THAT DAY

I start a small painting destined for this planet I'm building, Abyssia--a cherrytree hill dappled in petals, with a penciled, lightly built centaur sprawled in the foreground. Also add a 'taur to one of my late mom's discarded canvas scraps, depicting flowers and brush. Strange mixture of our styles.

In the evening I read Furry! (an anthology of anthropomorphic tales edited by Fred Patten). Two strike me:

• Rosettes and Ribbons by MCA Hogarth: in a society with no easy divorce and a tradition of duels, a charmer falsely boasts he's had a hot affair so his wife'll attack the girl he's set up as his lover. Figures neither will want him, no matter who wins--he'll be free. Truly nasty under his charm--he casually risks a stranger's life.
• Graduation Day by Phil Geusz. A plague called SCABS mixes species' genes. A man turns part rabbit, but comes to terms (if shakily) with his new timidity. He becomes a career advisor for other SCABS victims. One kid is an ex-football star who shrank into a small ewe. Genderbent AND species-bent! But it turns out her real problem is, her dad's abusing her. She's stayed to shield her three younger siblings. Her school overlooked obvious signs, blaming all her problems on SCABS. And our timid rabbit has to blow the whistle in the face of institutional disapproval...

THAT NIGHT

I'm in a lecture held impromptu in a basement cafeteria, like Stanford's business school. Crowded. A famous yoga teacher leads us--a tough, lean middle-aged woman. Echoing room, but she holds their attention and they keep quiet; she's heard. Says to lay down blanket and coats over the linoleum floor. We do, but it's very crowded.

I'm with friends including two or three women I don't know well; attractive. A couple of them have cynical, negative styles, but humor and strong auras underneath. Healing from hard pasts. They sit on a fallen log (?!) and talk; I join in, joke and flirt a bit. Spread a blanket nearby, in the very back of the hall.

Then a tall, slender man with a saintly aura, an advanced yoga student or instructor, greets the women on the log... by patting them on the head! They wince and look dizzy; he's doing something to their auras without their consent. Sense a smudgy charcoal twist in their auras around the sixth and seventh chakras. He's deliberately inducing headaches!

And he's not done. Hovers, and the moment any of them indulges in any negativity, he twists one hand into a mudra and jabs it at her gut or cunt and... twists. Her third and second chakras turn dim and muddy, and she doubles over with cramps.

One short woman angrily tries his own medicine back at him--the head conk, the mudra in the gut. He calmly lets her; he's quite untouched. He seems to think this proves a point--that his immunity shows spiritual advancement and authority--his right to practice aversion therapy without their consent! A cumbersome phrase for abuse. For attacks! He's quite guiltless--their negativity clouds their judgment, so he knows what's best for them.

Cold fury floods me. The next time he touches one of them I plan to stroll over and hit him hard in the face. If that provokes an attack to the head or the gut, I'll knee his balls. And then tell people "he attacked this woman and then swung at me"--characterizing his aura-curses as the aura-rape it is. This isn't teaching. It's abuse, and it has to stop now.

Won't be easy. He won't listen--why should he? He knows best; we're all corrupt.

Has the yoga teacher failed to spot this... or does she condone it?

NOTES

• Students, I stay near back: in Graduation Day, the career advisor sat in back at graduation, by the exit, so if his rabbit instincts panic, he can bolt.
• Teacher ignores righteous guy's assaults: in Graduation Day, advisor sees a dad abusing a kid. The school missed it. The dad's defiant, the kid resents his meddling (fears her siblings will suffer), and the school's mad at him for showing them up. But the kids get out, school counselors get investigated, and the rabbit gets a job offer.
• Smooth guy, abusive beneath: in Ribbons and Rosettes, a wolf invents a hot affair so his wife'll attack an innocent grad student and he'll be rid of her.
• Attractive women recovering from abuse, joking and cynical: today I recalled a play I saw on incest recovery--I got crushes on two actresses; one radiated "Fuck me but be kind!", the other was a snarly wolverine burrowing in blankets, but both were more emotionally honest than most non-abused. Or did their moods merely resemble mine?
• I've been asking my dreams about the recurring fevers I get: so I meet my illness face to face! Do the attacks have an agenda? to keep me in? single? working on art? Or is it just some opportunistic infection the tests haven't caught? Answer: a self-righteous spirit punishes trivia & ignores consequences. No practical agenda at all! Abusive and deaf to criticism--that's just more negativity to be punished with more illness.
• One further warning: even as he abused students, his aura felt clean and light! I read emotions, not thoughts, moral values or spiritual depth; and he felt just fine about his actions! I can misread others, not just myself--I see their private self-images, but what if those are delusional?
• ACTION 1: Tell this dream in therapy Wednesday. How to fight this? The dream suggests sharp counterattack, not compromise.
• ACTION 2: Go ahead with doctor's tests and the herbal program to kill any intestinal parasites or dormant infections; give this abuser no allies to work with!
• ACTION 3: Take a yoga class and talk to strange women. Be funny and cynical. Try not to punch anyone. Unless they reeeeally ask for it.

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