The Cult of Personalities

          I've been thinking a lot about my other personalities - the ones I left at the game table decades back. I'd always thought that was a good thing. My psychologist said that was a good thing, but... since I've been writing this blog I've been facing some things I guess I normally don't think about. Things like: those personalities carried some of the best aspects of me.

What else could it be? :-O

          I didn't know that's what they were at the time. In my superstitious crazy-christian, serial-killer capitol of the world there was one term for what I had: Demon Possession. So, that's what it had to be. Only, they were too cool to be demons. They were helpful to me. Everyone said that they were helpful and protective and nice. In fact, they began to build a mythology, and their own language. Soon, before I knew it, a full-blown religion was born with symbols and special drinks and holy phrases and everything. It went beyond me and my circle of friends, too. One day, I walked into a trailer of a man I'd never met who lived in a far-away town and found him knelt before a candle with his hands in the symbol of the faith I'd somehow invented. I asked him, "You know Cassandra?" He answered, "Who doesn't?" 

       Cassandra was never a main personality of mine. She'd become a dark figure in my set of personalities - one I feared and one we desperately tried to exorcise. She kept trying to usurp the good and strong ones. Apparently this sect had made her their primary figure, though they'd adopted them all.

Cloaked people.

        I had always seen people moving, as if cloaked, wherever I was. I always wondered why. It was like another world was going on while I watched, unable to see me as I was to see them. It was interesting how their story developed that they came from another dimension. Each of us here, they said, had a counterpart there, and at night, we could visit them if we practiced enough. All my friends practiced and did rituals. I channeled their counterparts and, yes, loved ones. I became pretty well-known as a psychic. 

        Khrysti was the strong one, and a bitch. She kicked my ass a LOT and was the epitome of tough love. She got me out of bed and made me work out, go for walks - anything to keep me from being a wuss. She was my counterpart over there, according to the Mythology. I know now she was the thing that kept me going when I just couldn't. I probably wouldn't have made it through school without her. Now, no part of me makes me do anything.

          Moon was Khrysti's husband, and therefore the counterpart to my soulmate on Earth (wherever he was). He loved me, without question or reservation. He worried about me and cared for me and had no demands. He just wanted me to be happy. My psychologist said that there's a part of me who is him and feels this way about myself... but I haven't felt it. 

          Trae was the romantic. He was the poet who loved to be in love and to give love. He found beauty in people and things and wrote beautiful things about them. He came out fully when I'd met my first love, but I couldn't bring myself to admit how I felt to a woman. He beat me to it, I guess, and swept her off her feet. When I heard her go on about him I'd get so upset. Pleh. Anyway, I've written lyrics since then, but mostly from an angry, indignant place. No part of me is Trae; I'd probably make fun of him if we met.

           Venn was the intellectual. He had a great love of math and problem solving. He could have very well have been the least popular guy among my friends. A couple of people would ask for him, but geeks just weren't quite cool yet. Me? I hate math. I avoid it as much as possible. I used to love logic problems back before Venn left and now I'm kindof lost. I've studied Egyptology - the ancient Hieroglyphic language, the culture, the religion, the Pharonic dynasties, etc. I've studied World Mythology, Pirates, Old West Gunslingers, etc. etc. Like I said, I study for fun. However, there's this chunk of... logic that Venn has that I don't.

         Okay, I know that sounds silly. It all sounds silly. These are all me, or were. My husband says that I have the capacity in my brain to do what these personalities did. I'm just not sure how without splintering again. I want to raise these qualities and re-claim them, without... becoming them, and just talking about it gives me this pressure in my head that I used to get before the switch. I think next year I'll find myself a new psychologist - one who won't lie to me, and try to re-integrate some of these things.

Thanks, Blog, for making me think some.

-DC