Masochistically Delicious (original) (raw)
Hi! Request for legal and health resources in Northern California!
Sep. 1st, 2011 | 03:01 pm
Hello! I know I haven't updated in forever. I am working on it. No, that's not true. I am working on being quiet, honestly.
But I couldn't pass up the opportunity to re-post this very loving request for help that I have received from a friend of mine who is trying to help another friend without many tools, or spoons if you are familiar with the concept.
I am hoping someone reading this (or more than one person) may have the tools/and spoons necessary to assist this person, who wishes, at this time, to remain anonymous - I can attest to the difficulty required to utilize the internet to request public assistance and kindness. It is a vulnerable space to be sure, and very few people are comfortable doing so without extreme reasons. I have 100% trust in the integrity and goodness of the person who sent me this request.
I have limited access to the internet right now and some very big developments to attend to in my life, but I will try very hard to check back here in the next few days. I am personally grateful for any help anyone may be able to provide in this matter.
:Thank You: :Love You: And, :Love You:
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A very good friend of mine who lives up in San Rafael, Marin County, USA needs some help. She's a great lady, who's been sending me cards and encouragement all through this tough time in my life when I'm helping my grandma as a live in caregiver. She's a widow and a single Mom, trying to stay as close as possible to her two teen kids, who are talented singers and actors. She loves Disney characters, rock and roll music, caring for stray and neglected animals, hiking, and long walks on the ocean. She's designed some lovely stationery, dreams of opening a fashionable thrift store and writing her autobiography.
She has narcolepsy and adult ADD, where she falls asleep at random times of the day and night and has sudden attacks of sleepiness and doesn't have much control over her schedule and struggles to stay organized. She's also a child abuse and domestic violence survivor, with panic attacks and stress...and has just had major surgery on her esophagus and can barely move and barely function.
She's being evicted from her disabled-housing complex for a variety of reasons which are out of her control...a mentally troubled neighbor periodically gets upset with her without cause and reports her as causing trouble, and also the place is noisy and not properly insulated, which causes stress and aggravates her disorders.
Right now she needs help with possibly finding another place to live in San Rafael/Marin County (she's a non-custodial mother of two teenagers, they can't live with her since she's too sick to care for them, but she comes by where they're staying and helps them out a lot and needs to stay in the area.) If there's any place she could go where there's room for one lady and her two rescue-adopted puppies, that would be great. Also, in the meantime, some help with emergency finances and/or with some kind of legal advocacy about her rights as a tenant, someone who can stand up to the Marin Housing Authority on her behalf, would be great. She's always paid her rent ($400 a month for the one bedroom apartment) and has lived in the complex for several years with no problems, until she moved to the upstairs unit where she is now, with the challenging neighbor and the sound problems.
Her income is only a little over $700 a month, and she has to pay for food, utilities, water, medical co-pays, transportation and gas for a car that she shares as there's not much mass transit in her area and she has to somehow make it to doctor and dentist appointments and to see her children.
Also, she has severe dental problems and it's painful for her to chew and eat. Some of this is from domestic violence-related injuries over the years, some just from not being able to afford dental care. She needs procedures which Medicare can't pay for - implants and a new partial because of her missing teeth. Dentists have warned her that she's let this go so long that it might not be treatable unless she gets it taken care of immediately, and she might even need a bone graft. This could cost thousands of dollars and she's already struggling to buy groceries!
She asks me for help and I'm doing the best I can, but not sure where to go or what to do as I don't have a car or an income now and I'm with my grandma during the day. I'd like to help her but have been searching for years and asking people I know, and thought to ask the resourceful Hella Pretty Army! ;) If anyone knows of financial resources that can help with hard-core dental care, knows about tenants' rights resources or wants to advocate on her behalf, or would like to help financially or knows of either a place for her and her puppies to stay, or who knows of work-from-home opportunities where she can earn money online (she's a great writer and proofreader and editor!) then please let us know.
Thank you very much - we are all holding you close to our hearts and in our thoughts and prayers. Thank you so much for serving as a bridge over troubled water for many souls in our community!
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Durham- Get Your Dirty Valentines' Needs Met Here!:
Feb. 8th, 2011 | 07:13 pm
mood: 
excited
SALACIOUS Magazine: Durham Launch Party!
Time Friday, February 11 · 7:00pm - 10:00pm
Location The Regulator Bookshop
720 9th Street
Durham, NC
Created By Katie 'Megaphone' Diamond, Kiki DeLovely
More Info
Readings by Fran Varian, Sam Peterson, & Kiki DeLovely!
Lily de Luca showing off her best moves on the pole!
Ta-ta cupcakes & Valentine cookies!
Fun for all!
----
In this era inundated with free Internet porn, mostly created to cater to male audiences and enforce restrictive stereotypes, queer consumers are left with very few palatable options for partaking in the X-rated. None too soon, SALACIOUS has arrived on the scene! SALACIOUS is a brand new magazine dedicated to erotic art and literature curated with a queer, feminist, anti-racist lens. A perfect fusion of pornography with high art, comics with erotica, titillation with stunning visuals, SALACIOUS is the radical queer answer to the proliferation of such limited stereotypes as “girl-on-girl” and gay “muscle” porn. With a broad definition of the word queer, SALACIOUS offers a smorgasbord of lascivious delights!
Boasting an editorial board comprised of kinksters, authors, performers and activists from across the United States and helmed by Portland, Maine activist-artist Katie Diamond, SALACIOUS features sex art that ranges from pinup photos of a voluptuous Black “Femme Shark” to pastel drawings of White transmen in bondage. Bear orgies share a leaf with an earnest poem about the sweet sensuality of first love. SALACIOUS runs the gamut from vanilla to hardcore, each piece selected for its unique perspective on queer sex as well as for its artistic excellence.
__________________________________________________
This is going to be the official soft launch for the 2011 Fran Varian Femme Dominion Tour!!!
More details to come....in the meantime please contact -franvarian@gmail for contact/booking information.
Yay!
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"If You Live The Look In Your Eyes Is Never The Same"
Jan. 29th, 2011 | 02:49 pm
A whole year has come and gone.
She wasn't kidding, you know. She has your wings. She's watching. Go get them.
Bunny up my loves....it is the Year of the Hare. If there was ever a time to launch a revolution of love and meaning it is now. If there was ever a reason it is because she helped frame one for us.
"Don't you dare waste your time.
Don't you dare waster your time.
Don't you dare."
I love you all more than I am afraid of the pain of losing you. She taught me that.
I love her more than the pain of losing her. And that is a whole hell of a lot.
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(no subject)
Dec. 29th, 2010 | 05:47 pm
Zero Circle
Be helpless, dumbfounded,
Unable to say yes or no.
Then a stretcher will come from grace
to gather us up.
We are too dull-eyed to see that beauty.
If we say we can, we're lying.
If we say No, we don't see it,
That No will behead us
And shut tight our window unto spirit.
So let us rather not be sure of anything,
Beside ourselves, and only that, so
Miraculous beings come running to help.
Crazed, lying in a zero circle, mute,
We shall be saying finally,
With tremendous eloquence, Lead us.
When we have totally surrendered to that beauty,
We shall be a mighty kindness.
Rumi (trans. Coleman Barks)
w/ much <3 to C. for sending me the book.
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A Special Request - Please Forward Widely
Nov. 30th, 2010 | 11:40 am
Dr. Jemsek is one of the most important and knowledgeable Infectious Disease Specialists in the Country. He has been a pioneer physician and indefatigable champion of Lyme patients for quite some time. As his reward he has been plagued by bankrupting law suits from the insurance companies of the patients whose lives he has saved, and has had his medical license revoked in the State of North Carolina. Though he has persevered and continues to save and restore countless lives he is clearly now facing the most horrible battle I can imagine.
This disease has brutally taught me to release my vanity and pride and ask for help when I did not want to. That is infinitely harder for me to deal with on a daily basis than the disease.
You have shown me the unexpected and humbling face of love as you continue to show up for me time and time again with words and actions and community that is so much more expansive than the word generous can contain.
If you are considering a donation to the Hella Pretty Lyme Fighting Army - or worse, - some sort of "thing" to give me to acknowledge the upcoming holiday season I want to ask with you the most sincere gratitude I can express to do this instead.
Even if you think you will not be a match for The Jemsek's daughter you may very well be a match for someone else's daughter, or son. If you are ill and cannot donate please forward this to as many people you know. Someone, somewhere is a bone marrow match for this child.
Please help us find that person.
Thank you so much.
Love,
Fran
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Subject: A personal message from Dr. and Mrs. Jemsek regarding our daughter Jordan
November 29, 2010
Dear patients, friends, and family,
My wife Kay and I are writing to you today to make a somber request on behalf of our six year old daughter, Jordan. As most of you may already know, last September 2009 Jordan was diagnosed with acute myelogenous leukemia (AML). She received outstanding care during several rounds of extended chemotherapy while hospitalized for 6 ½ months at Presbyterian Hospital in Charlotte at the Hemby Cancer center. When Jordan was declared in remission we were finally able to bring her home on Easter day this Spring. After several joyful months at home with Jordan, this past week we were devastated to learn that Jordan has relapsed. In the upcoming weeks, she will begin receiving chemotherapy in preparation for a bone marrow transplant that she will have later this winter.
Last year, after much research aided by the excellent support of the Hemby physicians in Charlotte and the Pediatric Oncology Department at Children’s Hospital in Washington, DC, we were already exploring the option for Jordan to have a bone marrow transplant in the event that the chemotherapy was ineffective. Unfortunately, neither members of her family, nor those in the national donor registry provided a satisfactory match. Unfortunately, at this time we are left without another option and must proceed with a bone marrow transplant for Jordan to survive. We anticipate that the transplant will occur in March/April 2011 at Children’s Hospital in DC after Jordan undergoes an estimated 3 months of induction chemotherapy at the Hemby Center; she is on her way to the hospital with us today. In order to increase the likelihood that we find a better match for Jordan, we are asking friends and family to participate in joining the National Marrow Donor Program. Because patients are most likely to match someone of their own race or ethnicity, please be aware that Jordan comes from a Scottish, Irish, and Ukrainian background. We have outlined the simple steps below in how one can get signed up to be part of this registry.
For all of our patients and others suffering from Lyme Borreliosis Complex, the highly disturbing irony is that the National Marrow Donor Program (NMDP) does recognize chronic Lyme disease while the general community does not. As part of the NMDP medical guidelines, patients with ‘chronic Lyme disease ‘ may not register (details on the linked site below). However, we would humbly request that those individuals struggling with Lyme Borreliosis encourage other family members and friends to consider joining the registry.
As for those of you wanting to be tested specifically as a match for Jordan, i.e. a designated donation, due to the complicated process and cost of being tested privately, we instead recommend and request that you enter the general registry. We greatly appreciate all of the prayers and overwhelming support that our family has received, and we ask for you all to continue to pray as we continue on our journey towards Jordan’s recovery from this devastating disease. If you have questions, please contact Elizabeth Ballas at eballas@jemsekspecialty.com. As before, regular updates will be posted to www.caringbridge.org under keyword jordanjemsek.
God Bless,
Dr. and Mrs. Joseph G. Jemsek
From the National Marrow Donor Program website:
In order to get signed up in the Be the Match Registry, please follow these easy steps.
1. To get signed up now, you can register online and have a test kit sent to your home!
· Go to this website and follow the instructions: http://www.marrow.org/JOIN/Join_Now/join_now.html
Confirm you meet basic registry guidelines. (Must be between the ages of 18 and 60. Please pay special attention to the medical guidelines)
o Complete the online form and order your registration kit, which should arrive in 7-10 days. It is free to join and get tested, but please also consider making a financial contribution.
o Follow your instructions in your kit to collect a swab of cheek cells and return the kit in the mail.
2. If you’d like to get tested in person, please use the following link to locate a nearby donor drive or recruitment center.
· http://www.marrow.org/JOIN/Join_in_Person/index.html
For more information, please visit: http://www.marrow.org.
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The Very Last Time.........
Nov. 1st, 2010 | 06:25 pm
I had a lucid, happy, giggling phone call from Gabrielle Bouliane was October 31, 2009. She called me somewhere near 10pm and said: "I am calling you because I figure you are the only other hot bitch staying home tonight." And then she laughed.
Her pain was managed. She had been doing things. She was really happy because she saw "her boys" the night before. I forgot to ask who they were...Buddy and whoever he was touring with, I imagine.
It was a really good phone call.
None of my cultures really give me a road map for this stuff. There is no sensible parade and drinking on the graves of loved ones in my stunted little history. I don't know how to build remarkable and ghoulish things with sugar cubes. My throat is raspy and dry all the time now.
I don't know that I had any costume picked out for last night - I certainly had a costume budget of zero dollars...but somewhere along the way yesterday I kept hearing that scene from the end of Steel Magnolias in my head - the part where Daryl Hannah tells Sally Field she's going to name her baby Shelby, and Dolly Parton is there and they have this great women in melodrama moment - fucking fantastic women in melodrama moment - that movie still reigns, nothing since touches it,as women in melodrama tend to be looked down upon by the elite and really adored by lots of other people - my point is it's hard to get a good melodrama made (it's remarkably easy to live one!,) - but once you do and you throw a cast like that together....well....
Life Goes On....
She was adamant that *that* is how she wanted it.
<3 <3 <3 <3 <3 <3 <3 <3 <3 <3 <3 <3 <3 <3 <3 <3 <3
Bunny Mamas are for spoiling your children and filling their impossible cheeks with sugar. They are formed in sugar and love and come out only once a year in service to joyful memory. Only joy and only once a year - but there are many and they are everywhere and they don't always dress like this:
<3 <3 <3 <3 <3 <3 <3 <3 <3 <3 <3 <3 <3 <3 <3 <3
It's a fucking sled...watch this movie instead:
Alternately: You know what they say....if you can't say anything nice about someone come sit next to me!
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themagdalen!
Oct. 27th, 2010 | 07:08 pm
mood: grateful
I swear not 45 seconds after texting you I opened the newest Issue of The Sun magazine to this page*
Thanks
*
W.S. Merwin
Listen
with the night falling we are saying thank you
we are stopping on the bridges to bow from the railings
we are running out of the glass rooms
with our mouths full of food to look at the sky
and say thank you
we are standing by the water thanking it
standing by the windows looking out
in our directions
back from a series of hospitals back from a mugging
after funerals we are saying thank you
after the news of the dead
whether or not we knew them we are saying thank you
over telephones we are saying thank you
in doorways and in the backs of cars and in elevators
remembering wars and the police at the door
and the beatings on stairs we are saying thank you
in the banks we are saying thank you
in the faces of the officials and the rich
and of all who will never change
we go on saying thank you thank you
with the animals dying around us
taking our feelings we are saying thank you
with the forests falling faster than the minutes
of our lives we are saying thank you
with the words going out like cells of a brain
with the cities growing over us
we are saying thank you faster and faster
with nobody listening we are saying thank you
we are saying thank you and waving
dark though it is
-----------------
*
themagdalen is my go-to woman for prayers in my hardest moments. This is one of the wisest things about me, loving this woman. We are having intense weather here in NC today - not where I live - but elsewhere...thunderstorms, hail, wind and possible tornadoes. It is 85 degrees of humidity in Durham today and this kind of weather cripples me mercilessly. Barometric pressure is no friend of mine. Additionally, I asked for another prayer which I will keep between the two of us....
Last night my new friend and I were talking about childbirth. She is quite happy to never have children. She appreciates other people's but does not want any of her own. I greatly respect people who know themselves so well, and I greatly respect her. I was sharing that though I still hope to parent someday I mourn the fact that creating a baby inside of me could possibly create another human being with this disease and I could not live with that. Still, every part of pregnancy fascinates me. And I am one of those people who would want a little pool in my living room and every ounce of pain - I said to her: "There is no other time beside our own birth and our death when we can come that close to what lies on the other side. And I want to feel that!"
And my new friend said, "But I don't believe there is anything on the other side. I am an Atheist. People always talk like childbirth is a miracle, but it happens millions of times a day!"
My new friend is smart as a whip. And she is perfect. Her thinking is entirely right. I would not wish her any other way. My belief cannot be validated or invalidated by any other person - and I strongly believe that coercion, disrespect, arrogance, and a closed mind has no relationship to God and Gods and Goddesses and Universe and That Thing (choose your name,) I feel. So I said, I love you new friend. You are perfect as you are and I will never try to convince you otherwise. I only ask that you not assume I am stupid for being a person of faith, and she assured me that she does not.
I did not say - but held in my heart - Yes, millions of babies born every day. And millions of times a day someone steps in front of a car or bus and nearly dies but does not. Millions of times the wrong words said at the right time lead to something entirely unexpected and necessary, even joyous.
Miracle is just a word, after all. Just like serendipity is only a word. And I am only one small person, one millionth part of a dust particle in the great landscape of history. I like my world full of people who are loving and decent and offer different thoughts. I love people who challenge me, because they make me grow. At some point we will all find out, right? Either splat and nothingness or something we cannot know now. In the meantime - I'll take my tea outside in the unseasonably warm October weather with a new friend who is beautiful and smart and funny and most importantly of all firmly believes that all people - but especially middle-aged women should eat cake! Can we not all say Amen to that?! :)
Earlier yesterday my other beautiful friend 
robertinnc bought me a decadent piece of cake at an Italian bakery and coffee shop, even though it was my turn to treat.
There is a badass, no nonsense energy healer in Oakland named Asha who says gratitude is the highest spiritual frequency - and there are a bunch of glbtq adult children of/and or parents of/or friends of/or partners of alcoholics in this town who say the same thing. Having a crappy day? Write a gratitude list.
Thank you. If you think I'm talking to you when I say that you're right. And if you don't think I am talking to you when I say that - nuh-uh. Thank you. <3
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Call For Submissions
Oct. 12th, 2010 | 10:28 pm
mood: This is good
All GLBTIQ-identified poets are invited to submit up to 5 poems or short autobiographical stories to a new anthology, BETTER: queer writers speak on their survival.
Submission deadline: December 1, 2010 (early submissions encouraged)
Submit work to: whatgetsbetter@gmail.com
The recent "It Gets Better" campaign responding to the epidemic of bullying and the recent spate of suicides by gay youth begs, to us, the larger question of what it means and what is required of us for things to "get better."
We're looking for poems and autobiographical stories about what it was like growing up, and what it is like now that we're older. What kept us going then, and what drives us now. We're not necessarily looking for happy endings, but an honest statement about who we are as people, and how we got here, whether that experience is filled with rage, joy, confusion, or anything in between.
We would love to receive poems and autobiographical stories that address more than one time period in the writer's life, and are more likely to select more than one piece by a writer who does so.
We know what the issues are -- HIV, bullying, suicide, drug and alcohol abuse, marriage inequality, stress -- we take these issues personally, and expect the poems in the anthology to do so as well. The primary intent of this book is not to change the political landscape, but to give hope to those who need it. We are also not looking for stories about friends or historical figures, we want to know what kept YOU going, what keeps you going still.
All submissions will be accepted electronically; please send your submission as a Word document attachment, and include your name, contact information and a brief bio. You may submit up to five unpublished poems or stories (each 4,000 words or less).
We will also consider work whose rights have reverted back to the author. There are no specific language restrictions, but our goal is for the book to be a resource to youth centers and schools, so keep this in mind when choosing work for submission.
Edited by Adam Stone and Marty McConnell.
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Happy, Happy Birthday huskypapi!!!!
Sep. 1st, 2010 | 04:12 pm
Thank you for being my family and one of my best friends in the world. I love you and I wish many blessings and much happiness for you in the coming year. You deserve it!
I miss you and I'm sending lots of birthday hugs. Have fun at your party tonight!!