularly accessible, but it's worth the time to get into it....everything is layered on to of each other, and I find myself drawn in to spots I hadn't noticed before.

Plus, the packaging for the special edition is amazing. I even got a penguin charm.

I've been listening, and feeling better, and today I've been downright cheerful in a non-manic sort of way, which is a pleasant change. I've got my Halloween socks on, and soon I'll go down to Renton for scrapbooking and greeting trick-or-treaters.

I think it'll be a good night.

(this has been an On Display collaboration. Subject: masks.)

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