The List Of Things We Don’t Talk About

(Opening; opening; opening.)

This hotel is surrounded by Cedar & Stonecrop & Roses & I saw them with new eyes yesterday, wondering if that’s one of the reasons I feel safe here. The hotel I stay at in in Ohio has a Magnolia tree in the courtyard & I would sit underneath it when we would stay. I love how there are people reading this who will know how I feel & where I am at by the plants I just named. For those that don’t, I feel clear & grounded & there are Oceans in my lungs, tectonic plates shifting beneath my feet. The therapist tells me to watch Squirrels & how they run across wires, trees, fences, & how they always seems to find their balance in their feet even when they are upside down or sideways. I talk to the Canada Geese outside & I ask them “teach me how to stand up for myself”, tears streaming down my face. My mom sleeps while I write. My mom gets to be a complicated human with complicated feelings like everyone else. I told her I’m calling my new zine “The List of Things We Don’t Talk About” & she froze.

I told her “don’t worry, Mom, I’ll give you credit for the name.”

See, on our way to Kentucky, we would practice The List. We kept a lot of our life from the extended family because we were different, & we were afraid of being judged. My mom left mostly because she was different & she didn’t want her kids exposed to the level of racism, ambient in the air, sometimes more overt. Sometimes, I blame her for instilling a lot of shame around race, sexuality, other things, by making me & my sister keep so many secrets. Sometimes I fucking understand why she did it, she was trying to protect her daughters, her partner, & herself, & like I said, my mom gets to be a complicated human like anyone else.

I drop her off for another 11 hour shift while my dad & my sister sleep on the couch. Maybe the reason I’ve been having a hard time writing & feeling this blockage in my chest & throat, is because I’m not writing much about the thing I need to write about, which is some of the challenging things about family & Home.

I am at the hotel alone now. I hope I can get it for one more day. A friend offers me his trailer as a temporary retreat & another friend can give me a ride out there, but i am always too scared to go.

Sometimes, I imagine getting there, closing the door behind me, & letting my body drop the way I do when I am at the hotel alone. Setting up my stones. Brimstone, Serpentine, Mahogany Obsidian. I bought them at a store at the half abandoned mall next to the hotel, & I feel them differently the way I feel everything differently now, & it’s not the manic Everything Is Drenched With Fucking Significance either, this is just being an alive human & noticing noticing noticing, the sacredness in everything.

Including the sacredness in my mom’s tired eyes.

I don’t know if my work is to leave: to stop the fighting, to reclaim my agency, to “choose myself” like all the therapy memes & well-intentioned friends say. Most of them don’t get it, could never get it.

They don’t understand We’re All We Got.

I moved around a lot as a kid because my dad was always running from his problems, & I am just like my dad. Who is asleep on our couch a few miles away from the hotel where I am staying because he experienced a crisis & he did what animals are supposed to do & he got in his car & he drove six hours until he got to his herd & he’s sleeping now. He sleeps all day, like a cat.

And I love him, and I can’t be mad at him, & also I can’t be at home right now.

I imagine walking up to the trailer, up the little metal stairs & opening the door. Climbing up the metal stairs. Building a fire in the side lot & finally burning the journal where I had spelled out “SEARCHING; FEARLESS” & wrote down all my deepest darkest secrets. I always relapsed before I got to the part where you let them go.

Last night, in the car outside the hotel, I apologized to my mom for how I treated her when I was psychotic & using. I never realized how much that must have impacted her & scared her until I was in the same position, caring for someone who was psychotic & using & having them treat me like shit & threaten me while I cared for them. After a long period of crisis after crisis things have relatively stabilized in my family. We’re all in therapy & some of us go to recovery meetings. There’s no physical violence or threats or chaotic alcohol & drug use. We’re all doing better & doing our best to care for each other & heal from trauma & survive capitalism. A lot of the time I really appreciate the way that we all show up for each other, the way we do what we can with what we have. Other times, these wounds (& I’m just talking about the more recent wounds here) are so deep & I want to run.

I feel like my mom sees me differently, after being my caregiver for those years when my bodymind was in a very different place. How could she not? For a long time, I was so grateful to her I saw her as a Saint, which erases her humanity & also kept me from recognizing our codependent patterns. Now, I push back hard against anything I perceive as a threat to my agency. I am still new at standing up for myself & right now, my teachers are the Canada Geese in the hotel parking lot. It leads to yelling matches in hotel parking lots. I catch myself fawning with my body & I immediately go to “correct” it, but I don’t want to go around puffed up & on the defensive, either, because that’s not a way to build or heal relationships.

When I talked to my mom last night, acknowledging how fucking scary & dangerous my behavior had been during the time (2021-2022) & the impact that must have had on her, my words started coming out in sputters & my entire body started spasming as I walked down the hotel hallway, starting at the head, coming to a peak; then release, once I was in the room with the door closed. It felt like exorcizing a spirit that had been inhabiting my body for the last several years. It knocked something loose. When I laid down on the bed, my jaw popped. Hard.

I had felt like I had permanently hardened her heart against me. In my piece Dangerous People, I literally called myself a Monster, capital M. Since then, I have read books & zines, taken workshops, talked about it in therapy, written about it, & it all helped me let go of shame. I am not a Monster. I am just some dude. A deeply traumatized addict who has the kinds of problems addicts tend to have & has done a lot of the shit addicts tend to do.

Who sometimes gets lost in Stories because it’s less painful than reality. (Clematis flower essence is indicated for this very thing & I made an essence over the Summer with a dear one who also gets lost in Stories.)

I think about what I actually want, what would feel right, what would help my lungs open more when I am at home, & what I want is either a studio apartment or a spot in a collective house nearby, where I could go to work on my art & take space & still be close enough to be show up for my family, & receive support from them too. I’m am looking out for artist residencies nearby (feel free to tell me of any) & I am trying to save to take classes in somatics. There is one coming up specifically for somatic sexology & pelvic floor health & this is what I want to specialize in because of how much it has helped me with my own bodymind. I also want to get certified in Detox Acupuncture, which has been a big part of my journey.

I dream of building a healing practice where I can blend & remix all the different modalities I have studied over the years & collaborate with other practitioners. I imagine building a space where people can come to live & heal & be taken care of, make art when they are ready, because Goddamn I am fucking grateful that I have had that. Now that I am stronger. I want to work on building that for others. Tears streaming down my face in the hotel parking lot. I know my dreams are going to take some time, but anytime I can communicate openly I get closer, anytime I give someone a zine I get closer, anytime I make a new friend I get closer. And I want my family involved too. I imagine my mom bringing over tomato pies from the garden & my sister, who will be a peer recovery coach by then, coming by to photocopy some zines for her clients.

If anyone of this resonates with you, please write back to me & let me know.

If you would like to contribute to my short or long term goals, if my writing has ever helped you & you would like to help me out right now & leave me a donation or tip, my Venmo & cashapp are both: jacksonraeyall & my chime is calebandhiscats

My zine, Becoming an Animal, is 20-30 sliding scale. I write about a lot of the same stuff but I can write more freely in print. It’s 94 pages half sided.

My old zine, I Still Believe (In Fire) 2007 is 10-20 sliding, it’s about moving to Maine for midwifery school, Detroit, environmental racism & reproductive justice, mental health & collective living, breakups, & grief. I’m still so proud of it.

Food is Medicine:

I have Nettle Sesame Pink Peppercorn seasoning salt 20

Chive Flower Vinegar 20

Tulsi Lemonbalm Strawberry 🍓 Oxymel (honey & apple cider vinegar) 20

All prices include shipping.

It might take me awhile to ship so if yr local & want something faster:

I’m also going to be tabling at the Detroit Zine Fest & I’ll have my tiny distro, new & old zines, & some potions, tea blends, & herbal seasoning salts. I might have earrings too. I’m not sure yet. It’s complicated. Earrings are complicated. Don’t worry, there’s a piece in my next zine about all my Complicated Earring Feelings & hopefully it will be ready for the fest.

I hope to see you there!