Neither Murderino nor Magician
I'm no fanatic but I do like, "My Favorite Murder." I have spent many road trips alone in the car listening to the details revealed by two women that know where empathy and humor find their place in relaying these events to a captivated audience. Now that there is almost definitive conviction of The Golden State Killer, Georgia and Karen seem to be working through their feelings about how this person terrorized their towns and their state and what it meant to have that pall cast over portions of their own history. Both of them, because of their proclivity to be interested in topics like these, have deeply-rooted ideas about how these unsolved cases change the landscape and remove the safety from behind every collective corner.
When I went to see Georgia and Karen live it was interesting to see the collective gasps of the crowd when gruesome details are revealed - but not many gasps came or will come from me. When I think about how people are surprised at the things that they hear it reminds me of the tale of Siddhartha Gautama when he leaves his palace for the first time and realizes that people get old and die. That the realities of life are inevitable and that he must make the choices in his life to reach his awakening.
I really have lost count of the number of times I have heard of a family acquaintance or a family member quintuple-removed being murdered or committing a murder. These tales have been woven into the fabric of my upbringing and still the threads find themselves onto my ever-working loom. Of all of the things in life that I want to feel versed in - understanding murder wasn't at the top of the list.
Vividly, I remember my mother receiving a Christmas card every year from Sharon - a woman that she worked with at Woolworth or Murphy Mart or whatever iteration of that store was present in the seventies. My mother was considered the bumpkin and Sharon was the city kid. When my mother and I hear Nick Gilder's, "Hot Child in the City," she remarks that that was her song. I never met Sharon but I did meet Christopher, her son, through the corresponding school photo that would come with the card. Christopher seemed to be around my age and grew before my eyes when I looked through the Christmas cards that we received each year. The last time I saw Christopher it was on the five o'clock news while being secretly filmed - sobbing in the arms of a unknown family member. My mother said plainly, "he finally killed her," and that was all that she shared about her personal grief. Sharon succumbed to an abusive husband and Christopher stopped growing up in my mind. This suspended vision stays with me almost twenty years later.
These are the tales of death and murder that will not find themselves as collective topics of intrigue on a Podcast or ID channel special but have contributed to the curtain being pulled back - my own emergence from the palace.
As my cousin and Miguel Ferrer say (and I have also adopted this into my lexicon),
There is some kind of shame that I feel when I find that I am fascinated by stories that depict crimes and either their eventual solution or their ongoing mystery. Aren't the memories in my head enough? I relayed these ideas to my therapist...how I couldn't understand why people still remained surprised. She mentioned that it might be time to start to reclaim the magic in my life. It seems like an odd response out of context but she's right. I live in such undying realism that sometimes reclaiming the idea of things being unreal is so necessary.
There are few times in my life when things seem particularly magical. The only instance in my recent memory that I can recall is when I was visiting Stan Hywet Hall and walked onto the children's garden. Unbeknownst to me, I had triggered bubbles to erupt from a well that paired amazingly with an instance of blaring of classical music. Mike still recalls this time to me - that it was the time that he saw that there was actual wonder on my face for one moment in time. The beauty in that moment comes from a lot of places: the idea that something amazing happened that required no real effort on my part (which never really happens), being completely caught off-guard by a nice surprise, and the idea that something exists solely for people to enjoy - even me.
Reclaiming magic, for me I think, starts with the idea that I deserve beautiful things in my life solely because they are beautiful - whether they be experiences, plants and bubbles, a nice shirt, or whatever. It continues with my actually believing that there are people that will create magic for others - and that means me, too. It solidifies itself with the idea that although these terrible things have changed my life and my belief system...that we are still capable of the most magical of acts.
Isn't that all magic really is anyway - is allowing yourself to believe?
When your very existence is threatened for such a long time, the idea of letting in the unknown seems like a death sentence. Much like Siddhartha Gautama, though, he really only reached awakening when he knew that it must be all of the things in life that allow us to live with enlightenment.
When I went to see Georgia and Karen live it was interesting to see the collective gasps of the crowd when gruesome details are revealed - but not many gasps came or will come from me. When I think about how people are surprised at the things that they hear it reminds me of the tale of Siddhartha Gautama when he leaves his palace for the first time and realizes that people get old and die. That the realities of life are inevitable and that he must make the choices in his life to reach his awakening.
I really have lost count of the number of times I have heard of a family acquaintance or a family member quintuple-removed being murdered or committing a murder. These tales have been woven into the fabric of my upbringing and still the threads find themselves onto my ever-working loom. Of all of the things in life that I want to feel versed in - understanding murder wasn't at the top of the list.
Vividly, I remember my mother receiving a Christmas card every year from Sharon - a woman that she worked with at Woolworth or Murphy Mart or whatever iteration of that store was present in the seventies. My mother was considered the bumpkin and Sharon was the city kid. When my mother and I hear Nick Gilder's, "Hot Child in the City," she remarks that that was her song. I never met Sharon but I did meet Christopher, her son, through the corresponding school photo that would come with the card. Christopher seemed to be around my age and grew before my eyes when I looked through the Christmas cards that we received each year. The last time I saw Christopher it was on the five o'clock news while being secretly filmed - sobbing in the arms of a unknown family member. My mother said plainly, "he finally killed her," and that was all that she shared about her personal grief. Sharon succumbed to an abusive husband and Christopher stopped growing up in my mind. This suspended vision stays with me almost twenty years later.
These are the tales of death and murder that will not find themselves as collective topics of intrigue on a Podcast or ID channel special but have contributed to the curtain being pulled back - my own emergence from the palace.
As my cousin and Miguel Ferrer say (and I have also adopted this into my lexicon),
"That's life in the big city."
There is some kind of shame that I feel when I find that I am fascinated by stories that depict crimes and either their eventual solution or their ongoing mystery. Aren't the memories in my head enough? I relayed these ideas to my therapist...how I couldn't understand why people still remained surprised. She mentioned that it might be time to start to reclaim the magic in my life. It seems like an odd response out of context but she's right. I live in such undying realism that sometimes reclaiming the idea of things being unreal is so necessary.
There are few times in my life when things seem particularly magical. The only instance in my recent memory that I can recall is when I was visiting Stan Hywet Hall and walked onto the children's garden. Unbeknownst to me, I had triggered bubbles to erupt from a well that paired amazingly with an instance of blaring of classical music. Mike still recalls this time to me - that it was the time that he saw that there was actual wonder on my face for one moment in time. The beauty in that moment comes from a lot of places: the idea that something amazing happened that required no real effort on my part (which never really happens), being completely caught off-guard by a nice surprise, and the idea that something exists solely for people to enjoy - even me.
Reclaiming magic, for me I think, starts with the idea that I deserve beautiful things in my life solely because they are beautiful - whether they be experiences, plants and bubbles, a nice shirt, or whatever. It continues with my actually believing that there are people that will create magic for others - and that means me, too. It solidifies itself with the idea that although these terrible things have changed my life and my belief system...that we are still capable of the most magical of acts.
Isn't that all magic really is anyway - is allowing yourself to believe?
When your very existence is threatened for such a long time, the idea of letting in the unknown seems like a death sentence. Much like Siddhartha Gautama, though, he really only reached awakening when he knew that it must be all of the things in life that allow us to live with enlightenment.
Cultivating the belief that life is still magical aside of all the sadness seems to be a lifelong journey. A journey that I didn't realize existed...until maybe now. What a day, right?
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