I woke up at eleven yesterday, tested my bloodsugar. Then Wendy, Juliette and I hand Pedicures. Wendy (after looking at my nails and face with distaste) also insisted I got my eyebrows waxed and my fingernails fixed. The man who did this to me was highly sympathetic with my shy, quiet responses, to which I said, over and over again, "I trust you. You're good at your job."
I think he wasn't used to hearing it. He brightened, picked out a pretty color for my toenails and made my fingernails shimmer iridescently. My eyebrows are honestly perfect, and it didn't even hurt because he was so careful. I think he's used to being bossed around and taken for granted, and maybe I was supposed to act like that to, but I don't do that. I'm gentle. I believe firmly in equality and kindness. I don't care if you work third-shift at a Gas station and have four bastards or if you own half of New York. You're a person, with feelings, with dreams and hopes and illogical fears, and that is how I'll treat you.
*Shrugs* I value, too much, the human heart, some say.
They're wrong, though. No matter who you are, you appreciate being noticed and loved for who you really are, and I do as second nature. That guy did ten times better a job on me than my aunt and cousin, just because I was kindly to him, and he had a motivation for wanting me to look nice. He was so starved for basic human interaction.....
Then we went to lunch. I'm rather obsessed with the chicken salad and seafoody-things around here, I'm having a lot of that. The chicken salad at home is downright disappointing but beautiful here.
The sky is beautiful here, and the trees, too. It reminds me of home, which makes it easier to breathe sometimes. When we got home, I tumblred for a few hours. Then Juliette and I went out for a little while to the Downtown area (read: real ghetto, fascinating and fun) to a little store she wanted me to see. She didn't normally go there, she said.
Yeah, it's a Craft store called Sojourn. My nose and eyes are assailed with things I know from the Roses: talismans, amulets, herbs like Yarrow and Ochre, clothes that would stop your heart because they were so beautiful, books and books on Craft, the knives, the wands, the perfumes, everything. I'm so happy I have to "wipe my eyes" a suspicious number of times. Here are the legends from the Norseman's lands, the books on the Dryads and the Naiads, the legends from Ancient Greece, tucked in a corner near Dragon's blood incense....
I buy perfume that smells like the one I wore at the Roses: tangy and bitter like blood but it warms your body and you lean it a little better, even if you wrinkle your nose (later I buy sensual Amber from Bath and Body works and combine the two, and good God, the hotness!). The bottles are small. I buy two.
I'm walking back and cradling them like they were my precious precious babies (read: they are) when I catch sight of a green Talisman I'm unfamiliar with. I bring it to the counter and ask the cashier (read: gorgeous, with flowing brown hair and she's dressed like a Druid) what it's for, because I like the way it channeled.
She studies me with curious eyes, then, in a soft voice that rubs you at the edges, intones, "It's a Talisman of Balance. For the soul." Her long hands fiddle with a wave bracelet.
Juliette and I speak at the same time. Her words are, "Who would ever buy that?"
I say, "I'll take it."
Then I catch a book in the corner of my eye I have to pick up.... just for a moment.
Understand, I'm not a practitioner. These books that explain rituals by my light in the low-hung heat of Summer, these books that ask for blood and wax and sacrifice, are not the magic I was taught. James, my teacher when I Was a Rose, expressly forbade any and all Pagan or Wicca related magic to be taught to me. It wasn't, he explained, that I would lack the Talent, but rather that I would throw myself into it and specialize.
Specialize is (if not exclusively perhaps) a Rose term; it's the Magic that an Eliac adapts once their true White Knight is found. You Specialize in whatever magic best suits your heart, personality, all that stuff.
So I know absolutely nothing about their type of magic, the Pagans, the Wicca, other than that it isn't as exclusively dark as it's made out to be by popular society, and that there's a touch to nature involved that is replicated in few other places and religions. I've always wanted to learn but I lack the Coven and my soul is in no place to go looking for new adventures and..... I think James is right. I'd twist it, manipulate it, for my own devices. I'd lose the purpose to find myself, and I'm not sure what part of myself I'd find.
This book in on the Faerie myths and how they are tied to common Fairy tales. There are a few rituals in the pages, I sense them whispering in my ear.
Snow White (as a Nymph) is painted on the Cover, long fingers curled around a bright, red apple. The letters on the Title cover sparkles.
Make that moment eternity.
We left and I'd spent money and Juliette said, "Yeah, I thought you'd like it there."
"Why?"
She considers this as we climb into her red jeep. Muse flies over the Radio and I grin in recognition.
"I dunno," she said. "There's incense and those weird necklaces you're always wearing and books.... like witch stuff."
We went to bath and body works, because they had Honeysuckle lotion for a limited time, and I also bought some amber, which I mixed with my new scent from Sojourn.
Then, we hung out with Kat. Short for Katherine. She has waist-length dark hair and a long, pale face with cat-like features. She's thin and bony like a faery. Her voice is twangy because she moved here from New York and the accent hasn't faded yet.
She's fucking beautiful. Three seconds and, despite myself, despite the men plastered to her side, I'm fascinated.
I talk to her all night, and the next day we spend time with her and we end up cuddling and she asks me if I wanted to touch the tattoo of an elephant behind her ear. I change her flat tire when it happens, because she's too small to lift it and she smiles and--
Flirting. Humans. I'd forgotten how much fun they could be.
Today was fun too, I got a nice trim for my hair and everything, but they straightened it. That freaked me out because to me, my hair is a symbol of who I want to be/who I am. Wild, a little mousy, wavy, but not too much--and they straightened it. I freaked out for like ten minutes.
I'm so happy here. I feel so pretty and alive and I can breathe. It's so nice to wake up and not feel like I'm worthless, like there's a world out there that appreciates me for who I am---
and here, for the very first time in my life anywhere but Schuster's, they do.
*Shakes head with a grin* I still miss Katie, though. Still miss Finley. What I don't know how to communicate is that when I return, I won't be the same person. I'm already not the same person. I can breathe and I sense myself and my purpose in life again. I can keep my head up high, and I feel confident. I feel like I really, honestly belong here, and I've been here two days.
I'm leaving for New York tomorrow. I'll have adventures and then I'll come back, and I'll live here until August and I'll flirt with the pretty girl friends Juliette has and I'll be....
Amazing.
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