How did Dog survive before it had Man to hold it while it whined and protect it from thunder? Did Dog always need its food broken into smaller pieces, or did it at some point consistently and instinctually remember how to chew? And what did Man do in the pre-dawn sleet storm? Sleep?
No, Darwin here is a fairy tale. Fur and love and big desperate eyes must be grand design; otherwise I would have eaten the little fuzz-monster.
Friday, December 31, 2010
Monday, December 27, 2010
Belated
Why write now when I haven't blogged in almost two months? A Boy, of course. I'll get there in a moment...
I never wrote about Thanksgiving, how much we had to be thankful this year. My cousin adopted a child. My other cousins are pregnant. Amber stopped by and she's all kinds of pregnant, too. I've created an actual business that's started to make actual money that I enjoy and works extremely well with the chronic migraines and depression that I need to accept as part of myself that's not going anywhere any time soon. And my mom had the fastest, easiest experience with breast cancer humanly possible. I don't think we've ever cried so much as we went around the table and did our "I'm thankful for..."s.
My babycousin (the adoptee) is almost one and friggin adorable. My parents still have this plastic horse on wheels that was my favorite 1st birthday present. I found it in their basement, Lysoled the hell out of it, and brought it up to see if Babycousin wanted to try it out. She loved it and I love that she loved it. Maternal instincts creeping in, biology and all that...raising the next generation with my own experience...someone please start singing "Circle of Life."
I never wrote about my business taking off over the holiday season, money coming in for the first time in a substantial way, paying down the credit card I pretend doesn't exist from a few years back, seeing 800 shop views in an hour, front page, treasury after treasury, hard work paying off.
I never wrote about The Ritalin Experiment. As happens every year, fall showed up and so did a general feeling of gloom and constant exhaustion. My psychiatrist thought I'd do well on a "stimulant" meaning Ritalin. It was a good thought. Unfortunately, I had a paradoxical reaction and it took me two weeks to realize my total lack of desire to do anything and deep dark depression were a result of the drugs and not just a part of me I deserved (isn't depression fun?)
I never wrote about my mom's surgery. Breast cancer reconstruction stuff. The last of it. She was getting back to her negative fussy ways, but then about 24 hours before going under, she saw her therapist and POOF! back to positive thinking. Amazing.
I never wrote about the ovarian cyst I got the day before my mom's surgery. I ended up driving myself to the ER in agony, getting probed by nice people with creepy machines and dumb people with nice drugs and then missing the entire time my mom was in the hospital. Not ok. Ok with my mom (who was wonderful about it) but not with me. I felt guilty, like somehow I'd made myself sick so this would be about me instead of her. They got a nice clear view of the cyst in the sonogram, so if I did somehow give myself the damn thing, I've gotten good at materializing my psychosomatic symptoms.
But I never wrote about the boy, either.
At first I thought he was gay. I misinterpreted something as him flirting with another guy, and I must have thought he said something else early on, too, because I filed him away as "gay" very quickly in a way I don't normally do. So he was my fun new friend I didn't see that much. He was there for Halloween, we hung out for a good chunk of the night as I got consistently more and more wasted. He was gone by the time I was almost ready to follow home the snarky stranger.
I think Halloween was when I first thought, "Wait, why exactly did I think he was gay?" Went from "Too bad he's gay" to "I don't think he's gay..."
Apparently I'm extremely dense. Aural Girl is amazed at my obliviousness, and Possible Boy knew exactly who I was talking about because "it's just that obvious that he likes you."
Still, I wasn't sure until he was talking about Neighbor Guy basically trying to rape him no matter how many times he said "I'm. Not. Gay." (Glad to hear Neighbor Guy is sticking to his M.O., falling for straight boys and then not taking "no" for an answer.)
I had to reevaluate The Boy. Because now he could actually be a Boy. What? Further investigation was in order, but I saw him at most once a week at the bar. We didn't actually hang out until right before he left for the east coast for a month-long winter break vacation.
But.
The day we hung out, we were together from 11 AM to 11 PM and had a really fantastic time. Driving around in freezing rain and an estate sale and making music and cooking and more music and being awkward and then just a little bit of smooch on my way out the door. He followed me out to my car in his t-shirt, oblivious to the cold in our mutual dazed bewilderment. The freezing rain slush had turned to snow. After our final bits of giddy and apprehensive, I managed a cool "See you in a month," and drove home.
And then he flew away. To a Carolina. For a month. He won't be back until mid-January.
I wished for an excuse to write love letters, but at this point it would be for the storyline and the love of myself.
But it turns out, he tends to be awake at stupid hours of the night creating things. Whether it's a bad habit or just my natural clock, I've been indulging my nocturnal tendencies and spending hours and hours (like, a good 5 hours a night) "talking" to him on Facebook chat.
I'm not quite sure he's real. I suppose there's enough about him that is just completely his that he can't be purely a narcissistic projection of myself, and there's so much I still don't know. But so much of what I'm finding out seems to fit very well. I'm not getting completely lost and stupid because, via instant messages, he seems more like a concept than a real person. We'll see when he gets back. As long as he keeps making me feel better about myself instead of worse, he's an improvement on most of my past emotionally-involved Boys and I"ll gladly live in fluttery-but-cautiously-optimistic limbo for a few more weeks.
[No code name yet because I haven't decided on one.]
I never wrote about Thanksgiving, how much we had to be thankful this year. My cousin adopted a child. My other cousins are pregnant. Amber stopped by and she's all kinds of pregnant, too. I've created an actual business that's started to make actual money that I enjoy and works extremely well with the chronic migraines and depression that I need to accept as part of myself that's not going anywhere any time soon. And my mom had the fastest, easiest experience with breast cancer humanly possible. I don't think we've ever cried so much as we went around the table and did our "I'm thankful for..."s.
My babycousin (the adoptee) is almost one and friggin adorable. My parents still have this plastic horse on wheels that was my favorite 1st birthday present. I found it in their basement, Lysoled the hell out of it, and brought it up to see if Babycousin wanted to try it out. She loved it and I love that she loved it. Maternal instincts creeping in, biology and all that...raising the next generation with my own experience...someone please start singing "Circle of Life."
I never wrote about my business taking off over the holiday season, money coming in for the first time in a substantial way, paying down the credit card I pretend doesn't exist from a few years back, seeing 800 shop views in an hour, front page, treasury after treasury, hard work paying off.
I never wrote about The Ritalin Experiment. As happens every year, fall showed up and so did a general feeling of gloom and constant exhaustion. My psychiatrist thought I'd do well on a "stimulant" meaning Ritalin. It was a good thought. Unfortunately, I had a paradoxical reaction and it took me two weeks to realize my total lack of desire to do anything and deep dark depression were a result of the drugs and not just a part of me I deserved (isn't depression fun?)
I never wrote about my mom's surgery. Breast cancer reconstruction stuff. The last of it. She was getting back to her negative fussy ways, but then about 24 hours before going under, she saw her therapist and POOF! back to positive thinking. Amazing.
I never wrote about the ovarian cyst I got the day before my mom's surgery. I ended up driving myself to the ER in agony, getting probed by nice people with creepy machines and dumb people with nice drugs and then missing the entire time my mom was in the hospital. Not ok. Ok with my mom (who was wonderful about it) but not with me. I felt guilty, like somehow I'd made myself sick so this would be about me instead of her. They got a nice clear view of the cyst in the sonogram, so if I did somehow give myself the damn thing, I've gotten good at materializing my psychosomatic symptoms.
But I never wrote about the boy, either.
At first I thought he was gay. I misinterpreted something as him flirting with another guy, and I must have thought he said something else early on, too, because I filed him away as "gay" very quickly in a way I don't normally do. So he was my fun new friend I didn't see that much. He was there for Halloween, we hung out for a good chunk of the night as I got consistently more and more wasted. He was gone by the time I was almost ready to follow home the snarky stranger.
I think Halloween was when I first thought, "Wait, why exactly did I think he was gay?" Went from "Too bad he's gay" to "I don't think he's gay..."
Apparently I'm extremely dense. Aural Girl is amazed at my obliviousness, and Possible Boy knew exactly who I was talking about because "it's just that obvious that he likes you."
Still, I wasn't sure until he was talking about Neighbor Guy basically trying to rape him no matter how many times he said "I'm. Not. Gay." (Glad to hear Neighbor Guy is sticking to his M.O., falling for straight boys and then not taking "no" for an answer.)
I had to reevaluate The Boy. Because now he could actually be a Boy. What? Further investigation was in order, but I saw him at most once a week at the bar. We didn't actually hang out until right before he left for the east coast for a month-long winter break vacation.
But.
The day we hung out, we were together from 11 AM to 11 PM and had a really fantastic time. Driving around in freezing rain and an estate sale and making music and cooking and more music and being awkward and then just a little bit of smooch on my way out the door. He followed me out to my car in his t-shirt, oblivious to the cold in our mutual dazed bewilderment. The freezing rain slush had turned to snow. After our final bits of giddy and apprehensive, I managed a cool "See you in a month," and drove home.
And then he flew away. To a Carolina. For a month. He won't be back until mid-January.
I wished for an excuse to write love letters, but at this point it would be for the storyline and the love of myself.
But it turns out, he tends to be awake at stupid hours of the night creating things. Whether it's a bad habit or just my natural clock, I've been indulging my nocturnal tendencies and spending hours and hours (like, a good 5 hours a night) "talking" to him on Facebook chat.
I'm not quite sure he's real. I suppose there's enough about him that is just completely his that he can't be purely a narcissistic projection of myself, and there's so much I still don't know. But so much of what I'm finding out seems to fit very well. I'm not getting completely lost and stupid because, via instant messages, he seems more like a concept than a real person. We'll see when he gets back. As long as he keeps making me feel better about myself instead of worse, he's an improvement on most of my past emotionally-involved Boys and I"ll gladly live in fluttery-but-cautiously-optimistic limbo for a few more weeks.
[No code name yet because I haven't decided on one.]
Sunday, October 31, 2010
My Halloween Evil
Every Halloween, much of the female population dresses as sexy, skanky, whory as possible. This year my costume was an inanimate object not normally considered sexy, made sexy. It's part of an inside joke from a few years ago (mainly with NBF) that somehow seemed funnier if most people witnessing the costume weren't in on the gag. Aural Girl and Possible Boy ended up going to non-Chicago portions of Illinois for the weekend and my social awkward/laziness landed me at a single party where I pretty much laughed alone.
But the costume turned out very well and I was walking sex.
I spent much of the past week growling at the extra 15 pounds Emsam exploded around my middle. I actually got stuck in the corset that used to be too big for me, and shirts and dresses all seemed to point directly to the weird lumpy bulge popping out at my waist line. I tried to contain it and hide it and wondered what I was doing bothering with a sexy costume at all now that I'm such a lard-ass.
Fucked. Up.
I still fought with the tights that wanted to roll beneath my roll, still buttoned my sweater lower than I would have a year ago. But once I found tight cotton short-shorts to wear over the tights, I remembered the First Rule of...well, certainly not Fight Club. Aesthetics Club? They'll be staring at my ass, not my middle. And if that's embarrassing or whorish, in autumn it easy to forget how much less we wear to the beach in summer.
But here's the real deep-dark "secret" of it all: I like the attention. I like the sense of power. Not only was my costume an inside joke with myself, so was the reaction the costume produced. I got to be Holly Golightly and Mae West all at once, boys' sly remarks caught in their tied tongues.
When we're dressed up as someone else, we get to be ourselves. And for me, as I think for a lot of women, ourselves are a lot more sexual than we think we're supposed to admit. I think my ideal is a smile with just a shadow of smirk wrinkling my lip. Enough to remind myself I'm in control but no real malice.
I could have brought home one of the boys. Considered it. But once I'm reminded that even with my awkward and crazy and my gimpy migraine life, that I can still command a room, then I get to require basic things of a boy like intelligence, attractiveness, and giving a shit about me. Greedy? Perhaps. Thinking a whole fucking lot of myself just because I wore something slutty? Yes. But I'm hanging out with Ken on Tuesday and no matter how sexual I'm feeling, that's a much better option than random strangers.
Happy Halloween.
But the costume turned out very well and I was walking sex.
I spent much of the past week growling at the extra 15 pounds Emsam exploded around my middle. I actually got stuck in the corset that used to be too big for me, and shirts and dresses all seemed to point directly to the weird lumpy bulge popping out at my waist line. I tried to contain it and hide it and wondered what I was doing bothering with a sexy costume at all now that I'm such a lard-ass.
Fucked. Up.
I still fought with the tights that wanted to roll beneath my roll, still buttoned my sweater lower than I would have a year ago. But once I found tight cotton short-shorts to wear over the tights, I remembered the First Rule of...well, certainly not Fight Club. Aesthetics Club? They'll be staring at my ass, not my middle. And if that's embarrassing or whorish, in autumn it easy to forget how much less we wear to the beach in summer.
But here's the real deep-dark "secret" of it all: I like the attention. I like the sense of power. Not only was my costume an inside joke with myself, so was the reaction the costume produced. I got to be Holly Golightly and Mae West all at once, boys' sly remarks caught in their tied tongues.
When we're dressed up as someone else, we get to be ourselves. And for me, as I think for a lot of women, ourselves are a lot more sexual than we think we're supposed to admit. I think my ideal is a smile with just a shadow of smirk wrinkling my lip. Enough to remind myself I'm in control but no real malice.
I could have brought home one of the boys. Considered it. But once I'm reminded that even with my awkward and crazy and my gimpy migraine life, that I can still command a room, then I get to require basic things of a boy like intelligence, attractiveness, and giving a shit about me. Greedy? Perhaps. Thinking a whole fucking lot of myself just because I wore something slutty? Yes. But I'm hanging out with Ken on Tuesday and no matter how sexual I'm feeling, that's a much better option than random strangers.
Happy Halloween.
Wednesday, October 27, 2010
Ethics, Judgment, Fault: Conversations with my Mother
Yesterday I had a conversation with my mother about blogs and privacy and all of that.
When I write about my life, there are other people in it. What right do I have to publicize their secrets and stories? But I do have some right to my own happiness, and writing is how I process. And not to sound pretentious/conceited, but "Art" has a stake in this equation as well. The written work created effects far more people than those mentioned in it, and that is every bit as important as the process of its creation, for what good is the unaffected life?
My parents pick pick pick and criticize my (and everyone else's) every action. My own doubts in my mind sound in their voices, echoing back and forth conversations real to imagined and imagined to real.
I tried to be clear and strong to my mother yesterday that she, as a therapist, needs to insulate her privacy to the degree she sees fit, and that's her prerogative. If she wants to write books (as she has) and be findable on Facebook (as she does and is), those are all her decisions and her issues. I am a writer and not a therapist. I write under a pseudonym now, but my business is under my real name, I'm on Facebook, I am me and I am not afraid to share with the anonymous world or with people who might know me very well. I get to choose what I cloak about myself. If she is the therapist and the person trying to maintain privacy, she needs to be the one to put up the blocks and the barriers. It is literally her job, not mine.
When it comes to writing about other people in a public forum, I wrestle with it all the time. My instinct is to share it all as openly and honestly as I can, real names attached because then you know what I'm talking about and it's true and pure; anything I change or fabricate on purpose will be somehow less beautiful than the genuine article.
But I behave myself. I'm not actually the narcissist I often think I am. Maybe that's why I'm so bothered by my mom calling back today with her ominous "We need to talk. About the blog thing," that I know is just her dissatisfaction with my trying to put the responsibility on her instead of taking the burden on myself.
I have to decide what path to take when I call her back, because if I just listen and respond the conversation will be her telling me why I'm hurting other people by doing the one thing that means the most to me in the world, and it's my responsibility to protect her and myself and everyone else from her crazy stalking client because she (my mother) didn't foresee the professional conflicts of Facebook.
I get frustrated because I feel like everything is all about my mother except for judgment and blame.
When I write about my life, there are other people in it. What right do I have to publicize their secrets and stories? But I do have some right to my own happiness, and writing is how I process. And not to sound pretentious/conceited, but "Art" has a stake in this equation as well. The written work created effects far more people than those mentioned in it, and that is every bit as important as the process of its creation, for what good is the unaffected life?
My parents pick pick pick and criticize my (and everyone else's) every action. My own doubts in my mind sound in their voices, echoing back and forth conversations real to imagined and imagined to real.
I tried to be clear and strong to my mother yesterday that she, as a therapist, needs to insulate her privacy to the degree she sees fit, and that's her prerogative. If she wants to write books (as she has) and be findable on Facebook (as she does and is), those are all her decisions and her issues. I am a writer and not a therapist. I write under a pseudonym now, but my business is under my real name, I'm on Facebook, I am me and I am not afraid to share with the anonymous world or with people who might know me very well. I get to choose what I cloak about myself. If she is the therapist and the person trying to maintain privacy, she needs to be the one to put up the blocks and the barriers. It is literally her job, not mine.
When it comes to writing about other people in a public forum, I wrestle with it all the time. My instinct is to share it all as openly and honestly as I can, real names attached because then you know what I'm talking about and it's true and pure; anything I change or fabricate on purpose will be somehow less beautiful than the genuine article.
But I behave myself. I'm not actually the narcissist I often think I am. Maybe that's why I'm so bothered by my mom calling back today with her ominous "We need to talk. About the blog thing," that I know is just her dissatisfaction with my trying to put the responsibility on her instead of taking the burden on myself.
I have to decide what path to take when I call her back, because if I just listen and respond the conversation will be her telling me why I'm hurting other people by doing the one thing that means the most to me in the world, and it's my responsibility to protect her and myself and everyone else from her crazy stalking client because she (my mother) didn't foresee the professional conflicts of Facebook.
I get frustrated because I feel like everything is all about my mother except for judgment and blame.
Wednesday, October 20, 2010
Dual Citizenship
September, my head was so good. I had days and days of zero headache. Zero. And almost every day the pain was at least tolerable enough to function.
At first, I freaked out. I was so desperate to cram in everything I don't get to do when I'm a blob. I worked my tail off and felt like it wasn't good enough, like I wasn't getting enough done, like there was so much more to do and any moment I wasn't doing something visibly productive was a waste of my precious healthy time.
Then there were my friends. When the migraines are bad, I have trouble maintaining friendships. I have to cancel plans all the time and then we stop making plans. I can do things spontaneously, but few other people are available at my healthy whims. Then when we do get together, what do I have to talk about? My life is fairly limited, and if you don't find my present occupation or the ethereal and observational shit I like to spew interesting, I will bore you. Illness is incredibly isolating, and with a healthy dose of narcissism (I'm a writer, for fuck's sake), the Bad Days go by as all about me. My pain. My struggle. Pain is loud and makes me strongly aware of myself, everything else just background and things that might add or detract from pain. I'm like an infant, entirely corporal and needy. I kick and scream at pain, hunger, loneliness, frustration, and when these base things are quieted I marvel at my own two feet and the way light and color exist in and out of my dreams.
When September was good, I barely started relearning how to go out and be outside of myself, try to rediscover those friendships I care about. I went out to dinner with Possible Girl. I went back to the bar. I went to a party. Just getting my feet wet.
My neurologist says that my brain thinks pain is very important. We find something new to confuse it for as along as possible but it's trying to get back to the pain. When it finds it again, we go to something new. I like him better than the migraine clinic. The clinic is more aggressive, which was great short-term, but now that they've kind of blown their wad, he still has lots of ideas and worries about things like my long-term health and if my medications are killing my kidneys. But the point is, we'll keep working on finding things to trick my brain and keep getting chunks of time without pain. And each chunk of time I'm not in pain, I'll keep learning how to live a double life. And maybe I can take some of my this-is-just-how-it-is migraine-life acceptance into the bright places, and maybe I can take some of my human contacts and friends with me back into the dark.
Because October, thus far, sucked. I've gotten some good days. But more than half the days have been bad with some really bad. Today was particularly rotten with light and sound kicking my ass and logic evading me at every corner. When I curl up into myself, I want it to be about someone else for a change. I've had enough of me. I'm reading, looking for contact on the internet, but obviously it's not the same. I may call a friend tonight and deal with the pain of mechanised cell phone sound. Tell me a story of you.
At first, I freaked out. I was so desperate to cram in everything I don't get to do when I'm a blob. I worked my tail off and felt like it wasn't good enough, like I wasn't getting enough done, like there was so much more to do and any moment I wasn't doing something visibly productive was a waste of my precious healthy time.
Then there were my friends. When the migraines are bad, I have trouble maintaining friendships. I have to cancel plans all the time and then we stop making plans. I can do things spontaneously, but few other people are available at my healthy whims. Then when we do get together, what do I have to talk about? My life is fairly limited, and if you don't find my present occupation or the ethereal and observational shit I like to spew interesting, I will bore you. Illness is incredibly isolating, and with a healthy dose of narcissism (I'm a writer, for fuck's sake), the Bad Days go by as all about me. My pain. My struggle. Pain is loud and makes me strongly aware of myself, everything else just background and things that might add or detract from pain. I'm like an infant, entirely corporal and needy. I kick and scream at pain, hunger, loneliness, frustration, and when these base things are quieted I marvel at my own two feet and the way light and color exist in and out of my dreams.
When September was good, I barely started relearning how to go out and be outside of myself, try to rediscover those friendships I care about. I went out to dinner with Possible Girl. I went back to the bar. I went to a party. Just getting my feet wet.
My neurologist says that my brain thinks pain is very important. We find something new to confuse it for as along as possible but it's trying to get back to the pain. When it finds it again, we go to something new. I like him better than the migraine clinic. The clinic is more aggressive, which was great short-term, but now that they've kind of blown their wad, he still has lots of ideas and worries about things like my long-term health and if my medications are killing my kidneys. But the point is, we'll keep working on finding things to trick my brain and keep getting chunks of time without pain. And each chunk of time I'm not in pain, I'll keep learning how to live a double life. And maybe I can take some of my this-is-just-how-it-is migraine-life acceptance into the bright places, and maybe I can take some of my human contacts and friends with me back into the dark.
Because October, thus far, sucked. I've gotten some good days. But more than half the days have been bad with some really bad. Today was particularly rotten with light and sound kicking my ass and logic evading me at every corner. When I curl up into myself, I want it to be about someone else for a change. I've had enough of me. I'm reading, looking for contact on the internet, but obviously it's not the same. I may call a friend tonight and deal with the pain of mechanised cell phone sound. Tell me a story of you.
Monday, September 06, 2010
When I'm in pain, I feel like I can't get a grip on my life and the few things I can control I desperately cling to and force into storylines.
When I'm clear, I feel like I'm all hands and I don't know how to just live. I went out tonight and felt so sober and awkward, I didn't know how to just be. Nervous, out of balance, I wanted to scream. I could have gone home, but I stayed out. Mu usual signals to go home, like I get tired or start to feel the booze or people I'm talking to leave, just didn't exist. So hour after hour it was like I was waiting for the fun or the human connection or the sign that the world is beautiful. Instead, I finally spoke to the guy who had been sitting next to me and he was a magnified version of everything that was disgusting myself about my own awkward. He'd brought with him a sketch book, half a dozen artist pencils, pencil sharpener, and eraser but spent hours on the outline of a single cartoon-like character's head an 11-year-old could have drawn. His t-shirt tucked into his jeans belted high above the waist and the way his fat collected above his belt, in the seat of his pants, and in his face all added to the 11-year-old affect. I wasn't in much of a mood to give him a chance to redeem himself, but when the bartender said something about his drink also not containing alcohol, I asked why not.
"I just don't have much of a taste for it."
I asked why come to a bar then (he hadn't spoken a word to another human being since I'd sat down hours earlier).
"For the conversation. You don't get the social element at Hardees or McDonalds."
At this point he physically shifted forward waaay into my bubble. In as few sentences as possible I closed up my bag and escaped.
So is that me? Not even to middle school in my ability to interact with other people? And at the same time, I keep questioning what I'm doing with myself, letting my brain rot away, doing my sad bits of male scouting at a bar?
It's 2 AM, I'm still not tired. I'm going to go read. Like, a novel. I'm PMSed and on too many medications that make me want to climb walls and throw up angry things. Where's my fucking dog?
When I'm clear, I feel like I'm all hands and I don't know how to just live. I went out tonight and felt so sober and awkward, I didn't know how to just be. Nervous, out of balance, I wanted to scream. I could have gone home, but I stayed out. Mu usual signals to go home, like I get tired or start to feel the booze or people I'm talking to leave, just didn't exist. So hour after hour it was like I was waiting for the fun or the human connection or the sign that the world is beautiful. Instead, I finally spoke to the guy who had been sitting next to me and he was a magnified version of everything that was disgusting myself about my own awkward. He'd brought with him a sketch book, half a dozen artist pencils, pencil sharpener, and eraser but spent hours on the outline of a single cartoon-like character's head an 11-year-old could have drawn. His t-shirt tucked into his jeans belted high above the waist and the way his fat collected above his belt, in the seat of his pants, and in his face all added to the 11-year-old affect. I wasn't in much of a mood to give him a chance to redeem himself, but when the bartender said something about his drink also not containing alcohol, I asked why not.
"I just don't have much of a taste for it."
I asked why come to a bar then (he hadn't spoken a word to another human being since I'd sat down hours earlier).
"For the conversation. You don't get the social element at Hardees or McDonalds."
At this point he physically shifted forward waaay into my bubble. In as few sentences as possible I closed up my bag and escaped.
So is that me? Not even to middle school in my ability to interact with other people? And at the same time, I keep questioning what I'm doing with myself, letting my brain rot away, doing my sad bits of male scouting at a bar?
It's 2 AM, I'm still not tired. I'm going to go read. Like, a novel. I'm PMSed and on too many medications that make me want to climb walls and throw up angry things. Where's my fucking dog?
Saturday, September 04, 2010
Mouse Hunt
I killed a mouse Thursday. Snap trap and plum. Only I didn’t kill the mouse, it somehow set of the snap trap and escaped with the plum. I should have known then it had an accomplice.
I killed a mouse last night, this time for real. I moved the snap trap and used smaller bait: just enough muenster cheese to cover the bait part of the trap. It seems to have worked, because the mouse was very dead in the morning.
I would and could have set down glue traps, covered traps, other things that require less contact with the mouse, but these are actually less humane and less effective. As for a live trap, I live in the city. I’m not driving over an hour so some urban-adapted little shitter can go get eaten by his more wilderness-prone cousins.
So ding, dong the mouse was dead and I went about cleaning up the disgusting poop it managed to leave under my kitchen sink and behind my kitchen cabinets.
All mopped, every surface disinfected, so what the fuck still smells like mouse shit?
I’m not happy I now recognize the smell of mouse shit. I have nose that rivals most of the animal kingdom, a trait that’s been entertaining in my antiques/vintage acquisition. I already think cling wrap has a smell and my ice maker has a smell, so adding “mouse poop” to the olfactory equation has me homicidal and I already killed the mouse.
Or so I thought.
No mouse is an island.
A smaller, completely black mouse darted across the kitchen tonight. Darted across my freshly mopped floors. I yelled and I banged on things and I told it I was buying a shot gun. It seemed lost. It went for the washing machine and tried to come back out again with no real direction. Maybe I killed off the mouse responsible for acquiring food and making poop, and now this mouse is looking for answers. If I could show this mouse the door and no other mice or bugs or vermin ever crept across my threshold again, I would show this mouse my mercy. Otherwise, I want to blow it to hell.
I fear my kitchen floor boards don’t make it all the way to the walls and there’s a zoo living in what I judge to be my downstairs neighbor’s heating duct, creeping up into my kitchen at night to feed and poop.
My dog is useless.
Does Illinois require a license to buy a flame-thrower?
I killed a mouse last night, this time for real. I moved the snap trap and used smaller bait: just enough muenster cheese to cover the bait part of the trap. It seems to have worked, because the mouse was very dead in the morning.
I would and could have set down glue traps, covered traps, other things that require less contact with the mouse, but these are actually less humane and less effective. As for a live trap, I live in the city. I’m not driving over an hour so some urban-adapted little shitter can go get eaten by his more wilderness-prone cousins.
So ding, dong the mouse was dead and I went about cleaning up the disgusting poop it managed to leave under my kitchen sink and behind my kitchen cabinets.
All mopped, every surface disinfected, so what the fuck still smells like mouse shit?
I’m not happy I now recognize the smell of mouse shit. I have nose that rivals most of the animal kingdom, a trait that’s been entertaining in my antiques/vintage acquisition. I already think cling wrap has a smell and my ice maker has a smell, so adding “mouse poop” to the olfactory equation has me homicidal and I already killed the mouse.
Or so I thought.
No mouse is an island.
A smaller, completely black mouse darted across the kitchen tonight. Darted across my freshly mopped floors. I yelled and I banged on things and I told it I was buying a shot gun. It seemed lost. It went for the washing machine and tried to come back out again with no real direction. Maybe I killed off the mouse responsible for acquiring food and making poop, and now this mouse is looking for answers. If I could show this mouse the door and no other mice or bugs or vermin ever crept across my threshold again, I would show this mouse my mercy. Otherwise, I want to blow it to hell.
I fear my kitchen floor boards don’t make it all the way to the walls and there’s a zoo living in what I judge to be my downstairs neighbor’s heating duct, creeping up into my kitchen at night to feed and poop.
My dog is useless.
Does Illinois require a license to buy a flame-thrower?
Tuesday, August 31, 2010
Who Knows Best
FDA: Do not take these drugs together.
Doctor: It's ok, you can take these drugs together.
My body: Why the fuck did you take those drugs together?
At least, as of today, I'm finally recognizing the symptoms of the serotonin reaction shit. Also very weird, the increased dose of my MAOI started taking very obvious effect about a week ago, a week and a half after the increase. Now I feel everything else louder and louder, but at least I'm not in pain. I just hate the want-to-throw-up-the-inside-of-my-toes feeling. I'm making an executive decision and taking a half-dose of the offending drug tonight until I can talk to my doctor in the morning. I JUST WANT TO WORK RIGHT AND FEEL RIGHT AND NOT FUCKING THINK ABOUT IT ALL THE FUCKING TIME.
Doctor: It's ok, you can take these drugs together.
My body: Why the fuck did you take those drugs together?
At least, as of today, I'm finally recognizing the symptoms of the serotonin reaction shit. Also very weird, the increased dose of my MAOI started taking very obvious effect about a week ago, a week and a half after the increase. Now I feel everything else louder and louder, but at least I'm not in pain. I just hate the want-to-throw-up-the-inside-of-my-toes feeling. I'm making an executive decision and taking a half-dose of the offending drug tonight until I can talk to my doctor in the morning. I JUST WANT TO WORK RIGHT AND FEEL RIGHT AND NOT FUCKING THINK ABOUT IT ALL THE FUCKING TIME.
Monday, August 23, 2010
Sun Ray Sting Ray
It's beautiful out. I tried to help pack the car and the sun stabbed me in the eyeballs. I was and still am wearing my giant sunglasses. I came back in and still felt it piercing all the way through the inside of my skull. I couldn't complete a sentence. I still feel it. I want to hold on until HDS leaves. Then it will be silent again and I can bury my head in my pillow and my dog can curl up in any room he wants. I will have as long as I need to be alone; this is my human contact time and the end of my HDS time and my chance to soak it up, pain or not.
If I still feel like this tomorrow, maybe I'll go to the migraine clinic for extra shots. Too many days of really bad.
Whine whine whine.
If I still feel like this tomorrow, maybe I'll go to the migraine clinic for extra shots. Too many days of really bad.
Whine whine whine.
More Pain, More Thoughts
My brand of love scares away boys and sets back feminism 40 years. Writing about love is gauche now, anyway. That's why I get migraines--to give me something to write about. It's a through-line to my story, a regular source of conflict, and a free pass to be self-involved.
Free pass is putting it nicely.
Screaming internal distraction that makes it hard to notice much else. Unless I lose myself in something. Today I spent a very long time figuring out how much something listed in an obscure currency decades ago would cost today (as in, today dollars versus then shekels, not how much it's actually worth today). I edited photos, tried to write product descriptions, got frustrated and heard my brain fizzling, and finally settled in to watch a gazillion episodes of Twin Peaks.
I wanted to be functional this weekend. I even saved my shots this week and drugged up Saturday morning. No good. Pain pain pain since Friday. Before that, too? I don't really remember when this bout started. It's been a bad one. HDS leaves tomorrow and her husband and friend came to pick her up. I wanted to have a nice goodbye weekend. I want to feel well enough to know want.
I'm supposed to go out to see my mom on Tuesday and maybe go shopping with her. It's been less than seven weeks since she was diagnosed with cancer. Now she may be fine to drive and shop again. That's amazing. She's so lucky and we're so lucky and everything has been so amazing. But there's a part of me that also struggles with her getting better and better while I have no real "better" in sight. Mine isn't scary, mine can't kill me. That's huge. But there are no walks, no ribbons, no support groups, no t-shirts, no awareness months, no product lines, and no foreseeable relief for my migraines. I will never be a "survivor," and that's appropriate because there was never any threat. Cancer is something you survive. But migraines are something you suffer.
I don't expect life to be easy, I just feel the things that aren't.
Everything is true at the same time, Reality is the version accepted by the majority.
Free pass is putting it nicely.
Screaming internal distraction that makes it hard to notice much else. Unless I lose myself in something. Today I spent a very long time figuring out how much something listed in an obscure currency decades ago would cost today (as in, today dollars versus then shekels, not how much it's actually worth today). I edited photos, tried to write product descriptions, got frustrated and heard my brain fizzling, and finally settled in to watch a gazillion episodes of Twin Peaks.
I wanted to be functional this weekend. I even saved my shots this week and drugged up Saturday morning. No good. Pain pain pain since Friday. Before that, too? I don't really remember when this bout started. It's been a bad one. HDS leaves tomorrow and her husband and friend came to pick her up. I wanted to have a nice goodbye weekend. I want to feel well enough to know want.
I'm supposed to go out to see my mom on Tuesday and maybe go shopping with her. It's been less than seven weeks since she was diagnosed with cancer. Now she may be fine to drive and shop again. That's amazing. She's so lucky and we're so lucky and everything has been so amazing. But there's a part of me that also struggles with her getting better and better while I have no real "better" in sight. Mine isn't scary, mine can't kill me. That's huge. But there are no walks, no ribbons, no support groups, no t-shirts, no awareness months, no product lines, and no foreseeable relief for my migraines. I will never be a "survivor," and that's appropriate because there was never any threat. Cancer is something you survive. But migraines are something you suffer.
I don't expect life to be easy, I just feel the things that aren't.
Everything is true at the same time, Reality is the version accepted by the majority.
Wednesday, August 18, 2010
Lake Street Red Line Stop on a Wednesday Afternoon
Two men singing on the el platform with their permit clearly visible.
One plays guitar and sings melody, the other harmonizes.
They sway.
The harmonizer smiles.
The guitar player has long grayed dreads. He’s thin but not hungry, looks faded and worn but without pain. His skin is graying. His shiny black guitar looks gray under the subway lights.
His voice is anything but gray. Warm and mellow, like honey, like the 1960s folk that bore him. You can hear the hope and marijuana round the edges of each phrase.
The harmonizer reminds me of the old smiling Sambo images. Less bright, less ridiculous, but retaining a bit of the please-the-white-man quality. Still, his voice is pure and adds a dimension to the familiar tunes.
Police officer with his big german shepherd sitting not 10 feet away, staring.
The German Shepherd is watching the permit
The police officer isn’t watching much of anything.
A train comes and the guitar player leans into a concave *beam* to retune.
I drop a dollar into the bag with the permit.
A woman walks past. She is so large her legs sink down, burying her feet and her flip flops.
One plays guitar and sings melody, the other harmonizes.
They sway.
The harmonizer smiles.
The guitar player has long grayed dreads. He’s thin but not hungry, looks faded and worn but without pain. His skin is graying. His shiny black guitar looks gray under the subway lights.
His voice is anything but gray. Warm and mellow, like honey, like the 1960s folk that bore him. You can hear the hope and marijuana round the edges of each phrase.
The harmonizer reminds me of the old smiling Sambo images. Less bright, less ridiculous, but retaining a bit of the please-the-white-man quality. Still, his voice is pure and adds a dimension to the familiar tunes.
Police officer with his big german shepherd sitting not 10 feet away, staring.
The German Shepherd is watching the permit
The police officer isn’t watching much of anything.
A train comes and the guitar player leans into a concave *beam* to retune.
I drop a dollar into the bag with the permit.
A woman walks past. She is so large her legs sink down, burying her feet and her flip flops.
Saturday, August 07, 2010
Pad My Walls
I've got the crazies tonight. The pain was mostly gone today, but all the other fucked up shit diminutively classified as "aura" rendered me insane. It's so strange that when I get like this I can write. I can do a number of other random things quite well, too. Hopefully tomorrow I won't discover that I destroyed, offended, or bankrupted anyone, but I think I got a lot of work done. Walking the dog, I was ready to chainsaw the trees after 30 seconds of the cicadas. I hate the fucking cicadas. Crickets chirp; cicadas scream like electronics, but they ebb and swell so you can't forget they're there, vibrating at the frequency of your skull.
So I thought I was hungry. I'd been munching snap peas all afternoon, but perhaps red meat would cure my homicidal crankiness. I browned ground beef, planning to add one of the Trader Joe's Indian eggplant pouch things as an instant, no-thought sauce, but then I found a can of ranchero something soup with a recipe that sounded good and we had all the ingredients. So instead of three minutes and my nice fake Indian weird beef thing, it was 30 minutes for my fake Mexican weird beef thing. When it was done, I opened the oven and grabbed at the metal without thinking--no oven mitt. I can write but I can't use a stove.
Oven hot. No touch. Four-year-olds understand this. I'm alternating typing and icing my pointer finger.
Possible Boy and I had talked about seeing a movie tonight. At some point this afternoon I considered inviting him over to watch a movie, or doing some quiet but still social activity with him. Then I stand up and everything is wooziness and I try doing basic household crap and realize how scary I look. I don't want to hide all the time and only see friends when I'm glowing, but the bad stuff is easier to ride out quietly at home where I don't have to consider the variables. I'm not sure how to maintain friendships this way, but tonight I'm curled up afraid of myself and still trying to figure out how to get back to my parents' house to help out as soon as possible.
Cancer trumps migraine. Cancer kills.
So I thought I was hungry. I'd been munching snap peas all afternoon, but perhaps red meat would cure my homicidal crankiness. I browned ground beef, planning to add one of the Trader Joe's Indian eggplant pouch things as an instant, no-thought sauce, but then I found a can of ranchero something soup with a recipe that sounded good and we had all the ingredients. So instead of three minutes and my nice fake Indian weird beef thing, it was 30 minutes for my fake Mexican weird beef thing. When it was done, I opened the oven and grabbed at the metal without thinking--no oven mitt. I can write but I can't use a stove.
Oven hot. No touch. Four-year-olds understand this. I'm alternating typing and icing my pointer finger.
Possible Boy and I had talked about seeing a movie tonight. At some point this afternoon I considered inviting him over to watch a movie, or doing some quiet but still social activity with him. Then I stand up and everything is wooziness and I try doing basic household crap and realize how scary I look. I don't want to hide all the time and only see friends when I'm glowing, but the bad stuff is easier to ride out quietly at home where I don't have to consider the variables. I'm not sure how to maintain friendships this way, but tonight I'm curled up afraid of myself and still trying to figure out how to get back to my parents' house to help out as soon as possible.
Cancer trumps migraine. Cancer kills.
Friday, August 06, 2010
Pathological
Pathology report: lymph nodes all clear. No chemo necessary. Woohoo!
My mom had to have a second, though minor, surgery because her skin wasn't healing properly from the first surgery.
My dad has been by her side every possibly moment, bringing much of his work to the hospital and actually taking his years of accumulated time off. He has been an absolute super hero. Under normal circumstances, he likes doing as many things as physically possible. He's mellowed down some so that he can now wait in line without exploding, but he used to send each member of the family to stand in a different check-out line and then we'd all join whoever got to the counter first. If there were fewer lines than family members, my father would bounce back and forth between lines, check things out at the front, go back and shop some more or do whatever he found to keep himself occupied. The man couldn't stand still. As adults, my siblings and I refuse to participate in the efficient but rude multiline blitz.
I try to be there for my mom as often as I can so my dad and my brother don't have to. My dad hadn't cleared his work schedule to take my mom home after the unexpected second surgery so I planned to be there Tuesday and Wednesday. Thanks to the migraines and everything I've had to do to fight them, I'm no longer bothered by blood and IVs and all that, plus I'm female and not modest so I can help my mom get undressed and dressed.
Driving back and forth these past few weeks, I've somewhat abused my Torodol: nothing that will kill me, but a bit much for keeping it effective.
Tuesday, HDS stayed home from work because the inside of her head burned. I went to the hospital to find my mother quite chipper. She was walking around before they had her out of recovery and wanted real food as soon as the nurse could find her an unplanned turkey sandwich. Considering how much trouble she had with the anesthesia the first time, we were all pleasantly surprised.
Meanwhile, I took one of the alcohol wipes and bandaids laying around and gave myself another shot of Torodol. My sunglasses never came off.
My mom, who had surgery, was doing fine and better all the time. I, who had all my parts intact, got worse and worse. Sound, smells, all the usuals but no amount of caffeine or drugs seemed to stave them off.
I wigged out. There was nowhere I could hide in the hospital that was dark or quiet. Everything buzzed and hummed and beeped. I'd find a dark hall or stairwell only to step in and activate motion censor fluorescent lights. It was light a bad nightmare. I curled up in a corner behind a doorway where at least no one was around and cried and cried because it hurt so much.
I cried because I felt like I had no right to my pain, here on a post-op hospital ward.
Mine can't kill me.
But my mom will get better. My mom will be a cancer survivor.
I went back to her room and sat in a chair in the dark part while my dad tried to fuss over making it darker for me. I'm not sure what I said or did at that point but I figured I'd just sleep in the corner until the pain blew over. Then my mom said my dad and brother were going to both drive me home so my car would be back at my house and that was what she wanted and they would deal with Wednesday because I needed to take care of myself.
Lots of gratitude and I was home. I give my family a lot of credit for this one.
That night it stormed so loud the lightning woke me.
My mom had to have a second, though minor, surgery because her skin wasn't healing properly from the first surgery.
My dad has been by her side every possibly moment, bringing much of his work to the hospital and actually taking his years of accumulated time off. He has been an absolute super hero. Under normal circumstances, he likes doing as many things as physically possible. He's mellowed down some so that he can now wait in line without exploding, but he used to send each member of the family to stand in a different check-out line and then we'd all join whoever got to the counter first. If there were fewer lines than family members, my father would bounce back and forth between lines, check things out at the front, go back and shop some more or do whatever he found to keep himself occupied. The man couldn't stand still. As adults, my siblings and I refuse to participate in the efficient but rude multiline blitz.
I try to be there for my mom as often as I can so my dad and my brother don't have to. My dad hadn't cleared his work schedule to take my mom home after the unexpected second surgery so I planned to be there Tuesday and Wednesday. Thanks to the migraines and everything I've had to do to fight them, I'm no longer bothered by blood and IVs and all that, plus I'm female and not modest so I can help my mom get undressed and dressed.
Driving back and forth these past few weeks, I've somewhat abused my Torodol: nothing that will kill me, but a bit much for keeping it effective.
Tuesday, HDS stayed home from work because the inside of her head burned. I went to the hospital to find my mother quite chipper. She was walking around before they had her out of recovery and wanted real food as soon as the nurse could find her an unplanned turkey sandwich. Considering how much trouble she had with the anesthesia the first time, we were all pleasantly surprised.
Meanwhile, I took one of the alcohol wipes and bandaids laying around and gave myself another shot of Torodol. My sunglasses never came off.
My mom, who had surgery, was doing fine and better all the time. I, who had all my parts intact, got worse and worse. Sound, smells, all the usuals but no amount of caffeine or drugs seemed to stave them off.
I wigged out. There was nowhere I could hide in the hospital that was dark or quiet. Everything buzzed and hummed and beeped. I'd find a dark hall or stairwell only to step in and activate motion censor fluorescent lights. It was light a bad nightmare. I curled up in a corner behind a doorway where at least no one was around and cried and cried because it hurt so much.
I cried because I felt like I had no right to my pain, here on a post-op hospital ward.
Mine can't kill me.
But my mom will get better. My mom will be a cancer survivor.
I went back to her room and sat in a chair in the dark part while my dad tried to fuss over making it darker for me. I'm not sure what I said or did at that point but I figured I'd just sleep in the corner until the pain blew over. Then my mom said my dad and brother were going to both drive me home so my car would be back at my house and that was what she wanted and they would deal with Wednesday because I needed to take care of myself.
Lots of gratitude and I was home. I give my family a lot of credit for this one.
That night it stormed so loud the lightning woke me.
Thursday, August 05, 2010
Saturday, July 31, 2010
Don't Call Me Shirky: Over 800 People Can't Be Wrong
Birdie sent this to me with the note "This reminded me of the content of some of your blog posts. Plus, it is so funny and I thought you would LIKE IT."
Hyperbole and a Half: This is Why I'll Never be an Adult
Yes. Me + cartoons = that post. And it's funny.
What amazes me is that it has over 800 comments. Eight hundred people feel this way.
My expectations are so high that anything less than perfection gets thrown together in the "I am garbage" pile. "Unable to cure cancer," "didn't email back friend," and "forgot to pay parking ticket" all fall in the same wretched half of my black-and-white world. I go through Allie's responsibility cycle, worked into my very own ballet of self-loathing.
Why?
Over 800 random-ass blog readers responded to say they do the same damn thing. What's going on that so many people's expectations of "normal adulthood" knock them into the fetal position?
We have this strange luxury of choice, this ability to do things with our time other than find food and fight predators. We need what we need to stay alive. Then there's the next layer of the things we need to make life worth living. This is the crap people kill for and die for, things that inspire epic poetry, Opera and phone commercials.
Then there's everything else. There's just so much everything else. It's unnecessary and overwhelming, but it also helps all the people live a little smoother and it can be beautiful and add to the "worth living." But bullshit and junk and imaginary importance and stress stress stress make me run back to being a child, when all the grown-up nonsense is supposed to look like nonsense. I personally made the mistake of taking grown-up nonsense seriously as a child, which makes a lot more sense when you think about it--making noise and writing on lots of papers and everybody picking a title and wearing funny things to signify what they're supposed to be is much more of a child's game than the business of the life-learned. Send me to school now that I need daily gym class, now that I can understand the practical applications of economics, and could really use a refresher course in sharing.
With real mortality-related things happening in my life right now, I have much less luxury of choice. Dealing with my mother's needs and just sucking it up is exhausting, but it certainly reminds me I am and can be an adult. Last night the stress and weather finally won over my over-medicating hyperdrive and I crashed hard. In a strange way, I was glad because it somehow re-legitimized my migraines; like my body made it abundantly clear I'm not just being a pussy and I can't just push through and be OK.
My mom's ok and I'll write more later. Now I need to nap so I can go to my parents' house for dinner.
Hyperbole and a Half: This is Why I'll Never be an Adult
Yes. Me + cartoons = that post. And it's funny.
What amazes me is that it has over 800 comments. Eight hundred people feel this way.
My expectations are so high that anything less than perfection gets thrown together in the "I am garbage" pile. "Unable to cure cancer," "didn't email back friend," and "forgot to pay parking ticket" all fall in the same wretched half of my black-and-white world. I go through Allie's responsibility cycle, worked into my very own ballet of self-loathing.
Why?
Over 800 random-ass blog readers responded to say they do the same damn thing. What's going on that so many people's expectations of "normal adulthood" knock them into the fetal position?
We have this strange luxury of choice, this ability to do things with our time other than find food and fight predators. We need what we need to stay alive. Then there's the next layer of the things we need to make life worth living. This is the crap people kill for and die for, things that inspire epic poetry, Opera and phone commercials.
Then there's everything else. There's just so much everything else. It's unnecessary and overwhelming, but it also helps all the people live a little smoother and it can be beautiful and add to the "worth living." But bullshit and junk and imaginary importance and stress stress stress make me run back to being a child, when all the grown-up nonsense is supposed to look like nonsense. I personally made the mistake of taking grown-up nonsense seriously as a child, which makes a lot more sense when you think about it--making noise and writing on lots of papers and everybody picking a title and wearing funny things to signify what they're supposed to be is much more of a child's game than the business of the life-learned. Send me to school now that I need daily gym class, now that I can understand the practical applications of economics, and could really use a refresher course in sharing.
With real mortality-related things happening in my life right now, I have much less luxury of choice. Dealing with my mother's needs and just sucking it up is exhausting, but it certainly reminds me I am and can be an adult. Last night the stress and weather finally won over my over-medicating hyperdrive and I crashed hard. In a strange way, I was glad because it somehow re-legitimized my migraines; like my body made it abundantly clear I'm not just being a pussy and I can't just push through and be OK.
My mom's ok and I'll write more later. Now I need to nap so I can go to my parents' house for dinner.
Wednesday, July 28, 2010
Sunday, July 25, 2010
Ways to Help
My mom went home today. My dad has been with her since she had her surgery, sleeping in the chair beside her hospital bed. My parents can be infinitely annoying and occasional emotionally abusive, but they are pretty incredible.
Today is the first day since Tuesday I won't see my mother. I'm relieved. Starting tomorrow, much of her daily care will fall to my brother and me. He lives there for the summer, so he has less ability to escape. I have to remember it is not my job, that her friends can take up some of the slack.
Yesterday, while I was feeding her ice chips, my mom started complaining to me about one of her friends and went on her standard bitch-and-moan about her mother and one of her clients and other flawed people in her life. She's keeps checking to make sure she's not overburdening me with the physical stuff--repeats over and over I don't have to feed her or help her stand or poke at the bloody things unless I'm comfortable--but I've never been able to properly communicate how uncomfortable I am being her emotional support system, and now seems a cruel time to say something. I feel so backwards--help from her local adult daughter post-double mastectomy is a huge act of charity; therapeutic services have been assumed since I was 4. I never had to do the dishes or take out the trash, maybe I just got the emotional trash instead. And my parents still don't expect any sort of physical, visible work, but perhaps to them it's a greater burden to do something than to feel something. Not me.
I'll be back at their house tomorrow night and it will be emotionally draining, too, but it's emotionally draining sitting at my house.
The cicadas are loud again tonight. Crickets chirp, cicadas scream. The sound swells and ebbs in irregular waves. I never see them, but I hear them. They are monsters.
Today is the first day since Tuesday I won't see my mother. I'm relieved. Starting tomorrow, much of her daily care will fall to my brother and me. He lives there for the summer, so he has less ability to escape. I have to remember it is not my job, that her friends can take up some of the slack.
Yesterday, while I was feeding her ice chips, my mom started complaining to me about one of her friends and went on her standard bitch-and-moan about her mother and one of her clients and other flawed people in her life. She's keeps checking to make sure she's not overburdening me with the physical stuff--repeats over and over I don't have to feed her or help her stand or poke at the bloody things unless I'm comfortable--but I've never been able to properly communicate how uncomfortable I am being her emotional support system, and now seems a cruel time to say something. I feel so backwards--help from her local adult daughter post-double mastectomy is a huge act of charity; therapeutic services have been assumed since I was 4. I never had to do the dishes or take out the trash, maybe I just got the emotional trash instead. And my parents still don't expect any sort of physical, visible work, but perhaps to them it's a greater burden to do something than to feel something. Not me.
I'll be back at their house tomorrow night and it will be emotionally draining, too, but it's emotionally draining sitting at my house.
The cicadas are loud again tonight. Crickets chirp, cicadas scream. The sound swells and ebbs in irregular waves. I never see them, but I hear them. They are monsters.
Saturday, July 24, 2010
Not Real Sucky
Headline News on mute in my mother's hospital room has been nonstop coverage of Lindsay Lohan. I don't have to look up the spelling of her name online because I can look up and it's on the TV. Still.
There are four clear turkey baster bulbs attached to four clear tubes attached to the incisions in my mother's chest. The body tries to heal the wounds, sends blood and fluid, and something needs to be sucked out. The tubes are stretchy and need to be squeezed clear of blood clots. Then we have to empty the bulbs and measure the fluid.
I don't have to do any of this. I volunteered. I'm strangely good at it, except when I tried to feed her the applesauce and got more on her than in her. At least I thought to bring the applesauce. All natural, NOT chunky, no sugar added. My dad said she'd been really nauseous all day, and I'm an expert at nauseous. She has dry mouth, too, way worse than I ever did but at least I understand the feeling. Ice chips mixed with the apple sauce trumped everything the hospital tried to feed her. You'd think hospitals would know these kinds of things, but I suppose it's different for everyone. We're related, so I imagine our reactions are far more similar. Nausea requires cold. Cold and wet, but not clammy. I'll often run my wrists under cold water at rest stops to battle the car sickness. My mom was grateful and amazed that I knew to put ice chips on her wrists when she was at her wooziest. But with her, with Cancer, with life in general, there's so much beyond my and anyone's control. I want to say it's "nice" to be able to make her feel better in little ways for even a moment, but "nice" the wrong word. It's all I can do and I'll take it.
The past few days have been filled with heat waves and electrical storms and flash flooding. Our power went out three times in the last week, only once while it was raining. Driving to the hospital today traffic signals were out or blinking all over the place. Transformers 3 filmed in Chicago last weekend, with explosions and parachuting and fireballs. Tuesday HDS and I sat on the Wao Bao patio at State and Lake and heard a huge blast. Most people didn't even look up.
I feel like the world is getting more and more absurd. There's crazy shit all over and we have our far-fetched explanations because if you stop and really think about any of it, the whole universe is too insane to be real. My dreams make more sense than my awake. Nothing makes real sense, we just stretch and accept whatever gets put before us. We're incredibly flexible creatures. Turkey basting my mother's chest? Why not.
There are four clear turkey baster bulbs attached to four clear tubes attached to the incisions in my mother's chest. The body tries to heal the wounds, sends blood and fluid, and something needs to be sucked out. The tubes are stretchy and need to be squeezed clear of blood clots. Then we have to empty the bulbs and measure the fluid.
I don't have to do any of this. I volunteered. I'm strangely good at it, except when I tried to feed her the applesauce and got more on her than in her. At least I thought to bring the applesauce. All natural, NOT chunky, no sugar added. My dad said she'd been really nauseous all day, and I'm an expert at nauseous. She has dry mouth, too, way worse than I ever did but at least I understand the feeling. Ice chips mixed with the apple sauce trumped everything the hospital tried to feed her. You'd think hospitals would know these kinds of things, but I suppose it's different for everyone. We're related, so I imagine our reactions are far more similar. Nausea requires cold. Cold and wet, but not clammy. I'll often run my wrists under cold water at rest stops to battle the car sickness. My mom was grateful and amazed that I knew to put ice chips on her wrists when she was at her wooziest. But with her, with Cancer, with life in general, there's so much beyond my and anyone's control. I want to say it's "nice" to be able to make her feel better in little ways for even a moment, but "nice" the wrong word. It's all I can do and I'll take it.
The past few days have been filled with heat waves and electrical storms and flash flooding. Our power went out three times in the last week, only once while it was raining. Driving to the hospital today traffic signals were out or blinking all over the place. Transformers 3 filmed in Chicago last weekend, with explosions and parachuting and fireballs. Tuesday HDS and I sat on the Wao Bao patio at State and Lake and heard a huge blast. Most people didn't even look up.
I feel like the world is getting more and more absurd. There's crazy shit all over and we have our far-fetched explanations because if you stop and really think about any of it, the whole universe is too insane to be real. My dreams make more sense than my awake. Nothing makes real sense, we just stretch and accept whatever gets put before us. We're incredibly flexible creatures. Turkey basting my mother's chest? Why not.
Wednesday, July 14, 2010
Staring at the Sun
My mom is being amazing. She's optimistic and rational and moved by all the support she's receiving. I'm so impressed. She was built for this. I very much wish she didn't have cancer and we're only a week into knowing it's there, but at least it's acting as the smack-in-the-face we all sometimes need to remember what it means to be alive.
I'm also completely freaked out and not sure what else to feel or think, so alive is a pretty good place to concentrate.
I'm also completely freaked out and not sure what else to feel or think, so alive is a pretty good place to concentrate.
Sunday, July 11, 2010
My mom just called to let me know she has breast cancer.
She just found out. It's apparently one of the least bad kinds and she sounds pretty positive about the whole thing. My response was "That sucks, I'm sorry, do you need anything? I love you."
She said she kept thinking, "Oh no, now my daughters have a mom who had breast cancer."
Maybe all our day-to-day negativity and pessimism is just a way of saving our hope and optimism for the big stuff. I always say about my migraines, "it's not cancer and it can't kill me." Well, my mom has cancer. Maybe the distraught hasn't hit yet. Maybe today's just a day I'm accepting things. One foot is already in a dream. My mom has to have cancer to show her the meaning of life. That's how the story goes. We all learn things and understand things and hurt and cry and bloom. I've seen this movie. Now it's our turn to live it.
She just found out. It's apparently one of the least bad kinds and she sounds pretty positive about the whole thing. My response was "That sucks, I'm sorry, do you need anything? I love you."
She said she kept thinking, "Oh no, now my daughters have a mom who had breast cancer."
Maybe all our day-to-day negativity and pessimism is just a way of saving our hope and optimism for the big stuff. I always say about my migraines, "it's not cancer and it can't kill me." Well, my mom has cancer. Maybe the distraught hasn't hit yet. Maybe today's just a day I'm accepting things. One foot is already in a dream. My mom has to have cancer to show her the meaning of life. That's how the story goes. We all learn things and understand things and hurt and cry and bloom. I've seen this movie. Now it's our turn to live it.
Thursday, July 08, 2010
Clear, Fog
The rain is so light it barely textures the surface of clear, still Lake Michigan. I can see angular boulders make a path under the water and I want to walk rock to rock until the water submerges me, too.
Like a plow, the beach comber made its shrinking circles around the sand. My dog and I stood at the top of the concrete steps separating beach from city to watch and wait. The machine seemed to change its course to finish the section in front of us. It felt like he was combing that bit just for us, but I figured it was more like finishing off a golf hole. We stood and watched his figure eights disappear unswept sand, and then he honked and waved for us to come down to the beach; he had changed his course for us. We were royalty. In cotton shorts, flip flops and a t-shirt, I commanded a presence. Sometimes I forget I'm not invisible.
Since the hospital, I've been feeling better in that I'm more inclined to get shit done and only had bad pain yesterday evening through now. I was crazy light sensitive before that, but light's not bugging me anymore.
I feel like I'm in a temporal hiccup where I constantly cross paths with past, present, and future versions of myself. These sorts of lessons get learned much faster on television.
Like a plow, the beach comber made its shrinking circles around the sand. My dog and I stood at the top of the concrete steps separating beach from city to watch and wait. The machine seemed to change its course to finish the section in front of us. It felt like he was combing that bit just for us, but I figured it was more like finishing off a golf hole. We stood and watched his figure eights disappear unswept sand, and then he honked and waved for us to come down to the beach; he had changed his course for us. We were royalty. In cotton shorts, flip flops and a t-shirt, I commanded a presence. Sometimes I forget I'm not invisible.
Since the hospital, I've been feeling better in that I'm more inclined to get shit done and only had bad pain yesterday evening through now. I was crazy light sensitive before that, but light's not bugging me anymore.
I feel like I'm in a temporal hiccup where I constantly cross paths with past, present, and future versions of myself. These sorts of lessons get learned much faster on television.
Saturday, July 03, 2010
Discharge
I'm leaving the clinic today. I still have a migraine.
In the hospital, I don't have to remember my pills and meals all day. I don't worry about paying bills, running errands, making plans. They take care of me.
They also struggle to find my veins so they can then shoot me full of drugs. The IV lines start to hurt almost immediately, and after a day, ice packs and deep breathing are no match for the excrutiating pain ripping into my hand and burning its way up my arm.
They do this in the middle of the night, too.
And the food 65% sucks.
At home I take care of myself. It's hard for me. I see couples taking care of eachother and I'm jealous, but I push people away so I can prove to myself that I'm capable. HDS doesn't do dishes. Another friend of mine doesn't drive in the city or on highways. Other people don't kill bugs or clean showers. The longer I'm alone, the more I'm forced to learn.
Lately, I've been a stagnant smog of indecision. I've been turning to other people for excuses to go one way or another on all choices. HDS refuses to make decisions for me because she knows I'm just looking for a way to blame someone else for the outcome. Maybe that's the only way I know how to let myself off the hook; everything is someone's fault, so how can it be not mine?
I now have to wear a medical alert bracelet for my MAOI patch. Honestly, I'm glad. I want something to show for all this fucking pain.
All the other symptoms, too.
In some ways, I belong in a hospital. My memory is swiss cheese. Faces blend together. Being fucked up in the hospital is ok. But at home I want to run around and go to the bar and see friends. At home, I have a very hard time keeping up with friendships. People (Neighbor Guy) take it personally when you repeatedly cancel plans. Other friends stop calling when they don't want to bug you in case you have a headache. It takes that much more effort when you have that much less energy. But today I so desperately want out of this fucking hospital and the IVs out of my veins, I'm taking charge and responsibility and out out out.
In the hospital, I don't have to remember my pills and meals all day. I don't worry about paying bills, running errands, making plans. They take care of me.
They also struggle to find my veins so they can then shoot me full of drugs. The IV lines start to hurt almost immediately, and after a day, ice packs and deep breathing are no match for the excrutiating pain ripping into my hand and burning its way up my arm.
They do this in the middle of the night, too.
And the food 65% sucks.
At home I take care of myself. It's hard for me. I see couples taking care of eachother and I'm jealous, but I push people away so I can prove to myself that I'm capable. HDS doesn't do dishes. Another friend of mine doesn't drive in the city or on highways. Other people don't kill bugs or clean showers. The longer I'm alone, the more I'm forced to learn.
Lately, I've been a stagnant smog of indecision. I've been turning to other people for excuses to go one way or another on all choices. HDS refuses to make decisions for me because she knows I'm just looking for a way to blame someone else for the outcome. Maybe that's the only way I know how to let myself off the hook; everything is someone's fault, so how can it be not mine?
I now have to wear a medical alert bracelet for my MAOI patch. Honestly, I'm glad. I want something to show for all this fucking pain.
All the other symptoms, too.
In some ways, I belong in a hospital. My memory is swiss cheese. Faces blend together. Being fucked up in the hospital is ok. But at home I want to run around and go to the bar and see friends. At home, I have a very hard time keeping up with friendships. People (Neighbor Guy) take it personally when you repeatedly cancel plans. Other friends stop calling when they don't want to bug you in case you have a headache. It takes that much more effort when you have that much less energy. But today I so desperately want out of this fucking hospital and the IVs out of my veins, I'm taking charge and responsibility and out out out.
Wednesday, June 30, 2010
My room has a great view; the "lounge" gives you a 90º view of Lake Michigan, two boat harbors, and a huge green stretch of Lincoln Park. Between fluffy trees I see the morning joggers, large enough to differentiate but too small to judge from a 9th floor window. Green and light blue shirted women passing black shirted man. Black tank top and short hair taking an exhausted stretch between sets on the pull-up bars. Dirty blonde pony tail heavily bouncing stride, stride, stride, stride...
Even with the runners and the cars, everything looks so still. It's hard to believe time is passing at all.
If all goes well, I'm out of here Sunday. Fourth of July. I can go home and celebrate and watch fireworks without pain. That's the new goal.
Even with the runners and the cars, everything looks so still. It's hard to believe time is passing at all.
If all goes well, I'm out of here Sunday. Fourth of July. I can go home and celebrate and watch fireworks without pain. That's the new goal.
Tuesday, June 29, 2010
Inpatience
It's amazing that last post reads so coherent. I felt like I was in pieces, like I shouldn't have been able to type the words.
Now, I'm in a hospital bed with an IV aching on my left hand.
I've been so ambivalent about this whole inpatient thing because this is somehow the big huge next step overhaul in migraine treatment options and it feels like more of the same: more throwing curious chemicals at a problem we don't understand. The drugs they're giving me to break up my current headache cycle aren't even anything new; they're the exact same thing dripped into me five years ago in Cleveland with limited success.
I feel so down and negative right now. It's a universe of infinite possibility and potential. I'm trying to concentrate on the shiny happy things, but it feels like all my shiny happy places are currently imaginary. Still way better than feeling like shiny happy places will never exist, but at the moment I can't see them in a touchable way.
I see the beautiful moon and amazing view from my hospital window. I see tubes and informational bracelets and "mid-century furnishings."
I had one friend (Possible Boy) drive me to the doctor's office, the bank, and the hospital, and stay with me through all the waiting and my frazzled uncertainty, until hours later I had a room and internet and gratitude I'm never sure how to show.
I have another friend (HDS) who is not only walking and feeding my dog but also sent me a picture of him adorably accepting her surrogate love.
These are my shiny happy and these are real. I feel like I'm covered in muck and can't be a part of them. They are a part of me, I know, but I am a part of them, too.
I want this dark cloud off of me and the only way out is to realize it's not actually there.
My parents came by to visit tonight. They showed up just after visiting hours ended. I was still glad to see them.
Now, I'm in a hospital bed with an IV aching on my left hand.
I've been so ambivalent about this whole inpatient thing because this is somehow the big huge next step overhaul in migraine treatment options and it feels like more of the same: more throwing curious chemicals at a problem we don't understand. The drugs they're giving me to break up my current headache cycle aren't even anything new; they're the exact same thing dripped into me five years ago in Cleveland with limited success.
I feel so down and negative right now. It's a universe of infinite possibility and potential. I'm trying to concentrate on the shiny happy things, but it feels like all my shiny happy places are currently imaginary. Still way better than feeling like shiny happy places will never exist, but at the moment I can't see them in a touchable way.
I see the beautiful moon and amazing view from my hospital window. I see tubes and informational bracelets and "mid-century furnishings."
I had one friend (Possible Boy) drive me to the doctor's office, the bank, and the hospital, and stay with me through all the waiting and my frazzled uncertainty, until hours later I had a room and internet and gratitude I'm never sure how to show.
I have another friend (HDS) who is not only walking and feeding my dog but also sent me a picture of him adorably accepting her surrogate love.
These are my shiny happy and these are real. I feel like I'm covered in muck and can't be a part of them. They are a part of me, I know, but I am a part of them, too.
I want this dark cloud off of me and the only way out is to realize it's not actually there.
My parents came by to visit tonight. They showed up just after visiting hours ended. I was still glad to see them.
Sunday, June 27, 2010
My insides are fizzing
What's wrong what's wrong what's wrong?
I'm trying to write it. I can't seem to write it.
I feel like crap.
I'm spending another day here because I chose to spend another day here because I decided HDS's need to have another day at home was more important than me having one more day of this.
Lots of pep talks and rallying cries. The bad I'm feeling isn't so bad, it's just knowing it gets worse before it gets better that makes me want to smash my head through a plate glass window. I'm going through Prozac withdrawal. And the weather is migraine hellacious. And I'm already down to my last shot which I have to save for the drive home. I'm tired but anxious so I'm not sleeping well and I want answers that apparently don't exist on weekends.
Monday I will get home, get dog, do laundry, and pack for my extended hospital stay. Monday hopefully I will get all of my questions answered while I'm on the road. I'm particularly frustrated that some papers I meant to bring are at my house and make it much harder if not impossible to get everything (charts and doctors and such) up to date and finalized while we're on the road.
I do things at the last minute, or at least wait until I feel the pressure of the deadline. I think this makes me a procrastinator and procrastinators are bad people.
I'm mad at myself for deciding to stay in Nashville until Monday. I did it for the wrong reasons and I am mad at myself for being mad at myself instead of just accepting that I made a decision. Let it go. I can't let anything go lately. I'm gooey.
Writing isn't supposed to make me worse. I'm feeling worse. More agitated. Where's the fucking Lorazepam? I need sleep and I'm too fucking bonkers. I've taken more Lorazepam this month than I have in the past year. It's still less than some people take in a few days, but it's a lot for me.
I'm trying to write it. I can't seem to write it.
I feel like crap.
I'm spending another day here because I chose to spend another day here because I decided HDS's need to have another day at home was more important than me having one more day of this.
Lots of pep talks and rallying cries. The bad I'm feeling isn't so bad, it's just knowing it gets worse before it gets better that makes me want to smash my head through a plate glass window. I'm going through Prozac withdrawal. And the weather is migraine hellacious. And I'm already down to my last shot which I have to save for the drive home. I'm tired but anxious so I'm not sleeping well and I want answers that apparently don't exist on weekends.
Monday I will get home, get dog, do laundry, and pack for my extended hospital stay. Monday hopefully I will get all of my questions answered while I'm on the road. I'm particularly frustrated that some papers I meant to bring are at my house and make it much harder if not impossible to get everything (charts and doctors and such) up to date and finalized while we're on the road.
I do things at the last minute, or at least wait until I feel the pressure of the deadline. I think this makes me a procrastinator and procrastinators are bad people.
I'm mad at myself for deciding to stay in Nashville until Monday. I did it for the wrong reasons and I am mad at myself for being mad at myself instead of just accepting that I made a decision. Let it go. I can't let anything go lately. I'm gooey.
Writing isn't supposed to make me worse. I'm feeling worse. More agitated. Where's the fucking Lorazepam? I need sleep and I'm too fucking bonkers. I've taken more Lorazepam this month than I have in the past year. It's still less than some people take in a few days, but it's a lot for me.
Thursday, June 24, 2010
Wigging out again.
We leave for Nashville in the morning. Driving. HDS is really homesick. Nashville is home. And the flea market. Fun fun fun, right? I'm just in dread mode. Dreading a car trip. Dreading getting back and going into the hospital. Things I don't understand and don't think I can understand and things that make me upset. I have many many doctors. It feels like doctors are something that happen to me. They are like the oligarchy of my life. They say different things and think they are science and right and I want them to be right.
We leave for Nashville in the morning. Driving. HDS is really homesick. Nashville is home. And the flea market. Fun fun fun, right? I'm just in dread mode. Dreading a car trip. Dreading getting back and going into the hospital. Things I don't understand and don't think I can understand and things that make me upset. I have many many doctors. It feels like doctors are something that happen to me. They are like the oligarchy of my life. They say different things and think they are science and right and I want them to be right.
Down with Down
I'm having an icky down time. I've been wrestling and fretting, tears and furrowed brow, bile working the backwards path of post-nasal drip.
So I'm having a down time. My clawing around for a reason and a way out makes me bleed a little deeper without finding firmer footing.
Relax, take a deep breth, and remember it's ok to go through the sad, lonely, depressed shit, too. Fighting so hard is what makes it so hard.
So I'm having a down time. My clawing around for a reason and a way out makes me bleed a little deeper without finding firmer footing.
Relax, take a deep breth, and remember it's ok to go through the sad, lonely, depressed shit, too. Fighting so hard is what makes it so hard.
Tuesday, June 22, 2010
What if your kid starts biting people?
Upstairs neighbors who went to the condo board to voice their concerns about my dog instead of talking to me had a baby a few months back. HDS and I opened the door to leave on Sunday and the dad, his grandmother, and other various adults were in the hall. My dog ran out barking and snarling. I ran out and got my dog, picked him up, and carried him back inside (he's 14 lbs). He didn't bite anyone. But my neighbor still lost his shit. "There are laws against this." I lost my shit in tears.
HDS and I had been on our way to lunch with my mom, who suggested a gate for when we open the door so there is no way my dog can run out in the future. I had the gate up already when a police officer came by later in the day. My neighbors called the police. They don't talk to me, they go to the condo board and then they call the police. When they were dog sitting, I was there when their furry charge got out off her leash. I reattached and tightened the harness for them. My dog escapes for an instant and they call the police.
I'm terrified. I don't know what to do. I keep him on his leash, muzzled in the presence of others, and we've been working our butts off on training. But he is my dog and I love him so much and he isn't going to kill anyone and he's a complete sweetheart, joy, treasure, necessity in my life. He is not a pit bull or a thing or a gun. I'm so scared my neighbors will go after him and I see the huge unfairness and uncaring of situations like these and it crushes me into a little ball of chalkiness.
Friday we go to Nashville.
Monday I go to the hospital.
When will this anxious, sinking feeling go away?
HDS and I had been on our way to lunch with my mom, who suggested a gate for when we open the door so there is no way my dog can run out in the future. I had the gate up already when a police officer came by later in the day. My neighbors called the police. They don't talk to me, they go to the condo board and then they call the police. When they were dog sitting, I was there when their furry charge got out off her leash. I reattached and tightened the harness for them. My dog escapes for an instant and they call the police.
I'm terrified. I don't know what to do. I keep him on his leash, muzzled in the presence of others, and we've been working our butts off on training. But he is my dog and I love him so much and he isn't going to kill anyone and he's a complete sweetheart, joy, treasure, necessity in my life. He is not a pit bull or a thing or a gun. I'm so scared my neighbors will go after him and I see the huge unfairness and uncaring of situations like these and it crushes me into a little ball of chalkiness.
Friday we go to Nashville.
Monday I go to the hospital.
When will this anxious, sinking feeling go away?
Thursday, June 10, 2010
Decisions, Stress
I leave for Santa Barbara tomorrow morning.
There are things I wanted to do before I left.
I cannot do all of them.
I absolutely have to go to the DMV and renew my drivers license, which apparently expired on my birthday.
I absolutely have to pack.
I absolutely have to shower.
Just shy of absolutely, I have to photograph as many items as possible and upload them to my computer. Every time I go to take photos of something, I want to scream. Even the things I thought would be super-quick shots need to be cleaned or don't sit straight or something else killing the super-easy. And now that I know how to find all kinds of information on any given item, I feel much more obligated to keep digging until I have at least the manufacturer and time period. So no more instant gratification, and I've spent the last two weeks pushing pushing pushing without taking a breath, stoking my anxiety fire.
Not absolutely but I really wanted to, I was going to go to a movie with Possible Boy this afternoon. I haven't hung out with him or Aural Girl in ages and his school year is over now so he's a bundle of free time. Last night, "everyone" was at the bar watching the Blackhawks win the Stanley Cup, but HDS was cooking really fabulous dinner and she's still far from ready to plunge into the bar, no matter how tame it is. By the time dinner was over, so was the game and I was back to stressing.
But somewhere in the "watching the game at the bar" was an invitation to today's movie watching, and in my last night thinking, going to a movie today would be an excellent break from the crazy, a reunion with the last time I blinked and a person I'd like to see.
Now it's already after 2 PM and my body is begging to lay down again. I don't want to cancel movie time. I don't want to feel like I've let someone down or messed up his plans for the day. I already blew off Neighbor Guy who called with boy troubles and really wanted to hang out and talk, my mother when she called with one of her non-reasons, and my dog by cutting his morning walk to bad-weather length. I know I have to call Possible Boy and say no movie. I know writing this instead of using these minutes on one of the time-requesting entities is extremely narcissistic, but I have to consider this a case of putting on my own oxygen mask first before assisting others.
See? Starting to breathe better already.
There are things I wanted to do before I left.
I cannot do all of them.
I absolutely have to go to the DMV and renew my drivers license, which apparently expired on my birthday.
I absolutely have to pack.
I absolutely have to shower.
Just shy of absolutely, I have to photograph as many items as possible and upload them to my computer. Every time I go to take photos of something, I want to scream. Even the things I thought would be super-quick shots need to be cleaned or don't sit straight or something else killing the super-easy. And now that I know how to find all kinds of information on any given item, I feel much more obligated to keep digging until I have at least the manufacturer and time period. So no more instant gratification, and I've spent the last two weeks pushing pushing pushing without taking a breath, stoking my anxiety fire.
Not absolutely but I really wanted to, I was going to go to a movie with Possible Boy this afternoon. I haven't hung out with him or Aural Girl in ages and his school year is over now so he's a bundle of free time. Last night, "everyone" was at the bar watching the Blackhawks win the Stanley Cup, but HDS was cooking really fabulous dinner and she's still far from ready to plunge into the bar, no matter how tame it is. By the time dinner was over, so was the game and I was back to stressing.
But somewhere in the "watching the game at the bar" was an invitation to today's movie watching, and in my last night thinking, going to a movie today would be an excellent break from the crazy, a reunion with the last time I blinked and a person I'd like to see.
Now it's already after 2 PM and my body is begging to lay down again. I don't want to cancel movie time. I don't want to feel like I've let someone down or messed up his plans for the day. I already blew off Neighbor Guy who called with boy troubles and really wanted to hang out and talk, my mother when she called with one of her non-reasons, and my dog by cutting his morning walk to bad-weather length. I know I have to call Possible Boy and say no movie. I know writing this instead of using these minutes on one of the time-requesting entities is extremely narcissistic, but I have to consider this a case of putting on my own oxygen mask first before assisting others.
See? Starting to breathe better already.
Tuesday, June 08, 2010
Too much. I need to decompress.
Friday I cleaned like I've never cleaned before. I went through the piles and lumps and stacks and ridiculousness of my office and transformed it into HDS's room. The craft closet is still a craft closet, my "to file" bin is still outrageous, there's still one pastic drawer unit of crafting insanity, and several boxes of miscelaneous I've yet to go through, but compared to a week ago, it's an entirely different room.
SHIT SHIT SHIT.
Phone just rang. I had an appointment to get a hearing test for research people. I never put the appointment in my phone calendar, the final resting place for all things transfering from memory to schedule. I feel like such a jerk. I also feel extra frustrated because this is one more piece of "too much" I just couldn't carry and don't see why I can't do it, too, without brain matter sloshing out my pores.
So I cleaned HDS's room and most of the house barely in time for HDS and husband (Cheeseburger Sam? Hot Dog Ashley?) to arrive a day early. I wanted the house to sparkle and for HDS's room to look ready and inviting, I wanted her to walk in and feel welcomed. Instead I was frazzled and hadn't gone to the grocery store or made her a set of keys and I still haven't mopped, but there was nothing to be embarassed about and I had worked hard for many many hours and accomplished something visible.
My dog and I are both awkwardly adjusting to a roommate. He sniffs her legs, follows her aaround, then turns around and barks like she's a newly intruding burglar after his food and warm spots. I'm trying-too-hard step-mother wanting to do and say the right things but not even sure what those things are. There's conventional wisdom, there's my gut, and then there's HDS and my shared flavor of crazy sauce that we have to be really careful not to splash all over the walls and eachother.
There are some big things happening right now for my vintage/antiques/buying/selling enterprise. From an objective standpoint, right now I should be filling my shop and marketing like crazy.
But I also have to go to my cousin's graduation in California this weekend.
My dog has a vet appointment this afternoon so I can kennel him if he's not BFFs with HDS by Friday.
Catalogue. Photo. Research. List. Repeat Repeat REPEAT.
I need my computer for everything. HDS didn't bring her computer because it is a giant desktop. What's the protocol for sharing? What's the protocol for me making sure HDS has what she needs? This is where I end up being weird.
The house is already a mess again. It's raining and my priorities list has cleaning the house pretty low. Writing wasn't even on the priorities list but became an obvious necesity when I was ready to curl up into a little ball.
Friday I cleaned like I've never cleaned before. I went through the piles and lumps and stacks and ridiculousness of my office and transformed it into HDS's room. The craft closet is still a craft closet, my "to file" bin is still outrageous, there's still one pastic drawer unit of crafting insanity, and several boxes of miscelaneous I've yet to go through, but compared to a week ago, it's an entirely different room.
SHIT SHIT SHIT.
Phone just rang. I had an appointment to get a hearing test for research people. I never put the appointment in my phone calendar, the final resting place for all things transfering from memory to schedule. I feel like such a jerk. I also feel extra frustrated because this is one more piece of "too much" I just couldn't carry and don't see why I can't do it, too, without brain matter sloshing out my pores.
So I cleaned HDS's room and most of the house barely in time for HDS and husband (Cheeseburger Sam? Hot Dog Ashley?) to arrive a day early. I wanted the house to sparkle and for HDS's room to look ready and inviting, I wanted her to walk in and feel welcomed. Instead I was frazzled and hadn't gone to the grocery store or made her a set of keys and I still haven't mopped, but there was nothing to be embarassed about and I had worked hard for many many hours and accomplished something visible.
My dog and I are both awkwardly adjusting to a roommate. He sniffs her legs, follows her aaround, then turns around and barks like she's a newly intruding burglar after his food and warm spots. I'm trying-too-hard step-mother wanting to do and say the right things but not even sure what those things are. There's conventional wisdom, there's my gut, and then there's HDS and my shared flavor of crazy sauce that we have to be really careful not to splash all over the walls and eachother.
There are some big things happening right now for my vintage/antiques/buying/selling enterprise. From an objective standpoint, right now I should be filling my shop and marketing like crazy.
But I also have to go to my cousin's graduation in California this weekend.
My dog has a vet appointment this afternoon so I can kennel him if he's not BFFs with HDS by Friday.
Catalogue. Photo. Research. List. Repeat Repeat REPEAT.
I need my computer for everything. HDS didn't bring her computer because it is a giant desktop. What's the protocol for sharing? What's the protocol for me making sure HDS has what she needs? This is where I end up being weird.
The house is already a mess again. It's raining and my priorities list has cleaning the house pretty low. Writing wasn't even on the priorities list but became an obvious necesity when I was ready to curl up into a little ball.
Thursday, June 03, 2010
Getting Help
I scoured the inside of my fridge. Something smells. It's clearly inside my fridge, but it's none of the individual foods. I hope my neurotic cleaning takes care of the stink.
My counter tops are visibly dirty.
My mom really wanted to come over this week to help me with anything that needed helping and have me try on clothes she and my dad bought at a store they love that just went out of business. I had a few projects that I wanted to get done before HDS got here and my brother is home for the summer.
I wanted to finally hang my dining room chandelier even if that was all we did.
That's all we did.
But it's up and it's beautiful and my dining room is finally beautiful and ready for dinner parties and the arrival of HDS.
I enjoy basic creative problem solving, working with my hands, doing things myself, etc. My mother was clearly trying to be helpful and said more than once, "It's your house." Trying is good. Still, she complains, shoots her misery from the corners of her eyes and sighs. She makes sure you are well aware of her martyrdom, being there and helping you out. Then when she's really sick of waiting, she offers to take my cousin out to dinner if I have him do it.
We are not bribing my already overworked cousin with a meal to come fix my chandelier.
This is why I feel weird asking my friends for help. It's this whiny bored refusal to use the thought and energy to do anything. Then as soon as a task or project gets labeled "I can't," it's devalued and outsourced.
I feel weird asking friends for help because my family doesn't return favors in kind or kindness, they use money. I'm trying to figure out how to be a good, real, equal friend.
My counter tops are visibly dirty.
My mom really wanted to come over this week to help me with anything that needed helping and have me try on clothes she and my dad bought at a store they love that just went out of business. I had a few projects that I wanted to get done before HDS got here and my brother is home for the summer.
I wanted to finally hang my dining room chandelier even if that was all we did.
That's all we did.
But it's up and it's beautiful and my dining room is finally beautiful and ready for dinner parties and the arrival of HDS.
I enjoy basic creative problem solving, working with my hands, doing things myself, etc. My mother was clearly trying to be helpful and said more than once, "It's your house." Trying is good. Still, she complains, shoots her misery from the corners of her eyes and sighs. She makes sure you are well aware of her martyrdom, being there and helping you out. Then when she's really sick of waiting, she offers to take my cousin out to dinner if I have him do it.
We are not bribing my already overworked cousin with a meal to come fix my chandelier.
This is why I feel weird asking my friends for help. It's this whiny bored refusal to use the thought and energy to do anything. Then as soon as a task or project gets labeled "I can't," it's devalued and outsourced.
I feel weird asking friends for help because my family doesn't return favors in kind or kindness, they use money. I'm trying to figure out how to be a good, real, equal friend.
Monday, May 31, 2010
Tonight was what I imagine my life "should" be.
I cleaned, photographed, researched, and listed things to sell on Etsy.
I walked the dog.
Then I went to the bar and was socially awkward among the socially awkward for several hours of healthy human contact, food I didn't cook, and and alcohol I only occasionally had to pay for. I hung out with girls and non-prospective boys and watched people play bags and tried to learn to play bags for real instead of having to giggle and flirt to hide my embarassment.
Birdie came to visit Friday night and got to see all the wonderfulness that is my bar. Neighbor Guy was completely shit-faced and thought Birdie was the hottest woman he'd seen in his entire life and could say little more thant "You are so hot!" He's still convinced she's "mixed" (racially) and would gladly go straight for her. Then tonight Neighbor Guy is following around this "straight" guy I don't particularly like as a person. I escaped the bar a bit earlier than necessary because I got sick of the two of them.
I hope the grocery store is open tomorrow.
Is it supposed to rain? My feet itch.
I cleaned, photographed, researched, and listed things to sell on Etsy.
I walked the dog.
Then I went to the bar and was socially awkward among the socially awkward for several hours of healthy human contact, food I didn't cook, and and alcohol I only occasionally had to pay for. I hung out with girls and non-prospective boys and watched people play bags and tried to learn to play bags for real instead of having to giggle and flirt to hide my embarassment.
Birdie came to visit Friday night and got to see all the wonderfulness that is my bar. Neighbor Guy was completely shit-faced and thought Birdie was the hottest woman he'd seen in his entire life and could say little more thant "You are so hot!" He's still convinced she's "mixed" (racially) and would gladly go straight for her. Then tonight Neighbor Guy is following around this "straight" guy I don't particularly like as a person. I escaped the bar a bit earlier than necessary because I got sick of the two of them.
I hope the grocery store is open tomorrow.
Is it supposed to rain? My feet itch.
Thursday, May 27, 2010
What I learned from the LOST finale
Black people don't go to heaven. Even if they marry white people.
Friday, May 21, 2010
Morning Downs and Ups
The president of my condo board is a complete dick, as proven by this morning's round of emails. There's a lot of hot-headed self-centered bullshit in this building, and having grown up in a nest of hot-headed self-centered bullshit (frequently wrapped up in it myself) I now like to play peace ambassador whenever possible. But in Condoland, I know so little about the process and the rules and everything, I don't stand a conscilliatory chance.
Reading nasty emails full of personal attacks was ruining my morning when my brother called.
At 10 AM he was drunk.
It was the last day of finals. He was at a bar.
Ah, college. Memories. The bar staying open all night right up until graduation the next morning
My brother's call drastically improved my mood.
Reading nasty emails full of personal attacks was ruining my morning when my brother called.
At 10 AM he was drunk.
It was the last day of finals. He was at a bar.
Ah, college. Memories. The bar staying open all night right up until graduation the next morning
My brother's call drastically improved my mood.
Wednesday, May 19, 2010
Tuesday, May 18, 2010
Hard-Headed
Yesterday was a really bad day with lots of awake pain.
Today is worse. I try to unravel the pain like it's a tight, rigid riddle--release this muscle, swallow this pill, concentrate on this simple activity. Minutes are hours as I sit and breathe and dance across the surface of this hard hurt inside me.
Today is worse. I try to unravel the pain like it's a tight, rigid riddle--release this muscle, swallow this pill, concentrate on this simple activity. Minutes are hours as I sit and breathe and dance across the surface of this hard hurt inside me.
Saturday, May 15, 2010
State of the Onion
Thursday was my birthday. I'm 28. The last several years I've been having trouble remembering how old I am; each birthday I'm not sure if it's that birthday or the next one. This year, I know I'm 28. It means very little, but it's comforting.
I'm still feeling like crap a lot. Still having good days, too. Good parts of days, bad parts of days. For awhile I was working and sleeping like a normal person, up and down with the sun and churning out fairly regular accomplishments without much regulation. Then it thunderstormed and I slept 15 hours and haven't gotten back on track since.
Today hurts like it should rain again. I didn't expect to spend much time with my friends on my Thursday of a birthday, but another weekend alone in the dark and quiet sucks. I feel so out of touch, seeing the people I'm closest to feels like dropping in on the lives of vague acquaintances.
Well fuck now I'm sulky teary. Maybe letting it rain from my eyeballs will relieve some of the pressure I can't control in the greater atmosphere.
I'm still feeling like crap a lot. Still having good days, too. Good parts of days, bad parts of days. For awhile I was working and sleeping like a normal person, up and down with the sun and churning out fairly regular accomplishments without much regulation. Then it thunderstormed and I slept 15 hours and haven't gotten back on track since.
Today hurts like it should rain again. I didn't expect to spend much time with my friends on my Thursday of a birthday, but another weekend alone in the dark and quiet sucks. I feel so out of touch, seeing the people I'm closest to feels like dropping in on the lives of vague acquaintances.
Well fuck now I'm sulky teary. Maybe letting it rain from my eyeballs will relieve some of the pressure I can't control in the greater atmosphere.
Friday, May 14, 2010
Thursday, May 06, 2010
One Pille, Two Pill, Orange Pill, Blue Pill
I messed up my pills this morning. Really weird. I have dreams where I just keep putting pills in my mouth without realizing it until I notice my mouthful of pills and spit everything out and worry about what I've already swallowed and what I still need to swallow. This morning, reality felt closer to that than it ever has before.
I went to take my pills as always. I start on the big capsules and then take the little ones, so I grabbed my norotriptyline and downed my most recent dose: two. I went for the next vial and realized I'd just taken my norotriptyline. That's a night-time only drug. Fuck. Not worth making myself puke (I've never done this in a finger-down-the-throat way, only by mentally allowing my body to let go when it was already nauseous, and I wasn't nauseous, and I didn't want to change that). Fine. It's not going to kill me, I'm just taking it 12 hours early. Now where's the Prozac I was reaching for in the first place?
And having just taken two norotriptyline, I took two Prozac. Not on purpose. I wasn't consciously aware of my mistake for a solid minute, then, boom. I'd taken two because I was compensating for the two wrong pills with two right pills. Prozac fucks me up. I wondered if I was asleep, dreaming this. When my teeth fall out I know I'm asleep. Elementary school reunion is a dream, too. No, this time I was awake, but not for long. I was extremely careful with the rest of my drugs and then took a whole as-needed lorazepam to hold back the double-Prozac jumpy crazy weird shit and anything else unpleasant.
I fell asleep for real and for hours. So much for Thursday. I hear Fridays are nice.
I went to take my pills as always. I start on the big capsules and then take the little ones, so I grabbed my norotriptyline and downed my most recent dose: two. I went for the next vial and realized I'd just taken my norotriptyline. That's a night-time only drug. Fuck. Not worth making myself puke (I've never done this in a finger-down-the-throat way, only by mentally allowing my body to let go when it was already nauseous, and I wasn't nauseous, and I didn't want to change that). Fine. It's not going to kill me, I'm just taking it 12 hours early. Now where's the Prozac I was reaching for in the first place?
And having just taken two norotriptyline, I took two Prozac. Not on purpose. I wasn't consciously aware of my mistake for a solid minute, then, boom. I'd taken two because I was compensating for the two wrong pills with two right pills. Prozac fucks me up. I wondered if I was asleep, dreaming this. When my teeth fall out I know I'm asleep. Elementary school reunion is a dream, too. No, this time I was awake, but not for long. I was extremely careful with the rest of my drugs and then took a whole as-needed lorazepam to hold back the double-Prozac jumpy crazy weird shit and anything else unpleasant.
I fell asleep for real and for hours. So much for Thursday. I hear Fridays are nice.
Wednesday, May 05, 2010
In college, Post Modernists were PoMos, over-educated hipsters
Oh, oh, silly PoMo
So we don't know what's real
So?
I, too, have days in which I lash out in outfits
We are so rebellious
Twist up in the meta meta meta
Every generation has us
So so subversive
Can instead we laugh?
Not hate ourselves but laugh?
Twirl our perception of perception around in our fingertips
Love every echo of the meta meta meta
Lose ourselves in it, instead of thinking about trying to lose ourselves in it.
PoMo, let go.
So we don't know what's real
So?
I, too, have days in which I lash out in outfits
We are so rebellious
Twist up in the meta meta meta
Every generation has us
So so subversive
Can instead we laugh?
Not hate ourselves but laugh?
Twirl our perception of perception around in our fingertips
Love every echo of the meta meta meta
Lose ourselves in it, instead of thinking about trying to lose ourselves in it.
PoMo, let go.
Tuesday, May 04, 2010
I don't want anything touching me right now. I get like this around the Imparting of the Red Sea, where everything feels icky. I only want to eat smooth cool foods and wear slips and my lingerie/chemise things all the time.
Ok, now I can't fucking think or write. I have all this writey crap in my head and getting it down isn't working. I feel electrically charged. The way people describe before they get hit by lightning.
Frustrated.
Ok, now I can't fucking think or write. I have all this writey crap in my head and getting it down isn't working. I feel electrically charged. The way people describe before they get hit by lightning.
Frustrated.
Monday, May 03, 2010
Roach Attack
Roaches were living in my dishwasher.
Shock value accomplished, I should be more specific. There's space in the door behind the stainless steel face where all the electrical and mechanical workings of the dishwasher stay dry. I imagine if you're a bug it's a pretty fabulous space to live, warm and steamy, always surrounded by food smells, but dry enough that there's a designated spot in there for your instructional booklet.
I clean my kitchen a lot. I get a bit OCD about it. The first time I opened the dishwasher and a roach crawled out, I was grossed out as all hell but I chased it down and killed it. The second time I opened the dishwasher and a roach crawled out of the same little spot as the first time, it was too disgusting a possibility to comprehend. Then Friday I saw a roach on the digital display, went to kill it, and discovered it was in the digital display.
Screwdriver, paper towels, garbage bag, indoor bug spray.
I had my dishwasher in pieces and it wasn't even 7:30 AM.
As soon as I saw the bug in the display I had this mental picture of a horror show crawling with a layer of roaches. So when instead I chased maybe 20-50 insects out of plastic compartments and insulating foam and around the wires and processors, it felt quite manageable. "Cockroach holocaust" and "I'm issuing a fatwa on creepy crawly things" kept playing in my mind. [Insert thought-provoking commentary on the religious nature of my bug-killing mentality HERE.]
I need to go camping. Then I'm invading the bugs' space and things are supposed to be dirty covered in dirt because they are made out of dirt.
Thanks to a 2 1/2 hour nap today, I am awake after 10:30 PM for the first time since...Wednesday?
Shock value accomplished, I should be more specific. There's space in the door behind the stainless steel face where all the electrical and mechanical workings of the dishwasher stay dry. I imagine if you're a bug it's a pretty fabulous space to live, warm and steamy, always surrounded by food smells, but dry enough that there's a designated spot in there for your instructional booklet.
I clean my kitchen a lot. I get a bit OCD about it. The first time I opened the dishwasher and a roach crawled out, I was grossed out as all hell but I chased it down and killed it. The second time I opened the dishwasher and a roach crawled out of the same little spot as the first time, it was too disgusting a possibility to comprehend. Then Friday I saw a roach on the digital display, went to kill it, and discovered it was in the digital display.
Screwdriver, paper towels, garbage bag, indoor bug spray.
I had my dishwasher in pieces and it wasn't even 7:30 AM.
As soon as I saw the bug in the display I had this mental picture of a horror show crawling with a layer of roaches. So when instead I chased maybe 20-50 insects out of plastic compartments and insulating foam and around the wires and processors, it felt quite manageable. "Cockroach holocaust" and "I'm issuing a fatwa on creepy crawly things" kept playing in my mind. [Insert thought-provoking commentary on the religious nature of my bug-killing mentality HERE.]
I need to go camping. Then I'm invading the bugs' space and things are supposed to be dirty covered in dirt because they are made out of dirt.
Thanks to a 2 1/2 hour nap today, I am awake after 10:30 PM for the first time since...Wednesday?
Saturday, May 01, 2010
Friday, April 30, 2010
Spiky
Sooooooooooooooo...
I've been up since 6:30 AM and I've been doing stuff the entire time. Cleaning and laundry and shopping for May gift-getters and at around 10 AM I was going to take a nap so I could get back to a normalish sleep schedule but then I wanted to sweep every possible surface before I took a nap so I could mop after my nap and then it was noon and the pain showed up and I hadn't taken my pills yet and I needed to eat and while I was eating I started doing stuff on Etsy and putting together pretty collections of possible gifts and then it was the afternoon and I had to do the one project I absolutely had to do today and then my psychiatrist called to say he actually had gotten the lab results fax and my nortriptyline levels were high (duh shit, this is why I'm crashing most days when the sun sets and in a content but shaky stupor during my awake times). At some point I blinked and it was 6 PM. I made dinner. Now it's approaching 9 and I'm still quite alert, unshowered, and need to go to Walgreens to get my new lower-dose prescription nortriptyline before it closes or I go to bed, whichever comes first. Before I can go to Walgreens (3 blocks away) I have to drive to put air in my tire (1.5 blocks away) which has been soft since before the last time I drove, two weeks ago. Tomorrow morning at 9 AM I intend to be at a demolition sale in Park Ridge. I may be a little bonkers, but it's an easy drive.
Oh, good, it's raining. I'm being 50% sarcastic. Good for my head, bad for walking to get the car and then finding the car a new parking space. And that whole putting air in the tires thing. Maybe I'll get up tomorrow at 6:30 again.
The rest of my week has been a blur; everything feels blurry. I haven't seen Aural Girl in some ridiculous amount of time.
>>Insert note: thunder and lightning outside, so my dog has to be touching me: my legs are crossed and he's resting his head on my elevated foot.<<
I only saw Possible Boy last Sunday for grocery shopping. And I feel like I haven't seen anybody, including myself, in ages. I've seen My Twin (new official code name for friend from junior high and high school with whom I'd lost touch and now we just started meeting up weekly downtown) but in my dreams I frequently see people from my past so something about it feels surreal. It's wonderful, but surreal. We used to say we were twins back in high school because we'd say the same thing or think the same thing all the time. People used to say we looked alike, and we had similar builds, but I'm blonde and pasty white while My Twin is deep mocha African-American and uses her hair an art medium. Still, we held ourselves the same (despite her dance background) and had the same speech patterns and we fed off eachother like Hall and Oates or something. Then we went our separate ways, I thought I'd failed her by being too young and self-involved...Ten years later, we've both changed and grown up and gone through a lot, and the same stuff that made us "twins" as kids seems to have ripened into an older but just as twinny version. I go around collecting people I like and identify with; My Twin was a cornerstone of my collection.
And then I got snippy over the use of the word "meta."
On most tv shows, characters go through some trial or tribulation and learn some life lesson, but things have to be set back pretty much to zero by the end of the episode so that you don't have to worry about the continuity and congruence of the episodes. I think I'm a little like this, too. I was reading through posts from last summer to see if I'd already given My Twin a code name, and it's the exact same thing day after day. Posts individually may seem like they mean something or are going somewhere or like perhaps I've really learned my lesson this time, but the accumulation is no more than pencil shavings, and I'm not using a pencil.
Life is so weird. Place your bets now on whether or not I'll make it to the demolition sale tomorrow, if I'll make it to any other sales, and who will go with me. I'm giving 5-to-1 odds I'll have a male or no companion. Who knows a bookie?
I've been up since 6:30 AM and I've been doing stuff the entire time. Cleaning and laundry and shopping for May gift-getters and at around 10 AM I was going to take a nap so I could get back to a normalish sleep schedule but then I wanted to sweep every possible surface before I took a nap so I could mop after my nap and then it was noon and the pain showed up and I hadn't taken my pills yet and I needed to eat and while I was eating I started doing stuff on Etsy and putting together pretty collections of possible gifts and then it was the afternoon and I had to do the one project I absolutely had to do today and then my psychiatrist called to say he actually had gotten the lab results fax and my nortriptyline levels were high (duh shit, this is why I'm crashing most days when the sun sets and in a content but shaky stupor during my awake times). At some point I blinked and it was 6 PM. I made dinner. Now it's approaching 9 and I'm still quite alert, unshowered, and need to go to Walgreens to get my new lower-dose prescription nortriptyline before it closes or I go to bed, whichever comes first. Before I can go to Walgreens (3 blocks away) I have to drive to put air in my tire (1.5 blocks away) which has been soft since before the last time I drove, two weeks ago. Tomorrow morning at 9 AM I intend to be at a demolition sale in Park Ridge. I may be a little bonkers, but it's an easy drive.
Oh, good, it's raining. I'm being 50% sarcastic. Good for my head, bad for walking to get the car and then finding the car a new parking space. And that whole putting air in the tires thing. Maybe I'll get up tomorrow at 6:30 again.
The rest of my week has been a blur; everything feels blurry. I haven't seen Aural Girl in some ridiculous amount of time.
>>Insert note: thunder and lightning outside, so my dog has to be touching me: my legs are crossed and he's resting his head on my elevated foot.<<
I only saw Possible Boy last Sunday for grocery shopping. And I feel like I haven't seen anybody, including myself, in ages. I've seen My Twin (new official code name for friend from junior high and high school with whom I'd lost touch and now we just started meeting up weekly downtown) but in my dreams I frequently see people from my past so something about it feels surreal. It's wonderful, but surreal. We used to say we were twins back in high school because we'd say the same thing or think the same thing all the time. People used to say we looked alike, and we had similar builds, but I'm blonde and pasty white while My Twin is deep mocha African-American and uses her hair an art medium. Still, we held ourselves the same (despite her dance background) and had the same speech patterns and we fed off eachother like Hall and Oates or something. Then we went our separate ways, I thought I'd failed her by being too young and self-involved...Ten years later, we've both changed and grown up and gone through a lot, and the same stuff that made us "twins" as kids seems to have ripened into an older but just as twinny version. I go around collecting people I like and identify with; My Twin was a cornerstone of my collection.
And then I got snippy over the use of the word "meta."
On most tv shows, characters go through some trial or tribulation and learn some life lesson, but things have to be set back pretty much to zero by the end of the episode so that you don't have to worry about the continuity and congruence of the episodes. I think I'm a little like this, too. I was reading through posts from last summer to see if I'd already given My Twin a code name, and it's the exact same thing day after day. Posts individually may seem like they mean something or are going somewhere or like perhaps I've really learned my lesson this time, but the accumulation is no more than pencil shavings, and I'm not using a pencil.
Life is so weird. Place your bets now on whether or not I'll make it to the demolition sale tomorrow, if I'll make it to any other sales, and who will go with me. I'm giving 5-to-1 odds I'll have a male or no companion. Who knows a bookie?
Monday, April 26, 2010
Things I Couldn't Make Up
Posted sign near the beach I like to go to with my dog:
Rogers Park is a strange patchwork of socioeconomics that changes in blocks, pockets, and next-door neighbors. I live in a huge gorgeous condo that's full of married couples starting families, pets, and retired people. Across the street is a gorgeous building owned and operated by a slumlord who steals electricity and does all kinds of shady things including renting to pedophiles and drug dealers. The drug dealers don't bother me since I have been known to smoke pot so I have no right to insist the source stay locked away from my lucky white self. One of the dealers seems not to have a phone or doorbell, so to get a hold of him you stand outside his window and yell his name until he lets you in. I'd be annoyed, but it's so fucking funny and it drives my neighbors so crazy (these are the people who want to disallow satellite dishes because they look too "trailer park") I just laugh and laugh.
Across the street in the other direction are perfectly decent apartments. Nice brick three-story building, well taken care of, reasonable rent.
Next door is a three-unit condo building with the most amazing patio garden area in the back. One unit is owned by a very nice gay couple in their late 30s. One unit is occupied by a single mother and her three(?) grade-school aged kids. I heard they were renters and not owners, but it's entirely possible people assumed the family only rented because it's a Hispanic single mother. One unit is owned by some shadowy male person no one ever sees or discusses.
The street Howard is a few blocks north of me. Howard is a notorious Rogers Park pocket of general goods stores and currency exchanges loitering people of color. For as much as I complained about growing up in Oak Park, it gave me a lot of perspective on fear, race, class, and people. I'm still skewed way over on "Lived entire life as a little white girl" side, but seriously? I walk down the Howard strip with some regularity. I'm just as likely to run into an asshole, a dog lover, and a person who smiles at me in the nicest parts of Evanston as I am on the crappiest parts of Howard. People are people. Then you cram them through different sets of life experiences, and they engage those experiences in different ways. But they're still people. We're all people. How the hell did the imperialist thing stay so popular with light-skinned people for so long?
Anyway, what got me started on this whole big rant: the name of the fairly new community center built on Howard? The Willye B. White Park and Community Center. Seriously. The message to "at-risk youth?" B. White. I won't even go into that she was a black Olympic athlete, blah blah blah the only way to be black and famous is to be an athlete.
Maybe Molly the Ferret ran away from home to escape the pressures of a patriarchal all-albino society.
Across the street in the other direction are perfectly decent apartments. Nice brick three-story building, well taken care of, reasonable rent.
Next door is a three-unit condo building with the most amazing patio garden area in the back. One unit is owned by a very nice gay couple in their late 30s. One unit is occupied by a single mother and her three(?) grade-school aged kids. I heard they were renters and not owners, but it's entirely possible people assumed the family only rented because it's a Hispanic single mother. One unit is owned by some shadowy male person no one ever sees or discusses.
The street Howard is a few blocks north of me. Howard is a notorious Rogers Park pocket of general goods stores and currency exchanges loitering people of color. For as much as I complained about growing up in Oak Park, it gave me a lot of perspective on fear, race, class, and people. I'm still skewed way over on "Lived entire life as a little white girl" side, but seriously? I walk down the Howard strip with some regularity. I'm just as likely to run into an asshole, a dog lover, and a person who smiles at me in the nicest parts of Evanston as I am on the crappiest parts of Howard. People are people. Then you cram them through different sets of life experiences, and they engage those experiences in different ways. But they're still people. We're all people. How the hell did the imperialist thing stay so popular with light-skinned people for so long?
Anyway, what got me started on this whole big rant: the name of the fairly new community center built on Howard? The Willye B. White Park and Community Center. Seriously. The message to "at-risk youth?" B. White. I won't even go into that she was a black Olympic athlete, blah blah blah the only way to be black and famous is to be an athlete.
Maybe Molly the Ferret ran away from home to escape the pressures of a patriarchal all-albino society.
Saturday, April 24, 2010
Sprunky
I don't know why I thought I'd feel better today, or why I'm surprised to feel like the same pukeshit yet another day in a row. I showered this morning; the sidewalks are wet outside, too, and maybe I felt the weather break and expected a reprieve. Still, it's spring, and even without the added stress of finals and life-changes that served as rationales in years past, it's a physically rough season.
Sunday, April 18, 2010
An Avocado with Parkinson's
Bad shakes. Shakes on the inside, too. I still went to the barbecue held in honor of Neighbor Guy's birthday. No booze, wonderful food, and just NG's best friend, best friend's boyfriend, Possible Boy, Aural Girl, and myself. I was in no shape or position to pull on NG's demons, but I guess I was in no shape to realize that, either. Still, nothing happened, no plunging off on any emotion. I wanted to walk home with NG, but I was too shaky just washing the pie pan I brought, so PB and AG drove me to Walgreens and home. They were very quiet in the car, and I felt like there was something they wanted to say but stopped themselves from saying in front of me. Commentary on NG? Commentary on my dealing with NG? Commentary on how they've never seen me this bad?
The last few days I've been more outwardly sickly. I see my psychiatrist on Tuesday so I haven't bothered calling to say "Bad things are flaring, what drug do you want me on now? More of something? Less of something?" I think the pills are burning holes in my digestive system. The upside to my migraine's latest manifestation is that for once I actually look sick; my friends don't have to ask me how I'm feeling, and the rest of the world is less inclined to expect me in the usual flow of things.
AG is coming over tomorrow to help me clean my house. My mom keeps offering to come out on a Monday and I was ready to call her because I knew I needed the assistance, but I really didn't want to deal with any of the other stuff that comes with my mother especially when I'm not doing well. A year ago, my mom was my only option. Now, I have local friends who are all happy to do anything for eachother.
My life is a really great avocado with a few rotten spots.
The last few days I've been more outwardly sickly. I see my psychiatrist on Tuesday so I haven't bothered calling to say "Bad things are flaring, what drug do you want me on now? More of something? Less of something?" I think the pills are burning holes in my digestive system. The upside to my migraine's latest manifestation is that for once I actually look sick; my friends don't have to ask me how I'm feeling, and the rest of the world is less inclined to expect me in the usual flow of things.
AG is coming over tomorrow to help me clean my house. My mom keeps offering to come out on a Monday and I was ready to call her because I knew I needed the assistance, but I really didn't want to deal with any of the other stuff that comes with my mother especially when I'm not doing well. A year ago, my mom was my only option. Now, I have local friends who are all happy to do anything for eachother.
My life is a really great avocado with a few rotten spots.
Happy Birthday Neighbor Guy, Deleted
I wrote a 1, 712 word post about today. I went to Cambodian New Year and three garage sales with Neighbor Guy. We had fun. Writing about it was a word-purge that took an hour or two. Minutes after I posted it, Neighbor Guy called. Drunk. And of the many things he said, the only one I can repeat is that he didn't want me telling anyone about anything he said today.
I'm not a journalist, I don't use real names, but there are people who know or will meet Neighbor Guy who also read this blog, and I would feel guilty if I didn't remove the post.
The only safe paragraph:
I'm not a journalist, I don't use real names, but there are people who know or will meet Neighbor Guy who also read this blog, and I would feel guilty if I didn't remove the post.
The only safe paragraph:
Cambodian New Year was too big an event for the temple itself, so it was held at the nearby city college. We walked in to parents with young kids and fussy babies out in the hallway; huge tables filled with Styrofoam bowls of noodles and curries and desserts and things don't translate; and monotone call-and-response chanting over a microphone. The two monks wrapped in orange sat on the raised platform with the whole room facing them, but I saw they didn't have the microphones. Two of the genuflectors at the front, dressed in white and posturing a bit higher on their knees, lead the chants.Maybe someday things will change and I'll post the rest.
Friday, April 16, 2010
I feel like I'm on a slow moving tilt-a-whirl. I keep eating, like that's going to fix anything. More likely another storm tonight. Maybe that meteor that fell from the sky in a flash last night (I didn't see it, but it's on the news...probably landed in Wisconsin) is sending me alien signals. I'm rooting for alien signals; then there's a chance they can fix this shit.
If my writing sounds even more bonkers and fragmented than usual, it's because I keep getting distracted and pausing to drop my shoulders back and close my eyes and breathe from my diaphragm.
Let go. gooooooooooooooooooo
If my writing sounds even more bonkers and fragmented than usual, it's because I keep getting distracted and pausing to drop my shoulders back and close my eyes and breathe from my diaphragm.
Let go. gooooooooooooooooooo
Thursday, April 15, 2010
Friends and Taxes
Very late. Very tired. I need to change the way I do my accounting so next year's taxes won't be Adventures in Approximationland. I could be deducting way more than I am, but if I don't find any 2009 repair reports on my car's mileage by the time I take my pills tomorrow, fuck it. Not sure if that's the socialist or the motherfuckinglazy in me, but either way.
___ and I met up downtown at the Art Institute this afternoon. We're going to try to make it a regular thing, since she lives in Berwyn and we never see eachother. We understand eachother's weird shit. We're made out of the same shit. The universe is an amazing place.
___ and I met up downtown at the Art Institute this afternoon. We're going to try to make it a regular thing, since she lives in Berwyn and we never see eachother. We understand eachother's weird shit. We're made out of the same shit. The universe is an amazing place.
Saturday, April 10, 2010
moblogged from Kingston Mines
Its a good thing im feeling well & enjoying unbelievably good music. Not wasting my time on drama or misalignment. Im here & theres plenty of wonderful.
Addendum: 1:08 AM. Home now. AG was tired and a bit fussy tonight, mostly at PB. Why do I feel like "Mom, Dad, I hate it when you fight," and the impulse to "fix" every recognizable hurt and sadness I think I see on PB's face? When did my protective side show up? I don't want it to be a narcisistic protective side--my mom does that a lot and I have, too, in the past.
Um, I had two drinks and I feel like I'm writing with rocks for brains.
Also, I made fairly clear but not particularly intense genstures in Ken's direction that were well received. The world is full of maybe.
Addendum: 1:08 AM. Home now. AG was tired and a bit fussy tonight, mostly at PB. Why do I feel like "Mom, Dad, I hate it when you fight," and the impulse to "fix" every recognizable hurt and sadness I think I see on PB's face? When did my protective side show up? I don't want it to be a narcisistic protective side--my mom does that a lot and I have, too, in the past.
Um, I had two drinks and I feel like I'm writing with rocks for brains.
Also, I made fairly clear but not particularly intense genstures in Ken's direction that were well received. The world is full of maybe.
Friday, April 09, 2010
Computer and Beetle Ramblings
The internet lets me get lost in my head until my body is just packaging. I can do a million things and go a million places and never be bored. It's an extension of my infinite internal narrative--streams to swim through and around and around. I have a keyboard to take minutes: receipts for the time I spend, justification for overthought after overthought.
Walking the dog on the beach today I watched the waves reaching higher and higher and lower and higher up on the sand. Where the highest waves left foam lines on the sand, I saw ladybugs. Mostly dead ladybugs, wings slightly open and bodies at weird angles to the ground. Did they wash up with the wave? Were they in that normally dry area and caught off guard? There were a few still alive. They were more orange than red, so I'm hoping they were what we called "Asian Death Beetles." In college, a non-indigenous swarm of these ladybug look-alikes took over everything. My friends' room had ceiling corner completely black and moving. And Asian Death Beetles bit. I liked insisting they were close enough to ladybugs and making wishes when they showed up individually, but I could never really like gobs of them or their rumored harm to local ecosystems.
This morning's beach massacre looked more like Asian Death Beetles. Maybe it's a sign.
I've been snoozing my pill alarm for an hour now because I haven't wanted to get up from the computer to go take my pills. I wanted to finish this, and I apparently wanted to spend more time lost inside my head. It's beautiful out today. I need fresh groceries. I also need to figure out a weird thing on my taxes and then get them effing filed. That's back at the computer. Pulling myself up, away, go face life.
Walking the dog on the beach today I watched the waves reaching higher and higher and lower and higher up on the sand. Where the highest waves left foam lines on the sand, I saw ladybugs. Mostly dead ladybugs, wings slightly open and bodies at weird angles to the ground. Did they wash up with the wave? Were they in that normally dry area and caught off guard? There were a few still alive. They were more orange than red, so I'm hoping they were what we called "Asian Death Beetles." In college, a non-indigenous swarm of these ladybug look-alikes took over everything. My friends' room had ceiling corner completely black and moving. And Asian Death Beetles bit. I liked insisting they were close enough to ladybugs and making wishes when they showed up individually, but I could never really like gobs of them or their rumored harm to local ecosystems.
This morning's beach massacre looked more like Asian Death Beetles. Maybe it's a sign.
I've been snoozing my pill alarm for an hour now because I haven't wanted to get up from the computer to go take my pills. I wanted to finish this, and I apparently wanted to spend more time lost inside my head. It's beautiful out today. I need fresh groceries. I also need to figure out a weird thing on my taxes and then get them effing filed. That's back at the computer. Pulling myself up, away, go face life.
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