Wow, I just got a letter from Mary dated the 24th and postmarked the 27th! Don’t know why it took nearly 3 weeks to get to me. That happens sometimes, I guess.

At this time she thought she was going to be there till the summer and asked for two copies of her drafts along with her astrology, saying she’d mail them to herself in Florida the day before she left Estrella, but I take it that she wants me to just wait and send the stuff to Florida, seeing that she’s leaving next month (unless there are more delays).

She still expects to be released in 2004 or 2005 at the max. I hope so! And I hope she really isn’t on intense probation for too long, but like I’ve said before, you can’t count on or trust the law to come through for you. I’m sure she knows this by now, though. She’s not stupid.

She says Virginia, who killed her drug dealers, is worse than Hope, but at least gets her own commissary.

She doesn’t yet know why José is in jail.

I sent her a couple of pictures of Chris, one face shot, one full body shot, and a few drawings I did years ago. She asked to see them which was nice. I sent her a person, dogs, and a colored drawing of a cat surrounded by flowers and butterflies.

I’m back to 129, but since I doubt I’ll shit for 2-3 days, I’m sure I’ll gain a pound or two back. I felt so teased earlier. I felt like I had to take a dump, but as soon as I sat on the toilet, the feeling was gone as quickly as it had come. All I can do is just eat sensibly and exercise regularly. It all goes to prove, though, that no, attitude is not always connected to the outcome. I was sure I’d lose the weight, yet I couldn’t, just like I was sure I could never quit smoking, yet I did.

I’m in mid-1997 with the proofreading, and right before the folks visited, I wrote that I had a feeling it was to be our final meeting. I sure got that one right!

I also wrote that I was struggling between being angry at his mom for using him and feeling guilty about complaining about it, but now I don’t feel an ounce of guilt for how I felt, and I shouldn’t have felt guilty back then, either. She did a terrible thing. She stole my husband from me, ran him ragged, and milked us of a lot of money. Why shouldn’t I have felt any hard feelings just because she might have done us a favor or two in return? She still used the shit out of my husband and took his attention away from me when I needed it more. I also think Tom should’ve realized what was going on a lot sooner than he did and put an end to it sooner, but he could never be nearly to blame as much as his mother. She knew that because he was so kind and generous, he’d have a hard time saying no.

The last mouse died today, so no more mice for a while. Next time, though, they’ll have all new cages and accessories.

In better news, the stock did sell yesterday, after all, for just under $1,500. I still don’t know what I’ll get for my next doll order or when, since we still have to get the damn carburetor so the truck can be up and running, then get the fences. We don’t know for sure how much the fences will cost, but I vibed $450.

There are a couple of really nice HSC dolls I’d like, but one of them is a 750-piece limited edition, and the other’s 750-piece closed edition, so by the time we get the extra money, they’ll probably be gone. In that case, I’ll just get the fashion dolls I want, but I’m pretty sure at this point that I won’t be bothering with Ashton-Drake.

I looked, and there is a fourth Playboy doll that will soon be available (I don’t know why they have her listed as the third in the series) named Ava Fabian. She’s a brunette and is going to be wearing Playboy’s original bunny suit.

I can’t believe that of the first four dolls, they’re all white. Especially what with the way everything’s so mixed. I mean, you can’t even find one TV series, one movie, or one commercial without a black in it these days, and Asians too, of course.

I finally spoke with Paula. Of course, she had to call when Charlie’s Angels was on, but oh well. She called at 5:30 her time, saying it was 10° and that there were two feet of snow. Naturally, I rubbed in our beautiful weather, although it is quite cold at night. Especially out here where there’s not nearly as much concrete to hold the heat in. While it can get up to 70° during the daytime, it can get down to the high 20s at night.

Paula says she goes to bed at 9 PM and gets up at 5 AM every day, and is her same old self. The conversation was the usual; about the losers she hangs with. If ever there was a woman attracted to abusive men, it’s got to be Paula B. She’s worse than my sister was. It’s sick. It really is. But more so, it’s sad. I can see a guy being attracted to an aggressive woman only because most guys, unlike most women, don’t have much self-respect. This is crazy, though. Totally crazy. She talks of how Miguel, her current PR of choice, put stitches in her head and about how she’s going to trial (she pled not guilty) on the 23rd for slugging him, yet says they’re still the best of buddies. She said she doesn’t want to dump him because he and Justin grew close, but that’s crazy. Any man that can beat a woman can beat a child too, and they should not be allowed near either one. Especially a child who cannot fight back.

Maybe he could, though, because according to Paula, my predictions for Justin getting into all kinds of trouble are already ringing true. He pulled a knife on a fellow student, so she says, which doesn’t surprise me in the least. Any kid who grows up with an aggressive mother whose millions of boyfriends are abusive is almost guaranteed to end up violent and in trouble with the law constantly. It wouldn’t surprise me in the least if Justin ultimately ended up in prison for years. I hate to say it, but it’s what I see plain as day.

She asked me if I saw her having to do 90 days, which is what she says she’ll get if she loses the trial, and at the time I didn’t see anything, but afterward, once we’d hung up and I’d had a chance to concentrate on it in silence, I did feel a slight vibe saying that she is going to jail. Sorry girl!

Then she says she may have to do an additional 30 days for getting caught driving without a license, something she never bothered to get, for reasons I can’t fathom.

Every other time we talk she says it cracks her up that Tom and I don’t sleep together.

Now, how can that crack someone up? I mean, what’s so funny about it? It may be odd, but funny?

She’s one funny lady, though, that’s for sure. Let’s see… she wants to send Tom a carburetor cuz they’re cheaper there and claims that the FBI hung up her phone when we were accidentally disconnected. She reminds me of Ellie!

I finally, after 6 months, found out what she thinks of the dolls. She says she likes and kept them all, though she hasn’t got them set up cuz she needs shelves.

Meanwhile, I’m sending her an extra dress that will fit a couple of the tall dolls which I can’t imagine ever having a use for. I told her that after that, though, I wouldn’t send anything else to her unless she contacted me saying she wasn’t in jail. I don’t want to be sending stuff her ditzy associates may not remember to give to her once she’s out.

Anyway, she’s at the end of the year’s probation she got for slugging that pig. I still can’t believe she got a year of probation for slugging a pig while I got half a year in jail, plus 2½ years of probation over a fucking letter! But then again I can because life’s so unfair.

What’s sad is that Paula’s the kind who’ll never get anyone decent, not that that’s an excuse to take just anything she can get. It’s just that the more stable people are going to see Paula as not good enough for them. I’ve walked in her shoes before. Back when I was young, naïve, mixed up and too nice, all I’d get were assholes. Those who had their shit together and who were more mature basically looked down on me, knowing they were too good for me at the time.

Later…

That was scary. Really utterly terrifying! I was playing with the rats. Tom was still in bed. Suddenly, there was a knock on the utility door. Whenever I hear a knock at the door I think – black bitch! Especially when 90% of the knocks have been connected to them.

I ran and opened Tom’s bedroom door, flipped on the light, and woke him up with the news. He asked me what my vibes were and I said I didn’t have any bad ones. Nonetheless, against my better judgment, he went out and checked after the third knock to find an old white guy looking for some guy.

Later he went out to look around and came back saying that it sounded like he was going door to door, judging by the way the dogs were going off, but dogs go off around here a lot lately, so I don’t know. I guess he was harmless.

I should’ve figured it wasn’t black-related, though, since the pigs have always preferred to come to the front door and only in the daylight. The cheeks, who also uses the front door, wouldn’t come at this hour to a client on standard probation.

“You also shouldn’t have turned on the light or walked as noisily,” Tom said, which is true.

Although few and far between, I can’t wait for the fences that will stop these casual visitors, or at least make it a bitch for them to bother us.

Fortunately, I still don’t have any bad vibes, but if there’s going to be any more trouble, I still say it won’t be till before or after 10/30. It’ll depend on how the freeloaders feel. Not being in the same county helps, but will they feel they “got me” and so be it? Or will their little victory of 2000 go to their heads, making them feel invincible and like they can do anything to me and get away with it (not that there wouldn’t be a grain of truth to that)? Sometimes abusing others can be a real addiction for some people.

The so-called easy diet hasn’t been so easy lately. For the last few days, I’ve felt as if nothing could fill me up. Like I could eat a ton of food and still be hungry. I can’t lose weight anyway, so I may as well eat when I’m hungry. I’m not going to make a pig of myself and eat for the hell of it, but I see no sense in going hungry anymore for no reason at all.

Mary was right when she said the clip I received today would be painful. The sick fuck I’d love just 5 minutes with, broke James’ arm when he was around two. As I told her, I know all too well the agony of a broken arm, and where the hell was God throughout all of it? Nowhere! He just didn’t give a damn, did he? I still can’t understand how she can worship something that allowed all this and so much more to happen! After considering all she and her kids have been through, doesn’t it ever make her wonder if perhaps she’s kidding herself by telling herself that God wants her to be happy and that he doesn’t want her to suffer? I mean, if he never wanted her to suffer, then who did and why didn’t he intervene?

And how the hell could she stay with Justin one second longer? I mean, what was she thinking?! Of all the dumb things I’ve done, not even my dumbest of all judgment calls comes close to how dumb she was to have put up with his shit for as long as she did. She had people she could’ve gone to. Some people may be truly stranded with no place else to go, but she had people she could’ve run to, and if she didn’t, I’d rather be homeless on the streets than live with such abuse!

Just what was she thinking? That he’d one day be a prince who treated her and her kids with the utmost love and respect? Please! How could it take one abused kid and one dead one to realize just what she was dealing with??? I’m sure Murphy and Andrew were abused, too. I don’t know who’s worse, her or Paula.

The woman prosecuting Justin in the James case asked Mary the same thing most people have undoubtedly wondered – why didn’t she leave? Mary’s answer to that was that she was too scared to because he threatened to kill her, her family, and her friends, but I don’t buy it. Oh, I don’t doubt she was scared. It’s just that as I’ve said a million times over, actions speak louder than words. Most people don’t act on their threats, and it just seems to me that it’d be a worthy gamble to take by breaking away despite the threats, rather than stick around and risk getting killed. I’d take my chances and leave as you’re a lot more likely to get killed by an abusive person than without them. If you break away from an abusive person, things can only get better, but if you stick around, there’s no hope for any change.

Anyway, in case I haven’t yet said so, Andrew and James were adopted and Murphy lives with her aunt Carolyn.

Another thing is that there is a huge difference between Mary and Paula, and that’s that Mary realizes she fucked up and has learned from it. Paula’s 35 years old and she still doesn’t get it. To quote from Mary’s own words; she lives in torment and regrets the fact that she let her fear of a man get in the way of doing right by her kids.