When I Grow Up…

I want to be paid to travel, photographing the world, saving endangered species and snowboarding the most remote places on earth. This is the start of those journeys.

It has been one hell of a ride, and I’m sure you’ll find every emotion you know and some you didn’t. This is the beginning. The roughness. And your criticism, words of wisdom, insight, or whatever comes through those fingers you type away with at 3 am, have a home. Leave your mark. After reading you may get a hint that you’re not the dictator in this match.

“Be careful what you wish for, you just might get it.”

I have had dreams of what I’m accomplishing for the better part of my life. All along I knew I would get to where I needed to be. All along I knew that everything I was going through, experiencing, learning from, crying over, writing about, watching, listening, and touching…every bit of it was molding me, and forming the life around me, enabling me to reach further than ever before. Every bad relationship (and the few good…). Every best friend that fucked my boyfriend. (and the genuine few that are still by my side – weapons high and mouths wide…) Each and every downfall and all the high-high-highs… Every road trip and the many that took in the experiences with me. All the people I’ve met along the way…good and bad…and yes *I’m sure you know exactly who you are. The business deals-most of which gone bad. All the photo shoots and lost photographs. The late night parties; rallies; conventions – any excuse to get wild…or not. All the pictures that got you in trouble, or made your world….It all came to this.

The stories, journal entries and postings and some non incriminating photographes within this blog are not in order…at least for now. All words, images,  ect [unless otherwise noted, quoted, and or given credit to] are copyright 2009 shyla .cameron. Steal my shit. I will sue you. True Story.

The eventual plan for this is a book. [ha. I know, just like the rest of the angsty love torn pen wielders....] Honestly, I just love writing about the** fucked up situations I happen into.

Enjoy.
ex.oh

*Names have obviously been changed, altered, or alias’ used to not-so-much protect the guilty, but to protect myself from later legal ramifications. Most situations are not altered, but may be, to protect the identities and myself from the po’ and the law…and well….protect myself from the lunatics I seem to attract.

**I am sometimes an outsider, writing of the things that happen to those around me. Some were even kind enough to share their insanely ludicrious stories as well. The same rule above applies.

ex.oh

the.leopard

I was always better off without you…..

and this time is no different.

I waited. I watched. I knew, that this was going down, unlike how you were planning. I deciphered all of the napalm lies, the deceitful maniacal tales that you spew from your counterfeit lips. Lips had I wanted to kiss for years, that were just as cold and empty as they were a half a dozen years ago. It took you that long, to give in, and let me have the realization that I needed. It took  a short 4 days, 7hours, 33 minutes, and 62 seconds to figure out, I was right all along. You are, no doubt, now cursing me for your misfortune, and one day you will realize that it was all on you. You brought this on yourself. Do you think, treating people the way you do, has had any impact on your life? I think you of all people will agree that…Karma is a filthy fucking whore. In all fairness, when you don’t learn from your mistakes, the second time around is your own fucking fault.

So, I gave into you. Each and every time. Sidestepping and slipping through the motions, not ever really knowing why. The dreams pulled me back in, even when I was pseudo-killing you, consecutively, for weeks and months on end-in a demented lucidity, lost within the own prison-like confines of my mind. I was connected to you because I allowed it to be so. Not because you have some divine hold over my subconscious. I’ve been charging through my chaotically ever-changing life-head first (because anything else couldn’t be something of my working…), fluttering in and out of everyone else’s realm, in the hopes *even still* that I will continue to live my life as I have been.. kicking parasites like you in teeth to watch you bleed, just for fun. This whole toxic mess is something that shouldn’t be given the energy or the time, because things like that, don’t deserve it. In retrospect, I’m not surprised to see, that this is one of the biggest lessons yet. That pipe-dreams and wistful, drawn-out, late-night fantasies, are exactly that. I don’t need you. I never did. And you never needed me. It was something of a delusional compulsion; I’m ecstatic it has finally ceased.

See, this hole you forged in my chest, is reminiscent of this one time, with this one guy, who was also around for a number of years. Who also proceeded to try and rip out my heart through my throat and feed it to me on a daily basis with a rusty spoon. So, when I put it all together I discovered, it was a repeat of the exact previous cycle. Do you know what a cycle is? A phase, a chain, an orbit. A fabrication. An abstract obsession with the insane. Cycles. Are made to be broken. Someone hand me a hatchet.

Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results. -Albert Einstein

Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results. -Albert Einstein

Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.- Albert Einstein

Exactly.

Our whole relationship/friendship and lack there-of, is a phantom neurosis. It wasn’t until the other night, enjoying a glass of wine, smoking, watching drunken magicians and street people, and listening to your “friends” bitch about how you’re so fucking entitled-that it finally clicked. It’s almost like we all need therapy to get over how it’s always been all about you…and how you’re a selfish, inconsiderate, childish, waste of perfectly good human being…that was once there. That lost his soul in a fight with his own existence. We pined how we loved you and how we had to let you go, because viral things, never change. They stay the same, and mutate. They lay dormant and they get stronger. It’s a vicious habit in itself. I think we’ve all realized that our lives stopped revolving around you, a long time ago, I guess we were just hoping with enough of us, you may see how good the world can be. But your cynical, twisted thought process makes us out to be in a war against each other, because in your life, war is all you’ve ever known.

And that war, is one I’m done fighting.

 

Narnia.

I’m sure you’re thinking, instantaneously of The Lion The Witch and the Wardrobe and whatnot…that’s fine, because without Aslan and the rest of the crew, I wouldn’t have the association I now have with Winter Wonderlands across the globe.

Narnia, which I’ll explain here, is actually in each of us. It’s that happy place where nothing can hurt you, because you’re the fucking HE-RO. There is no Sabertooth, no Joker, No Jason, No ex-lovers and disgruntled ex people from your life. There is nothing. Except you and the snow, and the trees, and the silence of the World. So My Narnia, would naturally be [ironically consciously and subconsciously-good dreams and bad] in the snow. And it’s all very curious and interesting to how my “secret safe place” became one of a time I loathed when I was younger.

I had wanted to start snowboarding the minute I saw someone do it-back in the ripe old school days of 1992, and it progressed worse and worse through the years as my parents didn’t have the money to fund “such a dangerous thing”, and I wasn’t motivated or driven or confident enough, nor did I have the proper backing to achive those goals at such a young age. So I just daydreamed my way through it, for a fucking decade. Think about this, I find the ONE thing, THE ONE PLACE, the one time of year that makes me so completely at peace, and because we were a bit less fortunate and I was raised a partly spoiled lazy brat – I neglected myself some of the utmost amazing feelings, sensations, experiences and times of my life. Now, I can finally enjoy and relish in these times…and do I ever. I soak up every millisecond I am privilaged enough to strap into my one true love: I was hand picked…by my Nitro T1. She’s treated me well…Colorado powder in one more season will be bringing me into meeting a NeverSummer for the first time, but shhh…the Nitro isn’t being retired… She’s my park love <3 and soul now. <3

See, this is what I mean. You can’t just let me ramble off about them like they’re my family. Oh, wait. They are…kinda. The point being, if you haven’t cruised down a mountain, in silence, without anyone or anything within the speed of sound in any direction; if you haven’t popped off a cliff into 2 feet of powder; if you haven’t driven 3+ hours in bouncy, animated, way-too-awake-for-6-am, breakfast sandwich and tea in hand, jamming to the shred session playlist on the i pod; in a complete white-out; if you haven’t forgotten half your shit in the car because you’re rushing to get to the lift, just to get freshies [fresh tracks, there kiddo....], well then….if you haven’t experienced a day in your own snowboard boots…

you simply haven’t experienced life.

<3

Autumn Night Terrors

I walked up to that familiar house, and walked inside. There was a woman there. I didn’t know she was going to die. I didn’t know she was another one of yours. I followed you and traced you, like you wanted me to. In and out of a haze, swerving in and out of traffic in your big SUV. Coming back watching the cats, driving around the house, searching for something that isn’t there. I was trying to find answers, beneath this full moon above…and then you gave them to me.

I went back to the house, her skull was there, dismembered with a present deep inside. A wig of all things, blond and short, almost how it was before you. And there was another there, claiming adoration, but never knowing of sacrifice. You were packing, leaving, going somewhere, with me apparently, and I couldn’t stop any of it. We walked outside, and sat on that small porch I almost recognize. We left in the truck and we talked, for what seemed like hours. You told me things that would happen. You told me not to worry, that everything was going to work out. That we would be together again and everything was going to be just fine. All these promises that will never come to full fruition, and I sat there, as I always do, wishing it to be true.

I reached down to your hand and held it. I felt your pulse to make sure you were there, and it beat at me with ferocious vitality. You felt and smelled just like you used to. I caressed your hand while we were speeding down that road, wishing that it was real, that this was really happening. The cars flew past us on our way to the mountain, where only my nightmares can turn into dreams. Your pulse was still pounding in my hand, your flesh as real as the air I breathe.

We reached the mountains, and the snow was there, welcoming and inviting. Just like your arms are on these nights; as they were years ago. You looked as you did in those years, strong and diligent, impressive and bold. Unlike now, bloated and angry, a needle in one arm with a smirk on your face, like you know you’re doing something wrong….and then, you disappeared.

And there I was, as I am now, unable to decipher between reality and lies; the truth and the fantasy. Wanting you in the snow with me, knowing that anything is a possibility, absolutely nothing is impossible, and you can’t change the laws of the universe. If it’s meant to happen, it will…Just as are the laws of attraction, chaos, and physics. To which, you, apply to all of the above.

**after writing this i entered a sentence from each paragraph and added it into a site called: http://www.wordle.com -check it. **

Goddess of War

The Boxer, was one piece of work. I really should have learned my lesson over the years of dating men that have a tendency towards anger, jealousy, resentment, rage, the list goes on and on…mostly, men that enjoy beating things up. Men that get off on picking fights.You know the type, guys that like hurting things, just for sake of seeing them break. I’ve found more men than not, that have abusive tendencies in their relationships. [and yes, women as well...but we're not talking about us.]

He was a lot like many of the men I’ve been in relationships with. Tall [I'm short...5'8 is tall to me....] with broad shoulders, a strong jawline, charm that could talk any woman out of her pants, bank account and life….a perfect smile that could melt a million women at once, perfect white teeth and eyes that sparkle, not always in the way you want them to; a penchant for fighting; “Napoleon Syndrome” types – always have to have all the attention and cause and win the biggest war they can find. He was not only a boxer [ex] but, full blooded Native American/Indian/Native…what have you [just as I am...], and his father was an abusive alcoholic. None of us apples fall far from our trees…

I know I didn’t, but luckily my father has qualities like respect, morals, integrity, and sheer determination.  I think the reason we were so destructive is we not only both enjoyed destroying pretty things, we were impeccably similar.  So this 6 month insanity of a relationship where I was lied to, cheated on numerous times with his ex and at least one other woman I know of, mentally abused, stalked, and all around just treated like shit for the majority of what was.

At one point, I drove to west bum-fuck New England, from about five states south to see him, while he was working there. We were having drinks with his co-workers in one of their rooms, one of whom he’s enjoying flirting with-immensely, like I’m deaf, dumb and blind. [note to the men reading: most real women LOATHE being treated like shit. Stop being a dick. Some of us still enjoy being "courted" and treated like ladies; ask us out, grab some pretty flowers - iris' and orchids are always a huge hit, show up on time, have some respect and good hygiene, open some doors -you would be surprised how many of us pass the test, and know about it..., and seriously, just be a real MAN.]  I leave the room to get a hoodie, a few minutes later I’m back at the door over-hearing his obnoxious Hennessey soaked mouth spewing game and shit about me-as if I didn’t just drive 5 states to see his lying, cheating ass…., as my heart is pounding in my ears and I can’t breath; I realize this is what a “panic attack” is. I walked back to the room in a different reality. I laid in that bed staring at the walls for hours. Thinking. Wondering. Writing. My heart never stopping. Thudding, hammering like pulsing blood in my ears that wants out – to shower the walls with my hatred. He stumbles in around 4 am…claiming: “Oh What’s Up? I fell asleep on the floor, I was wondering…where you were….” Really. Interesting. I was in the bed, in OUR room, where YOU should have been. Needless to say, like every other coward in the world he denied until his face was red, and I left him there, anger simmering with his hangover, placing blame to fill the holes of his stories, he foolishly and inevitably believes.

Returning home I came to the absolute conclusion that he was insane. He called so much I literally thought my phone would explode. This guy just wouldn’t stop. I had to leave the state. [sometimes, that happens....] So I left. And changed my number. And “Ghosted”, as some like to call it.

Fast forward a year or so. I go to visit friends. We see one another, kind of thought we hit it off, again…and we were wrong – again. Everything was exactly as before [as it usually is...] and the living situation he was in was more than I could even take. There really wasn’t enough Hennessey, Mary Jane or Insanity for me to think that anything other than a brief period of playing “friends” would ensue. The Boxer, was one of my first lessons on a few accounts. First off – ex’s are EXACTLY that for a reason. You came to your senses once, why go back and play the fool again? Silly, silly girl. Second, You can always tell how crazy a man can get without doing a thing. Just watch him in public when other men are checking you out. ha! Third and emphatically not the last of many, but, listen to your gut. If it tells you the situation you got yourself into, isn’t right, then do what you have to, to fix it. So I made sure he couldn’t find me, even if he really, really tried.

Three years later I end up back at the place we met,  with a few friends, celebrating my birthday. He sees me and a huge smile crosses his face; my heart stops beating and I stop breathing. Bee-lining for me, he exclaims how happy he is to see me, how he has such great news, and how I look amazing, and blah, blah, fucking blah. This whole situation comes much to my surprise, since last I checked I had wanted less than nothing to do with him or his lunatic antics.

While I’m picking my jaw up off the floor, he informs me he’s knocked up some bimbo, and they’re naming their daughter after me. Commence jaw back on the dirty fucking floor.

For some time I couldn’t think. I couldn’t say anything. I couldn’t react. And then…

I thanked him. And then told him he was a fucking idiot. Really? You cheat on me, call me names, drag me through the dirt, stalk me, lie to me, lead me on, and then name your crazy bastard love child after me because my name supposedly means “beautiful or flower” in some cultures and in others, it means Goddess.

It disgusts me to even think of what his definition of a “Goddess” really is. When it comes to him, mine is obvious. I hope that little girl with my name teaches him how he was a horrible man the majority of his life, and  once he sees the men she starts bringing home, that are just like him, I have a feeling, something will finally click.

Not all is really fair…in love and war.

xs

Anti-Valentine

We dated ten years ago. Back then, well, I was still me, just more reckless with short boyish hair and an attitude  bigger than a motorcycle club, and balls bigger than China, with not a care in the world, and he, was still the same as he is now. Difference is, I bettered myself. He…well…he didn’t.

We met haphazardly through friends and the ever-growing 1990′s rave scene. We shared common interests…like drugs. music. beer. liquor. sex. Normal teenage stuff. I moved him out a state or two over, and we moved almost immediately into a studio apartment in crack-central-white is the minority-run down up-state New York neighborhood. We shared 2 months of teenage angst and bliss. Drinking. Smoking. Fucking. Fighting. Doing what us east-coasters do best. Then along came Valentines day, and I apparently came to my senses. I kicked his loser ass out onto the street where he belongs…and got my karma three fold.

That night, I went out with a few “friends”. Namely: The Rapist. The Cop. And the Girlfriend. We met at an establishment on one of the main roads in the shitty New York town I once lived in. I myself was still way under age to be drinking…(take that po’!) but proceeded to get drunk enough to forget the events from earlier in the night. One thing leads to another and me and the Girlfriend are in the back of the SUV making out. We are driven by the half-hard, sweaty, and anticipating men in the front seats. Next comes the blackouts. I remember being in the house. Blackout. I remember me and her making out. Blackout. Cop is leaving, with Girlfriend in tow, by the arm. Blackout. Rapist is on top of me. Blackout. Clothes are partially off. Blackout. He’s fucking me. Blackout. He’s still fucking me. Blackout.

It’s morning. Everyone is gone. Except him. I gather my things and catch a cab back to my apartment-confused, hollowed and raw.

Natually,  Boyfriend packs and leaves. Only to come back a week later and fuck my roomate in the top of a parking garage (unbeknownst to me…) later proceeding to  fuck me in the bathroom before he leaves. Later that week…and I find out about them, and kick her out. (I hear she ended up joining the military. Great place for a whore.)

Fast forward 7 years. The Boy and I randomly run into eachother in a strip club I happened to work at for a number of years. There’s no hard feelings. Everything is great. We make my ex-fiance jealous all night long, catch up on old times, I meet his brother. We exchange numbers…and lose touch when I briefly revisit hell with the ex, and he was  seemingly brainwashed by some nasty crack-whore that goes by Kermit.

Three long tumulous years later, I’m in Colorado living my dream and happen upon his “single” myspace. (yes, it ruins lives.) We meet up, hit it off right away, and the Boy is talking marriage. Wants me to meet his kids. Move in. Start a life. Spits  all sorts of fun psycho-delusional stuff about spending his life with me and blah blah…two weeks into it, this Boy gets wasted. Unsuccessfully attempts to fight everyone in sight. I take him out of the bar and bring him to food. The Boy starts throwing plates and storms out of the resturant. Takes off into the cold winter streets with nothing but a shirt covered in angst and an ego the size of Jupiter. Two telephone numbers engrained into his vodka soaked brain. His roomate, and his ex, Kermit The Coke-Whore. I drive, nervously around the city, cops at every decrepid street corner, in an illegal car with no license, bums sleeping on street corners screaming for change in their sleep…for hours. I give up around 2am and head to the house. He calls the roomate, hours later, crying of frostbite and bitter residual resentment and is informed he isn’t the King of this world, at this moment. Who wants to talk to someone that acts like a five year old? He diverged-instructed us to “go fuck ourselves” and hung up the phone.

Three in the afternoon, the next day, he swaggers through the door, “Hey, babe…” escapes his lips, and he is out the door to work 30 minutes later-silent. That night, after he comes home and I question his where-abouts…he avows to his demise. Yes, he did in fact call Kermit The Coke-Whore. Yes, in fact, The Coke-Whore did come pick his Loser Cheating ass up at the gas station, where any Real Woman in her right mind would’ve left him. Yes in fact, he could’ve chosen to sleep on the floor (when asked about the couch, someone was conviently on it.), yet he *chose* to sleep in her bed. “With my clothes on, nothing happened I swear!”

Ha! Little foolish Boy, that thinks he’s playing the Game of Hearts. With his in the gutter and mine behind a lock. [Come now, and for once don't disappoint us with your idiosyncratic, detrimental stupidity.] So the next day, the Boy thinks it seemingly logical to purchase a new battery for my car, ten minutes before letting me in on his attempted master plan to break my heart.

Apparently, the Boy told me all that bullshit because that is what he “thought” I wanted to hear. Excuse me but where did I stamp “stupid woman wanting to be pregnant and barefoot and completely miserable while my husband cheats on me and brings me an std that I have to live with for the rest of my life” on my fucking forhead? He quite possibly could be considered insane, which is where his fault would lie. Yet, I don’t think anyone is really stupid enough to believe that….now if my assumptions are correct, doesn’t it make much more sense that he put me through all that nonsense for nothing short of his temporary revenge of our past. Oh no, I refute. I think he’s just a stupid little Boy.

Weeks later, he’s found in an establishment, talking trash about me being the one that was moving too fast, and “he’d still be with me, but it was all too much”. Will someone please inform this delusional fool that asking someone to marry you, is moving fast.

Lessons learned: Ex’s are that for a reason-let go of the past. Little Boys rarely grow up. They never just “sleep in a bed with their ex and not fuck them” -please don’t kid yourself.

Kill Your Girlfriend

I stared to the ceiling curious and anxious…hanging on each word as my longtime friend divulged on a situation that happened while I was on an emotional sabbatical 6000 miles from home. After I left silently. After the hell I endured. The seemingly never-ending tears. The frantic claustrophobic pain. The deception and the lies. After it all I saw him. The side I had been digging through for 9 grueling months. And it sickened me, more than anything before it. I felt my muscles tense as a nervous chuckle escaped my lips….my brain turned chaotic. I numbly watched the smoke curl up to that blank ceiling as the psych student in me began analyzing every frame, every angle.

This is his story…through my eyes, of how he wants to kill me.

My ex is quite the closet lunatic and sometimes people realize this on first impression. Others, it takes awhile to slice through his charm and passion into the hollow depths of his pathologically deceptive life. He has a psych file the size of most convicted felons’ rap sheets. And I’m sure his rap sheet from his childhood was no better….before the military thought it a splendid idea to turn him into a heavily trained sociopathic, manically delusional, killing freak of nature.

I had never really feared him, 6’2″, 220 lbs – on a good day, of mostly solid muscle. Until the day he methodically missed my face and hit the door. Unknowingly with good reason. I mean, that military career would be something great to waste on my face, no? After that the “love” faded, my anger simmered, my mind became that of a calculated hit-man and my fear, well it turned to jaded, bitter, cautiousness mixed with resentment and rage.

So I’m sure you can understand my utter disbelief (for no good reason) at the story that slithered out of my friends mouth. Word after word oozing onto the floor and surrounding me like a black hole. The familiar black hole of the lies and deception and fake façade of everything I knew. As she finished, the disturbing imagery set in…..

It began a little something like this:
The stage where I’ve watched so many of my favorite bands re-shred their hearts; their souls. The bar where I’ve played pool for years and drank some of the best beer around, with friends. MY friends…from my hometown…where he doesn’t belong. He’s on that stage belligerent, foul, growling. Looking ominous, heart broken, angry and lost. Screaming into the night veins pulsing and exploding with every wail, screech, and chant. Resonating with the voices of his fallen camaraderie, pure self expression is found. The smell of stale PBR and vomit, lingering like his naive girlfriend. He’s center stage, mic in hand, no one expecting that grotesque, whorish, latex, blow up doll (which is presumably all he thinks of women). She’s covered in the war paint of our past. My distinct permanent markings adorning her cold plastic flesh. The crowd watches in awe as he hoists her up by the caution-tape noose he lovingly fashioned for her. The music starts…loud, hurtful, mnemonic, pulsing through the building and there he is, screaming like a wounded wolf, slashing at the make shift flesh in front of him. Wishing openly that it was my heart he would later eat instead of being left with the empty metaphor. I can see inside of this deranged thoughts, while he’s screaming “KILL YOUR GIRLFRIEND!!!!!!!!!!!!!”, fully believing that this was MY doing. He was looking deep into her hollow eyes, his gaze transfixed, envisioning me staring back in fear. Without blinking he thrusts his fist into the only part of her that he wants to bleed, rhythmically, smiling a drunken hate smile, never quite realizing the reality of his actions. Just like a child – mid tantrum. He threw my mangled pseudo remains into the crowd for them to devour like ravenous hyenas…..

And I wonder…did he fuck that poor unsuspecting doll before the show for one last “HOO-RAH!”? Verbally defiling me, his new imaginary coping mechanism. Is that what he would do to me if given the chance? Climb through my window in the dead of night. Stealthy like a sniper and fist fuck me while he’s punching me in the face with the other hand? Shredding me physically as if the mental wasn’t enough. Only to discard of my soul like it was nothing…..