Category Archives: Unusual Poetry & Writing

Poetry Time

Posted on March 26, 2013 by funnygurl2

AN ENCHANTED BOTTLE AND THE IVORY CUPBOARD
By: JLF
2/28/95

Help Me! Help Me!
I don’t know what’s wrong with me!
What is this strange feeling?
Is it a headache, a stomach ache
A new strain of flu?
Why do I feel this way?
What–wait…
Is this happiness,
is this what it feels like
to be happy?
I don’t have any worries,
And even the worries I can think of
Just don’t seem to bother me
This fine winter evening.
The music from the radio
Seems to flow into me
And through my veins,
Electrifying me and making me glow
all over.
I want to capture this feeling
into an enchanted bottle.
I want to seal it up tight
And lock it away in an ivory cupboard,
Where I can save it
For a dark, hazy day of sadness
When I can take out the bottle
And remember what happiness was like.

I haven’t felt like this in so long
in a sense too far gone from love
That don’t last forever
Something’s gotta turn out right
–”Got Me Wrong” by Jerry Cantrell (Alice in Chains)

[A million thanks to my friend Jill for helping me to identify this song from a pivotal time in my life many years afterwards. How I told her "I am looking for a song with the words 'I haven't felt like this in so long', and she asked me if it was sung by two people, and figured out almost instantly it was Alice in Chains, I will never understand, but I am eternally grateful.]

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Posted in Entertainment Worship & Review, Unusual Poetry & Writing and tagged Alice in Chains, depression, emotion, Got Me Wrong, happiness, Music, recovery, sadness, therapy. Bookmark the permalink.

College Sucked

Posted on February 26, 2013 by funnygurl2

I always measure my experiences in life to how they would be portrayed on a sitcom. As you might expect, my own experiences often play out much differently than in TV Land. College would be one of these.

College sucked. On TV, everyone is always a joiner who participates in every student activity. They make friends they will have for the rest of their lives. They go to parties. They learn to be deep thinkers. They find their soul mate.

Me? Not so much. I was a commuter with no car for 3 out of my 4 years of college. While waiting for my ride home every day, I had to kill hours in the library. There are only two friends that I made in college that I still keep in touch with. I never went to a single party. I am not a natural-born joiner. I joined some sort of academic fraternity that never had any activities just so that I could get a sweatshirt with Greek letters on it. Then I felt self-conscious in it and never wore it. I submitted some of the depressing poetry I wrote while killing time in the library anonymously to the college literary magazine. They published a couple.

My two closest friends were at two other colleges in two different states. It made for a very lonely time in my life. My best friend came back home after her freshmen year (she HAD found the parties), which was better. But she was attending the university across town, so we never saw each other except at night.

I also had an undiagnosed, then diagnosed, stomach problem during this time as well. So I felt miserable physically as well as mentally!

It was overall the loneliest year of my life. I don’t really think I look forward to coming back in the fall. -JLF 4/27/95

My other friend, my asbestos friend, had an even worse college experience than me. I told her this week how I was going through my old college free-writes to get a true sense of the misery to work on my new story (and this blog post). Her reply?

“I don’t think I could relive that time. I’ve blocked much of it out & I think that’s for the best.”

She has told me a few of her great miserable stories, including being sick with mono and all alone, and donating so much blood for money that she passed out in the parking lot at the donation place. (Those are two separate occasions. I think.) But my favorite story is the one where she takes her life back into her own hands. It’s the story where during her last semester she realizes college is making her miserable and she is an adult. She has her own job and her own place to live. She just leaves the campus and never turns back. She is my hero:)

I did not leave. I stayed, hoping to get my MRS. degree. I only went to college because my mom told me I had to either do that or get a job. I had gone to school for K-12 years. I had never had a job. I picked the option I was familiar with. I should have got a job. Now I have a Bachelor’s Degree and I am applying to entry-level store jobs at Meijer, Cash Advance, and Family Video. And they are not hiring me.

Compilation of 2 No Doubt drawings I made while in college

I had my first boyfriend for a month my freshmen year. After it ended, from my old writings, I seemed to be lonelier than before.

When I was in high school, I had a few hours after school everyday before my mom got home from work that was my time to myself. In college, I had no privacy. My mom was my ride. If she was home I was home and she drove me nuts. (This is probably the only way my college experience was worse than my asbestos friend’s.) My bedroom didn’t even have a door. I would stay up late to do homework, and find myself watching Beavis & Butthead marathons on MTV instead. I always said that I could feel my brain cells rotting away as I watched that show. I think it helped numb my depression. Then my mom, who always slept on the couch in the living room where the only TV was, would wake up. (Yes, I went to college in the Dark Ages. My college had text-only Internet my freshmen year!) She would ask me,”Are you watching Beaver & Buttface?” I mostly watched it for the music videos, which sucks, because any version released on DVD has only limited music videos. How much did I watch them? Here are a poem and some fan artwork from that time:

Lovin’ the Boys
By: JLF
3/7/95

If I make a video
Can I get on that show?
First I would have to make
A really cool video
You know,
One with lots of guitars,
And riffs, and drums.
I would stumble around
In a really short dress
And scream all the words
Really, really loud.
I would put in some shots
Of farm animals and livestock,
And throw in a toilet
(To give them something to talk about).
Then I would send it to New York,
To that video channel,
And wait every day & every night
For them to put my video on that show.
They could sit there on their couch
In their dirty T-shirts & stinky shorts
And watch my video.
That dark-haired guy and his dumb-blond friend
Could belch and fart
And yell “Fire! Fire!”
Then they would deem my video
As “Cool” or “Sucks”,
By how short my dress was,
How loud I yelled,
And the fact my video had only one
Toilet in it.
But I would be happy
Because I got to see my video,
With one of those yellow, pointy
signs with their names in it
In the corner of the screen.

And that would make it worthwhile. . .

Illustration I made based on a video that Beavis & Butthead mocked. (My son likes this pic a lot. Maybe I should be concerned about that.)

I ended up getting an on-campus job, so I started interacting with my classmates a little more. It also got me out of the library. I got paid (!) to wait for my ride. That helped a little.

Then I got a better boyfriend. I couldn’t find him at college, because he was still in high school. (I should have flunked!) Those who know me know he is now my husband.

Then I got an off-campus job too, in addition to those other things. My best friend worked at the convenience store too, and helped me get the job. People who know me know it was one of my favorite jobs. I liked it so well that I saved up my earnings over the summer so that I could buy a car so that in the fall I could keep the job while I finished college. (Most people get a job to get a car. I got a car to keep a job.)

I should become a writer like Erma Bombeck & just write about “stuff”. -JLF (found in an old college notebook)

So, ya, college sucked for me. I can enthusiastically say that not everyone enjoys themselves at college. Accept this post and the accompanying writings below as evidence. Probably the worst time of my life. When my son gets old enough, I don’t know how I will ever be able to keep from talking negatively about it. I kind of feel about it the way I do about the Lord of the Rings films. I want my time and money back. I want my four years and my $18,000 back (I got a lot of scholarships).

Untitled
By: JLF
4/8/95

There’s a party tonight
General Admission – $2
There’s a party tonight
Everyone Welcome
Are you going to the party tonight?
I don’t think they mean me
Are you going to the party tonight?
Everyone would be happier if I didn’t
Everyone’s going
But I am not
Everyone’s going
I’ll stay home and listen
to my own silence.
Sometimes a person
has to look through the thick, black
copier ink lettering
And realize that circumstances
and situations and history
are the things that really predict
who will attend the ball
and who will stay home.

The Driving Rain
By: JLF

It is 9:06PM. It’s raining. I have a half a tank of gas. Will this be the night. Will this be the night I keep going and don’t look back?

I could change my life right now. It would be just as easy as changing channels on the television. I can see all my different options spread out in front of me, and the television channels just keep going. There is the music video channel, blaring sounds and images. There is Channel 25. All Hitler, All the time. The third reicht of the Chicago area. Heil! Channel 25. Then the weather channel. Do I want rain or do I want sunshine? Which road will lead me to what type of weather?

Oh. I’m on the road back home. But I still don’t have to go there. This road is so boring, so familiar. A person could die on a road like this and the drivers who travel it every day would probably not notice the body for months. Was the light I just went through green or read, not that it would really mater. The slick road is completely vacant of other cars. The only tire marks I can see on the wet pavement are in my rear view mirror. I could slip out of town now, right out of the city limits. No one would see me, no one would be the wiser.

God, to just keep driving. To have no pre-planned destination, no over-analyzed goals—it all sounds like a dream. For the first time since I walked into Kindergarten on Experience Day and was assigned a seat and pencils and crayons, I would be in charge for myself. New mothers complain about not having handbooks to care for their new children. It is too bad they don’t make handbooks for the children, to help figure out what is right for themselves. I feel like I have never done anything I truly wanted to in my entire life.

One more road until home. Is this it? Well, a few times I have done what I wanted. There was the time I went to the carnival by myself, and I kept playing games until I won a stuffed animal. But I felt as though everyone was staring at me because I was by myself. (I am always by myself. I am at this very moment.) I got a stuffed animal that day. But it wasn’t from the guy I flirted with or the games I tried the hardest at. I got my little stuffed bear from a crooked game and, even though I know that, I still think of him as a lucky charm.

Should someone as naïve as I be roaming around the nation’s highways? Probably not.

Ahh—I just passed the drive to my house. But it wasn’t a brave, meaningful decision of symbolism as I had hoped. I simply got too caught up in my petty thoughts. But there is always a last refuge of a coward. I click on my turn signal for the next road, like reflex. I will turn around and make my way back to the same house and my same room.

Tonight—tonight I just couldn’t do it. Rain can be romantic, but it is also scary. A half a tank of gas, well, maybe I’ll try it when there is a full tank. Maybe I’ll try it when I have more courage, or more caffeine coursing through my veins. Maybe I just need something more to run away from than familiarity.

So, I pull in the same driveway, unlock the same door with the same key, and walk through the living rom. I flick on the TV without even turning on a lamp, enjoying the flashes of blue that light up the room instead. I turn on the Weather Channel and see what it will be like tomorrow.

I hate life.
By: JLF
8/96
I hate life. I hate life. Life sucks so bad. My life is just one f***ing blackhole, which I don’t know what that is because I am too lazy & distracted to bother to read my astronomy book to bother to find out what a f***ing blackhole is! And why do I have to come back to f***ing school, which I f***ing hate! I have only had panic attacks while I had to go to school since I was in, like Kindergarten. I HATE SCHOOL! It makes me feel all yucky inside. It makes me feel dark & gloomy inside. It makes me feel like I do when I think about death–> DEATH, how stiffling & cold & lonely & empty it will be. That is what every second at school feels like to me…

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Posted in Childhood Reminiscing, UnProfessional Photography & Artwork, Unusual Poetry & Writing and tagged Beavis & Butthead, boyfriend, college, coping, depression, drawings, first job, Friends, high school, lonely, MTV, No Doubt, poetry, run away, suck, suicidal. Bookmark the permalink.

Unknown Book Quote (Do YOU Know It?)

Posted on February 14, 2013 by funnygurl2

At the moment it happened, the first shooting stars were crossing the sky – they were beginning to stream across like strings of jewels flung from another planet – and everyone was watching them. The smaller children were exclaiming in delight, while the older ones stood silent and enthralled. Here on the hill, where the valley people often came to watch the glittering night unfold, you could see the whole magic sweep around you, and you felt close to everything in the heavens. Other people, you knew, were standing on other hills on other worlds, watching even as you watched.

–Unknown (to me)*

Do you know what this quote is from? Oh, of course I KNOW.

I found it in a book I randomly took off the shelf in the middle school library. The paragraph above was the beginning of the book. I thought is sounded so awesome, that I copied it down. And I thought it was so great that I have kept it for all these years.

What book was that?

I don’t know. I didn’t write down the title.

What was the rest of the book about?

I tried to read it, but the rest of the book didn’t live up to that paragraph. So I stopped reading it. Like on page three.

So, you see, in my old age I can see the err of my youth. Even though I still do not intend to ever read the whole book, it would be a nice piece of mind to know WHAT THE BOOK WAS CALLED!!!

Something else kind of bone-headed I have done pertaining to this quote? I have never made another copy of the quote (until now). It is written in red ink on a piece of typing paper (yes, that is what it used to be called in the old days) & then folded up till it was 12th of it’s normal size. Not the easiest to find when you are searching through old boxes of wanna-be witchcraft non-precious gemstones and two filing cabinets containing everything you have written in your life, including elementary school reports.

So, by putting it on my blog, I accomplish two things at once.

1. Maybe someone out there will know what the quote is from (If I find out, I will totally give proper credit on this post).

2. I now have another copy of this quote that I can semi-easily find when I want it.

UPDATE!: * This has been identified first in the comments by Dane Jackson as being from “The Forgotten Door” by Alexander Key. Thank you to everyone for reading and helping me!

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Posted in Childhood Reminiscing, Unusual Poetry & Writing and tagged book, hill, library, middle, night, quote, school, shooting starts, sky, unknown, valley. Bookmark the permalink.

From the Edge of the Deep Green Sea

Posted on February 12, 2013 by funnygurl2

In high school junior year (1992–please do not do the math on my age), I had a class called Issues, which was History and English combined. I know, it sounds strange and it was strange at the time. Anyway, in that class there was a kid with a T-shirt on with a poem-type thing on the back. I kept reading it and liked it, so I copied it down. I then hung it on my bedroom wall for years and memorized it. Here is the original sheet of paper it was written on.

Beautiful, unknown lyrics*

For those whose browsers are picky about pictures, here is the text:

…and so we watch the sun come up
from the edge of the deep green sea
and she listens like her head’s on fire
like she wants to believe in me
so I try
put your hands in the sky
surrender
remember
we’ll be here forever
and we’ll never say goodbye. . .*

For years, these were just words I copied off a guy’s T-shirt. There was a Bon Jovi song that had similar lyrics, but these were clearly not from that song. I figured I would never find out where it came from, and I was kind of OK with that.

When I got sick of the crusty yellowing notebook paper on my wall, I decided to make a plaque with the words on it. (I’m just a lil bit crafty;) I wrote all the lettering with a toothpick dipped in black paint. I was pretty proud of myself.

Wooden plaque I made to replace the notebook paper*

Then one day at work (October 25, 2000 to be exact), my green-haired friend sent me an email with a Mad Libs type story, using the word “GREEN” and the phrase “THE DEEP DARK SEA” in it. So I typed up my “and so I watch the sun come up…” words to her and hit send.

GHF: whoah that was weird!!!!! you have totally stunned me into silence…. how did you know?

ME: know what?
I got that off some guy’s shirt in high school
I have no idea what it is from–do you?
I memorized it, and I painted it on a wooden plaque:)

GHF: it’s a cure song silly i think you know more than you say

ME: [AM] wore a cure shirt in 92?
I wouldn’t have thought he was into that.
Yah! My mystery is solved:)

GHF: That’s me and [S]‘s favorite song (lyric-wise) called…. “from the edge of the deep green sea” It’s the song that brought us together. he he

ME: That is just too freaky–is that why that one site is called “deep green sea” whoa, it is all falling together:)

GHF: YES!!!!! I KNOW YOU REPEATED THAT LINE TO ME AND I TOTALLY FLIPPED!

Then the email degenerates into me craving Butterfingers. But, you get the idea. It was a MOMENTOUS moment in my life.

My green-haired friend and my crazy friend (not crazy in the head, just crazy fun-wise) both were in love with the Cure, especially at this time in history. They tried to convert me. I was busy listening to Kid Rock’s Devil Without A Cause album daily. While I do own the song “From the Edge of the Deep Green Sea” by the Cure now, the only Cure song I actually like is “A Night Like This”, performed by Professional Murder Music (see YouTube video below for a taste).

http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL-xTfUi_q3IWvsnVDYakoqHVgqQXYd-P2
* Song lyrics from “From the Edge of the Deep Green Sea” by The Cure (Bamonte, Gallup, Smith, Thompson, Williams).

This was a quotation mystery that it only took me eight years to solve. For a quote that I am still trying to find the source of, come back to read Thursday’s blog.

Bobby Jo Jinkins

Posted on January 31, 2013 by funnygurl2

I was looking through a pile of old poems the other day and I found this gem. It is written in a similar vein of The Ballad of the Fried Squirrel and The Legend Live On, which I previously posted.

These are the rare funny poems. Most of my high school poems are about suicide. It is amazing I am still here. I could have really used some hard-core therapy my senior year of high school. Instead, I read Sylvia Plath and wrote lots of dark poems.

Enjoy this ditty!

Note: Bobby Jo Jinkins is a guy. I don’t know why I spelled the name like that.

Bobby Jo Jinkins
By: JLF
11/15/94

On a chilly autumn day,
I sat and watched the squirrels at play.
The sun shone down, bright upon the leaves
That were freshly fallen from their trees.
When all a sudden, their chatter ceased
And they ran away like pigs that were greased.
So I crept up to the leaves, to see what they’d found.
To my surprise, what was buried in that mound
Was a three-week dead, worm-eaten corpse–
It was Bobby Jo Jinkins, of course!
The story had been in the papers for days
Bobby Jo Jinkins wandered into the corn

and got lost among the maize.

But more than corn mites had found Bobby Jo.
It looked as though his head was bashed in by a hoe.
Poor Bobby Jo, what a terrible fate for a Jinkins,
His life had been rubbed out in a blink of a blinkins.
Oh, oh. If the town could see me now
They wouldn’t believe this sight–oh wow.
No one I knew, ever believed
I could ever get Bobby Jo Jinkins alone with me

under the trees.

(Aint life wacky?)

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Posted in Unusual Poetry & Writing and tagged Bobby Jo Jinkins, death, funny, gruesome, lonely, morbid, poem, rhyme, squirrel, unpopular, writing. Bookmark the permalink.

MUTILATION!

Posted on January 15, 2013 by funnygurl2

Now, to fully appreciate the jingle I wrote below, you need to be familiar with the 1980′s commercial for the Milton Bradley/Hasbro board game Operation* that inspired my parody.

When you read the words below, be sure to sing them to the musical score in the commercial.

Enjoy!

MUTILATION!

You’re the doctor, got the patient on the run

MUTILATION!

Oh joy, won’t this be fun!

MUTILATION!

Cut off all the fingers but ya better leave the thumbs

MUTILATION!

The patient doesn’t necessarily have to be numb

MUTILATION!

You’ll lose your lunch, heave-up every crumb

MUTILATION!

If you check into this hospital, you are pretty dumb

MUTILATION!

(See what happens to idle minds of high school students when left unattended in a computer lab?)

* I am in no way affiliated with Milton Bradley or Hasbro. or any actual hospital or medical school.

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Posted in Unusual Poetry & Writing and tagged classic, commercial, Hasbro, high school, jingle, limerick, Milton Bradley, Mutilation, Operation, parody, poetry, song. Bookmark the permalink.

Hogwart Discovers Christmas

Posted on December 24, 2012 by funnygurl2

Page from my scrapbook featuring Hogwart the hedgehog.

Hogwart the hedgehog sniffed the air.
Then she stretched herself out until she looked ever so long,
And let out a big yawn.

She opened her eyes and looked around.
It was just after supper time.
The smell of turkey & mashed potatoes was in the air.
Yummm. She licked her lips.

“There you are, Hogwart,” Jason said.
“I was afraid you might sleep through Christmas.”
What is Christmas, Hogwart wondered.

Jason reached into Hogwart’s cage and picked her up.
Hogwart didn’t like being picked up. She did like Jason.
He always gave her treats and played with her.

Jason put Hogwart on the floor.
She ran over to sniff the big green thing that had
appeared in the house a week ago.
It smelled nice, and it glowed.

“Hogwart, be careful of the Christmas tree.
It is not safe for you to play with.”
More of this Christmas stuff. What could it be?

Hogwart climbed into a box that held a warm sweater.
She tried to nestle into it, but Jennifer picked her up.
“No Hogwart, that is my sweater, not yours.”
I don’t care, I just want to sleep on it, Hogwart thought.

Then Hogwart started to run through the wrapping paper and bows.
This is fun, she though, and so pretty.
She found a candy cane, all wrapped up, and tried to figure out how to open it.
“No Hogwart, that is my candy cane.”
I just wanted to taste it, Hogwart thought.

Then Hogwart smelled something especially yummy.
She ran over to a pretty package. She couldn’t see in it.
It wasn’t opened like all the others.

Hogwart looked at Jason & Jennifer and they were smiling at her.
“Go ahead and open it! That one is yours, Hogwart.”
Hogwart sniffed it and licked it and then she bit at the paper.
When it came off, Hogwart had a box of crickets!
Yummy! Yummy! Yummy! Hogwart liked them better than ice cream.

“Merry Christmas Hogwart!” Jason and Jennifer said.
Oh, this is Christmas, Hogwart thought.
It is when people are extra nice to each other
And trees come indoors to keep away from the cold.

Christmas is making everything pretty.
Christmas is happiness and love.
Christmas is crickets.

Merry Christmas

Love,

.2”””\

©JLF 12/11/01

* The use of the name Hogwart in no way indicates a connection to J.K. Rowling or her works.

Little Josiah Cowles

Posted on November 20, 2012 by funnygurl2

I am going to tell you a story. Don’t judge me too harshly. My husband does. He doesn’t see why this is funny at all. My mother and I find it hilarious, all these years later.

My mom and I have gone to Mackinac Island, Michigan several times in our lives. One year we went, and it rained the whole time we were on the island. Because we were tourists and so that we may seek shelter from the elements, we bought tickets and went to tour Fort Mackinac.

I am not big on history, unless it is lighthouse or family tree-related, but Fort Mackinac was interesting. Their displays showed many aspects of life at the Fort. As you may imagine, there were weapons, the mess hall, the jail, the store. But you also got to see where the officers and their families lived.

And we learned about little Josiah Cowles.

This historical sign is displayed at Fort Mackinac, Michigan.

Here is the sign (or a more modern replica) that my mom and I saw that rainy, gloomy day. Maybe we were low on sugar and caffeine. No matter the circumstances, my mom read that sign, and translated it as such:

Little Josiah Cowles

Had trouble with his bowels.

AND WE LAUGHED AND LAUGHED AND LAUGHED until we cried and then we laughed some more.

Maybe you had to be there. But it is one of the purely happy memories I have with my mom. I felt obliged to share it with all of you:)

I’m not stalking you. is NOW ON FACEBOOK! “Like” that I’m not stalking you and get an update when there is a new post to read. (It is sort of like YOU are stalking ME.)

Dreams – Part Two (Adventures in Dreamland)

Posted on November 2, 2012 by funnygurl2

To read about the evolution of my dream journal, please read Dreams – Part One (Dream Journal) http://imnotstalkingyou.com/2012/11/01/dreams-part-one-dream-journal/

When I dream about home, I most often dream about the trailer I lived in between the ages of 8 and 23. The other night I even dreamed that my son was there, which is really weird because that place is long gone. My son has never been there. He wasn’t even a glimmer in my eye last time I was there.

This where i am when I dream of home. The saddest picture ever. I came of age in that home, and then it was just pulled out to the curb to be sold for best offer.

I also dreamed I had to grab my son and hide with him under the bathroom sink in the half (more the size of a quarter) bath because mobsters were coming to shoot us. (The whole time, I kept thinking in the dream, “Was there really enough room for me to hide under that sink?”) When I woke up, I was scared of the mobsters with guns blazing, of course, but not surprised. I have dreams of people with guns chasing me every so often.

Illustration from my dream journal about my recurring wrist dream.

The first dream I can ever remember having was also one of the few recurring dreams I have ever had. That was when I was really young – 4 or 5. In my dream I was wearing my blue hooded sweatshirt and running away from bad guy sin a big grey factory. There were big tanks and all sorts of walkways from the ceiling. The bad guys saw me and shot me. I help up my wrist and there was just a hole through it with black sides. No blood, not a realistic wound. I could look right through the hole in my wrist at the bad guys.

What terrible person would chase this girl through a scary factory and shoot her through the wrist?

Here it is in poem form:

The recurring dream

On a night i no longer remember
i got tucked into bed
covered up my head
and my mind turned on me