LIVING ON BORROWED TIME By Meri Ulrich Yesterday I was ten and living on borrowed time Wanting to be thirteen so very much, life would be just fine. When I was seventeen I counted the days until eighteen came along, Almost grown up, but not quite, I started each day with a song. At Twenty-one I was finally an adult, in the eyes of the law, It changed some things, from how I felt to what I thought and saw. At Twenty-nine I married my Prince and life was sweet and fine. I still didn't know as I continued to grow that I was living on borrowed time. My thirties and forties came and went and I began to understand, that youth is short and once its gone life isn't quite so grand. Fifties, sixties all passed by and I wondered what I would find, would I go on and on while living on borrowed time? Illness came and illness went; there was loss and love, I began to wonder what to expect as I prayed to my God above. Pleaase let me find the strength to care for those who were weaker than I. To have the courage and wisdom that I would need if someone I loved should die. Only one answer came forth, the one I had known that lived somewhere in my mind. All of us, everyone, with no one exempt, are living on borrowed time.

Jodi Arias......Evil Incarnate

I have wanted to write a thorough blog on this subject for months but found that for the first time in my life I was at a total loss for words. No wait, there were too many words.... I could copy the infamous Jodi and use words like "edify" or "Nay" but that sounds too pretentious for someone of my limited writing style. As I searched for the right words to describe how experiencing Jodi makes me feel I decided to just be me and tell it like I see it. Jodi Arias is now a 32 year old woman who has been jailed for the past 4 1/2 years after she was arrested and charged with the brutal murder of her on/off boyfriend (sex parter), Travis Alexander. Jodi and Travis met at a convention for the group once known as Prepaid Legal. Travis was a Mormon and eventually he babtized Jodi into the religion as well. They began a relationship that soon turned toxic for both of them. Travis, a nice guy who came from a rough childhood wanted to better himself and became a motivational speaker and a good friend to many. Jodi was an aimless young woman who was considered attractive to men and spent most of her young life searching for a permanent relationship (according to her). During police interrogations with her parents there emerged much more than meets the eye regarding who Jodi was. There is evidence (according to both of her parents) that Jodi was suffering from a serious mental illness and they were aware of it since she was a child. Her Father called her "Strange". Help may have been offered to Jodi for her problems, but none was accepted. Travis was a very conflicted young man and had a deep desire to experience sex although the Mormon Church is firm in it's belief that "Chastity" is necessary in all areas of sexual behavior. Travis was fighting a losing battle and he gave in to his desires. Although he fought hard to overcome these behaviors, in the end, he lost the battle as well as his life. Jodi and Travis soon found that they both enjoyed certain sex acts that may be considered kinky but are practiced by many people on a regular basis. At any rate, it was sex between two consenting adults and there was nothing illegal or deviant about their behavior. The problem was that it was absolutely deviant in their religion and this made the relationship extremely toxic for both of them. It is my opinion that Jodi was the enticer (seductress) and that it was she who introduced Travis to anal sex in order to convince themselves that they weren't violating the rule of chastity. Evetually they went "all the way" and had full on sexual relations including the forbidden vaginal sex. Travis and Jodi were addicted to one another and neither of them could escape their desire for one another. I doubt that love had much to do with how they felt for one another even though Jodi professes her undying love for Travis in her many Journal entries. I would substitute the word "Obsession" for love where it applies to Jodi and the word "Addiction" where it applies to Travis and his feelings for Jodi. For proof that Jodi was "Obsessed" I would refer to those who claim that she slashed the tires of Travis's vehicle on more than one occasion, hacked into his various accounts such as email, etc and wrote threatening letters to his female friends. She also cornered a woman who was a friend of Travis's in a hotel bathroom and acted in an ominous, threatening way toward her. Jodi crawled through the doggy door at Travis's home and spied on him when he entertained other women. The above actions certainly fit the description of "Obsession" and "Stalking", a word that many who knew them used to describe Jodi's behavior. I could go on and on about the personality traits of both Travis and Jodi and the circumstances leading to that fateful day in June, 2008, but you can read about them on the Internet so I will go straight to my impressions of Jodi Arias as she sits on trial for first degree murder and a possible death penalty outcome. Many of us have been watching a very long, colorfull trial filled with characters that seem to be coming from the pages of some fantastical fiction novel. The trial has dragged on and on and on and most of us viewers are weary and disgusted with what's transpired. Let me say that a lot of lying and posturing has been going on and after awhile it's hard to continue subjecting oneself to the tedious sameness of Jodi's alleged "Foggy" memory and her obviously false story of what really happened on the day that she slaughtered Travis Alexander. Before I go into how I feel about Jodi, I want to let those who are unaware of the circumstances surrounding Travis's death know that Jodi, a five',6" woman weighing approximately 120 pounds stabbed Travis, a 5'9" man weighing approximately 189 pounds, 29 time (nine stab wounds in his back and head alone), many more into his chest severing his Vena Cava, and slitting his throat from ear to ear. She shot him in the head for good measure when she was through with her stabbing frenzy leaving behind a blood soaked area that extened from his bathroom all the way to the entrance of his bedroom. She also left lots of evidence behind, planned a cover-up by disposing of the gun and other items and leaving a voice message for the now dead Travis. She lied about being at the scene of the crime when questioned by the police and then added a new wrinkle to the story by insisting that two ninja-like intruders did the deed leaving her to escape and live. In the end, Jodi finally decided to cop to killing Travis in self defense accusing him of being am abusive boyfriend who choked, kicked and slapped her. He called her names according to her and threatened to kill her on the day of the murder when she dropped his new camera, thus, the need for Jodi to kill Travis in such a brutal manner. I often wondered how she could claim self-defense when stabbing a man in the back, but Jodi doesn't seem to need reality to make her claims of being a battered woman. Speaking of being a battered woman, Jodi's defense expert is full of bloated Alyceisms (Alyce LaViolette). We have traveled through a Disney version of whether or not Snow White was a battered woman to the nightmare reality of the Brother's Grimm and still there is absolutely no proof that Jodi was battered except for her own lying words and Journal entries. What I first saw when I glimpsed Jodi Arias was a pudgy faced, overly made-up woman who constantly grinned at the people interviewing her while using a vocabulary that would surely impress any Professor of English at some second rate college. It sounded to me like Jodi had spent her time behind bars memorizing the dictionary but failed to pronounce many words correctly in the end. She "Edifys" and "De-Edifys" (no such word exists and the correct word is Dis-edify"), but Jodi missed that one in her attempts to appear smarter than the way above average bear. She has failed miserably in my opinion. Jodi is definiely smart but in a cunning, sly, frightening way.....not in an intelligent conversational way. I have studied sociopathy for a long time due to circumstances that I experienced as a much younger woman. Yes, I was once a battered woman caught up in the battered woman's syndrome and unable to escape for almost ten years. When I did, I slept for the first time without fear and I took a deep breath and felt like I had been released from a nightmare. I NEVER, EVER once thought of returning to my batterer and made sure that I was able to remain free. It became my main priority after my children. I was free for life and that was one of the biggest moments of my life. That is not to say that I forgot what had happened to me...I still have nightmares on occasion and over forty years have passed since the experience. Jodi, on the other hand got away from her alleged batterer and chose to keep coming back for sex even though she had put hundreds of miles between them. It is my opinion that Jodi was the abuser in this relationship and that she eventually killed her prey. Boiled bunnies anyone? Let me begin with Jodi's physical appearance as she sits next to her lawyers or on the witness stand. Jodi gives me the sense of having extreme strength for some reason. She has large hands and feet and looks solid even though she is slim. When I look at Jodi's hands I can visualize the knife that she used to stab Travis so many times within their grasp. Her eyes are black....they look like two holes with nothing behind them. They are frightening and empty. If the eyes are the window to the soul...she doesn't have one. She laughs, smirks, cries and often mirrors her female attorney as if she has no emtions of her own and needs to mimic human beings in order to pretend to be one. That sounds a bit drastic, but I honestly feel that Jodi Arias is not a human being in the sense that most of us recognize humans. Her behavior is not human and certainly what she did to Travis is not human. The desire to over kill, the rage and the strength that it took to accomplish what she did was definitely super-human. Maybe I should say super-evil because Jodi strikes me as pure evil. Something that one has nightmares about....a bogey man, a monster that you imagined was hidden under your bed when you were a child. A demon who possesses an innocent and wreaks havoc in it's wake. I have actually felt fear while observing Jodi even though I am watching through a television screen. The fact that she is currently near the city where I reside is frightening. The fact that she is allowed to exist and that there is a chance that she might walk free someday is even more frightening. Jodi Arias is not your average defendant in a murder case. She is not your average anything in my opinion. Jodi is evil incarnate and I know that I won't rest until I hear the word guilty of first degree murder. There is so much more that I could write but I have to admit that just putting words on my screen is upsetting to me and makes me uneasy. This is what I have always imagined it would be like if I came face to face with the devil or that monster from my nightmares. I sweat, I get a headache, I need to look away.....maybe even pray. For the sake of Travis Alexander's family and everyone else on the planet I say a prayer that Jodi will be locked up forever (or given the death penalty). It may be a strange thing to pray to God about but I feel that God knows what she is and that he just might listen to my prayers.