Friday, November 28, 2008

Yeah. It's over. I don't think there's anything to do to change his mind, and that is probably healthier for me, anyway. For reasons I'll explain when I have the strength. He wants to know if he can keep the key for a few days.

Forgive Me

I fucked up. I didn't mean to but I guess that doesn't count for anything. I made one big fuck-up in the year I've spent with J. I told J about it on Wednesday night because he was finally honest with me about some of his biggest secrets. I thought we had finally made a bit of progress in our relationship and I was completely willing to try to work through the problems we had. I wasn't sure that things would work out in the end but I care too much about him to not at least give it my best try.

He was feeling really awful about the things he told me, and I wanted him to understand that he wasn't a bad person because of the secrets he held. So I told him a few of my own. Including my one big mistake which I have never told anyone about. I thought that he cared enough to at least try to forgive me. But either my mistake was too big to forgive or he just doesn't care about me as much as I thought he did.

Maybe it's naive, but I haven't yet given up all hope. I'm pretty sure it's over since he said as much Wednesday night and hasn't come back since. But I'm still hoping that if he has time to think about things, he might come to understand that I have forgiven his every transgression big or small and have always given him a chance to try again. I'm hoping if he realizes that, maybe he might reconsider just once forgiving me and letting me try again.

I just don't have the energy to write more than bits and pieces right now. Forgive me.

Thursday, November 27, 2008

Morning After the Night Full of Trouble, aka Happy Thanksgiving, Asshole

I'm sure it's pretty clear that I had a rough night. I have yet to sleep a solid hour. I may have fucked up the turkey. I am very, very fragile. I just needed a walk to clear my head and prepare myself for the fakeness I must put on to deal with the Grandmonster. I just don't know if I have it in me today.

So I smoked. I took the dogs for a walk and had a cigarette. Smoking is a huge sin in my family because of the fact that it can kill you so I walked a few houses down to a corner that was shaded by trees and no one was around. I stood there and smoked my cigarette while watching Ginny play with Katie. When I was done, I turned around and began walking home.

A truck whipped around the corner so I shortend the dogs' leashes so they wouldn't get run over. The guy pulled up right next to me and started yelling at me. "Get your dogs off my lawn! This is private property! How dare you let your dogs shit on my lawn!" (In a raised, but not screaming, voice.)

I remained calm and responded. I told him first and foremost that I was sorry. I didn't realize that he didn't want the dogs on his lawn. He didn't give a shit. He hated me because I let my dogs on his lawn and it didn't matter that I hadn't let them shit there and that I was clearly carrying a big bright yellow recyclable shit bag, which one would only carry with the intention of picking up their dog's shit. You know, because they had no intention of leaving shit on someone's lawn.

He didn't want to hear it. He kept yelling, if anything getting only more agitated by the fact that I wasn't being the asshole he wanted me to be so his hate would be justified. "This is private property! Keep your dogs off my lawn!"

"Look, I don't live around here. I'm sorry; I didn't know. You can see I've shortened my dogs' leashes. I promise I won't let it happen again. Just please stop yelling at me."

"I have every right to yell!" (And then some more of the same blah blah . . . private property! . . . blah blah . . . dogs shit on my lawn! . . .blah blah . . . )

At this point, I realized that he would not be placated and I just wanted the yelling to stop. So I said, with no trace of any emotion but earnestness, "Did you know that my mother just died? I just wanted to take a peaceful walk. I'm sorry I upset you. Thank you for being so polite." By now, tears were streaming down my face. I was just so tired and so sick of people hating strangers. When did everyone become so hateful?

Now clearly, the "Thank you for being so polite" was meant to be ironic and he knew it. He was a smart man. He finally shut up and said, "Well alright then." He may have even felt a tiny bit remorseful. I didn't know anymore. I didn't care.

I did what I very rarely do and I let my anger out on a perfect stranger, just as he had done to me. As I walked away, I said, "Have a happy Thanksgiving." Then I raised my voice to make sure he heard me as he started pulling away: "Asshole."

He stopped and threw the truck in reverse. He backed up next to me and screeched to a halt. He said, "That was uncalled for."

I said, in my normal voice, though I was still crying, "It was uncalled for for you to speak to me the way you did. I was nothing but polite and I apologized and said it wouldn't happen again. But you didn't care."

He did what I did not expect and said, for the first time speaking to me like someone with feelings, "You're right. Let's start over. I'm sorry. Don't let your dogs walk on my lawn."

I said, "I won't."

"Happy Thanksgiving."

"Thank you," I said. "Happy Thanksgiving."

And he drove away and I walked away. I felt actually almost peaceful for a moment. I could almost forget the hurt.

I really needed another cigarette. I sat in my car with the door open and lit up while I waited to see if Ginny would finally shit. Still feeling almost peaceful. It lasted nearly a full two minutes until the Grandmonster pulled up.

The Grandmonster does not get showing your feelings. The Grandmonster would never be described as caring, compassionate, or understanding. You always put on your best face for her. And I just couldn't do it. The peacefulness was gone and I didn't know how I was going to sit near her right then when I was so raw.

I got the dogs in the car and drove to Dunkin' Donuts to get some coffee. It was purely an excuse to buy myself some time to get a grip. I thought maybe I was better when I got back. I just kept thinking, I only have to hold it together for six or seven more hours before I can go home and lose it if I need to.

I came in with Ginny and Katie and the Grandmonster reared its ugly head and pretended to fear for its life because of Ginny. The day my mom died, Ginny--a tiny puppy at the time, with tiny, sharp puppy nails and eager puppy love--jumped up to greet the Grandmonster as a new friend. Her nail scratched the Grandmonster's scaly skin and drew a tiny bit of blood. The Grandmonster got very angry at me as I pulled Ginny away and scolded her. We got her a band-aid. I put Ginny in my parents' room as my mother's one-hour-old corpse lay cooling in the guest room next door.

The Grandmonster assumed center court as it loves so much to do, putting a chair in the middle of my mother's grieving sisters and my mother's grieving mother. The Grandmonster bled through one band-aid and needed it replaced because the Grandmonster has old people tissue-thin skin. The bleeding stopped with the second band-aid. But the Grandmonster has never forgiven my dog, and I have never forgiven her not just for that time but for all the times she felt the need to treat my mother like shit. She had no right even being in that house at that moment if she couldn't respect the grief of others and stop being selfish for just one moment.

But the Grandmonster is named the Grandmonster for a reason.

And when I got back into the house this morning and the Grandmonster reared its ugly head to spout hate, I just pulled Ginny into the sun room and locked her in. Then I went and poured out a third of my coffee and filled the cup again with Bailey's.

Ah, the holidays with the family. A bunch of White Anglo-Saxon Protestants hiding their various vices from each other so they can use said vices to deal enough to get through a day spent together. Maybe I can get a few minutes' sleep before the meal starts and I need to sit at the same table with the Grandmonster and try to get through a few hours of conversation while apologizing profusely for not saying hello immediately despite the fact that I was crying and visibly shaken at the moment.

As I write, I hide in the sun room with Ginny drinking my coffee and Bailey's trying to figure out whether it will be hours, days, or months before I feel peace in my soul again for long enough to maybe even be happy.

I ponder whether to get drunk or sleep.

Night Full of Trouble

A moment of levity in a night full of trouble: I kid you not--someone from Wasilla, Alaska visited my blog three hours ago. This Wasillan was searching for hot toddie recipes and if you spell it wrong like I did in that posting, I pop up all the time. I'm sure it wasn't Sarah Palin, since this person visited on his or her Mac. And I am positive that Sarah Palin is a PC person.

About the night full of trouble, I have only this to say for now:
  • I am in love with J and have been for a long time.
  • I am a very self-destructive person.
  • I had been thinking for a long time that I was as screwed up as J and that two equally screwed up people who wanted to badly enough just might be able to make it work. Then tonight I thought maybe I was too screwed up for J to get over.
  • Reading those last sentences again, I still think I may have been right the first time. But I also may have been right the second time, or maybe wrong both times, but I just don't fucking know anymore.
  • I'm barely sure of very much in my life right this second, but I'm sure I don't want it to be over just yet. Even if it's going to be over eventually.
  • And I need to try to put the pieces of my life back together again, whether it's over or not. It's been nearly a year and a half that I've grieved, and it's time I started healing. Read: Start acting like a grown-up again and clean my house, walk my dog, spend time with friends, and actually try to succeed rather than live on the adrenaline of seeing how close I can come to total destruction.

When I've gotten some decent sleep and I've got the turkey almost ready for Thanksgiving, I'll try to fill in some more detail. But not all of it.

A girl's got to have some secrets, after all. And she's got to stop hurting the ones she loves.

Saturday, October 18, 2008

Crying Over a Man

The last time I was up at this hour crying over a man was, I think, the week after the Big X and I broke up. The whole week.

Oh, Bother

It bothers me that J did not come home tonight. I know that it shouldn't; we've never made each other any real promises. And he's not come home in the past. And this isn't home to him anyway; he has his own place still, even if the cable and internet have both been shut off for months. And we've both gone on trips without the other, not coming home for days.

But it does bother me.

There has been very little in the ten or so months since we've started dating that has bothered me. But now I'm bothered.

And that bothers me.

On a night when he was out, presumably at the bar, and the bars closed 2 1/2 hours ago, it bothers me that he hasn't come home or called. I really, really hate that it bothers me. In fact, it bothers me more that I'm bothered than his not coming home bothers me to begin with. I've worked very hard for a very long time to not let my heart be in a position to be bothered by a man's actions.

And now I don't know what to do.

Saturday, August 30, 2008

A Little Interlude, After a Long Silence

This is a picture of the house that I helped burn down.

Let me explain. One day earlier this summer, I stayed home from work, not feeling very well. I had to get to the post office, however, to mail my already-late rent. On my way to the car, I looked over the fence in the backyard and saw smoke coming from the backyard of the house behind mine. It smelled like burning wood, and there were no flames. It was only a little smoke, and the little voice in the back of my head, which I affectionately refer to as Murphy, for reasons I'll have to explain some other time, said, Maybe you should call the fire department. What if it's a real fire? But the rest of my voices were saying, Ha. It's just a chiminea or something and I'll look stupid. So off to the post office I went.

An hour later, I turned back onto my street after running a few other errands, and saw flashing lights at the other end, where my house is. My first thought was, Jesus Christ, Crazy Magdalena the downstairs neighbor lady has called the cops on me again, and this time I wasn't even home. (I'll have to explain that whole story soon.) Turns out, though, I saw as I got closer, that it was just that the house behind me had burned down.

It took me a minute to realize it was in some way my fault.

This is a nice allegory for myself lately--letting things burn down around me because I'm some combination of too overly cautious and lazy.

But I'm actually doing better after the last three weeks or so. More detailed updates soon, but first...

This is a picture of the kitten I temporarily adopted in order to train it to be a good cat for my dad. His name is Willy. He is in J's Pirates hat.

And second...

This is a picture of my new nephew at a month old, on my first baby sitting venture. He survived. I can't wait to do it again.

So there have been nice things in my life lately too. Just regarding the bad things--I've let them get really bad, and it's time I actually tried to do something about them before it's too late.

Like with the house behind mine.

Sunday, May 25, 2008

Digression and Mourning, Part I

I heart "Shortbus" and if you haven't seen it yet you should. I mean, the Mayor...James and Jamie...Caleb and Ceth-pronounced-Seth...the orgies...the pot and the masturbation...the photographs and the molestation...the blackout....the orgasms...but I digress...

I need to go see my Uncle George and Mike in Florida again soon. They just wrote me an email:
Now you didn't hear this from me....but huggy bear said word on the street is that john and his wife ( sorry I can't think of her name ..my mind is a complete blank..) is going to have another baby ...a boy ... due in august... How do you think they will be able to take care of this one??? Is Vickey old enough to take care of the new one??? Hope your all doing good and we miss you and think of you all daily...
stay healthy and happy ...Love always George and Mike

I heart my Uncle George...and Mike...One month after my mom died, he came up for a week to help prepare for and attend my mother's memorial. At that time and again with the help of Mike afterward, he filled a void that has been in my soul since Mom left me.

I've been having a rough time of it with the grief thing lately...I've been aware that I've been at bottom for some time.

A description of chronic depression that has always resonated with me is that of cliffs and oceans. Most people experience emotions as peaks and valleys--some have steeper hills than others and tumble faster down into the valleys of being depressed, and they have a harder time trying to climb back up to the peaks of contentment (a term which I prefer to happiness, which I believe sets an unrealistic goal of a feeling that we cannot achieve frequently enough nor hold onto for a long enough duration; contentment, on the other hand, is more easily accomplished and therefore comes with more frequency and longevity...but I digress...). Most people only experience short bursts of being depressed, and some (those with the steeper slopes) experience occasional mild depression (sometimes affectionately referred to as The Blues).

And then there are those who experience moderate to severe depression. We fart in your peaks' and valleys' general direction ("Monty Python and the Holy Grail", for those of you who aren't hip enough for that reference...) We experience cliffs and oceans. When we fall into depression, we step off the edge of a cliff; we fall farther and faster, and when we hit the bottom, we fall hard into an ocean of sad. It surrounds and overwhelms us so that we can't see a way out because it's so big and all-consuming. Most of us can tread water and get through our daily lives while trying not to choke as the waves of depression crash over our heads; most of us can ride it out. We're the Moderates. The Severes I can't explain as well because I have been lucky enough not to have to experience that, but I would venture that they are in far choppier seascapes; they probably cannot see land anywhere, not even behind them, where the cliff they fell from used to be. They probably swallow a lot more water with those higher, harder waves, and we all know some of them drown...so it's no wonder they often get to the point where they cannot get through their daily lives anymore. But I digress...

I fell off the cliff ten and a half months ago and have been in the Ocean of Sad ever since. I can figure it to the day, because it was the day I went on my first date since I had returned from England. It was the night that date was interrupted with a phone call followed by a trip to the Emergency Room to see my mother be admitted for what would turn out to be the last time. It was the beginning of the last two weeks of my mother's life.

The night (a Wednesday night) before what would be the last night of my mother's life , the boy I had been dating for two weeks jumped off a roof to prove his love to me. Then, of course, on Friday morning just before 8 AM, she died. I wrote her obituary. I directed the days that followed for my family, and after three days of mourning with them, I found the energy to end things with Crazy Andy. I spent two weeks in a daze, a good portion of that at two of my best friends' house in New Hampshire (hiding out in case Crazy Andy decided to show up at my apartment to slice his other arm open to further prove his love to me--the first arm having been sliced open a year earlier to prove his love to his ex-girlfriend who cheated on him with her cousin).

The first day back from New Hampshire, I went to the funeral parlor to pick up my mother's ashes. Then my nuclear family and I made our first social appearance since my mother left us at the wedding of my cousin Jamie. Jamie and his family--especially his mother and my mother's sister, Mary--are our second nuclear family; Mary is the closest thing I have to a Godmother, and Jamie is like a little brother of mine.

The Big X attended the wedding as Jamie's Best Man, and brought along his girlfriend the slut with whom he cheated on me and his father and stepmother, who were the equivalent of my in-laws for eleven years. It was the first time he and I had seen each other since the night we broke up two and a half years previously. He did not approach me or any member of my family to express sympathy for my mother's death which had occurred just over a week before that day. His parents came to me and spoke with my sister and I for a long time; his gay best friend Matt who I always knew was secretly in love with the Big X approached me at the bar to express his sympathy and share some kind words about my mother. But the Big X didn't have the balls. And that was all the closure I needed on that relationship. Dad, Stacy, Kristy and I had our first picture taken as a family without a mother.

I had forgotten that picture existed until just now.

Stacy, Kristy, and I were to spend the next two weeks cleaning the basement (a promise we had all made to my mother in her last years) but after my first day of cleaning (and heavy lifting), I came home newly inspired to rearrange and clean my bedroom and moved the mattress on my own, throwing out my back. A fight with my sisters ensued over my not pulling my weight with the cleaning despite my bad back for the next few days (during which the first of my financial troubles began to occur, along with the realization of the fact that I would fail to complete my thesis in time to graduate in August). My back got better and I had my niece over for a couple of days, on the last of which we were heading out the door to go to my dad's house and begin my first day back at cleaning when I fell down an entire flight of stairs, cracking my elbow, snapping a toe, and spraining an ankle (and of course re-throwing out my back). My niece had to come to the ER with us, where I witnessed her terror because what she knew of hospitals is that her Nana went there and got very sick and eventually died. I comforted her and got her to understand that I would not die on this particular day in this particular hospital because of that particular accident. More than that specific promise I could not make. But I digress...

The next week or so I spent healing from the fall and recovering from what would be the first of many minor illnesses like colds, bronchitis, and sinus infections, each of which lingered with me longer than usual. The end of the week was the beginning of Uncle George's visit. He came and pulled my sisters and I out of our feuding, helped clean the house for the memorial, and filled a hole that had been in our family since just before 8 in the morning on July 20. The memorial was held on August 25, a little over a month after my mother died, and it was the best and worst day I had had since that awful morning.

My mother's entire family (over 40 sisters, brothers, brothers-in-law, nieces and nephews, grand-nieces and nephews, her mother, her husband and children) and over 30 friends of the family came to my parents' house, which was filled with displays of her artwork and writing. There was the memory book we gave to her for her college graduation (which took place six months after her diagnosis) that was filled with love letters and happy memories from all who cared for her. There was the music video montage with pictures of her throughout the many stages of her life, at the conclusion of which a choir of 50 of her loved ones sang Amazing Grace as her friend Paula accompanied on the piano. My father's brother Jack and a few of my father's friends formed a makeshift folk band and played for awhile as small groups shared memories over wine and food. I do believe it was the best way my mother would have liked to be remembered.

But I digress yet again...

The rest of the month of August, and then September through December were marked for me by continued sicknesses, mild hermitism (yes, I made that word up), the wedding of my dear friends Whitney and Jake, and a lot of wallowing in grief, financial troubles, procrastination of my thesis work, frustrated failings with training Ginny the puppy, and a few bad dating experiences (see the Musician, the Republican, and, of course, the Whore Looker, the story of whom has become legend among my friends, a story that I am begged to tell at parties). In early November, I took a road trip down to Florida, where I picked my sisters up from the airport and we spent a few days visiting Uncle George and Mike. The purpose of the trip was to bring some of my mother's ashes to be placed in a memorial garden he has been creating on his property. Those days with George and Mike--and the solitude of the drive down and back--were the most peaceful I have experienced since my mother died.

I returned from the trip in mid-November and prepared for and hosted our first Thanksgiving without my mother. It was a surprisingly okay weekend--weekend because our family spends the entire day together, followed the rest of the weekend by some combination of Black Friday shopping, traveling to the tree farm to chop down a family Christmas tree, and decorating my parents' house for Christmas. The hangover between Thanksgiving and Christmas was filled with trying to figure out how to buy Christmas presents for family and friends now that my bank account was officially just about dry. I also met J (formerly known as the MF) during this time period, and after a few days of talking, our first date was on December 1.

This ends the first half of the story of my ten and a half months of grief, and since it's 4:30 in the morning after a long night of partying after a long day of cleaning after a slightly less long night of partying on Friday, I'm going to pick up the second half of the story later on.

Friday, May 23, 2008

Mr. Morning Person Security Guard

When I walk into the building every morning, I am greeted by security. They always say good morning and most of them know me so they add some other comment as well. There is one guy, however, who I dread seeing when I get here because he is one of those Morning People. I have never once seen him anything less than absolutely beaming at the prospect of starting a new day, and no matter how grumpy I am, he just keeps smiling that bright shit-eating grin.

As much as I like my job, it is still work, and there is nothing pleasant to me about being forced out of my bed before 8 am every day to go somewhere you have to stay until 5 pm every day. Not to mention I am not a morning person and am a generally grumpy, sarcastic individual. So I send him psychic resentment mixed with disdain as I fake-smile back every morning he's there. Luckily they rotate their duties, so next week it should be someone else. Maybe even the tall bald guy who saw me drunk after the wine tasting we had here and, I am sure, is a kindred spirit in hating the Man in his many forms.

Tuesday, May 06, 2008

I'm Working on It . . .

I'm working on something. Something that I'm going to post here but it's taking me some deep thought. It was started by the conversation that the MF and I had last night--a sort of checking in on the status of us thing, making sure we are roughly on the same page. Actually, though, it was started long before then, but that gave me the motivation to try to put it down in writing.

It's all about us--what I want and can handle from him, what I can't handle from him . . . but it is really me putting words to a way of thinking I've developed in the last few years--a way of thinking about my life, which includes men in general (and him in specific, now). And I'm doing it for him because there are some things I need him to know about me, and about what I do and don't expect. I think he will be relieved when he sees it, and there is a chance he won't like some of it. But I think mostly it will relieve him, and--I hope--free him and me up to be more honest about our feelings for each other, for other people, and about how we want to fit into each other's lives.

Wednesday, April 23, 2008

The Office Is Full of Floozies

(I'd apologize for the inappropriate nature of this post but then most of you have read this blog long enough to expect inappropriate . . .)

This is how low I’ve sunk: I went to the ladies’ room a few minutes ago to remove my panties because they are old and uncomfortable, so now I am going commando (with a skirt on) all because I have been too lazy to do my laundry for two weeks. And on my way back to my cube, I walked past the secret service guy who is in the office today preparing the Republican senator for President Bush’s visit later this week. And here I am walking around like a floozy with the breeze blowing across my ass cheeks.

AND.

And I went and told my office mate because I wanted to make sure it wasn’t obvious that I was walking around without panties on (not being a person who generally makes a habit of those types of things [at least in public]), and guess what I found out? She (who shall remain nameless) walked to work from the train station today as her panties crept into her ass crack so when she got to the office, she stormed into the bathroom, tore them off, and threw them into the trash. So there are two panty-less, skirted chicks in my office today. If only the secret service guy knew . . .

And THEN.

I got this email from my friend Raquel when I got back to my chair from the excursion:

HERE'S A RIDDLE TO MAKE YOU SMILE. Pantyhose quiz Q: How many animals can you fit into a pair of pantyhose?
Now, think about it...

Answer: 10 little piggies . . .




2 calves . . .








1 ass . . .











an unknown number of hares . . .





and of course one (1) . . . ahem . . .

Tuesday, April 15, 2008

Stream of Consciousness

why they are opposite . . . going to be an aunt again . . . the things that make him right . . . forgiving/forgetting . . . i'm sure i'm forgetting something . . . why so sensitive?

Friday, April 04, 2008

I like stories where the timing is completely different from all the other stories, where you’re never sure whether you’re near the end or just the start of another chapter of the story, not even when you pay attention to the timing of where the beginning and the end are. They break the rules, stretch the bounds of story-telling, not to the point of unbelievability—not to the point where they seem to break the bounds of reality—but just to the point where you are never sure what might happen next. You know there will be an end, eventually, but you don’t know exactly where it will come or what will happen when it does—but you know for absolute certainty that the path you take getting there will be highly enjoyable. I love stories like that, to be honest.

Wednesday, March 26, 2008

Big Things on my Mind

Sometimes a lot of time lapses between posts on this blog because I’m very busy and sometimes it’s because I have something big on my mind but I’m not ready to put words to it. This time it’s the second reason, and there are two big things on my mind.

I have avoided relationships for over three years. I have not wanted to get entangled with another person to that level mainly out of fear. When things ended with the Big X, I had to create a whole new life; over the course of a decade with him, I had lost all of my old friends and he was my best friend, so I thought that was okay. I had become a completely different person—someone who was unhappy most of the time, who had a temper, had lost her sense of humor . . . just not a great person, and not at all who I was before the Big X, and not at all who I wanted myself to be.

I didn’t ever want that to happen again; I didn’t want to lose who I am because of a guy. And I know it wasn’t entirely the Big X’s fault; he wasn’t so emotionally abusive to me that I HAD to give up my friends; he never verbally stated that I was to put him above family and everyone else—it was clearly implied and I was punished with screaming and name-calling if things weren’t the way he wanted—but still, I could have walked away at any point. I could have said no, I’m not going to go along with what you want over my own interests. It wasn’t entirely the Big X’s fault that I became a mean and unhappy person; he didn’t force my personality to change—it was nearly impossible not to pick up his pessimism and mean-spiritedness because that was the only thing I was ever exposed to—but still, I could have walked away at any point. I could have but I didn’t.

So after I picked myself up and put the pieces together again like the Humpty Dumpty of 2005, I decided I shouldn’t get in a relationship with anyone again for a long, long time. And I dated quite a bit, but I either always found something wrong with the guy within the first couple of dates, or they began to talk to me as if they wanted a relationship (using terms like girlfriend or talking about “our future”) and I had my usual panic attacks and ran away. I never had to worry about ending a relationship because I never let it get to that point.

I’ve been dating the MF now for nearly 3 months, and within the last week or two I’ve felt like things have turned some kind of corner with us. I haven’t been able to put the words to it even in my own head and certainly not to the MF himself. The best I’ve been able to do is tell him how I feel about the sex, and I’ve been telling him that a lot—maybe too much. I mean, it is really just great. Everything fits together just right and I am very satisfied—more satisfied than I have been in the past. But I don’t want to give him the impression that I’m in this for the sex because you know what I can’t hide from myself anymore? My feelings run deeper than just casual sex. I’d be lying to myself if I said that was all this is anymore. Maybe it started that way for me, but it’s not that way for me anymore.

I’m still scared as hell, though. I now find myself in the middle of that thing I’ve spent 3 years fearing: A Relationship. And I don’t want to end it just yet. But I’m still scared, and I’m trying to put words to why and see if they are reasons I can fix, or if this really just won’t work. I hope I can fix all the fears, but I don’t know that that is true, which is probably the biggest fear of all: What if I invest my efforts into this thing now (something I’ve really avoided doing so far)—get through such scary things as him meeting a couple of my friends, for example, or God forbid make myself vulnerable to him—and in the end, there are other things that just can’t be fixed? What if I do all that really scary and hard work and it’s all for naught? What if I let him hurt me? Or I hurt him unintentionally because of all my stupid fears? I couldn’t live with myself anymore.

So for now I just tell him about how much I love the sex, and not about how much I love everything else.

Oh. And the second big thing on my mind? An unsolicited IM from my sister which hurt me very deeply, so deeply I’m not ready yet—even though it was sent over a week ago—to discuss it here, or with her for that matter. So . . . to sum up: I’m afraid of getting hurt by or hurting the MF; and I am deeply hurt already by someone who I’ve considered one of my best friends in these last couple of years. The two of those things together is enough to make me re-think the philosophy by which I’ve lived my life from 2005 to 2008.

Translation: It may be awhile until my next post again. And I probably need a shrink.

Tuesday, March 11, 2008

A Short Missive on Tights

One of the things about working at the State Capitol is that there are cameras everywhere. Between just the fact that it is a government building and the fact that we now live in a Homeland Security Rainbow Alert world, there is nothing you can do anywhere on the campus of the Capitol without being recorded. Now, I’m sure that most of the time the state cops who are monitoring those cameras are unable to actually watch what is going on in range of all the hundreds of them. Still, as a rule, I try not to pick a wedgie or fix my bra anywhere in the building except for inside the four walls of the bathroom stall. (And I’m not even sure that the bathroom stalls don’t have cameras…) But yesterday I was wearing some tights that kept falling off my ass. This is because I recently lost over 10 pounds and they no longer fit properly (yay me except for the expense of buying new stockings). However, this also means that periodically throughout the day until I get around to buying some new black tights, I have to stop somewhere out of view of people and yank my skirt up under my armpits, bend over, and slowly work the extra material that has now gathered down around my ankles back up to my hips where it belongs. (And do so without causing a run due to my icky winter-time fingernails.)

If I do not do this, I risk walking down a long hallway in the Legislative Office Building while my stockings slowly fall all the way down my legs and rest—crotch exposed—between my ankles while I try to crab-walk to the nearest bathroom. And there are always dozens of people in the LOB hallways just waiting for someone like me to do something embarrassing so as to entertain them. No, this has not happened yet. Almost, but not quite. What has happened is that I’ve had to duck into an empty conference room or office, close the door, and perform the skirt-lifting, stocking-tugging ritual described above. All the while knowing that there’s a chance that just maybe some state cop down in the control room is sitting there calling his buddies over to ogle and laugh at me. And should that happen (or should that already have happened), then I will forever be followed around the building by the monitor-watching cops, just waiting to see what I might do next. Still, it can’t be helped. I’ll have the state cops ogling me in private any day over dozens of legislators, lobbyists, and staffers pointing and laughing in public at my bare ass shuffling quickly away from them.

Plus I'm sure I'm not the first person to be doing something inappropriate in private while the Staties silently witness down in the control room.

Thursday, March 06, 2008

Why, Yes. Yes I Was Drunk.

I reread that last post again this morning, and I really wanted to delete it. But there is something in me that disagrees with ever deleting a completed post. All I can say is I'm glad I didn't say what was in my head. And I was drunk. Yes, this particular time, I was drunk. I had been out with a friend for dinner and had a martini and a Guinness. Those Guinnesses can do me in. And of course, when I came home I had a bit more to drink. And I've been feeling the warm fuzzies toward the MF of late, as you know. And out popped that thought in my head. Thank god my drunk ass was able to keep my lips closed so I didn't vocalize the thought. What's never been said does not need to be explained.

Wednesday, March 05, 2008

The Answer

I said to him about my dog, "Because she loves you."

He said, "That's why I give her chocolate."

I thought of a hundred different variations of a response, all along the lines of, "So why did you give me chocolate for Valentine's Day?" before I realized what the response was to that question, why I kept asking it from his lips and responding in my voice, in my mind.

Monday, March 03, 2008

Something Little

The weekend was a very nice one. There was a snow storm Friday night into Saturday, and the MF and I just holed up in the apartment, played games, watched tv, and talked. And other stuff . . . I keep waiting for things to take a turn for the worse with the MF but every time I spend time with him, it just gets better and better. I'm feeling very warm and fuzzy toward the MF and not at all like talking about anything that might ruin things.

~~~~~

I went to my hometown at lunchtime today for a doctor's appointment and then went over to the pharmacy to pick up some prescription refills. Now that I actually have insurance, I'm using the hell out of it. At the pharmacy, the pharmacist came out to hand me the prescription himself--turns out it was this guy (who we shall refer to as LD so as to keep him anonymous) that grew up down the road from me. He was a few years ahead of me in school, but my god was he hot. I always had a crush on him.

When I was 18, I was at a friend's party and so was LD. There was significant drinking, as there tends to be at parties when you're that age, and I told a friend that I used to have a crush on LD. She of course thought it would be funny to tell him, and then he approached me. One thing led to another and a little bit later we were hooking up in a quiet corner. Things were going very well until . . . I slid my hand down his pants and felt his erect . . . member . . . which--remember I was only 18 with limited experience--but even so, I knew that this was the smallest penis I had ever seen or touched. And it was erect. Reader, I ask you to examine your thumb. Yeah.

I reacted poorly, snatching my hand back out of his pants and making excuses and going away. I felt really bad about this later on, especially the part where I told a couple of people about this *ahem* little issue. I'm sure that had this happened today, I would not have acted like that. I would have been able to cover up my surprise and I wouldn't have blabbed to people, but then again, I was only 18 and drunk. Also later on I found out he was cheating on his gf with me anyhow. So all's well that ends well.

Today he was very eager to remind me of who he was (I didn't recognize him) so apparently he wasn't too hurt by the incident. He also wasn't wearing a wedding ring, despite the fact that I know he's married. Once a little snake, always a little snake I guess. And now you know what LD stands for.

Friday, February 29, 2008

Intensity

I was talking to Rose last night and I mentioned that on Wednesday night, I got barely any sleep. I believe this was due partly to the fact that my father announced his wishes for Mother’s Day: He wants his girls to all come to the house so we can all talk about our memories of our mother with him. This is not what I want to do on the first Mother’s Day after my mom has died. Frankly, I may never want to celebrate Mother’s Day again ever, in any fashion, unless I myself become a mother. I want to just hide in my apartment, maybe with a friend, maybe drink, and go to bed early. My dad just won’t let go of his grief and sometimes I feel like when I spend time with him, his grief is drowning me. I cried a lot that night; he made me feel like maybe I’m a bad person, like maybe I don’t respect my mother’s memory as much as he does. I mean, he didn’t say that, but he surely did a good job of implying it when he said, “Well, of course I’ll respect your wishes, but I hope you change your mind.”

The other part of why I think I didn’t sleep is that I’ve been a bit lonely lately for my friends and family; between being sick basically for 3 weeks, and then getting mugged, I kind of pulled in on myself and I haven’t spent any real time with my sisters (or my dad, but after last night I’m not sure I care to spend much time with him right now anyway) or with any of my friends besides Rachel, who I see at lunch most days but with other people and only for like 45 minutes, so it’s not like I’ve been able to have a one-on-one with her or anything.

I spent Tuesday night with the MF, and I told him that we needed to talk soon but I couldn’t do it on Tuesday night; I was just too tired to deal with it. Last night I saw him again but I didn’t talk to him. I don’t know if I will at all. There are things I want to say to him that I just can’t, like “I don’t think you lie to me but I do think you intentionally keep secrets from me” but I don’t know that I really want to know those secrets anyway. I probably should; there is probably a reason he’s keeping them and it would probably be good for me in the long run to know, but I just don’t want to deal with it right now.

There are also things I need to say to him that I don’t want to say, like “You need to stop leaving marks on my body” because it’s disrespectful to the FWB—the FWB who I’m very ambivalent about seeing again anyway, but I’m afraid if I’m not seeing the FWB I might be stupid and let the MF hurt me. I’m also afraid that I might hurt the MF. Sometimes certain things—the way he looks at me or touches me, the things he does for me—make me think he likes me quite a bit. And I would feel awful if I hurt him.

~~~~~

P.S. I just realized what “marks on my body” might sound like; they’re sex marks, people. The MF doesn’t beat me. You should know by now that I would beat to a bloody pulp any guy who ever raised a hand to me in anger; shame on you, readers, for thinking otherwise.

Thursday, February 21, 2008

Further Proof of my Status as President of Procrastination

Ugh. I was just rereading that last post and it sounds almost gushy, like I'm way more into the MF than I really am at this point. All I meant to say was that for now he's what I want and I don't know if he's what I will want in the future, but that doesn't matter because I'm not thinking about the future right now, but that I do think that if we were to meet in the future, he would probably then be the type of guy I would want.

Every weekend he comes over for a day or two and I'm in this happy little cocoon with him where everything's great just the way it is, and it was from that haze of goodwill that I wrote the last post; and they are my feelings, but I absolutely didn't give the full story then. I was feeling positive so I only wrote positive, but the truth is much more complex. The truth is we are going to have to have that conversation I was talking about a couple of weeks ago, and soon. I've been putting it off for far too long because I was sick, then I was sick again, then I was working long hours and then I was mugged, and today is the MF's birthday and I'm not going to make him have that talk on his birthday.

So maybe this weekend...

Saturday, February 16, 2008

28/martinis

I think the age of 28 is when some people make the switch from shots of vodka or mixed drinks to martinis. Now, not all switch. Some continue with the mixed drinks or switch from shots to swigs straight from the bottle. And even if they do make the switch, there are grades of martini drinker, ranging from the cosmo and appletini to the espresso martini and the pomegranate martini to the straight up vodka or gin martini, and if someone is really hardcore they’ll have it bone dry. But no matter which type of martini drinker you are, the bottom line is, you have learned to appreciate the finer things, in a purer form.

There is of course also the difference between the olive and the twist, but that is for another story…

The MF is a shot of vodka kind of guy right now, but then he’s only 25. I like him because he’s a shot of vodka guy right now—because he’s young and brings out the young in me. But I also like him because I can see in him the Ketel One Martini guy of the future. He is both the thing I like and the thing I need.

I guess the question is, do I want to stick around until he turns 28 (or thereabouts) and turns into Mr. Martini? Mr. Shot can’t settle down and commit to being exclusive, but he is awesome in bed and a whole lot of fun out of it. And let’s face it, he’s not Mr. Mixed Drink. That is very important. He is, that is to say, a manly man and likes to take risks, try new things. He knows what he wants and it’s the same thing I want.

Mr. Martini right now wouldn’t be Mr. Right because as smooth as he is, he is the guy who is looking for a wife, possibly a mother for his children who will stay at home and care for them and when he comes home from a hard day of white-collar work, share those martinis with him before they sit down to dinner. And I am so not that girl right now. Or he’s looking for a mistress to fuck on the side when his wife is at home. And I might be that girl right now . . . I’m KIDDING! I swear!

I am too self-absorbed to have a kid and I like my independence and what I’m doing right now too much to want to stay home. I would share a martini before dinner right now, but I wouldn’t cook dinner most nights. I like to drink a little too much, I like to be a little too free, I like that the only things I have to do with my pets is feed them and take care of their crap. I’m a girl who is much more comfortable with Mr. Shot.

But someday, I do what a Mr. Martini. The question is, I guess, will this Mr. Shot turn into the Mr. Martini I need? And will I want him in 3 years? Or will I want something else sooner? Or will he not want me, Ms. Bone Dry with a Twist?

One thing I know the future holds: The MF will be a twist guy. I’m a twist girl.

Thursday, February 14, 2008

I Got Mugged

So the laundry attendant was wrong. My purse was not stolen because it was on the machine behind me while I was moving around my loads. It was stolen from me in my own driveway, behind my own house, last night at 9:30 PM on my way home from working late. I was mugged but not hurt physically. I'm making all the phone calls to credit card companies, the bank, etc., but I'm just very shaken up emotionally. I had been sleeping better the past few days but last night I barely got any sleep. I was panicking and I had such a nervous stomach I was throwing up and was just so worked up I couldn't sleep until I finally got about 2 hours' sleep around 4 am. I don't want to tell my dad or some other people because they will be all, "See? Tina moves to the city and she gets mugged. It's not safe there and I'm never going to visit her again." Time to go to the pharmacy to pick up my anxiety medication so I can stop having panic attacks long enough to take a nap.

Tuesday, February 12, 2008

Thank God

I recently surpassed 200 posts here...I have had several things on my mind the last few days besides the fact that I'm still sick and went home early today from work again because of it. Thank god I have tomorrow off.

I was thinking of my parents' relationship, the relationship I had with the Big X, and the relationships I've had with men before and since. I talked recently with a former FWB and continue to talk with Wade, a guy who has been interested in me recently but I haven't pursued. I am thinking in general of how I relate with men and how my parents' relationship plays into all this, and of course how this all relates to the MF.

This is a tangled web that needs to be unraveled once I am in my right mind again. Maybe tomorrow...

Thank god I have tomorrow off.

Friday, February 08, 2008

Wish I Could Stop Crying

I know I need to talk to the MF again; I've nearly figured out what it is I want to say, but I just can't make myself do it right now. I'm so sick today and I've been crying all morning like I do when I've got a fever or feel really, really awful, and it just feels so nice to have him taking care of me. I just want to relax right now and put myself in someone else's hands for awhile. At least until I feel better.

Tuesday, February 05, 2008

What's Keeping Me Up at Night

So the good news is I no longer have any signs of my stuffy nose. The bad news is my hacking cough kept me up most of the night last night. I didn’t have my handy dandy cough syrup with vicodin that helps me sleep when I get that really bad cough because I didn’t stay at home last night, and the regular old cough syrup where I was staying just wasn’t cutting it, not even when I doubled the dosage. Eventually I got a few hours’ sleep.

I’m worried that my lack of sleep is due to a recurrence of my insomnia, which bothers me at stressful times of my life. The longest bout was a semester of undergrad in which I averaged 2 hours’ sleep a night. Two nights ago, I got about four hours’ sleep (not too bad) and last night even though I was coughing all night, I also wasn’t tired in the least, despite the fact that I had three glasses of red wine while we were out (which is partly why I ended up staying over) and then took cough syrup—usually a surefire ticket to passing out.

I do have a few big things on my mind right now that I’m sure are what’s keeping me up. Even though it’s two weeks into the semester at school, I still haven’t registered so I can officially graduate in May, and I haven’t done a thing on my thesis in probably three months. There is no excuse for that, and there is no excuse for me not to graduate by May. I know all this and yet for some reason I can’t make myself do anything about it.

Then there is the thing I am most embarrassed to admit: I’ve got some serious financial issues right now. When I started my new job, I had to wait a month to get my first paycheck, and of course during that month I was no longer getting my unemployment. Suddenly, all the bills I had been able to manage for two years without working full-time were no longer manageable. In January, my father paid my rent for me—the first time I have asked him for money since I started baby-sitting at 13 to earn my own money. I was able to pay one credit card last month, but that was it. Besides that, I paid nothing.

Then of course my first paycheck wasn’t for a full two weeks because I started in the middle of a pay period, so now I don’t have all the money for rent. I know by the next paycheck, I’ll start catching up, but last night I had to ask my sister to borrow $300 to cover the rest of my rent in the meantime. Also, since I paid no bills last month, I of course owe double this month because they don’t just go away. I think I’m going to have to ask my dad for a loan to catch up with things, and I know I shouldn’t feel bad about asking him for money because if he has it, he’s always happy to help me, and I could list tens of thousands of dollars he spent on my sisters (mostly Stacy) for things like harps and pianos and riding lessons that he never spent on me, and that’s not to mention his continued support of them while they were in college and after.

And this is not their fault, and it’s not him playing favorites. It’s my own doing that he and my mother never helped me out. From the time that I was old enough, I worked usually two jobs so that besides living under their roof, I took nothing from them. I saved up and bought my own car, paid my own car insurance, bought my own food, clothes, etc., until the day I moved out. I never asked for help and when I turned sixteen and started working, I made it pretty clear that I didn’t want it. It’s that incredibly independent streak in me that makes it so hard for me to swallow my pride and ask my dad for help. But if I do, then I will catch up and within a month be financially solvent again. The financial problems have been on my mind for weeks now, and the thesis stuff has been on my mind for months, but both of them are coming to a head right now and I can’t seem to kick myself in the ass hard enough to get on top of them.

The newest thing, of course, is the thing with the MF. I’m still mulling it over right now, and what makes it incredibly hard is that I like him. I know I want to keep seeing him but the conversation we had on Sunday is troubling and something that isn’t settled, at least not for me. If I didn’t like him so much, I would walk away like I do at the first sign of trouble with any other guy I date. We’ll have to have another conversation about this, I know, which pisses me off. I don’t like to talk about this stuff and I wish things could just stay simple like they are the first few weeks you are dating someone: All you know—and all you need to know—is that you like spending time together. I’ve been spoiled these last few years by never having to get past that initial period but now here I am two months in and it’s getting messy. And I can’t walk away, not yet, because I still like him too much. Aside from this one thing (which is, of course, a fairly big thing), he has been so nice and so sweet. Why can’t he slip up once in awhile and be a jerk?

The fucker.

Monday, February 04, 2008

Disappointing

I’m feeling mostly better, just a lingering cough now really. Yes, Jenn, a hot toddie would help tremendously I’m sure, but I’ll need to go buy the whiskey for it first. I was at a friend’s house to watch the Superbowl and am feeling more disappointed than usual that my team lost. It just felt like destiny that the Pats would win this year of all years and to have that not happen really kind of left me feeling a little empty inside. So I’m back at work today after taking some sick time, it’s a Monday morning, it’s snowing outside, I didn’t get a lot of sleep last night, and I would say that I am feeling downright depressed this morning.

Oh, and the MF mentioned last night that he reads my blog and he’s not going to stop seeing other people. Not sure how I feel about that yet, honestly. I’m still mulling it over in my head.

Thursday, January 31, 2008

Home Sick

I went home sick yesterday. But I had to return to work at 2:00 for a 30 minute mandatory meeting. So I did. With a scowl on my face, but I did. In the meeting was P, the guy I went out with a couple of times a year ago. I knew he was still working in the building, but this was the first time I had been in the same room with him, so I did what any mature person would do when they run into someone they dated in the past: I ignored him.

To be fair, he ignored me too, but alas, this happy circumstance cannot continue. I will during the session have to interact with him at some point, so I guess tomorrow I'll send him an email to the effect of: "Sorry I didn't say hi the other day. I was feeling under the weather and wasn't in the mood to deal with people. Still, it was good to see you again. We'll have to catch up sometime."

What do you think? Sound mature enough? I don't hate him; I just squirm at the thought of him. He did, after all, practically smother me, both emotionally and physically. He was on the second date talking about having children and buying a house together, etc. A month after I dumped him, he sent me an email to tell me he was now dating a girl at work and they were talking about buying a condo together. So I was mildly surprised to see that he wasn't wearing a wedding ring yet. Of course, in his mind, "they" could have been talking about buying a condo when in reality he was talking and she was cringing, as was the case with us.

At any rate, he's not the worst guy from my past to have to work with. That would be a tie between Crazy Andy and the Big X.

And I'm home sick again today. It's either a cold or a sinus infection; whatever it is, the cough syrup with vicodin sure is doing the trick!

Tuesday, January 29, 2008

Days Since Mission Accomplished--1734; Days Before Mister Accomplished Leaves the White House--365

(I got that title from DailyKos; I'm not clever enough to think of it myself.)

Stacy called me last night around 9:30 and when I said hello, she said, "Are you listening to this bullshit??" I thought she was calling because something horrible had happened to her at work and she wanted to rant, so I told her to go ahead and tell me about it. Turns out she was listening to the State of the Union and was assuming I was too, which I normally would have been except I had my niece last night and I chose not to subject her to such drivel.

Stacy was calling me because she knew that whatever Bush was saying, he was either lying or there was another side to it, and she always relies on me to explain anything political to her. Unfortunately for her, this one time, I was not up on the most current goings-on, so I promised to learn about the SOTUS today and give her a call tonight so I can explain why her outrage was justified.

So far I've come up with:
  • The "economic stimulus" of giving every American a one-time check for approximately $500 is like putting a band aid on a stab wound to the stomach--sure, it might look like it's helping for about 2 seconds, but meanwhile, you're still bleeding to death. But at least you'll have $500 to buy a new Wii or iPhone this Summer.
  • The quote about why we need to go to war with Iran is virtually word for word what he said a few years back about why we needed to go to war with Iraq. Nuclear capabilities, supporting terrorists, blah blah blah, I don't have any more troops and I'm calling back 50-year-old fat guys who've been out of the Army for 20 years to serve again and I'm using the National Guard to fight in Iraq so they aren't available to help with national crises like Kansas's tornado devastation last year. Yeah, let's go to war with Iran too.
  • No Child Left Behind (aka No School Board Left Standing, about which W said, "No one can deny its results" and there was audible laughter from the audience in response to this line)
  • Health Savings Accounts as a solution to our national health care crisis (because the reason no one has health insurance is because no one ever told them to save money before, not because they don't have the money to save...and don't get me started on how we're the only industrialized nation in the world that does not have some form of universal health care)
  • But here's something I actually sort of agreed with him about: We do have to cut pork barrel spending. For those of you who don't live and breathe politics, this is when Congressmen (women) add line items to bills, the purpose of said line items being to bring back (usually) one-time cash grants to states or local governments, usually for capital improvement projects, such as paving roads or building schools. People get upset about this because federal money goes to something that is not of national benefit. In its worst form, things like the Bridge to Nowhere result. I don't think pork barrel spending in and of itself is bad, but it is too often abused.

Sigh...okay, enough about politics. I know I rarely venture into them here, but sometimes I just can't help it. I promise tomorrow to write something completely personal, as usual.

Monday, January 28, 2008

Misc. Monday Thoughts

I had a nice weekend. Friday I went out with Rose, and I spent Saturday and Sunday with the MF. Mike and I made up too; I made him promise never to pull that crap again, and I think I'm also getting a free dinner out of the deal.

Mike read one of my posts here about the MF and his response to me was that it's a good thing the MF doesn't read this thing, because if it was him, he'd be pretty mad at being referred to as MF. Apparently, Mike had not read the first couple of posts in which I shortened Man Friend to MF and he thought it was an abbreviation for motherfucker. He agreed after I explained, that Man Friend was not such a bad thing to be called.

Today my friend Raquel started work in my building. She works in a different department on a different floor, but it is still very exciting to have a good friend in the building. We've made plans to eat lunch outdoors in the Springtime, and to go over to Bushnell Park after work in the Summer to hear the free concerts and have some wine. Sadly, there is nothing much fun to do when there is snow on the ground in Hartford so all my happy daydreams must wait until the weather turns warmer.

Friday, January 25, 2008

I'll Think of a Clever Title When I'm Not So Tired...

Mike got really, really drunk last night and texted me like 18 times. I was on the phone with him I think 3 times. I believe the last communication was around 2:30 AM. Meanwhile, I was in bed with the MF...and had work in the AM. I was not happy. . The MF was not happy.

Details later.

Monday, January 21, 2008

I Get Gradually More Angry Because It's MLK Day

So oh boy was probably a bit of an exaggeration in hindsight; I'm just feeling a little overwhelmed right now. Two of my friends are in serious need of help all of a sudden, in a way in which I can't do much but encourage them to get it. They both are suddenly very much in the middle of some serious depression. They both have completely different lives but the reasons for their depression I think are actually quite similar.

They've both been isolating themselves and have developed very low self-esteem, a lot of which has to do with feeling completely alone. They've been wanting and (to different degrees) pursuing a relationship with people of the opposite sex but it has not been working out.

(Okay, I am sitting in a local cafe writing this while doing my laundry, and this is the first time I've been in here when a child has also been here. I like kids as a rule but this girl has started throwing one of those screaming, stomping, all-out tantrums that so many parents think it is perfectly acceptable nowadays to allow them to have in public. If I pulled that shit when I was a kid, my mom would have dragged me out of the restaurant kicking and screaming and dealt with me in the privacy of the car or something, so as not to disturb the other diners. This mother, however, like so many nowadays, just sat there and tried using her nicey-nice voice to calm the girl down, which was so not working, so then she just continued her adult conversation while the kid screamed herself out for another couple of minutes. My mom would not have allowed me to walk all over her like that and her reaction to such a fit on my part would be the complete opposite of nicey-nice. She would have scared the crap out of me so I'd stop and then she would have yelled at me for acting like a jackass in public. But lately moms seem too caught up in making their kids like them and not doing anything that might upset the kids any more than they might already be. And this is why the world is full of brats right now.)

But I digress...

The friends. Anyway, whatever some of the immediate causes of their depression, it is a vicious circle where they don't feel up to going out and seeing people so they sit on the couch and mope in front of the tv, because of which they feel worthless and upset because they never go out. I know. I was there before. There are undoubtedly several other underlying reasons why they got to this point which will require a shrink to figure out, and (as is so often the case) by the time it's gotten to this point where they and the people around them recognize what is going on, it's pretty damn bad.

Okay, I just went across the way to move my clothes from the washers to the dryers, and I left my purse directly behind me because my washers were on opposite sides of the aisle so I was between them and some dude that works there came up and started yelling at me because someone could come by and snatch my bag. Was he right? Yes. I was turning around every time someone approached to keep an eye on it but yes, if it wasn't actually being held in my hands I suppose I could have had it stolen. Did I need the public embarrassment of him screaming at me about it in front of everyone in the laundromat? Fuck no. Then as I was getting change out of the change machine, he started screaming at some dude to get the hell out of the store before he called the cops. At this point, some other white girl was leaving and she turned to me and said, "See, that's why you hold tight to your purse at all times." I was so incredibly pissed. I'm not some fucking idiot. I was quite aware of my purse and anyone who approached it. HOWEVER, it was impossible for me to hold onto the purse while reaching into the gigantor washer and pulling out the wet clothes into the basket. I am an adult who has somehow managed to live in the city this long without ever having my purse snatched, and maybe it's because I actually know what I'm doing or maybe it's because I'm lucky but either way, I am thirty fucking two years old and don't need to be yelled at by some laundromat attendant.

Phew. Deep breath. Digressing again. Suffice it to say, I miss when I was unemployed and could do my laundry at 2 in the afternoon on a weekday that everyone else didn't have off so no one but me and 3 other people were in the place. And when I came over to Tisane to sit and have coffee or a drink while my clothes dried, there wasn't a screaming two-year-old giving me a headache. Basically, my life would be so much nicer at this particular moment if I was still unemployed and didn't have to do my laundry on a holiday when everyone else has the day off too.

The depressed friends...I wish there was more I could do to help them besides just listen and tell them to get help, but there really isn't. I'm not smart enough to be their therapist. Too frustrated with the world right now to think any more on the nuances of the situation. I think I need to switch from coffee to wine right now and try to calm down, because now the yuppie couple sitting next to me is annoying the shit out of me and that is just stupid on my part because this place is full of yuppies; that's half the reason I come here.

Oh Boy...

Just oh boy.

Wednesday, January 16, 2008

Frigging Guys

The MF came home on Saturday and we spent time together then and Monday. He brought me a book and a very pretty necklace and earring set from India. The book, No Full Stops in India, is by a British journalist who lives in India, and it is a collection of essays that touch on different aspects of Indian society and culture. I started it last night, and it’s bringing back some things I had forgotten I knew about the country and at the same time showing me how much I still have to learn. The MF also mentioned that he’s reading another book about India that he’d like to lend to me when he’s done. I like that he wants me to learn about his country.

I am very happy with him but cautious. I wish we had never had the Conversation about not moving too quickly (that part I was fine about) and him not wanting to hurt me (that is the part that concerns me) because now I’m probably overly concerned that he will hurt me so I am holding back in a way that is hard to explain. I’ve talked this through with a couple of friends because what it comes down to is definitions, the biggest one right now being, are we or are we not exclusive to each other at this point?

I had a couple of other guys pursuing me when I first met him, and right at the time it would have been inappropriate and silly to say to them, “Hey, I’ve been on one date with this guy and I have a good feeling about him so I can’t talk to you anymore.” Then a week or two went by and we had seen each other several times so at that point I probably would have said to the other two guys, “I’ve started seeing someone and it might turn serious so I want to see where it goes and I’ll contact you if it doesn’t work out and blah blah blah . . .”

But the pesky Conversation happened and it made me cautious because what does that mean, he doesn’t want to hurt me? Does it mean he needs to take things slow? Does it mean he’s still seeing other girls (which would have been perfectly understandable at the time)? Does it mean he doesn’t see the possibility of a future with me and knows this is just temporary (which again would have been ok if I knew that was what he meant and knew it up front)? Or any number of other possibilities, which because I hate those conversations, it didn’t even occur to me at the time to bring up.

At any rate, when the MF left for India, we had not put any sort of definition or label to what we were doing, and these other guys were still pursuing me and I didn’t know what to do. So I talked with a couple of friends and of course everyone had their own opinion—some felt that if it had not been specifically stated that we would not date other people, I would be stupid to not keep my options open and I shouldn’t feel guilty about going out with other guys when he was gone; others felt that if they had been seeing someone for three weeks that it was sort of implied that they were exclusive and they’d be really pissed if they found out that there was dating of other people going on. I, of course, being the consummate love ‘em and leave ‘em type up until now, have no personal experience in this matter from which to draw.

So the situation remained unresolved and I still talked to the other guys but tried to keep them at arm’s length so that we didn’t get to the point of a first date before the MF returned, thinking that when he did, we could clarify things then. Well, the truth is, one of the guys did push for a first date soon after New Year’s and I tentatively agreed but then put off finalizing plans so we never ended up going. But these guys are still talking to me, clearly with the hopes that getting to know me will result in a romantic situation. And I still haven’t dashed those hopes. And I still haven’t had the conversation with the MF about frigging definitions. Because I hate the fact that we have to even have definitions and I especially hate having to talk about all that squishy stuff.

Also because of the Conversation. I sort of decided that since he brought that stuff up, I would not talk about anything resembling moving forward/defining things/(insert here any other term you can think of that may cause someone who wants to take things slowly to panic), that I would let him set the pace for now and bring that sort of stuff up the next time whenever he was ready. But that leaves me still stringing along these other two guys, and I’m realizing the main reason I’m doing that now is out of fear—fear that he is seeing other women or doesn’t see this going anywhere or something like that; fear that if I cut off these other options—they are both perfectly nice guys or I wouldn’t still be talking to them—he’s not making that same level of commitment to me or he’s thinking that there is an end in sight here, and I’m going to be alone again in a few weeks or a month and will have passed up on these other two opportunities in the meantime.

Of course, the most telling conversation I had with friends about this while the MF was gone was with Rose. She asked me, “Do you want to go out with either of these other guys romantically?”

“Not anymore,” I said. “Right now I’m only comparing them to the MF and I’d rather be spending time with him.”

So she told me that I’m not really missing out on any opportunities here because my mind isn’t in the right place to start anything with these other guys right now anyway. And yet, I’m still afraid because of everything else I’ve written in this post. I told you, I frigging hate dealing with feelings and labeling things and all the technical crap that goes along with trying to be with someone that you sort of like and might want to see a future with someday if you can successfully navigate all this other crap in between here and there and still end up liking each other.

Frigging guys.

Wednesday, January 09, 2008

I Re-enter the Working World

I am no longer gainfully unemployed. Sadly, I had to end my long, self-imposed vacation from the working world. Today is my third day back to work full-time, and don't get me wrong--I am grateful for the job, as I was soon to be kicked out onto the street for not paying rent if I didn't find income soon--but I do miss my days of couch-laying, book-reading, Netflix-watching laziness.

You know those people who retire and then say, "Gee, I'm so bored! I don't know what to do with myself!" That will not be me. I will always have a talent for filling my days with nothingness, given the opportunity. For instance, my blog entries had become more frequent of late. Sadly, now I have not had the energy these last few nights to write that other post I had wanted to about defining things with men.

I do like my job so far; my co-workers seem nice, and despite the fact that I have FOUR bosses, I am pretty independent in what I'm doing. Soon, I will have a bunch of temporary employees working for me as we head into our busy season so that will be nice, as I always enjoy bossing someone around at work. And this summer, I will have the ability to take lots of time off. I even think by the end of the week, I may be caught up enough at work to begin figuring out how to screw off sometimes. And tonight, I might just get relaxed enough to start posting good stuff here again, rather than this stream-of-consciousness blather I'm posting at 7:30 this morning because I woke up early and couldn't get back to sleep.

Saturday, January 05, 2008

Grieving Alone

When the Big X and I broke up, my dad was at a loss as to what to do, how to help me. He (like most fathers, I'm sure) was never comfortable with my love life. So he left me alone mostly. The trouble was, I was not just getting over a boyfriend; I was also just beginning to deal with the fact that we had been told that my mother was dying. My dad shared his grief with my sisters and tried to help them with theirs, but I for the most part was exempt from sharing my pain with him. Consequently, that was how I learned to deal with what was going on with my mother for the three years since then. On my own.

Friends were somewhat helpful, but only somewhat. The couple of short term boyfriends I had were also only somewhat helpful. The biggest problem, what would anger me even, was everyone else's lack of acceptance. Hell, when I was still with the Big X, even he wouldn't accept what I was telling him. The worst was last July, when we were told she was going to finally die. Everyone else around me who was not in the family--their way of "helping" was to try to convince me that it wasn't true. How could the doctors just tell you you're going to die, soon, and there is nothing left to do? It was inconceivable to them--I think because if it wasn't true for my mom, for me, then it could never happen to anyone they loved. If no one else had to hurt like this, then that meant they would never have to, either.

Honestly what I needed most right then, those few nights in July of last summer between the day that the cardiologist told my mother that she was going to die, and we got the same opinion from the oncologist--and the surgeon--and the rounds doctor at the hospital, and anyone else at all . . . what I needed most those few nights between that day and the day my mother died was for just one person who wasn't in my family to accept that all hope was lost and to just hold me.

What I got was friends who meant well frantically asking second opinions of their cousin's brother-in-law who was an oncologist or their uncle's best friend whose wife had cancer ten years ago, as if we hadn't already tried every possible outlet. Or people like Crazy Andy, my boyfriend at the time, who just blindly would not accept that it was even possible for someone my mother's age to just die while under all these doctors' care. Didn't they think it was hard enough for me to get to that point of acceptance, without having to try to talk all of them into accepting the truth as well?

Here we were, at the end of a three-year road, my mother laying in a hospital bed because she could no longer swallow anything, not even water, without aspirating (choking, for those of you fortunate enough not to have had to learn all the lingo). And even if we fed her intravenously (which is what we ended up doing for the remaining days), she could aspirate on her own spit. And even if none of that happened, let us not forget the rapidly growing tumor in her heart that would soon stop her blood from flowing and kill her that way. And no, they couldn't just operate. Everything is not like a Grey's Anatomy episode. There was still the lesions on her liver, on the bones in both arms, the new ones forming on her lungs, on her back. The shadows in the scans of her brain that soon would become tumors as well.

We--and when I say we I mean my mother--had fought this fucker for three goddamn years; we had beat all the odds. She should have been dead in 2005. The doctors had just been winging it for the past 2 years because nobody had ever made it that long. But last July, this fucker won, and I just needed someone who would accept me, accept my pain, and not try to make it better. There just is no making it better sometimes. And I didn't get that, so I guess the beginning, back in January 2005, where my best friend left me and my family couldn't help me, was good training for the end as well. I dealt with it alone.

* * *

I was thinking of all this stuff because tonight I used my mother's death as an excuse to my father for why I didn't want the Grandmonster coming to my birthday dinner next Sunday. I told him that since this will be my first birthday without Mom, that I just want it to be the immediate family, that I think it's going to be hard for me, and I don't want any extra people. It's not an excuse entirely; I do think it will be hard for me, and I do think that with the Grandmonster there it would be that much harder. That is entirely true. However, I also have never wanted the Grandmonster at these things; I just now have a valid reason to use that won't hurt my father's feelings.

So I was thinking on my drive home after I talked to my dad about that, and all these thoughts I've written down tonight ran through my head. And one other one. I haven't talked much at all with my new Man Friend about my mother, but I'm sure he's put it all together by now, or at least the big pieces. And that's kind of the point--I never had to sit down and have this big talk with him where I told him all about the pain that was my life these last three years. He just took the parts I told him and accepted them. I know, of course, that accepting this is all much easier once my mother has died, but still the way he is about it helps a lot. I don't have to feel like I have to explain everything; it just is.

There was once in the three weeks we've spent together that I cried about it. I had been telling him a story that was supposed to be funny but when I got to the point where my mom was dying of cancer, it suddenly wasn't funny. And I got a little bit weepy--not big all-out bawling, just sort of silently leaking a few tears. And he didn't say a word; he held me and touched me and kissed me and just let it be. And in a minute, it was over. I don't have any clue if he even has any idea how much that was the perfect thing for him to do in that moment; probably, he just didn't know what the hell he was supposed to say so he didn't say anything.

But whatever his reasoning for that was, it doesn't matter to me. It was just what I needed.

Wednesday, January 02, 2008

Man Friend Feelings

I've got two things I want to write here about the new guy, to whom a couple of my friends have been referring as my Man Friend. First I want to talk about the idea of feelings--chemistry, love at first sight, etc., and second I want to talk about defining things. These are two completely different things in a relationship, though it would seem that one goes hand in hand with the other. For today, I'm going to write about feelings; the other will have to wait til tomorrow.

I don't believe in love at first sight. I believe in lust at first sight, in instant chemistry. I believe in knowing after you first meet someone that you really like them and want to know them more. But love I think takes time to grow. So I don't love my Man Friend, god no. I don't mean that to sound like I'm repulsed by the idea; I think in time I could grow to love him, but it is ridiculous and immature to think that within just a few weeks I would be in love with him.

The first night, at the end of our date, in the middle of all the kissing, I told him I like him. And I have said it several times since. I have said, in the heat of passion, that I love his . . . ahem . . . (insert penis euphemism here). That is the closest I have come. I am reminded of a dream I had about a year and a half ago. What I know I feel is that I miss him. He's been gone for about a week and a half now, and he'll be back in another week and a half. I liked him more at the end of our 3 weeks together than I did at the beginning; he is definitely growing on me. So yes, I can see where one day I might love him.

But I had a dream that he came back and told me he loved me right away, and I . . . was silent. I'm just not there yet. The good news is that, in the dream, I did not flip out like I did when P. started talking about moving in together, or when the Musician said he was being exclusive to me and wanted a picture of us together "as a couple". I'm not scared of how he might feel toward me, and I'm not scared at the idea that someday I might love him and be in a real, long-term relationship. I'm also hopeful about things--hopeful that this one might take. You know, so long as it takes slowly.

So my feelings for my Man Friend right now? Like. Comfortable like. Mixed with hope. And I want him to come home. And that, my friends, is a big step for me.

Tuesday, January 01, 2008

A Short Missive on Deception

I just finished reading a book I picked up to keep me busy during the holiday, gods in Alabama. It was much better than I expected, with actual themes and symbolism and foreshadowing involved. I was just looking for a little brain candy to keep me busy for a few days, but I lucked out. Anyway, one of the themes of the book was different ways of being dishonest. The protagonist (fancy word, huh? You'd think I'd wasted 4 years of my life getting a degree in English or something...)....ahem. The protagonist for complex reasons involving rape and murder makes a promise to God that she will not tell a lie ever again, and she doesn't for ten years. Ever. Not once, does she tell a lie (not even "No, that dress doesn't make you look fat"). Instead she perfects the art of dishonesty by omission, by selective truth-telling, by careful wording. The author seems to be positing that in many ways a straight-forward lie is less deceptive and less hurtful than this deception by pointedly, cleverly, carefully not lying.

I don't know; that's a bit of a stretch for me, but...I do both--though I notice I engage in the dishonesty by selective truth-telling whenever I sense a risk of being caught. That way I can always fall back on the technical argument that I did not lie. Though that is the essence of it--I'm trying to get off on a technicality. And everyone hates someone who gets off on a technicality, probably more than someone who is proven guilty. Because everyone knows that the one that got off did the same thing as the one who was found guilty; it's just that the one that got off outsmarted us. So we hate him more than the other guy, even though they actually did the same thing, because he did it better.

Who knows, maybe that was Joshilyn Jackson's point when she wrote gods in Alabama--not that it is less deceptive and less hurtful to tell the straight-forward lie, but that if you're going to get the same result either way--dishonesty--that you might as well do it the straightforward way, because at least then people will hate you less.