Tick Tock Tick Tock (trigger warning)

I feel time today, more so than other days. I am aware that I am up way too early and that my body will scream for sleep again before 4pm. Pain woke me and with every breath I could feel the tick tock of the clock. I only have digital clocks around because the actual ticking sounds tend to make me want to scream when I can’t sleep. Breathe in, breathe out. Inhale. Exhale. I wonder at time.

Time for me is such a disjointed creature, not just the fast and slow but the way that memories sprout up at the oddest times. Since watching that horrible movie this week I have had to face my dangerous side. I know I am a dangerous woman. I have skills that could be used to hurt a lot of people if I wanted. Yet, I don’t think this is what makes me dangerous. Do I know how to kill you with anything at hand? Sure! Will I? Only if you start it. Only if I have to defend myself. Even then I may just let my cat protect me and I doubt I will kill you.

I am left with the images of blood on my hands. That phrasing is wrong too. The blood I see on my hands never goes away. No amount of scrubbing or washing will remove the memory from my head, or the sickening sensation as metal penetrated flesh, the thud as metal hit bone. It’s there for me always. Between the seconds, in every spare moment there is a small reminder. I feel queasy thinking on this stuff but I can’t not so I try and go with the flow.

I am burning and I am freezing as a result. I see myself from outside, but this is not disassociation because I am still here. It is merely me watching who I have become. I know blood. I know how to make several times of incidiary device, most of them on timers, one with a deadman switch though I am sure if I wanted I could modify that to fit into any other device. It’s not that hard. Then the smells would bother me, but that is another reason that I wouldn’t use those skills.

I am dangerous, but not because of those things either. I am dangerous because I choose to not kill. I choose to not destroy. I am a builder. I am the Katalyst. Everything I do is for change, and it always has been. The choice is mine if it is a positive change or a negative change. When someone angers me and I want to stab their eyes out, I don’t. Instead I try to educate them so that the next person they meet who could be as dangerous as me or more so doesn’t actually stab their eyes out. I try and give them knowledge because knowledge is the biggest force of change.

I am not the monster my father tried to create. I am not my mother’s daughter, to be pitied and a victim. This also makes me dangerous. I went off of their maps and plans for me. I am a rogue agent in the cycle of abuse. Not only have I gone rogue but I have also taken others with me. I have spoken up when a mother slaps their child at Walmart. I have called Child Protective Services on my own friends’ parents. I have done things to protect other people. I have done things to change my community.

When I see wrong I don’t turn away. This makes me dangerous. I know that just existing has put me in danger and I find that my fear of being hurt again is less and less. I know that I can date successfully if I want because if a man or woman tries to hurt me, I can protect myself. I also know I make the conscious choice to not be an abuser as well. I don’t ever forget I can hurt them.

The ticking clock in my day whispers to me about how this is. I can envision outcomes. I can see the paths before me. Do I choose one? Never. I never choose the path. I choose to roll over the grasses and enjoy the flowers. I may like my structure, and I may have my habits but none of them are as life affirming as the mornings between the clock. I can feel the morphine entering my blood, it creates a path of  numbness up my back as the next minute turns over, in another half an hour it will actually hit my brain and I will feel my muscles relax, the pain pushed under a slight haze.

The haze doesn’t take away my edge though, it gives me a better one. I know I will never be able to go outside without being armed to the teeth with precautions for and against things. Mace is the least of a predators worries. I know that I cannot enter a building without knowing all the exists, the safe places to sit, and that you should never sit in a corner with your back to the door. Sometimes, I try and sit in those seats just because.

I wonder why I needed these skills. What did my father thing I was going to grow up to be? Him? These skills are useful for a small segment of the population, people on the run from the cops, the cops, soldiers, and other people who fight all the time. I know I fight constantly but I fight in new ways. The ways he taught me may be effective but they don’t make change happen. They cause fear.

I think of my sensei, and I think of his home. There was never a seat in a corner, and the seats always faced the door. I think he too knew of the ways to be dangerous. Okay I know flat out he did. I remember the way he watched me the first time I entered his house. There was no rushing, just watching. I think he knew in that moment just how wrong my life had the chance to be. I remember him crying, the tears are fragmented. He never hid them from me though.

I remember my sensei not being afraid of my father. I remember my sensei teaching me the ways of defense instead of offense. I remember him showing me how to laugh. Laughter makes me all the more dangerous. The danger is to those who want me in their construct. A woman like me is apparently rare. I think that a woman like me is not so rare. That implication is that I must be as strong as a man usually. I am stronger than any men I know. My sensei is my equal, that is something he always told me.

Physically, I am there to be underestimated. I like this. I may be a lot weaker than many people physically but I know how to use my body. I also know how to use my wheelchair for self defense. It’s a part of the training. It’s also a part of the Escrima classes I took to get over that fear of going outside. Instead of my knee being used which would damage me, there’s always the arm rest. Arm rest has metal. Face to arm rest. That should probably take care of it.

If my body is so weak and my mind is so strong then together they can balance out. I know this is why I managed to move here. I did not evade the concequences but I do not fear being trapped ever again. I know I have what it takes to live fully. This is again something that makes me dangerous.

You see, all it takes to be dangerous is to be a rebel. To be a rebel you must do as you see, try and change the world, and ignore the rules of man. I am just one of many dangerous people in this world. I make friends out of the dangerous people too. I am not a killer. I am not a machine. I am not evil. My danger lies in my want of good, equality and justice for all without equivocation. My danger lies in my ability to enforce changes that should’ve been made twenty or more years ago. My danger lies in my refusal to just die and go away so that people who fear difference get comfortable.

There is no threat that I will harm them, there is fear from them I will. There is no threat that I will infect them, because being like me isn’t contagious. There is fear that I will show them that they are wrong. That makes me the most dangerous woman alive between the seconds. (Also I should so make this into a movie. 24 movie has nothing on this post!)

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