Author: Jgd

I am more logical than have been given credit for.  I am more logical than you understand.

My mother when I was just seventeen or so said the kind of car I should have is an MG.  I immediately said no.

Now, I wonder whose idea it was that I should have an MG hers or someone else?

I immediately said no because I was so aware of my financial position.  How was I going to pay for parts and service on a foreign car?  This was the 80’s service stations were different.

My finances said I was not an MG, I was a slightly used stock factory car still under warranty and original parts.

My personality however, is a convertible MG.  Zipping around town, I would be so cute.

Is this why the pastor at Harborside drove a convertible?  He told a story of his son playing basketball getting a bloody nose with friends, using his shirt to stop the blood.  He stopped for gas on his way home throwing the shirt with blood in the trash where someone at the station called the cops believing he had done a crime and was getting rid of evidence.

I just looked at my pastor when he told me this story.  It felt just like a story and nothing more.  It’s one of those moments where you say to yourself, how do they want me to respond to them?  In a normal conversation you don’t say that to yourself.

Do they want me to forget that I saw David Wolfe (2012 or so) in a car in front of me sitting in the middle of the back seat?

Day 1,551.

I am exhausted.  I am on my third day of non-stop writing that I must get done before I get to my paying job or I get yelled at.

What’s my job?  Because I don’t know anymore.

So far today I have been writing non-stop for eight hours, and I still have a massive list a mile long to accomplish.  I am so tired I was unable to bathe yesterday.  That’s bad.  That is a bad sign.

Since I am having trouble writing about food still this is going to be different – again.

When I had placed my mother in her nursing home I started to do things I had longed to do like go to the beach.  I went to the Ringling Museum in Sarasota.  I could spend days if not weeks with all the artwork they have there.  I took some wonderful photos while there.  I went to Fantasy of Flight, did the zip-line, and harnessed to a wire while climbing a tower stories in the air.  Things I had been wanting to do for years.

The property I had written about previously with the outdoor room built from reclaimed wood I am keeping.  Adding more details.  I have several rescued animals on this property besides my cats.  Horses, dogs, donkeys, some goats, and bird feeders throughout.

In this outdoor room I’ve made a glass wall out of wine bottles that have been enjoyed, epoxied together.  Creating beautiful colors in the sunlight, every so often taking more bottles, creating more colorful light to the wall.

I want to move on.

I want another job.

I am tired and spent.

And disgusted at the moment.

To me both sides International door, pressure washing, and spraying is exactly the same as the US side door.  It does, they both are exactly the same thing.  Why would I choose one over the other?  They are exactly the same.

I do not understand the weight gain.  It is not funny.  I do not understand why anyone is EVER allowed to enter my home when I am not at home while I am at work, or any other time.

What is my job?

I want another job.  I want to be able to move on.

Day 1,550.

This one is a little different from my usual Coffee and Breakfast’s.  This is one I made up in my head while working.  The part about God’s Throne is true.  When I visited Dominica, I looked out over the ocean thinking to myself it could be God’s Throne the area held such feeling only to turn around and see a government official – like a Governor – historic home.  Many times, before I have talked about how when I visited Dominica it still felt like the French and English had used the island and its people like a soccer ball.  Back and forth.

This story could be better, I am exhausted from all the work.  The book bar I wish I could write it the way I saw it in my head, but it takes time to flesh out details for writing.

My wish is that is does some justice in creating a memory and memories.

We were having trouble.  We were no longer talking any more.  We no longer loved each other anymore.  You went your way, and I went mine.  Love was only a four-letter word.  It was no longer felt between me and you.

How I loved you like no other.  Every man would have been jealous, mad, and wanting had he know how and to the depth that I loved you.

We hopped in the car you and me.  Taking a trip with no course.  Making our way hoping to reconnect and remember why we ever loved each other to begin with.

Up the coast, we drove.  Up the northeast coast, and just drove, and drove, and drove.  Like strangers who had never touched.  Driving.  In and out of the car.  In and out of the gas stations.  Hotels.  Moving, so we didn’t have to feel.

Filling the hours together, I would every so often tell you frivolous bits of information that you believed annoyed you when you really longed for me to tell you.  Every time I started to tell you something relief would wash over you like your whole body and being waited expectantly for me.

Then, there was that seaside town, small and quiet, full of character.  We walked around discovering the shops and businesses.  Was it me or was it you who saw it first?  The building of such distinction we walked over to it wondering what it was.

We walked into the best bar, didn’t we?  Books and books everywhere.  Two-stories high of nothing but books up to the ceiling.  Little niches and nooks for private reading with a beer or beverage of choice.  If you wanted to read a book you had to order it.  The barman would get on the railed ladder and grab the book of choice.  What ambience.  We had to walk around the whole bar before we sat down together.  Windows and light.  Filtered light.  Sofas, leather chairs, bar stools, and outdoor benches.  A bar unlike any other.

We sat together in the oversized leather chair, each with something to read and a beer.  Reading, you had your arm around me and I leaned in for the smell of you.

Going for a walk along the beach before sunset with the wind in my hair, playfully, I jumped on your back making you laugh again.  I did always like the sound of your laughter.

There was a clearing on a cliff that looked interesting.  We walked up the long winding wooden staircase to get there.  At the top there was a vista over-looking the ocean.  I said it looked like God’s Throne when we turned around and saw the Governor’s historic house.  Now wonder they built a home here.  You could see for miles and miles.

Talking away about something I turned to face you with the sun at my back.  The light shone through my hair creating a halo about me.  It was here you fell in love with me for the last time.

It was the picture you held onto the rest of your life.  Me beside that tree, the sun at my back, my hair softly blowing in the breeze, the sun shining through my hair.  You took my face in your hands kissing me as though you could never get enough of me.

For clarification, I was and am upset about the bulking of my food that was delivered to me.  The reason for me writing about not wanting to go on a fast.  It felt intentionally done, bulking me.

I believe my phone signature delivery person was chosen by Michelle Obama because I, Cherith Gjestland am a nice person.  So was the person who delivered my alcohol.  It has nothing to do with the color of her skin, clothing, or anything else.  The Russian t-shirt connection.

While working at Disney there was a white woman who worked in Guest Services who spoke to me several times about her bad experience of having dated a black man.  She was extremely emotional about how he had ruined her credit, on and on.  As soon as she started telling me not to date a black man, I stepped back in my brain.  This is not the time or the place to have such a conversation.  Since, she was so emotional I let her speak.  It seemed she needed to get it out.  That was more important to me than correcting her.

I disagreed with her in my head while letting her talk.  I started avoiding her after a few times of the same conversation.

This has to do with Chocolate Chip.

This has to do with the job audition in Orlando when I was a teen-ager for voice-over work.  There was someone else in the “room” while I was speaking to this agent about work.  I didn’t understand the job because someone else was present.  I understood the job to be about one thing, then when I got there they said it was something different from what I thought it was.  At the time I believed that is what threw me and why I said no.  However, I think now there was someone else watching.  That is what threw me.

My mother’s car accident and trial.  I was reading the abridged version of Princess Bride.  We prayed before it was to convene, and the lawyer flipped his lid and yelled at me and everyone for praying.  Swaying the jury or something.

Princess Bride, “I must know who you are.”  “Get used to disappointment.”

Any man who gives himself a nickname like Chocolate Chip cannot be taken seriously.  He had one of the best Mufasa voices.  People used to remark about it all the time.

I am not sure it was a date or not.  It seemed to me more like friends agreeing to meet and eat together.  Because a man plans a date, asks the woman, and pays for the meal.  This is how I see it.  We went to Cirque together and ate at The Contemporary.  I like the restaurant because it is open and has lots of openness about it.

I do not recall exactly what happened when the bill arrived at the table.  I paid and told him, he could get the bill the next time we went out.  I did this all the time with friends.  There was something weird about the bill.  If it was a date, he would have paid.  There was just something weird about it.

To me the date, the meal had nothing to do with what the woman in Guest Services spoke about.  Because it didn’t apply to me.  Nor did Chip apply to me.  The date felt like work.  I had to work to make conversation.  A man I want to date and have in my life should not feel like work.  Conversation should happen, naturally.  It should not be forced or contrived.

Also, Stuart talked too much for me to be interested in him as a potential relationship.  Not every moment should be filled with words and conversation.  It is nice to be in the presence of a man and not have to speak just to fill the air.

The strong, silent type.  This was said to me by my work husband at WORSHIP.  I enjoyed talking to him.  He told me that is the kind of man I need and like and it is true.  It is the kind of man I connect with.

To be clear, I want to be able to wear make-up to work.  However, if I must skip make-up to make sure that I am writing a justice than as a matter of priorities it is more important that a justice is made than my vanity is saved.  Still, I miss the person I was at The Container Store before I knew everything was faked.  Did my make-up, worked-out, got to wear and go wherever I wanted, etc.

I believe it was David Wolfe listening on June 25, 2018 and they put it to a vote and my supervisor was outed.  Or was that put in my head?  Or is it not true at all?

To be clear, If I was living with a man, or married to a straight man, I would not allow him to see me doing certain maintenance beauty things.  There should be some mystery in a relationship.  Do not read too much into this.  It is a truth.  How else can romance be kept alive if every detail under a microscope is known?

Bruno was the name I gave the dog I had.  He was the most beautiful dog.  I don’t remember what breed he was.  I barely remember anything else about Bruno.  Blocked memories (that is what it is called) to keep bad away.

Gorbechev was the name I gave one of the ducks because of the markings on his head while living in Oldsmar. I don’t need to share the name of the apartments.

This is not for reproduction, not every victory is won like a Hollywood movie.  The moment I paused when my fiancée asked me if I would ever date a black man, he went away from me never to return.  He went away in spirit.  I became disgusting to him.  He still had sex with me.  But, he soon found another woman to live with.

That kid at Hilton who smelled of must, or musty, or mildew, something along those lines I would talk to, however he is the kind of kid who sass’s his mother, he is not always polite, and at times kind of mean.  He is not a bad person, he is just not the best kind of person.

Patty, my supervisor at Disney – seriously, what the fuck is wrong with you people – who got engaged to a man who did not have a job who used to be a VP of a company and no longer worked.  He was living off of her salary.  In my head, I didn’t like the relationship.  He should be the provider or at least working.  Also, he needed to have a hip surgery.  She spoke about masturbation while in a supervisory meeting.  I had no idea how to respond to such inappropriateness other than to not say anything in response.

For me it is important my husband or boyfriend is the provider.  I don’t want to make more money than him.

Did a person purposefully disable my filtered water forcing me to drink alcohol as a way to hydrate?

Why would such conversations be important to you people?

Sunflower seeds.  Shelled sunflower seeds.  My grandmother had an enormous bag of sunflower seeds in their camper when they visited us in Oregon one trip.  This is how I remember her.  My poor grandmother who after becoming a Christian stopped wearing make-up and listening to records.  She threw out 45’s.  I got to keep a compact of hers that still had powder and puff in it.  I remember how fine the powder was.

I used to cough with my asthma in Oregon.  I disliked running track in Oregon.  The cold, damp air used to make me sick.  I got bronchitis at least once a year.  The PE teachers always acted like I was making up a problem with running, however one time it felt like a lance (true story) had opened a hole in my chest.  I laid on the side of the track after running trying to catch my breath.  These are just coincidences to the movie, I believe and nothing more.

What’s my job?

I’m exhausted!

Keeping secrets is not the same as communicating discreetly.  There is a risk and possibility of disrupting work and processes.  Please, do not endanger and risk the lives of others by thinking otherwise.  Somethings are a need-to-know basis.

Chris = Christ without the T or cross, CH – is – R, R – is – CH, take the letter R turn it upside down it is a symbol, legs upside-down, his, RC (cola)or CR (this could be a symbol) or C his R and vice versa, IRS, CH, on and on and on.

DARE – ER – AD, or ER, Da as in yeah, yes, Are, D, Dear, Read, I could go on.

The letter W, two V’s. A V can be a symbol for legs.

An M is a W upside down.  A W is an M upside down.  Together they are six points, the star of David is a six-pointed star.

Spoo = poos, as pooh bear – think, think, think, I think I’ll have a pot of honey, or defecation.

C M ducks

M R not ducks

O S they are

C M wangs

Well, I’ll B M R ducks.  This is something my father showed me many years ago, I don’t think I remember the code exactly.  At the time I told him it was funny, I remembered it all these years.  I believe my father had help with this.  As I used to sit by the pond at our apartment complex and feed the ducks, watch the otters and think a place where I was not living in an apartment.  Also, I saved the tree closest to our apartment.  I would take water to it everyday as it was just a sapling and still in danger of not growing roots deep within the earth and soil.

Marry me = Y, why, ram, me, R, upside-down legs.  YR, Your, AM – morning, REM – rapid eye movement.  M.E, medical examiner, YR, your, ram.

On and on and on.

Full of ideas.

I have always been full of ideas.  When I was at HCC, I believed it was not a smart move for the campus (the commissary) to shut-down in the afternoon.  Why not stay open for students to stay on campus, work, study, buy food, and feel a part of the school?  There was never enough involvement or involving of the students.  It was run as a commuter campus, shuttle students on and off atmosphere.  There was money to be made, let alone memories.

Naturally when I started going to Thespis Society meetings, I had ideas.  One of them being t-shirts.  I created, designed, and had t-shirts made for the Thespis Society members.  It was a way of advertising to other students if they did not know there was such a thing as the Thespis Society on campus.  It was a way of creating involvement.

David Wolfe had to butt in on my idea.  Pun intended.  Because he wanted long-sleeves with a mock-turtle neck, and I thought short-sleeved t-shirts were enough.  He went with me to the t-shirt printing place.  I did the research, calculated the costs, I found the place that could screen the t-shirts from my design.  I did everything, and David wanted in on it.

When David and I went to the screen printing shop, the man told me they could also embroider the shirts.  Another idea.  There were positions in the Thespis Society, President, Vice-President, and Treasurer.  Why not have the students who held those positions names and positions embroidered on the shirts?

Because David butted in, I did not dismiss his idea, I put it to a vote.  I asked the rest of the Thespis Society to vote on what they wanted.  The vote was for both short-sleeved t-shirts and mock turtleneck long-sleeved shirts.

Was it David’s idea for the t-shirts or was someone talking through David?

In designing the t-shirts, I decided black was to be the color because this was theater, not television or film.  I wanted an iconic image for the Thespis Society.  What is more iconic in theater than Shakespeare?  Does anyone remember Sir Ian McKellen on BBC America’s Graham Norton Show speaking about the English deaf sign for Shakespeare?  I remember.  What is the most iconic Shakespearean play?  Hamlet.  How many Shakespeare plays can you name?  Everyone knows Hamlet.

At our home the office was in the garage, there was a drafting table, multiple desks, and assorted pens, pencils, many varieties of paint, all kinds of things.  I took the Japanese calligraphy pen and started drawing.  I had in mind the scene from Hamlet where he is holding the skull it is the quintessential Shakespearean moment.  It is everything that is Shakespeare in that scene.

There were only a few drawings before I drew the skull and crossed scrolls underneath the skull that were used on the t-shirts.  The skull happened to be facing left.

Now, do you wonder why I told you that story to tell you about Sherlock Holmes?  Puzzle pieces.  In the episode between John Watson and Irene Adler in A Scandal in Bohemia.

Irene = I, Rene, David Wolfe at least once at The Container Store.  Is this why there were t-shirts as part of the uniform at The Container Store?  Irene Adler = AI.  Artificial Intelligence. IA = the abbreviation for Iowa, “if you build it they will come” Field of Dreams.

John Watson, Jon is my brother’s (who is gay) middle name.  My brother was used to get access to me, my whereabouts, my likes and dislikes, so you see the line from the show, Irene Adler says, I know what she likes.

The heavy-set woman who brings John Watson to Irene Adler is me from another time in my life.

Bohemia, La Boheme, the opera, Bohemian Rhapsody by Queen, on and on.

The naked scene between Irene Adler and Sherlock Holmes is me, Sherlock Holmes is me.  People were uncertain I knew where to look.  I did.  This is “my jaw doesn’t come unhinged”, he was a real man.

It is nearly every man’s fantasy of a woman beauty and brains to match, Irene Adler.

Sherlock Holmes and Mycroft Holmes where Mycroft is overweight, Mycroft is me from another time in my life.

To be clear, I was not a binge eater.  Here is another reason why I am denied access to food and water at work.  When I was overweight, I would go hours and hours without eating, sometimes I would go a whole day from five in the morning until nearly ten at night before I had eaten anything.  My metabolism got way screwed up.  Along with other things.

When I did my head work to go on my diet, one thing I did was to prepare and plan my food it’s a brain thing.  I had it planned, it made way in my head for other things.

“Tell him you’re not dead” is about my t-shirt design, the skull.  It is about David, and acting, performing, and singing.

I auditioned for Southern Methodist University at Dr. Phillips High School in Orlando, Florida on Turkey Lake road for their acting program.  I was the last person of the day to audition.  I saw it in his eyes as soon as he looked at me, I was not going to be invited to the school.  It was recorded.  I looked at the camera while auditioning a monologue, he asked me to sing something I had not been prepared to do.  I sang a Christmas carol of some kind.  I was so depressed by it I went to Blockbuster on the way home and rented movies.

I doubt the man was from the University that is the reason for my depressive response.  Because I could not understand exactly who this man was.

There are only so many times you can audition, not book the jobs, and continue.  To be clear, I have never been hired, nor been under any understanding that I was hired to act or perform since 2012.

I could go on and on and on.  It is difficult to dissect these pieces that I understand.  I dissect them so that they can be understood by those who are reading.

This dissecting is like working in a room, then having to write an exact play by play of every moment.  It doesn’t work that way in real life.  Talk about time-consuming.

I knew and was aware while sitting at the Starbucks café in Barnes and Noble that my conversation was being listening in upon.  I was not aware that my friend was partially in on it at the time.  I repeatedly remarked about how much I liked The Scandal in Bohemia episode of Sherlock.  I liked the episode without having to think about it.  Probably because of brainwaves about the script.

Drake – was probably the supervisor at the time, or it could have been edited into my version to keep me from wanting to write about Benedict.  And, nothing more.  It is extraordinarily gracious of Benedict Cumberbatch – BC – to create such a character and show, as well as, the creators and writers and so on.  Basing a character from my weight loss.

Most likely this is only a small portion of everything that is there.

On and on, and on and on.

Day 1,549.

It is time for a party.

I would ask for your forgiveness in the lateness of this writing, however, I know it will be understood how I’ve had to take the time to teach manners, respect, and the importance of priorities.  It is more important than some ill-claimed, teacher’s task list.

Tell me I’m wrong.  I dare you.  Tell me I am wrong when I see greatness.  I dare you.  I fucking dare you.

When I see a man, I see his town, his village, his people, his community, and his belief in his people and town that it is great and important so much so that it makes me want to tell the world.  If this man believes in his people, then I am interested, and I want to share with you.

When we lived in Gresham, Oregon we used to have block parties and International parties that my mother used to organize.  We had parties where we used to go from house to house, each house having a different international dish, national origin, and course.  Why do we live in a world where that does not exist anymore?

Do they still have sister cities anymore?  There is a sister city to Portland, Oregon in Sapporo Japan?  I thought it was in Nagoya.  We had, hosted, entertained so many Japanese it is beyond a notice to me.  I remember visiting a home when I was still single digit young that was apart, yet off a lumber yard property that was in Japanese style and function.  It was so unique, I so admired the function of this home and garden it is still present in my mind.

Both my mother and father were teachers, as far as I know my father is still teaching.  My brother is a teacher.  They were and are teachers that their students liked, admired, and wanted to be in their classes.  Do you know, understand, and appreciate how difficult a job being that kind of a teacher is?

My family has nothing to do with the “teaching” that has been done to me these years in this house.  None.  There is a difference.

My father worked with main-frame computers and taught ESOL.  My mother had more jobs than I can remember.  One of them being working with refugees.  I don’t know how many times I’ve told this and written this story – this is how I grew up with Internationals as though they were no stranger than a neighbor.  It is the best way I know how to be brought up in this world.

For reference and understanding, when working at The Container Store, Marvin and Rene talked about the show Duck Dynasty.  A great burden and heart-break to my mother who arrived in this country through legal means, worked her way nearly starving to death broke for years had difficulty from personal experience trying to reach refugees who arrived at this country, the United States of America believing what they saw on television as real.

Dynasty was a television show, not real life.  Having to convey to refugees the difference was – to say the least – a strain upon my mother.  See if you can catch the difference, see the meaning, and connection.

True story, my mother was approached by an animator wanting her to be a model for him.  If you saw her photos from that time you could understand.  My mother, I am sure was uncertain of his intent or she would have accepted.

My father who worked the night-shift with the main-frame computers when I was growing up, I was grateful when he moved to Florida and started working a dayshift.  There is a difference.

When I was a teen-ager walking up the stairs of our home, my father who was in the kitchen listening to a tape recording turned the corner to look at me.  A tear running down his face.  I had never before seen him cry.  He was listening to the recording of his father’s funeral in South Africa.

My father, I have always seen as a man who identifies himself as a black man.  If you know South African white men, you would understand.  I told this story to Denzel Washington, or who I believed was DW at the time.  There is a bond unlike any other I have ever seen or witnessed between South African white men and South African black men.  It is as great as any brotherhood, it is a bond and friendship so special it cannot be denied.  It is not the same as it is here in the States.  It is different.  It is great.  It is spectacular.  I am so grateful that my father – if he was unable to share anything else – provided me with the knowledge that color knows no difference in the hearts of men.

One family we knew from my mother’s work with refugees was from Sri Lanka.  The mother made a tomato salad dish, I have not forgotten.  Simple, tomato wedges, red onions, parsley, and salt and pepper.  I would add a splash of EVOO, I would make sure the salt and pepper were freshly-ground.

Let’s have a block party closing the streets down, or a park, or a theater, or a beach, or a pool, or anywhere.  Around the world everyone have a party.  Neighbors, families, friends, strangers, people uniting to create a moment and moments that will last a lifetime, and hopefully beyond.

Let’s everyone bring a dish.  Let’s everyone join in bringing light, happiness, joy, peace, understanding, love that passes all understanding, join hands in prayer or silence.  Let us all have a party bringing our own dish.  Let us all share in joy.  Let us all share in the big boom that is greater than any weapon man or woman could think of – the love of man-kind.

Bring the dish if it is only in your mind, mind’s eye, or thought, the thought that brings man to the brink of his greatness – the strength and bigness of his heart.

And, let’s party.

Let’s party with Internationals from around the world if the only way that is possible is in our own mind for one single second!

Let’s enjoy man-kind through food, hearts, and mind’s.

Let’s all of us believe if only for one second that man-kind is greater than his circumstances.

Let’s all of us believe in the importance of the moment.

I, myself want to believe in moments for the rest of my life…

And, you?

Most people watch television and movies, so they don’t have to think.  To zone-out, unwind, and destress.  I have been denied this for years when they made it a part of my job.  Any person after so many years of this would become unhappy, if nothing else, after being told what movies or shows they must see.

Trudging through a task list after working eight or ten hours straight through, no wonder I stop to watch a movie.  I don’t want to think anymore.  Why on a day off from work would I want to relax and not do work?  I must be crazy.

I am exhausted.

In addition, whatever I purchase is also a part of my job.  When I purchase an item, how I purchase an item, from what company, on and on and on and on.  Why I am not allowed any separation from work and home?  Why is it that people are allowed in my home at all?  Why is it that people are allowed to destroy my personal property like my refrigerator, dryer, my clothing, any photographs?

Modeling doesn’t work for me, what it does is push me into doing the opposite or inaction of the model.

Then, I am disgusted because I have not accomplished everything, and I am too tired to continue.

Ugh!