The Whimsical World of T.L. Gray: vampires

Showing posts with label vampires. Show all posts

Wednesday, July 03, 2019

Vain Words

I heard a man tell a woman yesterday that she was very beautiful. I think it’s nice to hear a person compliment someone else. I try to compliment the people I care about on a regular basis, to not only let them know how much I care about them, but that they are important me, and I think about them, and consider them valuable. I want to encourage the good gifts I see in them. There’s not enough of that in this world. We are so quick to judge, condemn, and/or use compliments as a form of manipulation. We want to lay blame.

On the whole, as a society, we don’t value our words. We make promises we don’t keep. We profess affection we don’t actually feel. We placate, manipulate and eviscerate with our words to justify ourselves and our actions, or in retaliation of our own insecurities and pain – pushing others down because we believe it’s the only way to succeed. We are politicians, pundits, and word panderers. If we want a strong society, we need to educate in truth - even if the truth hurts, is ugly, or isn’t popular. We need discover discipline and self-responsibilities. We need honest encouragement. Simplified – we need to do the hard shit regardless of how we feel or what we want - so we can feel fulfilled and satisfied with what we want and how we live.

The problem with the aforementioned man’s compliment was this: I knew the woman he boldly proclaimed as beautiful. While she has a pretty face and thin body, she’s far from anything I would consider beautiful. She is cruel, manipulative, and has such low self-esteem and daddy issues her life is a complete mess. She’s a drama-filled, drug-addled train wreck. Not trying to be mean here, just telling the truth. I’ve known her for years, have tried to help her, but she’s a walking sociopathic disaster and doesn’t care who she hurts. I wouldn’t wish her on my worst enemy, yet I often hear her being told how beautiful she is by stupid shallow men. She has a skewed view of beauty just like the men who reinforce it.

I also saw the meme again that says, “I fall in love with souls, not faces.” I really wish that was true for most people, but it’s not. Often not even for the people who say they believe and agree with the concept. I fell in love with my ex because of that phrase, mainly because I believed he did love souls and not faces, but he was a liar. He’s just as shallow as that man who complimented that ‘pretty’ vampire (I call this type soul-suckers – people who are empty and dead inside and with their selfish narcissism will suck the life out of someone else to try and fill the emptiness within themselves). He had a beautiful soul that loved him, but it wasn’t enough. I’m not trying to lay blame, I’m just speaking truth. He wasn’t a man of his word, always made promises he didn’t keep, always had ‘good intentions’ but no action to follow. He was full of empty words, constant failure, and was undependable. I didn’t hate that he lied to me. I hated that I learned to not trust him.

I’m also not making these statements because I’m a bitter, lonely, plain Jane, jealous of the attention other women receive. On the contrary, I am told quite often by men and women that I am beautiful. Unfortunately, most of those compliments come from strangers who don’t know me and only see a pretty face. But, that compliment that comes from those who do know me, who knows my character, and who can see my soul - those words mean the world to me and have power over me and I appreciate them.

So, be careful what you say and to whom to say them. Mean what you say. Let your words have power. Be a man or woman of your word. Don’t make promises you can’t keep. Be honest. Be truthful. Be generous and look for the positive in those in your circle. Be free with your compliments (as long as they’re true) and swim in the deep waters. Get away from the shallow vampires – there’s only death there. Don’t tell ugly people they’re beautiful. Don’t tell beautiful souls they’re ugly. Don’t say the words, “I Promise” or “I Love You” unless you mean them. Our words have the power to heal or destroy, to build or tear down, to empower or to weaken. Don’t lie – even if the truth hurts – just don’t lie. Call a liar a liar, a vampire a vampire, an asshole an asshole – you might just save their soul. But if you don’t care about their soul, keep your mouth shut. The world is full of politicians and liars, don’t add to their number.

Know this …if I compliment you, I mean it.

Till next time,

~T.L. Gray

Monday, December 05, 2016

Falling in Love... Day One

I’m on a quest. It’s the greatest quest of all. It’s one I’ve accomplished before, and one I know I can and will accomplish again. I want to fall in love. I want to be excited about life, thrilled about all the great possibilities that lay ahead for me every day. I want to see the beauty in everything around me because I’m looking through eyes of beauty, eyes that know love, feel love, and exude love. That can only happen if I’m filled with love. So, I’m on a quest to fall in love again… with myself.

As much as chemistry is important, the major factor of falling in love is a state of heart and mind. Opening our minds and hearts, or also closing them, to the concept and acceptance of love is the beginning of any relationship. If we are empty of love, we cannot give what we do not possess. We then become vampires, because we have a need inside, a hole desperate to be filled, so we seek love from others around us, sucking the life out of them to feed that need, only to discover after we’ve drained them dry, the hole is still there. That’s the thing about holes… unless their patched, bottoms sewn together, mended, or sealed, everything that goes into them, drains right out the other end.

I used to be so angry at vampires, because they’re so fucking selfish. They’re so self-centered, desperate, needy, they don’t consider the damage they do to their victims. They just need the blood, the love, and so they take, and take, and take, like a junkie using everyone in their life to get their next fix. They don’t “mean” to hurt anyone, but their disease controls them. A vampire’s need for blood controls them. They use, manipulate, lie and suck those that possess any love dry of that love, and then discard them, push their empty shells out of their lives, and then move onto their next victim. And most often, these demons don’t realize they’re the vampire, destroying all the relationships in their life. Most see themselves as the victim, and most often at one time they were by another vampire.

I don’t want to be a vampire. I could very well become one. I have a huge hole in my heart, and it’s been bleeding for a while now. I can feel it turning more and more into stone day by day. I was recently so in love, probably the most in love I’ve ever been in my life. The world wasn’t magically perfect, and all my dreams didn’t come true, and all my problems didn’t disappear. On the contrary, loving this man pushed me so far outside my comfort zone and magnified the difficulties this cruel world has to offer. He’s a mess. He’s complicated. He’s damaged. He came with a lot of baggage. Yet, I would light up just to hear his voice, my stomach pitched with butterflies when I stared into his beautiful eyes, and the peace I felt when he held me calmed the deepest storms inside. He had nothing to offer me, and that meant nothing to me, because I had the greatest thing of all… love. He was my soulmate. I was so deeply, madly, crazy in love and that made me happy. I didn’t just fall in love with him, but everything that came with him. I know he loved me too, because I felt it.

I still don’t understand what happened, and I suppose now it really doesn’t matter. I may never know or may never understand why I lost that love, but I can’t allow the loss of it to turn me into a vampire. I LOVE the woman I am. I have worked hard to become her, and she is the woman that I cannot lose, refuse to lose, and will fight to keep.

So, here I am. One of the things I learned from all the marriage counseling and couples workshops I participated in trying to save my marriage, is that all relationships require constant work. ALL relationships, and that includes the one I have with myself. In essence, THAT relationship is the most important one of all. How I love myself is the key to loving other people, it effects EVERY relationship in my life.

So, to my first love, my deepest love, Tonya… I see you and I love you. I love your unending hope. I love the way you see the best in people, look beyond their weaknesses and imagine their greatest potential. I love how you defend the defenseless, and go out of your way to put a smile on someone else’s face, especially when you’re crying inside and just want to die. I love how you would give up your lunch money to make sure someone else didn’t go hungry. I haven’t forgotten the time you gave away a dress you saved MONTHS to buy to a stranger. Or how you opened your home to a pregnant woman who had nowhere to go. Even in the darkest of times, you always fought to protect, to save, even knowing you would pay the greatest of prices. I will never, never, never forget the sacrifice you made to save a little girl from the hell you lived. No one else knew the price you paid, but I remember, and I love you for it. No one ever tells you thank you, hell, they don’t even remember you, most don’t even know your real name. You gave your gifts, your talents, your love, your support, and everything you had without hesitation and no one cared. I do. I care. I know your deeds, and most of all I know your intentions, I know the motivations of your heart, and you are precious. Those are the very words God said to you, “you are precious.” Never forget them.

So, in my quest to fall in love again with myself, I am going to keep reminding myself of the person I am, and see the virtues that I believe make me beautiful, and I’m going to do this every day until I can fill that hole, ease that pain, and feel loved once more.

Till next time,

~T.L. Gray

Monday, April 04, 2016

Where the Dead Things Are

*New original short story Where the Dead Things Are© by T.L. Gray - Part One

My Mama once told me, "If a man only wants to see you when the sun goes down, he's a vampire. Baby, run away. He'll bite you, leave you all mesmerized until he drains you of everything that makes you alive, and then he'll toss you into his collection of other dead things." She told me that once while braiding my hair. I remember looking into a dirty, smoke-stained mirror, watching vacant eyes stare off at nothing with a cigarette hanging out the side of pale thin lips. I can still see those small jagged lines along the edges displaying leftover bits of dark red lip stick. She looked younger when she smiled, but she hardly ever smiled.

Of course, my wild imaginative mind took the story literally to heart and in my youthful naivety found myself fascinated with the supernatural; vampires especially. Then after Mama died a few years later, I became obsessed with stories about death. However, I look back on that moment and realize she wasn’t talking about vampires at all, not really. I never thought Mama had much sense, but as I’ve met my own sort of vampire and found myself struggling to climb out of this cavernous pit of death, I now realize she was much deeper than I ever gave her credit.

Looking down at the shimmering Vodka, I see my dark red lipstick mark along the glass lip and can’t stop Mama’s words from echoing in the deep part of my mind. How did I get here? When did I lose myself and turn into Mama? Where had my soul gone? Will I find it among all the dead things?

I can tell you the exact moment, the particular hour, the definitive minute everything changed. It all started with the sound of tires slowly crunching over gravel as he pulled into my driveway. My heart started beating so fast I thought it would literally jump out my chest. It sounded too loud and I wondered if he’d be able to hear it. I quickly checked my underarms for moisture, because I was nervous as a chicken in a fox hole. My body may have been hot, but thank goodness I was dry and smelled like fresh flowers. My cinnamon breath caught as I gasped, almost letting out a small squeal as I heard the car door open and then close again. I never heard the engine at all. It’s like he floated in on a dream.

With shaky legs, I walked out the French doors that led to my patio-porch, and then to the privacy gate. He’d parked his car just on the other side. I could see the light green hue of his exterior between the fence slats before I caught a glimpse of him. It was only a slither of a glance of one of his long, bronze skinny legs sticking out a pair of basketball shorts, but I was transfixed. I tried to calm my breath as I opened the gate, but there was no controlling it. I’d lost it completely. It evaporated from my lungs altogether when my gaze locked onto those dark, brown, mesmerizing eyes and that soft crooked smile. The setting sun behind me cast a golden spotlight on his beautiful caramel skin, highlighting his chiseled face, full lips, and aura of authority. He looked like a god bathed in glory and I felt myself wanting to fall to my knees in worship. I mean I literally felt like falling when my knees suddenly buckled beneath me. I had to grab the wooden gate to keep the ground from jumping up and slapping me in the face.

Sometimes I wonder if he knew the effect he had on me. I doubted it, but I often wondered, still do. He always had a way of bringing the hidden things out of me, and reflecting my own image back at me when I tried so hard to focus on his. He didn’t have one. He was a mystery, yet something I understood without words, without explanation, and I loved him deeply. I still do. But he left me where the dead things are, tossed me to the side once he’d drained me of all the vibrant life I had once held. But I’m not without hope, not without magic. That’s what’s brought me to this bar in the middle of nowhere. I’m trying to escape, trying to save the last bit of my soul, trying to put some distance between me and him so that I may one day find the strength to resist him, breaking the power he has over me, and crawl out of this place of dead things. He doesn’t want me, but doesn’t want to let me go either.

I threw back the shot of vodka, feeling the burn all the way down my throat and settle into the emptiness of my stomach. Alcohol on an empty stomach always hurt, but it also helped the numbness rush in faster. I glanced down at my watch and realized the sun had surely already set outside. I needed to be on my way. He’d be able to find me. If he ever found me, I know I’d never have the strength to resist him. I pulled the small wad of twenty dollar bills I’d kept in my front jeans pocket. Slapped one down on the bar and then threw back the last of three shots I’d ordered. I wiped my soft lips with the back of my shaking hand and walked out of that dead place filled with other dead people, into a city where all the dead things are. Yet, I’m a survivor, and though too faint to hear, my heart still beats.