I was with my people. Some of them. Tangentially at first, like an audience or a detached journalist, but closer in later, until i became myself, one of them, a leader. A lady kind of like rehanna was walking around with me, talking to someone else about theaters, and which ones they used to use, and which ones were still in use, she said, call me if you need anything, leave a message. I said here? Cuz i thought she meant her phone would ring over here on the sidewalk at this old theater/auditorium. Ha ha, she said, no, the phone rings in my office. Okay. I was with my people, they were mostly young. Energized. Smart. Reaching out. Showing some skin. Lots of beautiful female legs. Gender was somewhat fluid. We were gestating this idea, having this baby of an idea about a massive writers workshop but it was also a gathering, a festival, a show. And it was turning into i was the leader of it. The day came and we were in a stone auditorium, like an amphitheatre but bigger, in the middle of the area our people were coming from. And they came. From everywhere, young and old, male, female, even more journalists. And i started walking around, hopping from level to level, feeling the stone under my feet. The microphone lady was there with a bullhorn but i called her microphone lady. She was trying to get people to do something a certain way or listen a certain way but i called down to her, it’s all right. Thank you but it’s okay. Can i have the microphone please. Can you please pass it up, and they did. They passed it to me but i didn’t even need it to keep making my speech. At one point i could tell i was kind of losing them, losing a little steam, so i got back on track. I was talking about writing. There were three things but the one i remember landing on was this: be honest be honest be honest. We were doing it. We were a team, they were my troops, and it was happening. There was katy and maybe a kind of taelin in a room and i wanted to suck someone. Katy at first said no but then said okay maybe just a little. The taelin figure kind of shadowed this activity or feeling somewhat. Katy was looking a little self conscious, maybe diffident, her skin was a bit pink and imperfect. I was still slightly on fire from the contact with my people, and the girls’ legs. Amm was back, it was some kind of arrangement, she was back in my house, she tried to make me feel guilty about being up here all by myself having all these thoughts and dreaming all this sexuality, she said you must have fun up there, all by yourself, and i said yeah, sometimes. I was writing or something, maybe even dreaming, and later i heard her sobbing, and self-recrimination tore out of her, it seemed so awful and sincere. I went down to her, i was a bit slow and heavy but it felt right to go to her. She was on the floor. I gestured come here for a hug, she said no, wearing glasses like nancy’s for some reason. I said okay. I touched her hand. I said I commend you for not giving up. I commend you for not giving up. I honor you for not giving up. She breathed heavier. I left, i didn’t leave, we were higher up in the house perhaps. I commend you for not giving up. She licked my hand. She was plump and ready, i was being drawn in. We came up close together, skin on skin. It was later maybe. I was standing, she was sitting. She looked like a man with a hollow expression, severe, old fashioned clothes, a desperation reddening her eyes, I pointed directly, electrically across the space between us; the connection was formed, the direct conduit was live and real. I said I commend you for not giving up. Do you hear me? A little later, I didn’t know for sure if I was talking to her or to me or to someone else altogether. She was by me, under my chest, half reclining. She turned tan, hollow, chitinous, a charred exoskeleton. I commend you for not giving up. But you have to listen to me. I can help you. She smiled a demon smile, her tongue flicked, I wanted to writhe and beg and hump and suck. Yes, I moaned, destroy my soul, as we kissed a desperate demonic kiss, and it turned literally to her shit in my mouth, my tongue was probing an insect anus of the demon that she was. I woke up and felt chills because it felt as if she had surely really heard me when I said, I commend you for not giving up. But did a repentant soul hear me? Or a maniacally laughing demon, whose laughter was mirthless, whose regret was a calculated ruse? Or was I actually talking to myself? Forgot to mention when i was writing in my journal before, another thing peggy said: it seems like you get to a certain place, and then you undermine yourself.