the Dalaverse

So my housesitting stint is over. Originally they weren't supposed to be back until tomorrow afternoon, but Heather called this morning to tell me they were leaving early and would be back this evening.

I cried all the way home.

It may only have been a week and a half, but I got really attached to those dogs. I don't even want to talk about it or I'll get upset again.

And Quinn is out of town so I came back to an empty apartment. I desperately need to do laundry, being down to one last pair of underwear (they are Company Underwear, because they are more lingerie than panties. Being the last resort on Laundry Day is pretty much all they ever get to do, alas). But one of the stupid fucking machines is jammed, which I didn't discover until after I'd stuck a load in. So I left my clothes there and waited an hour for the other machine to finish its load, then JUST as I walked back in the door some asshole was putting HIS clothes in the only working washing machine. I wanted to scream, y'all. I'd rather get up early than stay up late doing fucking laundry, though. Instead I watched "C.S.A.: The Confederate States of America," which I've been meaning to see ever since it came out. It's a mockumentary detailing a hypothetical American history in which the South won the war and slavery persisted into the modern day. Cleverly done, very disturbing. I've never shuddered through an entire film before.

I don't think it's going to be a particularly late night for me. I think Megan and her new roommate were going out somewhere tonight, but I could not summon the energy in this mood (if the invitation Katherine relayed was even extended to me as well, which I wouldn't know for sure because she never returned my phone call last night, whatthefuckEVER).

...I shouldn't end on a bitter note. Books, anyone? I read Flora Jessop's memoir Church of Lies and The 19th Wife by David Ebershoff while I was at Dr. Marc's, because apparently I am on a polygamy kick. Of the former, it's the third such memoir I've read and the differences between these three women's stories are fascinating (they're all related in some convoluted manner, like everyone in Colorado City/Hilldale). Carolyn Jessop (Escape) was a plural wife, but she was over eighteen when she married Merrill Jessop and she also was allowed to go to college for a nursing degree. She was the only one who had to escape with children in tow - eight of them, to be exact (though I think her eldest daughter went back to the FLDS). This was the first in-depth account of the FLDS I ever read, and it was like three hundred pages of social rubbernecking.

Elissa Wall (Stolen Innocence) was an actual child bride, being forced to marry her cousin at the age of fourteen. After she escaped, she was the main witness in Warren Jeffs' trial and got him convicted of accomplice rape. (Her book was the one I'd rank last of the three, but that could be because I listened to an audiobook and the narrator had a really annoying voice and reading style.)

And Flora Jessop suffered from sexual abuse as a child, escaped as a teenager, lived a hard life of drugs and partying for awhile, then basically became a vigilante fighting to free girls, women, and children from the FLDS. She is a fucking badass, and her account helped me to better understand what the hell is wrong with the various state agencies in regards to the FLDS (short answer: everything). Now I need to pick up Lost Boy, Brent Jeffs' story (Warren's nephew and a victim of his abuse. Fuck do I hope Warren Jeffs rots in prison forever.) It's new, so I'm wondering if it might have some info on the YFZ raid. The Prophet may be in prison, but there has got to be some scary shit going down on that compound after that.

The 19th Wife is excellent, one of the best novels I've read in the past year. I love Ebershoff's use of different formats - there are "excepts" from various books, autobiographies, scholarly essays, diaries, personal letters, etc. There's even a Wikipedia entry, for heaven's sake. Very cool stylistically, with two intertwined and equally engrossing storylines (okay, once Tom showed up I really wanted to linger on his gay Mormon adventures with Jordan, but that's neither here nor there). Highly recommended, especially if you have a weird morbid fascination with polygamist cults and American religious history like I do.

Now I'm finally starting Blackout. MR. DUNWORTHY I LOVE YOU (although he's being a right bitch in the first few chapters for some as yet unknown reason).

I do feel marginally better after that digression. Still lonely, though. I think I will reread the final few chapters of "Switch" and call it a night.