I woke this morning screaming “oh fuck! oh Jesus fuck!” with pain (in my hip, knee, finger, and wrist joints, all at once), after the worst persecution nightmare that I can recall (the thin veneer of tolerance and acceptance that normally papers over deep fear of and contempt for the Other is aroused by labeling us as aliens who are poisoning society and moves neighbors and friends to cleanse their world of the poison by hunting us down and slaughtering us). And a nonfunctional day yesterday (1/17, Ann Daingerfield Zwicky’s death day, back in 1985, routinely puts me into a tailspin, and the weather is almost always appalling). I’m thoroughly shaken, bewildered about how to get through the day. Eventually the panicked spike in my blood pressure subsided and I pushed through the pain to get myself breakfast. Now I’m sitting quietly in my chair at my worktable, trying to move my body as little as possible while still typing a posting.
1/17 is also Benjamin Franklin’s birthday (in 1706 rather than 1937), and normally that would give me a way lighten the sorrow with some of the remarkable and risqué details of his life. And I have just discovered that 1/16 was Appreciate a Dragon Day, which I should certainly celebrate publicly (and hope to be able to do so soon): dragons have picked up a ton of gay vibes — there are lots of rainbow dragons around, many on the cute side, but some fierce — plus a Year of the Dragon is the upcoming year (beginning on 2/10/24) in the 12-year cycle of the lunar calendar and I am in fact a dragon, born in the dragon year 1940.
Meanwhile, dark midwinter continues, as always, with the birthday (on 1/22) of my man Jacques Transue (who died in 2003). While, on a much more pleasant birthday front, I was so wrapped up in my medical treatments that I failed to celebrate the 1/9 birthday of Joan Baez, very much still alive and just a bit younger than I am, just a bit older than Jacques.
Meanwhile, I stumble unhappily through the day.
