Okay - perhaps not everyone has moods with names, heh - but if you had to split yourself in two - what would you name the other half and what would they be like?

-- Catherine (catherine@cmjcom.com), November 13, 1999

Answers

Hmm. First of all, thank you for talking with us about what is obviously a fairly fraught subject. I appreciate your frank and clear discussion of something that is outside my experience.

But to your question... I used to think that the angry and confrontational me of the bad PMS sessions I suffered with in my twenties was like an entirely different person. I'm mild and friendly and kind. That me was angry and bitter and careless of other people's feelings, sometimes trying to hurt and wound. Sometimes I had PMS two weeks a month and it started to worry me which me was "really me".

So. I never named her, but maybe she could easily be named Viv. Hah. Not that my Viv persona of the journal is her, but the person I am now is both of those things, much more integrated, that's all and that is expressed in my journal. I'm allowed to be both things, which I didn't allow myself in my twenties, which maybe made things worse during PMS, I don't know.

This was rather disjointed but I'm trying not to write a journal entry here.

Love, Jill/Viv

-- (viv@rosamundi.com), November 13, 1999.

Trying to answer this I think I can't because I don't have a name to start with. I can't see where the fractures would be. I have emotions and moods, but even they feel like the turbulence on the surface of an unchanged medium. Or better, like filters, that let out somethings or only let in some things. But let into what? nothing that is defined by my name.

Maybe I miss the point, though you express it very well.

-- Chris (chris@clatimer.freeserve.com), November 13, 1999.

I've come over here at least three times today wanting to answer this and unsure how. My moods zap all over.. but there are a couple that are pretty well defined, enough to have their own 'personas'.

One is the Mama Lion - been called that since I was a kid myself. Its the anger that happens when someone or something I love is threatened. Different than anger on my own behalf. Mama Lion kills and doesn't hesitate or care. much much better to go after me than to go after something or someone that is 'mine'.

The other.. the little girl... has a name too tho only a very few know it. it was my nickname as a child 'lindsey'. the vulnerable me, and only gets shown to a few.

heh..and thinking on it, Mama Lion's gotten pretty pissed when lindsey is hurt - but since it's very selective who gets in that far, it isn't frequent, and most of the anger is at myself for misjudging enough to let it happen.

odd question - i'm not split, but i do give those names or had them bestowed on me. Also feels strange naming them openly here.

-- Lynda B. (lyndacat@bigfoot.com), November 13, 1999.

There are at least two others: one is Bill, my childhood name (my father had the same name) and I didn't start going by "al" until high school. Al is a little closer to his emotions, a little more easily hurt, and a little more humorous. I notice the difference when I'm with my family such as my brother or mother and they call me that.

The other I've dubbed the "Anti-Al" which tends to get more vengeful and ticked and bitter and sarcastic. It tends to be more of my Id, wheras Al is more my superego. Oddly enough, the Decajour stories tend to be more the product of the Anti-Al than the other.

Al of Nova Notes.

-- Al Schroeder (al.schreoder@nashville.com), November 13, 1999.

Her name is Sofia, sexy, smart, strong, manipulative. Sofia has no feelings but one of superiority, she believes herself above, unhurtable, untouchable.

-- Diana (dianalucio@yahoo.com), November 13, 1999.

Interesting examination, the analogy of "moods". Tesserae now makes more sense.

Five years ago when I took my current job I decided that I would be Bob rather than Robert. Robert was the softer me, my closer friends still call me Robert rather than Bob. A conscious/unconscious choice to add a little more edge, perhaps, but clearly, as I think about it, done in the sense you have described.

I don't know what choices I've made to retain my "sanity". I operate relatively effectively out there in the "real" world. Well, let's see, "effectively". Let's say I get through without a lot of damage. Occasionally, though, I wonder if I haven't given up too much or so much I don't even know the price that's been paid. The "comfortably numb", the man who has yet to be told the terrible truth. They don't pass out guide books.

So, nice. Now, if I can get the dishes done, it will be a thoroughly successful afternoon.

Well, thank you for the thoughts. You seem to have touched a nerve in Al and Viv as well. Now that I've written this, I can write about something else in today's entry.

-- The Sole Proprietor (soleprop@apersonalsite.com), November 14, 1999.

well, as you might gather from the difference between the email address and the real name above...jack montana is one of the two others i have. jack is still a female, but she is so together. together. completely. in control. sure. confident. never gets cheated, pushed around, taken advantage of... she rocks.

beulah is the other. she is my inner pitt bull. she really takes no shit and is completely comfortable tearing shit up to get what she wants or to keep what she already has. she is a one woman dog and she will only like you and not rip your throat out after great consideration, deliberation, and a quiet talk with the julie me.

they are there. they don't come out often, but i wish they would sometimes.

-- julie boyd (jackmontana@hotmail.com), November 15, 1999.