"Safe in my frame" or in which I provide context...

...and quote a lot of Tori in order to connect some dots.

This is related to the last post. My brain is on fire with its longing to be just what I need to be.

Here are some things.

When I started this blog, I was very angry at DB for needing someone to inspire him....and that the someone inspiring him wasn't me. I whined around in my brain about having to put myself out as a Muse for Hire. Now however, I'm beginning to think that's not the point. Why should I inspire anyone but myself?
It sound very lovely and romantic to inspire someone else, and maybe that can be part of it, but I should start at home. I must inspire me. I am my own muse. I shall reflect my quirks, my spirit, my Shakti.

The "parasol" bit in the blog URL is a reference to Tori Amos' song "Parasol", which she writes about in Piece by Piece as follows: "I saw a painting by Seurat - Seated Woman With A Parasol - in a book on Impressionism. I was drawn to it and I started to think about Victorian women and then some women today, the type of women who don't want to intimidate their partner and so allow themselves to become reduced so the other person can feel confident."

Gods. That's the more important part here. It's not the Muse for Hire bit. It's the Parasol part.
I have very nearly become that seated woman "safe in my frame/in your house/in your frame". No. This is not the girl I was. She would hate that with all the fiery passion only a 16-year-old is capable of. This is not the woman I am seeking to honor and resurrect as of late.

As a pallet cleanser after the drag that was Outlander, I read The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants. What? Yes. Yes and more yes. This book brought me back to a time in my life when everything was bursting with potential. I was coming into myself (more than I realized) among strong girlfriends. We didn't date. We had no time for such Tom-foolery. We didn't need it either; we had each other. And I think that's still where my strength lies--between me and the women I have known since we were girls. Sometimes, I think it's no wonder we're having a bit of man trouble. It takes a certain sort of guy to stand in the midst of Us, and not feel intimidated by the bonds that remain.

But...the Pants. This is a book about four friends (ages 15-16) who separate for a summer (camp, relative visits, etc.) and share amongst themselves a single pair of jeans (that magically fit them all beautifully). The Pants are not to be washed; they must travel, carrying the summer stories of the friends with them. What they're really doing, however, is carrying the strength and support of the far-flung friends to each other--from Greece to Baja California. I'm not so far from any of my buds, but that these girls get how important they are to each other mattered to me. It made me remember the pieces of my younger self (who I have so often written off as having nothing important to say) that may have known more than I know now. I'm still sort of parsing this, but I think this book was a very necessary piece of whatever Growing I'm doing at the moment.

So, what did my 16-year-old self know that I need now?
Back to a Tori song from that time that I loved to belt as angrily as I could: "Professional Widow"
I didn't really get it at the time, but I did understand that there was a lot of indignant girl rage in this song.

Tori on "Widow": "[Professional] Widow is my hunger for the energy I felt some of the men in my life possessed: the ability to be king. I wasn't content just being a muse. I was the creative force. I was in relationships with different men where if they could honour that, they couldn't honour the woman, and if they could honour the woman, they couldn't honor the creative force..."

My 16-year-old self was hungry, and very few people had yet to tell her no. Ok. She was never going to be a stage actress under the bright lights of New York and London theaters, winning praise worldwide. She was never going to be a concert violinist either, but her mind was strong and full of good things.

I wrote more between the ages of 15 and 18 than I think I ever had before (or perhaps since). I had confidence in that writing that allowed me to share with people to whom I had hardly said three sentences before I handed them a manuscript. Maybe it was not so much the confidence in the writing, but confidence that I was not alone in feeling hungry. The young women who read about Armina all understood "the energy...the ability to be king."

I wrote it out very literally, true. Armina of that time was a warrior for her goddess, destroying false kings and her father--very subtle that, haha. I poured myself into that other young woman...all that desire to have all the pieces of myself recognized and honored.
Reading journals from high school is a little scary, but under the bravado--the statements of myself being fit for glory--was that desire to have the creative energy and the woman honored. I just wasn't quite sure how to get there.

My younger self also knew that it was ok to be herself. Loony, off-the-wall, different. I was always a little over the top. It is important to be a simmered-down version of myself at this point, but I knew something then about self-loyalty of which I may have lost sight.
"Self-loyalty" is a phrase which I rebel against for sounding too much like selfishness, but it's different. It's a matter of giving the best of yourself--to yourself and others. The ability to check in and say: Are you just afraid of something different or does this dishonor you? ...and make a decision from that point.

I think a lot of the friends I made, back in the day, I made because I seemed a little fearless. I stood on tables and gave recitations. I wore pleather pants and fangs to a formal dance at which I was another girl's "date." Some of this, certainly, is the strength of friends. "You want to be bizarre and out there--I'll be right beside you, laughing with you about your lunacy--just lead on, Oh Crazy One."

Sure, I can throw a lot of this in the "please please please notice me" pile, but that would only be telling part of the story, the part I've been telling for a long time. It dishonors that young woman I was. I've stepped out of my frame and into another frame...that I don't think that girl would recognize. Parts of it are good, but parts of it could stand to put on a little hot pink glitter, some rainbow socks and remember how to "Psycho Laugh" at exactly the right moment.