Xaos - Chaos Magick

Memory is a constructive process; it is not a movie play back. For instance, everytime you ‘see yourself’ in a memory, that’s a reconstuction of events.

I have only a few strong memories. I share them with you to release their importance. They’re too heavy to carry alone.

-—-

I am in my first family home. I’m making plasticine vegetables with Granma and Grandad.

I am looking at our tortoises on the swirling lounge carpet.

I am (over) feeding the goldfish.

I have just banged my head on the rough brick over-hang of our house. I am crying. (This is a reconstruction; there was no over-hang and I can ‘see myself’ crying.)

I am in our shared bedroom; one of my brothers pops his head round the door, perhaps to tell me something, perhaps looking for someone else. His head kaliedoscopes into the heads of my other family members, wheeling round and round in a whirl of colours.

I’m looking up at my mother as a crawl in the dirt. I am crying. My arm is broken. She will scoop me up.

My hands leave clean prints on the boot of my father’s car as I ‘push him off’. I’m holding back tears and smiling as he gets up to speed, but they spill out and I’m left weeping in the exhaust fumes.

I am last to leave playschool. Dad’s coming late. The manager takes me home; she has a great many soft toys.

I peek into the kitchen. My father is towering over my slumped mother. He is angry, she is crying. He tells me to get out. I return to the television where my older brother is clearly upset, but focussing on the screen. I watch TV.

My Grandparents are not allowed in the kitchen as I string scores of my potato print artworks up. The show is a huge success, but I vow to move away from vegetables.

I am making grass seed potions in the sun out the back yard.

The boy across the road says we DO come from apes. I say we don’t have a tail, he says we do, and intimates his crotch. I become incredibly British, but begin to understand Carry On films…

The girl who shares my Grandma’s name is afraid of thunder. I’m excited by the storm. I want to comfort her, but she’s a ‘naughty girl’ and I don’t know how to talk to them.

The boy next door is peeing in his garden. I worry he’ll be arrested or go to hell; but apparantly as he’s so young it’s alright.

I start school alone. I don’t know why. I am introduced to the class, sat next to the teacher.

I’m angry at the older sisters who pretend to be my friend but only so they can tease me. I decide to end our friendship and I punctuate my ‘goodbye’ by batting a stone. The stone (possibly) breaks a greenhouse window and their father (possibly) shakes his fist at me, like in cartoons. I am guilt ridden for days, weeks, months and years. I feel too awful to ask G~d for forgiveness, I only talk to H~m about H~s stuff, not my stuff.

The boy’s father(?) has given me a pigeon egg to care for. I am to keep it warm. Cruelly impossible back then in those days. I cry. He offers me a fresh egg, maybe this one will hatch. I decline. I’m a killer, I can’t be trusted.

I am playing with my teddies and the Ghost Buster HQ I have made them. The Proton Packs are OK because they are not guns.

I am looking at the sword the boy gave me. It is made out of pegs. It’s lent up against the wall and is only slightly bowed. I have willingly given up the weapon. Why play with killing weapons? Swords will be bent into ploughshears [whatever they are] and I don’t want to disappoint G~d. I stare at the component pegs. I want to hold the sword and swing it around.

A terrible nightmare wakes me with a swallowed scream. My left leg is numb from ‘the touch’. Repeats of the same experience cause my Granma to read from the Bible, leaving it open by my bed. Angels watch over me. But they must then watch my night terrors.

I have a plastic ET pencil case from my mother. We have just seen ET (possibly).

-—-

More memories than I expected, and so I end this exercise for fear of boring you.