white knuckles
Thursday, June 19, 2003
Good-bye to Interactive Communities
So it’s been a blast communicating on the bboard, wiki, and blogger. Utilizing these tools in the Backstory project has helped alleviate some of the stress involved with being a lead.
In the event team, I am utilizing the phpwiki as a posting for meeting notes and group decisions. I have made it an assignment for everyone in my group to participate and to make edits to notes I post on the phpwiki. It is a great tool for documentation of group communication. The other mdpwiki was more formal in nature and I enjoyed the structure and intellectual participation of everyone in the group. I liked how we could put outside links and images to support our facts. Commenting in type gives an addition of anonymity to the participant who may not openly discuss their thoughts in real life. I felt this was great because some of the quiet people actually commented on my postings and other people’s postings that normally they would not talk about in real life.
The blogger to me was more of an online journal of how I feel and what I am going through. I am a believer that in sharing thoughts one can help make someone realize they are not alone. It was a great tool for me because I normally keep a written journal and this just cut back on another thing that I need to lug around.
The bulletin board is also another tool I am utilizing in the event team. I am posting group goals as well as the schedule of meeting times. Also, I enjoyed the fun factor of some of the topics like shoes or where to eat in LA. It was relaxing to me to post things and read ideas that did not relate to MDP. Once again, I liked to see us being humans and commenting on fun things rather than defining what is media design. You mean the world is not just Art Center?
Saturday, May 31, 2003
sometimes i think that my addiction has attributed to my ability to stand up for what i fight for. i believe in community and social activism. you can talk about change. you can complain about the problem. you can mock it. but can you put yourself in an uncomfortable situation and actually change it for the better. i actively participate in the lives of others and try to show them hope. my recovery has allowed me to mentor women with addictions. before i left the east coast, i had helped a young woman get into college i attended as an undergrad. 2 years prior she was hanging from a noose that didn't quite kill her. i also believe in our young people and tutor and talk to kids and teens about going to college. an education will set you free. i believe you can be a power of example. i have been arrested for what i believe in. i do childish poster bombings and graffiti that i feel are not as effective as human intervention. i scream for instant gratification. i've walked out on a cubicle lifestyle. but the most nourishing thing i do for myself is helping others. not in a religious way, not because someone is making me, but because in my heart i need to.
my parents were political activists. i was raised to stand up or else be trampled. i was told to embrace my differences. to be unique is beautiful. i was never told i couldn't be anything. never be a follower. don't be a sheep, lead them don't follow them my father always told me. his words give me the strength to be here. before a couple of years ago, i never spoke to him. then he apologized for being a bad father and i accepted. you can't live your life with resentments. you can't live your live in fear.
when you show someone love and that you care about them. that you'll listen to them. and you'll help them without any expectations. you will change their lives forever. my father always says to the people he helps, i'm helping you now so when you get on your feet you can do the same for someone else.
see when you help others, there is like a 50/50 chance that they won't get it. i grew up with homeless people living in my basement that my father hired and my mother fed. some of them died because of alcoholism or drug addiction. some of them made it. but the reality is some don't. failure is something you need to accept before you start helping someone.
its kinda like how love works.
Wednesday, May 28, 2003
here are 2 published poems about my addiction. i sometimes forget that i can write or the fact that my writing expresses my honesty. i am looking to communicate, not to scare. writing gets it out of my head and onto paper so i can see what is going on. these 2 poems were written several years ago, i found them in a poetry compilation book. maybe i might help another addict and in doing so i might help myself.
__________
Time
against the grain
love poems are burnt in heaps
and flower beds are constructed
to commemorate the absence of presence
of all thought of every thought of you
but I forgot to remember the thing I hated
when you fell in flower beds
and I covered you with the last black rose
deconstructed dreams devour
the glossy retinas of the past twenty years
when life was the end of all struggle
and deviants became all worth saving
but you forgot to remember the end of the last time
but all of them were the beginnings
when alarm clocks put babies to sleep
in yellow rooms filled with cigarette smoke
exhaled fumes and the clanks of scales
reflected your absence of color
in plastic teething toys
drenched in my snot choking on the end of all beginnings
__________
Yellow Room
cigarette smoke turns virgin white walls yellow
yellow walls make me insane
you can paint them white again but past bad habits
always bring out the true color
cover it up hide it
but the real color always bleeds through
heroin turns virgin white skin purple
purple skin makes me insane
you can paint it white again
but past bad habits
always bring out the true color
cover it up hide it
but the real color always bleeds through
layers of white paint on yellow walls
layers of white makeup under purple eyes
smoke removes fresh white paint
tears remove fresh white makeup
eyes burn to look at yellow walls through purple eyes
__________
Cybil Weigel
Copyright ©2003 Cybil Lee Weigel
i don't like names that end in y
my best friend's name is tracey
she calls me drunk
telling me sadness through love
and i try to forget how i lived
on floors that had eyes below
in row homes with rats
but filled with friends
and art and love
and remember the door to my bedroom
and the flowers they brought me
which you hated
the orange and the yellow ones
the mattress on the floor
and the times i cried to forget
that i had to leave you
do you remember
the futon couch that never died
the trips to phili
the shampoo parties
layers of makeup
and tall shoes that danced on poles
do you remember all of this
i've seemed to forgotten it
pictures of me he took
and put under glass
covered table tops
looking like a doll
but feeling like a broken idol
i thought i loved him
i thought i wanted to be clean
and i struggle to remember
what i have done
what i can do
who i can help
by stopping
but somehow
somewhere
deep inside i want to deny
the fact that i was cut into
pieces and preserved
through the eyes of glass
by something i never loved
you never really miss them until they are gone
when the couch tour you did during your teenage
years makes you cry
and the person you really love doesn't ever exist
purple bruises on my hands scare me
i guess he held my hands too tight in that
imaginary walk we had on the beach
or the time you kissed me and i forgot to say good-bye
and i woke up wandering on streets
scared to trample the past
scared to look out
instead of down
scared to run back
and crawl under the quilt my
grandmother made me
Monday, May 26, 2003
so it’s like this. being an addict is like having sensory impairment. i do everything in extremes even since i was a child. my father would say that i didn't consider the fact that i was the weaker sex and always started fights. for example when i was seven, i thought i could throw down by male friend who was 10 and he broke my arm on the tile floor in my parent's family room. i tried to be a trapeze artist on my swing set when i was 10 and tore open my head. i played sports such as volleyball basketball and swimming, i mastered the violin by age 7 and piano by age 11 and still felt this sense to combat this feeling of the other. i have no fear, which is my problem. i have sacrificed everything for my education. no outside help, just cybil saving her own fucking ass. working the gamut of shitty jobs to pay for school, barista, waitress, "personal assistant," ta, graphical designer...all of which gives me dry heaves.
i feel like i could have been a doctor. i was too smart and dangerous, starting school at age 4 and feeling awkward because of it. i was a musician, an artist, an intellectual and i knew it at a young age. i gave it all away for a feeling that never exists. i think i was trying to find a substitute for love, but found a larger void instead. all day. everyday. i used to have no feeling when i first got clean. void of expression, emotion, and individuality...so i was in a long-term relationship for 4 years. which i broke away from by coming here but probably saved me from starving to death. i break belief structures and sometimes enjoy it. i feel some sense of power and control. i am trying to work on this behavior. i'm trying to be a caring and loving person to all of my friends and family, even those who have wronged me. i have made amends. my strength to follow my educational goals has helped those who love me understand how compassionate i am about what i do. its like the addict in some people's eyes never exists. all they know is the clean cybil. its all a fucking mess. what people see 1st when you walk in the room is the assumption which is never fleeting.
Saturday, May 24, 2003
I don't feel depressed. I just don't know what to do with this lifestyle decision. I am happy with every other part of my life right now. I feel like I have this battle in my head. Should I use? Should I not use? It’s never been so bad right now. It has to be the pressure of graduate school. I have the healthiest lifestyle I've ever had in my entire life right now. I'm on a vegan diet, a scheduled exercise program, I volunteer in my community, I socialize with both my family and friends.... Am I subconsciously rebelling against this? Is my old addict-self screaming at my healthy-self? What is really going on with me? It’s so weird. I'm the first to help someone. I'm the first one to give advice but all I can do right now is hold on for dear life.
Friday, May 23, 2003
i cried today because i want to make it stop
i walked on lines for years
the lines of life and death
and always ended up barely breathing
extremes i love
extremes i am scared of
like achieving this goal
and feeling a sense of accomplishment
i am scared that you love me
and i love you just the same
just like i loved a substance to death
which never quite seemed to kill me
i love him
i love him the substance
i love him to death
Thursday, May 22, 2003
white knuckles never make sense to me
and i hug them even though i’m not supposed to
they draw me pictures with crayon smiles
bellies growling
eyes wandering
and all i want to do is give everything
everything i know away
see when you’ve been helped
helped to live
you see all people as people
and they see you just the same
tired eyes want hugs
small hands want love
and i remember when i felt the same
So, this is one of the hardest times that I've ever gone through. I've been clean from drugs since August 1, 1997 because I was killing myself. I've been in therapy and all types of support groups, which no longer helps me right now. I am struggling to come to terms with the rest of my life. I know that since I've been in graduate school, that the intense pressure and stress has aggravated my lifestyle. I'm making an extreme commitment to myself and my future, which is effecting my addiction.
I want to use drugs more than ever before, but I don't want to loose what I've earned which has been the respect and love of my friends along with an education. I thought my void would be filled and go away but it seems like it has gotten larger. I feel trapped in a dry lifestyle. It is not normal for an addict not to use, but I do not want to die from my choices.
I will post some poetry I have written . . .
