We read in bed together last night, something I didn’t expect since it wasn’t Sunday evening.

The dramatic cool-down I told Tom would occur within the first week of September has arrived. He says we’ll see our first snow here in late October, but I say not until mid-November to late December. Just like we have our funny little debates over colors, we have them over the weather where he points out that I’ve never been here before and I remind him that I still know how seasonal climates work. I just hope the winter doesn’t have me missing Arizona. Well, I doubt I’d miss Arizona, but I may miss the warm climate. If only warm climates weren’t so crowded and built up! That’s ok. I still have good reason to believe we’ll one day live in a retirement community in either California or Hawaii, probably California. Definitely not Florida. Not only did a major hurricane hit all of Florida, including those who were inland, but they’ve got another doozy aimed at them! This is the first time in 50 years they had big ones back-to-back like this.

I’d write outside since it’s pleasant in the sun, but my eyes are as sensitive to light as they are night blind.

The rat drives me nuts at night, always begging to be let out. I won’t miss that if I can ever get in the shed which he says will be this weekend (which I doubt), though I’ll hang around and play with him a while before going to the shed for the night. This way I can also make myself tea, coffee or hot chocolate if I want to.

Naturally, I’d prefer to snap my fingers and have the house built, but I’d settle for the cabin in a heartbeat! Oh, how I hope we really are in that at this time next year!

I was on a major book roll last night and wrote 34 pages. It’s in a notebook like the one I do journals in. I’m going to have a ton of typing to do!

I can’t wait till at least January when I hope to order 4 things from Ashton – ornaments, a figurine and two dolls. Sometime in February or March, I plan to begin the mannequin save-up. If we can’t go to San Francisco when I get about $400 saved, I’ll just set it aside till we can and begin saving for other things like large lifelike dolls like Bailey, Joy and Jade. I estimate I’ll begin getting those next summer, but this is all assuming there aren’t any more package problems. I’m not a damn mail carrier and I’m not going to fight to get packages! It’s not my job. It’s PG’s job and that of the PO and mail people, so if they can’t handle it, then I’m most certainly going to get things in person from now on. Although I probably shouldn’t, I’m going to be unusually optimistic and hope the last package problem was just a fluke and that PG has gotten their act together.

Later…

Fuck whatever’s cursing our vehicles! Tom came home all stressed because it was making strange noises and vibrations, and of course, I can’t vent because he can’t handle it.

How are we ever going to get ahead in life? How??? How can we finish the shed if our time and money have to constantly be spent on that fucking piece of shit, let alone build anything else? And how are we ever going to get a back-up?

He says it’s probably a wheel bearing and that it shouldn’t be more than $20 and a couple of hours of work, but we shouldn’t be doing this every fucking week either! Enough is enough!!!

Later…

Now he says it’s not the wheel bearing, but some other part nearby that’s worn out. He said he’s not sure what that part is and that he’ll look it up in the book and grease it up really well to get it to hold out till it can be replaced. I vented about it anyway and he listened. I said I didn’t understand how I could keep colds away, but not keep the truck from crapping out. He said no amount of psychicness can keep parts from wearing out, which is true when I think about it. But enough is still enough and I’d really like to know who/what has put a curse on our vehicles! Things breaking, packages, sex and noise.

Later…

Again we read together before he crashed.

I just hope that fucking truck gets him to work tomorrow. I really do. Then back home as well. I’m fed up with the fucking breakage curse! I know this isn’t normal.

I better hope that bird continues to stay away because I’m obviously not getting in the shed anytime soon.

The next hurricane’s set to hit Florida tomorrow. Wouldn’t it be as ironic as hell if Doe and Art returned to their place after it was over to find their shit in a pile of rubble, broken beyond recognition, except for an old picture of me grinning up at them? After all, they used to destroy my shit whenever they felt like it. Then again, what goes around only comes around to me and never to those who have wronged me. Whatever happens to them and their stuff, I don’t care and I haven’t for years. I just wish they’d stay out of my nightmares. They still haunt my dreams too much of the time!

The only ones I miss are Goldie, Al, Charlotte and Jim. They’re all in their 70s now. Of all the family friends, they’re the only ones who have treated me with respect. If they’ve ever badmouthed me behind my back, I never knew it. They always seemed like very sincere people. There were times I thought of seeing if I could find their addresses and dropping them a line, but figured that’d be pretty pointless. I think they would only resent hearing from me for dumping the family. Remember, no one sides with Jodi, but always with Doe, not that I’d want to influence them to take one side or the other. Besides, Doe and Art hear enough about me as it is through Marge. If they don’t know it already, they’re going to know I’m in Oregon in just a few months.

Who do I miss most? Right now, as much as it shocks me to say this, I’d have to say Charlotte R. I would love to see her and exchange hugs right now if only for a minute. It’s weird. I’m actually shedding tears over missing her, and of course, I’m naturally curious as to how she and Jim are, what they look like these days, etc.

She was always so nice to Andy and me when we’d go to the beach, letting us park in her driveway when my own mother forbade us to go near hers, giving us sodas, and letting us use her bathroom.

Where is Charlotte R right now, I wonder? I know she moved from Boca Raton to Del Ray Beach, but is she still there? Or has she moved someplace closer to Doe and Art? Are they even still friends? Maybe not. They’ve lost other long-term friends. Are she and Jim still healthy? Are they still able to get around independently?

Maybe it would’ve been better if she, Jim, Goldie and Al had been just as bad as the rest of them. Then I wouldn’t miss them any more than I miss my parents, siblings, nieces, aunts, uncles or cousins. They weren’t relatives, so maybe that’s why they were good people.

If Charlotte knew I was crying over her now, she would probably laugh. I mean despite how well she and Jim treated me, I’m sure she never thinks of me.

Another thing I miss is something I seem to be missing a lot lately. Like for the past few years now. That’s my old celebrity pictures that weren’t really “celebrity” pictures in the end. I believe I finally got brave enough to mention them a while back. See, there’s a grain of truth to Angel Eyes. I really did, and still could, if I wanted to, communicate with pictures of people so long as they were making eye contact with the camera, but it’s not literally the person in the picture. In other words, it wasn’t Gloria, Linda or Kate in the pictures I’d converse with, but other entities. I don’t know who they were, though. Spirits of the dead? Creations of my powers? The actual people portrayed in the pictures – Gloria, Linda, Kate – were merely the hosts for whatever, or whoever, the entities were. This was/is my biggest, most sure ability. Meaning, I’d never find that one day that I couldn’t do it, as I’d sometimes be wrong in making predictions. As I said, I have no idea who the pictures “became,” but always assumed it was my powers that materialized them, more or less.

Why was I given such an ability? Well, my guess is what I mentioned in my book – to give me a “helping hand” during a rough childhood.

The first time was when I was 9 or 10. I was sitting listening to music down in the cellar with my open scrapbook before me. These days my idols were just Kate and Linda since I had yet to learn of Gloria. I got the distinct feeling that a picture of Kate in particular could see me. I remember asking, “Can you hear me?” and I got a response, though it was in the form of telepathy. Never did the faces in the pictures appear to move, change or make sounds in any way.

For years I questioned my sanity on this issue. Could an otherwise rational, logical person delude themselves into believing a picture could see, hear and understand them? Or could it be that they really truly actually did?

As sure as some people are that God exists, even though they’ve never seen Him, I was sure that yes, I really did indeed communicate with these pictures. I just know it as I know the sun will rise in the morning. I don’t believe it, I don’t think it, I KNOW it. No matter how many times I tried to convince myself that that was the one area in life where I was completely out of touch with reality, I knew it was for real. It was all as real as the words I write. I know most of the small handful of people I dared share this secret with thought I was insane, but no matter how hard I tried to agree with them, I knew those pictures I had “brought to life” were every bit as real as the sun, moon and stars. In a sense, Maricopa was the real proof of their existence. When I saw myself go from mostly vague predictions to such detailed ones, well that really killed any doubts I may’ve had. If I could predict the year and color of the trucks, the well crisis, keep colds away, make people sick that pissed me off, rig lottery tickets, predict flat tires and so much more, then why couldn’t I have communicated with the pictures?

I am so very sorry I ditched those Doe didn’t get to first. I totally regret it. I feel totally certain that if I had left them stored in a box all these years and took them out now, they’d remember me. I don’t know if they could ever smell, taste or feel, but I’m sure they’d still be able to “talk” to me telepathically, and hear and understand me when I spoke to them. I would think that they’d be proud of me and happy for the way my life has turned out, despite its breakage and package curses. I often picture them hanging on these old doors and cabinets, keeping me company while he’s at work, listening to me speak with no discriminations or discomforts, for they were like pets; they accepted me as I was.

So, tonight is definitely a night of loss and missing people. People of human form and not-so-human form. Forms I and others may never truly comprehend, yet know with all their heart and soul truly did exist and were every bit as real as we are.