Prison Pete
Latest Reading.
According to my records, the last book list I sent was back on March 24.
Since then I have read the following:
Dead Aim - Iris Johansen
Lethal Seduction - Jackie Collins
The Ring - Danielle Steel
Small Vices - Robert Parker
Therapy - Jonathan Kellerman
The Survivor's Club - Lisa Gardner
Midnight Bayou - Nora Roberts
Death of a Nurse - Ed McBain
Tempting the Heiress - Barbara Pierce
The Matlock Paper - Robert Ludlum
The Beach Girls -- Luanne Rice
The Road to Gandolfo - Robert Ludlum
Deadly Pursuit - Brian Harper
The Exorcist - William Peter Blatty
Mitigating Circumstances - Nancy Taylor Rosenberg
Get Smart - William Johnston
Delta Blood - Barbara Terry Johnson
Somebody Wonderful - Nat Martin
Ninth Square - Gorman Bechart
Accident - Danielle Steel
Changing Habits - Debbie Macomber
A Patch of Blue - Elizabeth Kata
The Last Precinct - Patricia Cornwell
The Villa - Nora Roberts
Night Shadow - Catherine Culter
Getting What You Want - Kathy Love
A Wanted Man - Susan Kay Law
The Runaway Duke - Julie Anne Long
Rogue of Gor - John Norman (This one failed to be readable after the first 60 pages)
Sanctuary - Nora Roberts
Total Control - David Baldacci
The last six titles on the list were read in the last ten days.
There may be a few books I forgot to put down.
So that is what it means!
I have been really lazy lately and have not typed much in the last five days. I am working hard at developing some consistent work habits. I am good at starting new things, so getting stuck in a rut has never been a problem for me, except the 'wonder why I never seem to make any forward progress' rut.
I have a lifetime full of great ideas and good intentions, but alas not all that much to show in the "completed goals obtained" column.
According to my records, the last batch of new words was written on June 3, 2005. I have one word from June 5, uxorious, and five more on July 8 and 9. Then nothing else is written in the new word book.
Certainly there have been other words that needed to be looked up, words that I was not really one hundred percent sure of the meaning. I even have all the tools needed to keep track of new words, yet time and time again I purposely skip over a word, refusing to take the time to write the word down in the "New word Book" and look it up in the dictionary.
Enough pontificating and lame excuse making. Here now the words:
Uxorious - adj. excessively devoted or submissive to wife. (Now there is a word that you do not hear often.)
Polemic - the art or practice of disputation. (This led to the following)
Disputation -- debate, an oral defense of an academic thesis
akimbo - Having hand on hips with elbow turned outward (I knew the meaning of this word, but think it should be used more often. It's such a great sounding word.)
Prevarication - to deviate from the truth, EQUIVOCATE
Harridan - a scolding old woman
There you have it, the latest new words that I took the time to write down.
Let us see how consistent I can be over the next two weeks.
Some of the biggest criminals
are not the ones behind the bars but the staff that watches them.
I think I told you how one of the guys at
Beckley failed a piss test for drugs and he only got fifteen days in the
SHU. As long as there is incredible money to be made selling drugs, there will be criminal activity connected with it. And just because you have people behind bars does not stop illegal activity.
We did have a man-on-man sexual action in the shower last week. While it does not appear it was all one-sided, staff intervention did not occur till twenty-four hours later, the "couple" are now residing in the SHU, presumably in separate cells.
Thanks for sending comments to
Summer. I did get a letter back from
Annabel on Friday along with three or four months of blog postings.
About the saxaphone. Go for it! I really had I bunch of fun with it and will hopefully be able to pick it back up when I get out of here! I was playing the Alto, which is in B flat like the trumpet and clarinet, but I also tried the tenor sax that the chaplain had purchased.
The fingering is the same for both, but there is apparently a slightly different approach needed. I think the tenor sax is a better choice, and that is an E flat instrument. I was able to do the transposing on the fly with the Alto sax, and found it a good way to exercise the old gray matter.
The trumpet is still a sexier sound, to be honest, but having now played both, you can get a much better sound from the sax with a lot less effort.
Well my fingers are getting tired; the typos are increasing, and so let me proof and print this. I will work on some more writing tomorrow, and get back up to my usual verbose self by the end of the week.
Broken Pledge.
For some reason, I have broken my "No Television" pledge, and for the last three weeks I have been watching "Rescue Me," the drama on the FX network on Tuesdays at 10:00 PM. (I am listening to local rock and roll station, not Jack FM, and Bad Company, "Can't Get Enough of Your Love" is now playing.)
Since today is Tuesday, and it is now 7:00 PM, I will work on this letter so that I can have the finished copy done before the 9:45 PM count.
I have read two papers each of the last two days, and am now up to Wednesday, July 6. Those pictures in the Science section of Saturn were certainly awesome.
I am still not 100% emotionally recharged and as such do not want to go off into areas that cause an expenditure from the emotional bank just now. That is sort of what caused the current gap in letters to you. Between the rush to complete the court filing, the lack of resolution of some outstanding issues with Mom and Dad, and a general sense of being overdrawn at the "emotional feelings" bank, I dived into a bunch of books.
This of course raises the same problem that you mention with the to-do list. Once the pile gets to a certain point it seems too much to handle. The trick, I think, is to be willing to take some baby steps to get into the water as it were. For example, since I have not written much lately, I took two easy posts to do, the word and book list.
This letter is missing some of the emotional weight that I usually put in, but not to worry; as I type this I realize it is not all that hard to move the stuff to the table and get to "work" as one of my fellow inmates reminds me when I do not set up shop on a daily basis.
I had given up on expecting the typewriter replacement, so I mixed the keys up again. It is amazing how lazy I can be. Even thought I proved to myself that I could indeed touch-type, once the keys were put back in order, I became the old hunt and peck typist again. This time I did keep the keys on the same row so at least they are all on the proper plane.
I have picked up some wine knowledge from the books I have read. One of the latest Nora Roberts, "The Villa" was based on a wine making dynasty. I think I mentioned that we passed a whole bunch of wineries on the way up here, after we left Auburn.
Letters do not type themselves.
I guess if I do not take out the typewriter and type the letter it does not get done.
I have put off a bunch of things over the last week or so, and know how easy it is to just not do anything but read.
The only thing I have not let up on in the least is the walking. For some reason even though we have had a whole bunch of thunderstorms, I have not had a problem with the 9:00 to 10:00 AM hour yet. I have set the standard that as long as the yard is open, I will walk.
I have also stuck with the extra hour (10:00 - 11:00 AM) on Monday, Wednesday and Friday. As of this morning at the 6:00 AM sick call, I am down to 203 pounds. That means I have lost another four pounds in the last three weeks. I am averaging four miles an hour.
I have just asked Mom and Dad to buy a couple of cotton shorts. Try walking in these polyester long pants. I take a quick pit stop on the two hour days, and have been running my sweat drenched t-shirt under the water in the bathroom sink. This helps keep me cooler during the second hour.
I received yet another letter from Smith Corona. This one is written as if the last letter I sent was the first contact with the company. I guess they do not have any reliable system for following up on open customer requests. I had included the RA number in all the letters that they assigned many moons ago, but that did not seem to mean much on this last letter.
I did get the new print wheel yesterday and they did not make me turn in the old one. I also received one two-pack of official ribbon. Between these two things, I think I am back to getting clear text. This letter was printed using the new wheel and real ribbon. I am only going to use the new wheel for your letters for now, using the old wheel for drafts.
I was really awed by the long email from Tammie. Well let me not get too excited, and take it slow. I will include an acknowledgment to those who have written to me in this or the next mailing.
Has anyone heard from Prison Pete?
[Editor] The last post was from a letter dated July 4. I have not heard from Pete in over two weeks.
This is very unusual; he was writing to me almost daily until now. I have sent him two letters but so far have received no reply.
I know there are several readers who have been writing to Pete. Has anyone heard from him recently?
This is the problem communicating with someone in prison. There is no way to contact them via phone or email. You have to wait until they contact you.
Well, I suppose he will contact me eventually and when he does, I will update the blog.
Plop, Plop, Fizz, Fizz and Beethoven's Ninth too!
It is a relief to have finished the legal work, all that remains is for me to address the envelope and put on the postage.
It is 6:30 PEI and I am listening to Beethoven's Ninth as I type the draft of this post. I need to catch up on the half dozen letters that need to be written, the fourteen days of New York Times that need to be road. I received yesterday's paper (Wednesday) today, and might receive one more tomorrow, but then will have three days of no mail to hopefully put a real dent in the newspaper pile.
While I have let a few things go over the last two weeks while toiling away at the legal stuff, I have kept up with my daily walking. I got on the medical office scale today and I am now down to 207.5 pounds. It is the first time in many months that I have been below the 210 pound mark.
It seemed to me that all that was happening from my daily hour of power walking was an increase in the appetite. I was pleased with the results when I stepped on the scale this morning.
While I have been doing four miles per day in one hour, I have decided to try and up the ante a little bit. So far this week, I have added a second hour of walking on Monday and Wednesday. I will complete the pattern with an additional hour tomorrow (Friday).
I can usually do between forty-five and fifty laps in one hour's time. It takes about 12.2 laps to complete a mile.
On Monday and Wednesday I completed eighty-five and ninety-six laps respectively. Not only have I managed to eat lots of healthy food, lose ten pounds, I have also increased my stamina!
I had decided that no matter how much "work" I had to do, the walking could not be sacrificed; besides the obvious health benefits, it also is a time to clear out the cobwebs, and produces a good portion of those somewhat elusive endorphins.
While the previous post mentions a rollercoaster ride, there is that blessed relief at having completed something within a deadline that was not mine to control.
Well I did it.
I got the filing for the court done, so that it will be in the mail before the twenty-one day deadline.
I do apologize for being lazy and using the enclosed blog post as a way to update you at same time, but I am really wasted. I typed at least three or four versions of the seven page motion and had to retype a page and a half twice when I accidentally deleted the file. There are no "Are you sure?" pop-ups on this typewriter.
I have plenty of letters to write, and probably owe you a nice long letter too. I plan to do a lot of catching up over the weekend, but then again I only have one full ribbon left, but doubt I could burn a whole ribbon in three days.
I just sent a note to Dad to please order some more ribbons. I am asking him to buy a new print wheel and the actual ribbons from Smith Corona to see if that fixes the somewhat spotty printing I have been getting.
I wonder if typing without the ribbon in place adds additional friction and war and tear to printwheel? It is only plastic, and I have certainly been pounding out lots of letters from the poor little wheel. Even if the lack of ribbon does cause wear and tear it is probably still cheaper than using the ribbon full time.
I do not know if you can get the feeling of amount of work I have to do each day. I am not complaining, and am not really sure where the pressure is coming from. I do not recall feeling so busy while at Club Fed. Yes I always had things to keep me busy, but I do not recall the sense of not being able to keep up?
One thing for sure is the daily subscription of the New York Times. There just is no short cut. I need to read one paper a day or else a backlog instantly develops.
Does my letter writing take longer now, since I am working more at proof reading it? Even though I can not type between 11 PM and 10 AM, I can still do reading and other tasks during those hours. Yeah catching some sleep falls into that time too.
I was walking at least an hour or so each day at Club Fed. Just do not quite understand, but hope it is that I am really doing more truly constructive, result producing "stuff" and it takes time to create. More to come.
Loud ticking sound.
This is a direct to paper letter. No p & p this time. It is already 10 PM and I am just starting to type.
The loud ticking sound you hear is the rapidly approaching deadline for my court filing. I still have no idea what the style of the motion in terms of how much information I am suppose to include. The good news is I did manage to get the rough outline of how I want to write it out. I only hope it gets the message across.
I got a short note with my July allowance from Mom and Dad today. They had actually mailed it last Wednesday, letting me know they were going to go to NYC on Friday. That makes three separate mailings from them in less then seven days. One of the letters asked me to send them visiting information as they were thinking of planning a visit sometime after Labor Day.
I did get a letter from
Annabel yesterday, three pages, one sided, handwritten, on rainbow hue paper. I sent her a response last night. I also got a third letter with blogs from Debbie. It was a great mail day. I also got the court papers from Mom and Dad.
I have to have the court papers in the mail box by July 6, 2005 and I am planning on having them done over the weekend. I will work most of tomorrow getting the draft done and may even get it finished in time for Thursday mail. Now that I have the rough draft, the tough part is done.
It is very frustrating reading what I have written and then see how the court basically ignores what I have argued and comes up with a completely different reason to deny my request. Well there is probably a book in this part of my journey also.
I met with Ms. Lemon (my counselor) yesterday and it took all of two minutes. She asked if I had any questions. I said no, signed my name on the bottom of a form, and went back out to walk.
I still managed 35 laps in the first hour, and then walked forty-four more from 10:00 to 11:00 AM. I got up this morning and did fifty laps in the one hour. I guess I am actually starting to see the benefits of the daily walking in terms of increased endurance.
I am way behind on my NY Times reading, although I did get one done today. It was actually June 14. Do you remember reading the article in the science section on the changing patterns of marriage? I thought of you while I read it. I did cut it out so you will be hearing more on that at a later time.
I need to confirm if my parents have been able to call about the typewriter. If they have and it is now a dead issue, I will order a new print wheel right away. They say I am only allowed to have one wheel. I am tempted to order the twelve characters to the inch wheel so I can fit twenty percent more letters per page.
I am currently reading The Day of the Jackal and have been spending time each day doing some book reading. It just seems that I now have more than twenty-four hours worth of stuff to do, and just like everyone else I cannot squeeze any additional minutes out of the day.
I spend my time reading, the crosswords suffer. I do the crosswords and the book reading grinds to a halt. I am thinking of adding an additional hour of walking on Monday, Wednesday and Fridays. More time chewed out of my day.
The thing I need to do is be sure I do a certain minimum amount of stuff a day. Even though the NYT comes in batches of two and three papers at a time, I really need to read one paper everyday. That is probably my biggest weak spot at this point. If I do not read one a day, before I know it I have two weeks of papers to read. And then I have to read two or three in a day just to catch up.
The one good thing seams to be I am actually reading more of the articles and cutting out fewer articles. I still have to go through all the clippings I do have and thin those way down.
I do not know if it just old age or a personal bad habit to ignore things that are troublesome, but I am going to start only putting one subject or request in a letter to Mom and Dad and be sure to follow up in a week if I do not get an answer. It is frustrating to get a letter from them, which asks if they are forgetting anything that I asked. That sounds like the old age thing; if I turn proactive and ask about something too much than I become a pain in the ass. You know what that is like.
Well it is count time, 9:45 PM, so off this letter goes hoping you are doing okay.
Found NPR News!
The AM sister station of WNED FM is an all news station. I never realized until tonight that means some of the news is the NPR shows Morning Edition and All Things Considered, just like I was used to listening to way back when I was in West Virginia.
The only downside is that due to the unique construction of my current living accommodations (steel reinforced cement blocks), I do not get a very clear signal and then only in certain parts of the dorm. But it is good to hear the familiar voices and intriguing stories.
Greetings from hot and muggy western New York.
I was typing a letter to my Nom and Dad, and it was three-quarters of a page and I just gave up and cleared the memory.
After skipping the walking for two days, I did 95 laps on Friday. Yes it took two hours and I was really wiped out after doing that. I still managed to get forty-five laps in yesterday and today. I actually jogged the last two laps, to get them in before they closed the yard for breakfast.
I watched all three movies this weekend. Friday night was
Under the Sea, the Bobby Darin story, Saturday "
She Hate Me," a Spike Lee joint. A silly story, while trying to paint whistle blowers as heroes. Today we got to see a good uplifting story. The movie was "
Coach Carter" with Samuel Jackson. It is amazing how one person can make a difference, yet the message is so easily lost. Tom complains it is hard to watch this type of movie in prison where you need to hold back the tears. Yes, we see the softer side of a hired gun.
Friday night I actually cooked a meal and included Frank in our group. It was a pasta meal and he has one of those pots that actually boil. I was able to cook the pasta in two batches and it took less than 20 minutes for each batch including heating the water. I ended up making three different sauces, one non-spicy for Tom, one with the crushed red pepper for Frank, and Bill and I had the jalapeño pepper sauce.
Frank has been trying to lose weight, and when he got on the scale this week and found he only lost seven pounds I think he was a little disappointed.
He has been asking for my advice, and I have been spoon feeding him little bits of info here and there. I am not working from the point of him being my friend; I am maintaining control, and not going overboard. I told him just because he thinks he is eating healthy, he still has to watch the calories.
For example, the other day he made a meal of rice, a can of black beans and a can of tuna. I told him he should have only had two of those items. The can of tuna and the rice was more than enough; the beans are a mean in themselves.
Tonight I offered to include him and he said he was cooking with someone else. No problem, I was not insulted. They used almost three times the caloric count for the two of them compared to the meal I made the other night. Frank was talking about how great the soy sauce was in the meal. I had a good laugh. The major ingredient for soy sauce besides water is salt. Real healthy when your food is drenched in that!
This letter is not a real page turner. I am on edge, have a few very important things to do and am waiting to see if Monday's mail brings any good news.
Why it would be nice to write to me.
I do not want to be in a position to beg anyone to write to me, I think there are a few people that perhaps me writing something will assist them with deciding to write to me.
I watched the "Coach Carter" movie today and was reminded about how important an individual is. While we tend to be a mass-market type of country, individuals can and still make a difference, and we certainly need more persons that are willing to really put themselves into their work and life.
I have learned a lot about life, the way I have treated people in the past, the power I have had and abused. I have had over six years of personal counseling from a professional psychologist, and while my past actions will always be a part of me, I think I am a very different person today.
I did do some things that were very abusive and my actions are nothing I am proud of. Questions that I have not really answered were due in part to the nature of this blog and my desire to remain anonymous. This was not done to pull the wool over anyone's eyes or to portray me as a saint.
I am surrounded and reminded twenty-four hours a day of what my actions have led to. I have never tried to deny the accusations made against me and I am willing to discuss my past with you in an open and honest conversation if you would desire to do that.
I am not a violent person and you would never be in any danger just from communicating with me.
I feel I have a story to tell that others may be able to learn from and apply certain aspects to their lives.
The question I have, and one that might not come through on the blog is: okay, I have been convicted and I have accepted responsibility for my actions, I am due to get out of prison eventually, at some point, provided I do not die first. But is there any type of a life I can have?
One tiny step in that direction is whether I can begin to communicate with other adults, and begin to develop some sort of relationship, even if it is only in writing via the U.S. Post Office.
Birthday.
Thank you for the birthday card. It is 7:30 PM and I have really not been off my bunk much at all today.
Without prior notice they turned off the hot water this morning. Since I realized this at 7:00 AM and was not sure when it would return, I passed on my morning walk. That makes two days in a row.
Had I known in advance of the lack of hot water, I would have definitely walked yesterday, to avoid the possible pattern of multiple off days. Each day off increases the desire to take the next day off at a geometric rate. Provided it is not raining cats and dogs, I will be walking tomorrow.
I did manage to find the Helmsley case I had asked you about. Hopefully you have not wasted too much time on it. Sorry for not fully exploring the possibilities I had available.
I have not received any mail yet with the exception of the two letters from Debbie (one of my pen pals). I was wondering if I will get a third letter from her this week, before writing to her again. It would be better to not have to write two letters to her without knowing where she would like me to go topic wise.
I was blown away by the special section in the NY Times on the current state of the digital photography! That certainly fits into my education ideas. That has certainly got to be the biggest "torture" for me, reading about technologies that I use to dream of, or still do since I have so little access to them, and not being able to put my toes in the water.
Despite my parent's complaint that they have not heard from me, I have not heard from them in relation to the typewriter at all. I am wondering if they understood the seriousness of my request for the court filings. They should have gotten that letter yesterday, Wednesday, and in theory, I should yet something in the mail by Monday.
I asked them to next day mail it, if they did go into the city personally and I am hoping they were able to do it today or tomorrow! Then again I do not even know if they are home to receive the mail. Last time they were at my sister's for the ten days and I did not even know that.
Did I mention that at this week's commissary they were out of onions? Since we only shop every two weeks, I will not have onions until after the July 4 holiday. I will miss them since they do dress up the rice and beans, and the pasta also. Of course I never even had the option of buying onions, legally, at Club Fed.
I just realized something else. If I did purchase an onion from one of the kitchen workers, it usually cost me two stamps. That would be 74 cents. Now I can get a two pound bag for 54 cents. And I am complaining about going two weeks without onions? Relativity, that is the point. It is indeed all relative.
I realize I have not written anything lately as far as specific blog posts go. I assume you have taken a tidbit or two from the letters and I will get back on the horse shortly I hope. Feeling sorry for myself really only makes me feel sorrier and it is up to me to pick myself up.
It is actually fairly interesting if you think about that sentence. I had to help Frank look up a few cases for his appeal process, and that is when I took a second look for the Helmsley case and found it. Then I came back and pulled out the typewriter and as much as I would like to deny it, I am feeling better just by the fact of writing to you.
Yeah I would like to wallow in pity awaiting a letter or some outside source to lift my spirits, but that is not the way things really work around here. I still eagerly await your letters, and they do lift my spirits, or at least provide some sort of emotional input. The point is I need to not let myself hang in a certain emotional zone awaiting your letters. I need to be able to lift myself up. I have the tools to do it.
It is not always easy to discern which is best way to attack a funk I am in. I actually do feel physically well rested. I still hate to go to sleep. I like to stay up and read then drag myself out of bed at 6.45 AM each morning. So to lie around and let the body "rest" is probably not all that bad an idea once in a while. Let me see how well rested I am at 8:00 AM tomorrow when it is time to resume my four mile walks!
I am going to proof and print this letter, and then go off and make something to eat. Tonight was pizza night. One slice is such a tease. The cheese is real, and it is just enough to whet the appetite, and certainly not enough to be considered a full meal!
Once I get this legal thing done, and hopefully the C++ book arrives I can add yet another tool to my toolbox. The box being things to lift my sagging spirits.
I loved the recent article about Craig's List. That is what I have been talking about, using the web to connect communities. I do think there is still plenty of room for innovation on the web. Especially if you are willing to work in niche areas to start.
I think the idea of using a portion of your customers to support the site is indeed an interesting way to cover expenses and assure growth. Things to think about.
You Must Be This Tall To Ride This Ride.
Well after a long pause in the never ending quest for some sort of judicial relief, I am about to jump back on the emotional rollercoaster of knowing any day I could receive something in the mail that will radically effect my life.
I had received a letter from the United States Court of Appeals on June 17. The letter was actually dated June 14 and stated that I have 21 days from the date of the letter (not the day I received the letter) to send a motion to the court asking for the court to issue a Certificate of Appealability. This is like playing "May I?" Before I get the Court of Appeals to review my case I have to ask for permission first
I have learned a lot about the law over the last nine years, but I had no idea what form this motion would take. I still do not know what it is supposed to look like, but I have done my best to submit a seven page motion. It is going in the mail this evening, Thursday, June 30, and will get to the post office Friday morning. If I had missed the mail tonight, it would not have left till Tuesday morning, July 5, sort of too last minute.
Now the wait begins. I can anticipate one of the following answers at some unknown point in the future. That is where the rollercoaster comes in. Not only do I know what the next step or answer will be, but I have no idea when "it" will come. The possible responses are:
1. My paperwork gets returned for not being in the proper format. They may enclose some specific instructions to enable me to fix the problem or refer me to some legal publication that I may or may not have access to. They will probably give me another date to get the fixed document back to the court.
2. The court accepts my paperwork, but rejects my request for the certificate. I am basically at the end of the road at that point. I have run out of any further court proceeding and am stuck here in the New York prison system for the next 5 to 15 years.
3. They accept my paperwork and agree to issue the Certificate of Appealability. Then I would need to send some more paperwork and they could then:
a. Deny my appeal, and short of getting my case in front of the United States Supreme Court, I am also at end of road as in #2 above.
b. They grant me the relief I am seeking and back to the New York courts I go where there would be a possibility that I could win the argument that I am being doubly punished, and become a sort of free person. Sort of because even if I am released from the New York prison system, I would then start a three year term of Supervised released as part of the sentence I received from the Federal Government.
4. The old "None of the above," response. The court sends a letter telling me of a completely different option that I had not even thought of.
I assume the above is as clear as mud, but perhaps you can see the emotional rollercoaster I have just jumped on. Stay tuned for further updates.
Inspection.
Well it is Tuesday, so that means our row of bunks has Area Inspection.
Mr. King is one of the few officers that actually does the "inspecting." I have cleaned off my headboard, made sure my locker is locked and the bed is made. I have moved all my writing supplies to the table off to the side and am "hiding."
One of the other inmates decided to smart off to Mr. King and he is getting all hell now. I do not wish that on anybody and hope it does not get him (King) all fired up to go after the rest of the row.
I am down to twelve actual newspapers, but that does not count the stack of Week in Reviews and Sunday magazines I have stacked neatly on the top shelf of my locker. I think I am all right for now. I do not even want to walk over to the row.
Damn I must have placed your latest letter some place else, it is not in the portfolio that I keep all the correspondence in. I will need to go back to locker and find it. Be back, I hope.
"
The stark life, the repetitive regime, the lack of human touch was beginning to lose its meaning for her."
That line is from "Changing Habits" by Debbie Macomber. It is the book I just finished. It is a novel, not non-fiction but is well researched.
This line is spoken by one of the three women that we follow from their teen years, entry into the world of being a nun, and their eventual departure and return to "civilian" life. Talk about cult. The old "habits" (both about the outfit, and the practices) were straight brainwashing.
Ironically the same day your letter came, I got a second letter from Debbie, my pen pal, and in the blogs she sent she was bitching about the lack of house and garden work she was getting from her husband. I was here stuck in the middle wishing I was being bitched at by a female that loved me.
It is all relative, and relatively I ain't got nobody.
What I have attempted to share with you in a number of ways is that relationship problems with the female spouse are really emotionally, intellectually, and psychologically based. But the word "based" here is referring to SEX. I am convinced that when it comes to sex, physical sensations are really not all that important until the other three bases are covered.
There was a pregnant former Playboy model on Howard Stern Monday. I have not as a rule listened to his show much but for some reason I turned it on yesterday. The model brought up two topics that I found of interest. One she was "molested" as a child, shown pornography as young as age eight and lost her virginity at age 13 to a family member or relative.
Howard says how weird is that etc. and she goes on to say she is okay with it now, having gone through family therapy and is on speaking terms with the abuser now. She goes on to say how she has had sex with other women including three-ways with a former boyfriend.
She says her current hubby and she talk often about this or that good looking woman, but that she will not do three-ways at this point as it did not promote a healthy relationship. Again it appears that it is how she has worked through things emotionally that guides her actions now.
I contrast that with someone's questions about would they be in trouble once I yet out? No, I am not a homicidal monster!
Sorry we were talking about your problems, not my life. Again and again, what I continue to realize, you need to really listen to what women are saying and then decode it to find the true meaning.
That is where I do think I have an advantage over you. The massive hours of one on one counseling with a female counselor and my reading of both fiction and non-fiction.
This is not an impossible task for you to accomplish, but I do think you have to really be willing to try a few different things and evaluate if the action you try has a positive, negative or null effect. You would not repeat the negative ones, the null ones you might recycle at a later point and the positive ones you build on.
I think I mentioned this before, but I believe it was Liz Smith, the gossip columnist that said she was molested at some point during her younger years and she "enjoyed" the attention. Now please realize I am certainly not advocating that behavior at all. It is wrong for all the legal and moral reasons, but the point is it is about how a woman wraps herself around past experience that counts.
I am not sure if this will make sense but let me give it a shot. The Jackie Collins book I just finished had the plot of a husband and wife, two kids having the great American life. The teenage daughter is in a life threatening auto accident; the wife tries to locate her husband who is supposed to be in Cleveland on business, but is still in San Francisco. They finally get hooked up on the phone, she at the hospital, him in Cleveland, but wait he manages to show up at the hospital one hour after the call.
It turns out he is having an affair with a younger chickee. For eight months. Amidst the daughter being in coma, she confronts hubby and the truth comes out. He does not know what to do, says she has to give him time. At one point they end up in bed, and he goes soft as soon as he inserts tab A in slot C. It is the first time that he has screwed wife with her knowing about other woman. He practically runs out of house over to girlfriend to be sure he can still get it hard.
The point, for us guys, a bad sexual experience only lasts until our next erection. For women, not so. Not only do you need to get a woman's mine going a good long while before you even try to start the physical attack, if there has been some "bad" experiences, recently or in the past, you need to be sure to overcome that brain wiring also.
My opinion is that it is not your job to get a confession out of her. No my premise is that you take her outward behavior and work with it.
The books are full of how barriers fall and all of a sudden dirty talk etc. is all good to get your partner hotter etc. No this is not always the case. Again in my opinion it can actually be a minefield. Even though some of her inhibitions might begin to fall during physical sex, she is still battling some sort of emotional memory that saying the wrong thing on your part could really blow things out.
That is why I have suggested you try to work with her barriers, to start anyhow, and not fight them.
I really think you should give my after sex bath setup some thought. You may need to modify it a bit or implement it in stages. For example you first might just work on the changing of the sheets, you can make a bed can you not? After that works, then maybe you would try the candle lit bath for her only.
Any initial changes should be designee mostly around you doing the changes, and not be specifically sexually related. Here is the cumulative point, maybe when you try the bath thing, you have a new bathrobe or whatever she normally wears to bed all wrapped up and sitting in the bathroom.
This is great. Think about what we guys would usually do. Stop off at Frederick's of Hollywood, buy one of those great skimpy things, toss it to the little woman and say here this is for you. Put it on and model it for me. Then you jump her bones. WRONG.
What you want to do is take her through the pleasure of the after sex experience, you want to be able to show her how special you feel after you do get some. It is not necessarily the fastest way to get laid; we are talking about putting something in the bank that will hopefully pay off with interest at some future point.
Yes the deposits will probably not always be the same amount, and not even the same currency. You can not buy her a new bathrobe after every time you get laid. Unless of course you decide to keep her home, barefoot and pregnant. I think it is a little late for that anyhow. Ha Ha.
Flying High.
I was just about to start page two of the letter, and was going to say how cool it was that I could fill a page so quickly when I all of a sudden realized I had not put the damn typewriter into the word processor mode!
The whole first page now needs to be retyped into memory, then proofed and printed. It is now 9:55, so I will hopefully be able to get this page in and fill most of page two, before I need to stop and proof and print. Told you I was flying high from the mail. Oh wait you have not read page one yet, so let me retype page one.
Always a great day when a letter from you arrives in the mail. I was going to wait and tackle responding to the letter by doing a handwritten draft first. I just can not take it. The letter was another of your high emotional energy transference letters. Way to go. They make me soar above this lousy place and partake in a little bit of freedom. I read these letters very slowly, prolonging the arrival at the dreaded last page! I savor the words and the emotional energy like one might enjoy a fine wine. Thank you.
I decided to pull out the typewriter (9:20 PM) and perhaps comment on some of the simpler areas, then work on the draft letter tonight and type that one tomorrow.
I found my body crying out for some protein and ended up making some pasta with mushrooms, onions, and tuna. Now the brain is raring to go. [A little too fast on the trigger since I am now typing this a second time.]
It is amazing how really piss poor the food is, in terms of providing fuel my brain (note: I did not say the brain ha ha) needs to function at anywhere need peak efficiency I know I am capable of.
I so not know for sure but it seems to help with the ADD also. I was so hyped up having received such a great letter from you and a second letter from a pen pal. There was no mention of her receiving my letter, but I realized she would not have received it by the date she sent this one. Glad I wrote back to her fast so she did not think it would take two letters to get me to respond. She included some blog postings.
Today was the bi-weekly fill out your commissary list.
I picked up one of the books from the latest shipment. "Changing Habits", by Debbie Macomber. About three women that entered a convent in the early 1960's and have now left the Order. Plenty of female feelings involved. You will be receiving some thoughts on this book! I have read 225 of the 377 pages so far today and will be diving back into it as soon as this letter is placed into the mail!
Now I am really on page two. And the first page is in memory. Watch the damn typewriter freeze up on the proof stage. I still have not written to Mom and will be busy doing court stuff next two weeks so that letter will have to wait.
Thanks for radio stuff, but alas it was the former and not the latter that I needed. I thought I explained the problem was that the station I was looking for was broadcasting on same frequency as the WNED the 90.7 one. The one: you sent is actually the station that carries Howard Stern and used to be the all talk format till they switched to "Jack" FM.
Turns out this is exactly the same format they just implemented in NYC on WCBS FM. It is a disc jockey-less format, and they are actually using some witty tag lines going into and out of the commercials, but it is non area specific. I would be willing to bet that if you listened to 101 WCBS you would hear exactly the same thing I do. If you could send the address of WBFO I would appreciate it.
Really have to stop now. Will just have time to proof and print.
