Cowpunk

Printed out the manuscript

2011-10-25T01:04:00.000-05:00

Was at Karen's yesterday and printed out the entire manuscript that I have so far. It's pretty thick. 77 pages on Open Office. Karen's sick, so am I... sat home and did nothing at all today. I feel like death.I hate calling in sick to this job, because I KNOW it's causing them a true hardship but fuck. I can't do that job when sick. IT's too intense. I come away from it hurting as it is. Karen brought me some hot food from New Seasons today. Poor thing is totally whacked, sick as a dog with coughing. I'm not coughing, but was sneezing and my joints ache like mad. Trying to get back on track with PSU: by the way, they use QUARTERS, and Winter Quarter starts soon. I hope to get that scholarship. I'm tired. And I hate my job so much I really want to give up.

Portland

2011-09-12T13:11:00.000-05:00

So much has happened since I moved to Portland. I do not regret the move at all but I do regret that I took this job instead of going for Warner Pacific. This job is killing me. My back aches, my feet hurt, my mind is going insane. I have four nine hour days and a half day on Friday, and the job is extremely labor intensive and there really is no comfortable place to take a nice break from it. Lunch is hectic but at least there is a production meeting after lunch so I get a little over thirty minutes to sit down and rest and eat. My partner and I have been getting along so well and I just fall deeper in love with her, and with Portland. I just have to find a better, less hurtful job. I'm working way too hard for minimum wage, which is at least a dollar more here than Arizona but they take out way more taxes too. I'm not really making enough to live on and save money up so... I'll be on a strict budget for a while. Hard, because there is so much good food here. *sigh*I'm also in need of my benefits : I have a surgery consult set up for the 28th. I'm not at work today for a few reasons: yesterday I crashed after breakfast and stayed in bed all day, not sure what happened. It might be anything, and partly it might be mental because my adoptive father died this weekend. Just a few hours short of Sept. 11, so that day will mean more than the usual sadness now. Karen bought me tickets to see Devo next weekend. I'm pretty stoked about it and hope they are not lame now that they are older. I hope it's fun. I haven't really had a lot of fun lately, due to always being so tired and my back hurting like it does. I don't tell K about how severe the pain is but it is pretty bad. I have been fighting the urge to lay down in front of traffic, telilng myself to take it one day at a time, this job isn't forever.

One more day

2011-06-02T12:14:00.001-05:00

It's Thursday, June 2. Tomorrow morning at 5:20 I board a shuttle van that will take me to the Phoenix airport so I can get to Portland, Oregon where my sweetheart will be waiting. I'm just so in love, that nothing else really matters that much. She's so amazing, and so intense, I never thought I would find anyone like her.
I wish I was a bit younger, I do. But there's nothing I can do about that. I wish I had a better job and straighter teeth but she loves me the way I am, and so intensely that I can't stress it enough, I seem to have found my match. When we are away from one another I feel like my soul has been cut out and shrink-wrapped and put on a shelf.
I can't wait to see her. It's been a very long and boring three weeks since school let out, and I've not worked a lick, just sat around killing time trying not to spend money. And now I get to go Oregon, and see the most beautiful state and the most amazing and sexy woman, my butch boi, so strong and so sad, she is kind of sad, and I want to love her up.

well it had to happen.

2011-05-20T22:16:00.000-05:00

Yeah, she texted me tonight saying she was drinking beer. Now, I don't own her, by any stretch of the imagination, and she's been hinting that she might drink one day, I just didn't know it would be today.
My only worry about her drinking is that she had told me she wanted to stop entirely, forever. She went to AA even. But of course, the week was long and the work was hard and of course there is me the g/f wanting to know how she is every five minutes (well, I guess that is ok most of the time, but not when she's so busy... I mean, sometimes it's her who is needy, sometimes it is me. but we're always up each others' ass, except once in a while, I guess it gets to be too intense for her, despite her saying it is not.)
I am getting to know her well enough to know that when she sleeps not enough, she gets a bit unstable. And I knew all this, and I plunged in anyway, and today when she texted me that she was drinking, I did not react well, but instead,
sort of freaked a bit. I cried, I cajoled with her to call me, not to ignore me, and when she did call, she was defensive,
and saying things like "I don't want to feel guilty", and
"It's non of your concern", and...
things like that, hurtful things, to where I said (*why do I try to talk to people when they are drinking?*) "Who are you talking to here? Do you know who you are talking to? It's me!"
Dumb. I reacted badly. I made her feel shitty. I hate myself for it. I need to go to Al-Anon for a while I guess.
I've written her a couple of e-mails apologizing (I do not own her, it's really NOT my business.) and I hope I hear back from her tonight, drunk or not. I worry because she has admitted to driving drunk in the near past; I'd fucking die if anything happened to her this close to my moving out there.
but she also said "You are moving to Portland to be with me, you have to find out I'm not perfect".
Ok, sounds like she is making sure I know she's not going to give up drinking, and that is something I have to deal with. She's put her foot down and made sure I know she will pick drinking over me sometimes. I get the message loud and clear and I have to decide how much I am wiling to take...
it's all relative. AS long as we communicate, as long as we keep talking.

That which burns but does not kill

2011-05-14T04:26:00.000-05:00

I'm immersed, engulfed in a conflagration of the heartfires. I wish I could blog about it but I have spent the better part of the day writing back and forth with my love, each trying to so hard to describe our feelings for one another. It has been three solid months of constant craving;
I have been to her house twice now, as hard as that is for me to believe because our time together has been so short each time.
But I think it 'taking it slow' ...sort of. I mean, two days here and two days there, and in June, ten days together,
and then eventually hopefully I'll live in Portland and we'll see each other more often. I don't want to lose my autonomy, but I don't want to live in a different state either. I need to be closer to this woman. She holds my heart in her hands.
As for my mom: I feel the need to be mean to her. I need to get away so i can have sympathy. I want to slam the door in her face and kick her down the stairs. I hate myself for it but she asked for this life, and I leave her to it.

The hotter they are, the bigger they fall

2011-04-26T14:32:00.000-05:00

GAWD DAMN IT. I want out of here. It's so windy and dry. And difficult. It seems when the wind blows for days on end that everything gets so hard. You can't just go do something. The wind tries to take everything out of your hand and slams doors in your face and on your legs and slams trunks shut and blows grit in your face and you can't open your car window for fear of a dirt devil blowing in (those are the worst: little dirty cyclones whirling around your car blowing cinders into your face while driving)... everything is dirty and gritty and my skin is so dry and itchy and my hair is gritty and walking to class , although so pretty and such a nice walk for the view, is a BITCH! Walking against the wind with a heavy pack.
I hate it. I have always hated it here and must abandon it for my own sake.
K... omg. She moves me to far ends of the universe. What can I say, I haven't the words to tell about her. Suffice to say all my words are used up on her. We are reading LOLITA to each other over the phone sometimes at night.
I am going back to see her in 9 days. I am so hot for her all the time that it takes masterful effort not to lose focus.
The good news is it is mutual. The great news is, we are both alike in many ways that make it possible to believe in one another. I believe this is 'the one' for all time, and if she is not, I am not going to try again. This has been more intense than any other relationship I've had in my life and it is only two and a half months old. Communication is stellar and sex is beyond hot and the love is quite deep and there is no pretense .

Portland State University

2011-04-23T14:43:00.002-05:00

I fell in love with Portland when I visited. The PSU campus is downtown on the "Park Blocks"... light rail is free downtown and there is a sustainable cafe in the basement of the student union.
I've applied to PSU for FALL term, and hope to get a dorm. I'm addicted, hopelessly, to Ruck, and Ruck to me, and I don't want to ruin it by moving in with her, so I'm going to just try to get a dorm and work just enough to pay bills. I hope this works out. I'm not happy in Flagstaff at ALL; and I want Ruck in my life, in my nights whenever possible.
We get along so well... communication is amazing. And the best thing is we're both feeling it just as intensely: it's amazing.
Finals coming up. Australian relatives are here and hanging out with mom in Sedona today, I have to work tonight... might have been able to get the time off to hang with them but; I took too much time off to go to Portland.
I know, I'm a sucky person sometimes, but I can no more not go see Ruck than fly to the moon.
I'm going back in two weeks for two days and back again in June for 10 days.

All over the map

2011-03-28T21:42:00.000-05:00

Man it's been intense with this woman. The other day we got into a little e-mail flirtation that was just silly mostly but kind of role-playing, and we both got a little bit turned on by it. It started when I realized I had no idea what kind of accoutrements she has on her person, like, what sort of belt, shoes, socks, wallet, that kind of thing. I wanted to know. So I told her to take all those things off, including jeans, and backpack, and put them all in a pile and take a photo for me and send it.
She did! She took off her jeans and shoes and took out her wallet and put it all on a chair. She slung her 'man bag' over the chair too. There too were her sunglasses: but no socks. Instead, there sat a writing pen.
Well, looking at her belongings in a pile got me kind of horny (I've got it bad for her, and she me: looking at her jeans even without her in them is enough to make me crazy!) but then I noticed ... no socks. I e-mailed "But where are the socks? I give you a command and you only give me 90% compliance? " (which cracked me up)...
Well. She sent me a photo of her with the sock on her hand touching her chin. For some reason she hates the photo but it made me so weak in the knees, sent chivers and shills all up and down my spine. I cannot believe it's even possible I might be touching that face soon... such a face this one has, makes me want to cry just looking at her picture. Like it was made just for me.
The photo is one that was just for me. It was taken because of a fun e-mail exchange that got a little bit naughty but only in our minds... the photo exemplifies how we interact.
I told her recently that I was like one of those electrical sub-stations where you can hear the wires humming and the transformers transforming. You know the palpable feel of electricity in the air around those things, that's me, when I look at her photo. Today while at school I got a photo from her, just a picture of an electrical substation ...
and I knew what she meant by it immediately.
Yesterday I was so down. So very down; ennui of the highest (lowest?) order. I was glancing at the shotgun wondering how hard it would be to pull the trigger and not fuck things up.
I was lonely and sad and stuck and for some reason when I called her she had nothing much to say; and we just stayed on the phone talking about nonsense or what we were looking at on the internet.
It made me feel worse that we had no magic like we'd have the previous day. But I sat in my misery and knew that the electricity would come back and that when it did, it would be made to seem even more vibrant due to the doldrums I was in at the time...
And sure enough the next morning I took a shower and had a revelation. Why am I in this horrid mess, this old house that it costs me way too much to heat and even then I'm freezing through the winter...
Why am I staying here where my original intention was to help my mom but she doesn't want my help because I'm not a man. I wanted to fix things up but I can't afford to do what needs to be done. I wanted to get a dog but I can't have a dog. I drive 25 miles a day and I just paid 250 bucks for a starter... what if the car breaks down...
No bus , no public transport.
It's so cold in the winter and so windy all the time... I decided in the shower to just change majors and move to Portland by the end of this school year. December that is. soon as I made that decision I felt a lot better...

words, where you be at

2011-03-22T00:07:00.000-05:00

Have so much to say and no ability to say it. Writer's block? Perhaps. Maybe it's me being inundated with managerial type stuff in my school work: school of business, leaves not much to the imagination.
Wish I could transfer to Portland State U and get a Bachelor's in Social Work. I suppose I could if I really thought I could live in a dorm... at the age of 48. I dunno. Maybe after this semester there won't be so many team projects.
Snow today, man I Left the house and it was 39 degrees and got to the car garage and it was snowing like mad.
Tonight, just keeps snowing.
And I'm feeling really melancholy but my love interest is ... getting deeper and more intense.
Disappointed she didn't come out here but she says she still might try before the time for me to come out there June 7...
here's hoping & wondering.
I really like her. She says she doesn't mind that I am older and much older looking as well. I hope not. Because she is a great fit, I believe, and very handsome, somewhat brooding good looks that stir me.
I hate to think of such a beauty and the beast thing going on, but I am really not aging well at all...
At any rate, I really can't wait to meet her although I do have to.
We talked on the phone last night for almost two hours including phone hanky panky; and it feels so good and right. I am waiting for the other shoe to fall though. Waiting for her to run away or end it or whatever ; the usual.

Such a letdown.

2011-03-17T22:12:00.000-05:00

So she didn't come after all. Her dog got sick. I am very sad. But there is nothing I can do about it.

She's on her way.

2011-03-15T00:50:00.000-05:00

She's purchased a refundable ticket, in case she can't board her animals. But the plane ticket is purchased and she'll be here Thursday evening. It's going to be so weird, having someone around, someone to do stuff with. I'm trying to picture the two of us in Safeway. Perhaps we should go to New Frontiers or Bashas...
I wish we had a Trader Joes.
Anyhow, she's coming. very soon. Renting a car and driving up from Phoenix Sky Harbor airport.

I don't know, man.

2011-03-09T10:09:00.001-06:00

She's so very young looking. And yeah, she's wearing my shirt and she's into me but how can a beauty, a drop dead gorgeous exotic beauty like that, have any desire to touch and old dried up fig like me? *SIGH*
Well, I hope she's not kidding when she says she doesn't care about how old I look. Because I think she's in for a hell of a shock despite me sending her the most realistic and honest photos I possibly can.
Well, the worst thing that can happen is I get a new bff. that would be great.

And there you have it. The L word.

2011-03-06T13:46:00.002-06:00

Last night she said she loved me. I started to protest about it being too soon then remembered I had been thinking about writing her to tell her I was falling in love. What a hypocrite I am.
At any rate, yup, we're 'in love' and all that good happy horseshit. CJ wrote me back the other day telling me that we would probably never kiss, that she had gotten mostly hetero in her old age, it was her not me, and what great timing for that, it could not have been any better.
K. and I are floating around on that pink cloud and why not enjoy the hell out of it. She sent me a mixed cd and I listened to it this morning. I think our musical tastes are quite compatible.
I believe this could be 'the one' if neither one of us fucks it up .

David Lynch

2011-02-21T00:03:00.002-06:00

She just told me that David Lynch is her favorite director, KD Lang is her heartthrob, and she loves bagpipes.
We just spent an hour sending You Tube videos back and forth. She loves Portishead.
I think that I am serious serious trouble.
serious trouble.

The ocean I crossed

2011-01-23T11:43:00.000-06:00

Recovery is like crossing an ocean. It's hard work, and intimidating, and if you are not prepared you might drown. The two decades since CJ cut me out of her life have been like crossing an ocean. I got tired, I quit, I nearly drowned a few times. I kept starting over and getting a little bit further each time. Last night I think I reached shore...
A couple of months ago I wrote CJ a love letter. I told her that I felt that if anything happened to me and I had not told her how I felt it would be my dying thoughts, that she didn't know , and it would be a sad thing. I told her how beautiful she is to me, that I find her as alluring as day one, if not more so. I told her that I was still head over heels in love with her but that I was not obsessed any longer, that all I could think of was that it would be nice if I could write letters to her to use one day to help me understand my love and to write a book about my life.... the way famous poets and writers always have these love letters to someone they can't have hidden away in a shoebox (Elanor Roosevelt, for instance)...
Anyhow she wrote back saying the letter was 'lovely' and not freaking her out at all. So I wrote her back and said I hoped that one day I could kiss her again, a bit more of a kiss than the last one twenty one years ago... which was a kiss on the lips that lasted a good minute. I told her I imagined myself coming to see her once in a while and having a kiss and just hanging out a little bit and then we would go on about our business.
I did not hear back from her... I figured I had gone too far, I had stepped over the boundary and so I let it go. I worried it like a dog worries a bone but there was nothing I could do.
Yesterday when I woke up there was a comment from CJ on my Facebook wall. Nothing much, just a comment about something she had remembered from the past about her dog, Phoebe, who we had figured was my 'soul dog'. The fact that she commented on my FB wall was enough to send me into the stratosphere: she was not mad at me after all, and she was still fond of me.
Last night, after a day of thinking about her, I was driving home and saw the most amazing clouds, dark in the middle and on the edges looking like molten rivulets of silver. There was a dragon breathing fire and the fire curled up around the moon. And the moment I got home I wrote CJ an e-mail telling her that it had reminded me of her in its stark natural beauty, and the way that despite driving a car I could not take my eyes off of it.
And she wrote right back . She wrote back saying that she was just checking in, that I was in her thoughts, and that she wished I could be there for her birthday next weekend. And she signed it xxoo.
I am still in shock. I have fought so many huge battles to get here. Once she cut me out of her life. Once there was a time when I was devastated and knew for a fact I'd never see her again. Bit by bit, step by step I have slain demons and climbed mountains and crossed oceans. She represents all that is good and light and worth working for. She represents love and desire and patience and to imagine that I might kiss her again is enough to drive me forward, onward, onward on a high high horse that carries me easily over the tangled rotting corpses of my past. On to my bright new future, one that includes her, my one and only love of my life, this one life I get, she is the one love I get and to know she is not lost to me is the greatest miracle ever worked.
In the words of the poet," my heart is broken ... open."

WHEW

2011-01-18T23:52:00.000-06:00

Ok, wow.I got to class on time this morning, and that amazed me. Right on time. Even though it turns out it takes a very very long time to ride the damn shuttle bus from the parking lot. What took me fifteen minutes to walk when I left class took me a half hour on the shuttle to get there. And the shuttle was CROWDED! I think it would behoove me to walk to class from my car, if I can find a bloody shortcut. Anyhow,
Class 1 was ok. It's just an hour. Class 2 is a HISTORY class and it looks like it's going to be intense. I have to BUY TWO BOOKS for that class. Good grief! But it will be good to learn about ASIA.
I had time in between the two classes to eat a double fudge brownie and drink a latte from Starbucks. After class two, I had a couple of hours to kill. One hour mostly taken up by finding a route to work on foot. Then, found a comfy chair and an outlet and sat with my laptop reading reddit.
Then work. Work is full-tilt from four to nine-thirty ish. Then after a long drive home, I get to take a shower, sit here watching Miss Congeniality, mindlessly.
I bought an iPhone off ebay the day before yesterday, waiting for it to arrive in the mail. When I get that I won't need to carry my laptop to work to have entertainment before I go to work. I'll be able to read e-mail and such via iPhone the way I used to do with my iPod but now its' battery is dying. :(
Someone said I could probably sell it on e-bay despite the battery going dead. I may try that.
I'm so tired I don't know which way is up. A long long day. And I spent an hour and a half vacuuming the dining hall. With a huge vacuum on my back like Ghostbusters. And I want to complain but hey: I should never have stopped when I went to college the first time.
There is a guy named Miguel who has worked at the dining hall for 30 years. He has been a dishwasher all this time. He was there when I worked there 16 years ago. He's hunched over, can not move to quickly but he washes dishes five nights a week. That would be me if I did not go to college NOW, I will not have the stamina to do this much longer.
Hey... Susan Sarandon is on a MILK commercial. She sure looks a lot better than Tim Curry or Barry Bostwick!
So tired.

suddenly

2011-01-12T22:01:00.002-06:00

I got hired at Sodexo today. Full time, benefits... 401k, vision, dental... paid vacations... yeah. They may never get rid of me. Now, what smart phone do I want?

Interview

2011-01-11T23:35:00.000-06:00

I have an interview with Sodexo tomorrow. South Campus... the place I used to work a long time ago. Here's hoping things might fall into place for once, and I can go to work after classes; killing time in between with studying and going to the gym. My life is about to have meaning and purpose: lately I've been sitting in front of the TV with my laptop surfing reddit and Facebook for company.
The interesting thing is, having only been here not quite a month, I already have three friends! As opposed to ZERO friends in Huntsville. Things are looking up.

getting better

2011-01-10T14:12:00.000-06:00

I am emerging from a deep dark funk. Sitting her being quiet, listening to the TV, which I have had on every waking hour that I am home to ward off silence. Usually silence is my friend but not since I got here. I am waiting for my student loan refund so I can spend it on car registration, driver license, books... propane...
I met Aud. in person last night, she is a great cook and wonderful conversationalist. She is going to Alaska to work in a remote lodge for the summer and I am contemplating doing the same. I used to have fear surrounding things like that but feel no trepidation at this time. Orientation for school is in a few days, school starts next Tuesday... I'm hoping I can park at Target and walk to classes to avoid paying 380 bucks for a parking permit. I could use that money to buy an iPhone which I REALLY want, and probably need: a person in school for business management should probably have a smart phone.

that dream

2010-12-30T22:08:00.002-06:00

I had a dream about CJ last night. I was following her around and she had minimal time to talk to me but I appreciated every moment she gave me... in the end we were laying with our uncovered legs intertwined. I remember that I was so happy laying there with her talking and our legs twisted together. I was so very content.

Flagstaff

2010-12-24T22:37:00.000-06:00

The trip out to Flagstaff was long. My brother and I being not quite so young we decided to stay the nights at hotels. That runs the price of the trip up a bit. We arrived Monday around noon. I am quite shocked at how much my mother has aged, it is sad to me. And frightening. The ranch has become quite dilapidated, and there are abandoned vehicles laying around. The mobile home I used to live in has fallen completely in. It's just a shell, a shambles. I walked through it yesterday and it felt the way walking through a ghost town feels. I saw no relic of my own inhabitance there .
I am burning through money at an alarming rate. It took a large chunk of money to fill the propane tank. I had already given 300 dollars to my mom for the propane. That should have filled it halfway but when I got here it was only 20 percent full. I shudder to think what happened to money. That's 700 dollars I have spent on propane in the past few days.
And I don't have a job yet. Well, this is when "One Day at a Time" comes into play. I'll find something. I have to pay 300 bucks to NAU for a parking permit. I think I'll be walking to class from wherever I Find to park downtown in Flagstaff.
I need some boots! And a balaclava. Oh and some snow goggles. And a ski cap.
I'm tired. I have not had any fun since arriving. I had one coffee at MACY's but it was fraught with worry about spending money on coffee.
Brother Donnie and I just bought mom a 280 dollar TV for xmas. And we got a lasagna & cheesecake for xmas dinner.
I miss Ingrid. I miss the sure thing of having a job. But I do not miss my job. I miss playing computer games. Tried earlier, this internet is bad. Only 1.5 mps. I hope I can find something better. That internet is going to cost me... only 30 bucks a month though. As opposed to 60 in Huntsville.
Oh I have got to find work. ASAP. I'm starting to fret. I hope to look back on this post soon and laugh at my worry.
To top it off, people are texting me day and night, to the number I just got given. I text them back saying do not text me again , you have the wrong number. They text back saying 'sorry". I have only 200 texts available on my plan. I'm going to owe them money. Damnit.
It's cold out here and has been gloomy and not very light hearted. I let my mom get on my nerves. She's really old now. And I don't do bumbling old people very well. I hope to learn patience and kindness towards her.
I have super cramps and a heavy period. We went to see True Grit last night, and it made me so sad that my horse is gone. But I could not take care of her right now anyway. I do want a dog but that has to wait. Need work.

Caroline Chocolate Drops

2010-09-04T16:44:00.002-05:00

Listening to the Carolina Chocolate Drops and thinking about how I'm going to feel when I escape the south AGAIN.
I want to be a part of, but it seems to me that everyone is so caught up in just acquiring stuff. I never did and never will be able to cotton to that idea, that stuff makes the man.
I'm a human and soon I'll be a pile of worms and some bones. What good will working every day to sundown do me if all I have in the end is nothing anyway?
I have to find happiness within. My mind is too idle.

Wow, that's a lot.

2010-08-28T00:08:00.000-05:00

Let's see. I am halfway through the student loan application process, there is a LOT to do online. I also have to get a rubella /titer test. (64 bucks). I sent in my 300 dollar deposit to NAU. And I've signed some stuff online. I've activated my NAU e-mail account. It's weird, it is google mail but for NAU. So it looks just like g-mail but it's NAU mail. Weird. Throws me off.
Anyhow, looks like I'll have to get a private loan to round out the loans. Not for much though. Couple thousand. I'll have some big loans for sure. But I will finally have a chance to make something of myself.
At any rate, I look forward to school at NAU.
I'm moving from my little house this weekend. I just got back from dinner with PUmpkin Pie Lady. Oh it was so good. Stuffed pork chops & potatos & brownies. *sigh*
We watched JAWS. I was sitting a few feet away from her wishing she'd put her feet in my lap but it didn't happen. Well what's the harm in wishing?
None I say. I'm going to miss her terribly. The only thing that made this hell hole bearable, and she's going to be gone in a few days.
UGH. I wish I could be better company but when I'm around her I turn into some idiot who can't speak. I can't think at all. She's wearing a spaghetti strap top and I can see every strand of her hair and want to feel it, smell it. And the whole time I'm around her I'm fighting myself because I know she's not into me that way but I'm overwhelmed so it's just a total loss . She must think I'm crazy, the way I search for words. I'll even lose my train of thought entirely, especially if she looks into my eyes.
we were sitting on the couch and her phone was on my left. I had seen it sitting there and knew if it rang she'd have to go around me to get it. Or I'd have to hand it to her.
It did ring. And she reached over me to get it. And for one brief moment I was back in bed with C; the morning her alarm went off and she had to reach over me to turn it off and I nearly died that time too.
Oh, I wish I could talk intelligently with this one.

Transition

2010-08-01T12:53:00.000-05:00

My roommate told me his girlfriend might be getting her visa and then coming over to live with him. Soon. My first thought was sorrow for my landlord, such a nice guy to have to put up with a hot-blooded latina who is going to no doubt cause a stir in this house when she moves in. 1) I doubt any yard work will EVER get done and 2) I know these two have some knock down drag out fights and I hate it for my landlord who is used to us being so quiet. LOL
Anyhoo: I might have found a place nearby. I found this guy on reddit. com, and he has a room for rent not far from here. He said it 'needs work'. Which means it is full of crap and the light is dangling and it needs paint etc. But, they are awesome student types. Gamers, into internet memes, and going to school full time at UAH. a 2o year old gamer gal and a dude that is 30. If I fix up the room I can pay partial rent for a while. It sounds good, and I am trying to get the guy on the phone. I hope it works out. I'd live there a while then move to Arizona I reckon. It's all up in the air. Working at the diner tomorrow, dreading the hell out of it, it's supposed to be hotter'n blue blazes.
The pizza joint is ok, it's at least cool and keeping me from working the diner five days in that heat. OSHA apparently fined my boss 6,000 bucks but he hasn't fixed anything. HE's supposed to fix the A/C in the dining room but not in the kitchen. I'll be hotter than ever when the place fills back up with patrons and I have to cook more. I think I hate the man.

Monkey Spit

2010-06-04T22:49:00.000-05:00

Went to the FlyMo tonight. M. went with. At first I was uncomfortable because she made a big deal about me wearing holey jeans. I thought she might be embarrassed or something but she later said no, it wasn't that. She was just commenting. Anyhow we went to listen to Monkey Speak (open mic poetry) and I was bored to tears. Some dufus got up and read Emily Dickenson with too much inflection and it got on my nerves but most of the stuff was ok.
I told M. that I used to read with Michelle Tea at Sister Spit. She's never heard of Michelle Tea. *Sigh*
She wondered if I was going to read anything next time. I'd have to write something. I told her I didn't know if she would want to hear anything I had to say, as it was probably going to be about cutting, S&M or dead animals. I should write about getting drunk enough to bury my mom's horse.

good grief.

2010-05-24T20:18:00.000-05:00

Seriously, why do I do this to myself? I go up there all full of anticipation. Friday is great. The three of us have dinner (C. her mom and I ) and it's great. Then C. and I go into her house and chat. I've made dog biscuits for her dogs and they really love them. It's a lovely evening and we have a great talk and she says I can write a book about my life and not to worry about telling stories that are about her. And when I leave she gives me back my cow-skull and kisses me on the cheek and I saunter off merrily in the aftermath of the thunderstorm .
And the last thing she had said to me when I was leaving was that if I was still in town on Sunday, she'd get together with me since she was coming back Sunday afternoon.
And so I took Monday off like a dildo and stayed an extra day. She got back late Sunday and was in a foul mood. We went to some horrid pizza place that was really loud and then we had some frozen yogurt that sucked and her attitude was raunchy and I left feeling very unhappy that I had taken the day off today and lost income due to just wanting to see her one more time before I left.
meh. She looks like hell anyway. I don't know, I need to let go once and for all, that's for sure. But now I have her permission to write that book. What a relief.
The drive was great, except my eyes get tired. I need new prescription lenses... but the car sure kicks ass.
I got Frank back...

I want to put my blood in a centrifuge and spin her out of it.

2010-05-15T21:20:00.003-05:00

I was watching this video trying to get my mind off of C.
Then in the video, a kid is writing on the wall with chalk. There on the wall is written my name over C's name. The universe is either telling me something or I am driving myself batshit.
I have got to get a grip on this C thing. I want to end the connection and move on. How to do that, now that we finally got to be comfortable around each other again?
I want her so badly that this entire two weeks before seeing her I've been distracted, sad, moody and not eating right.
Then I will see her and we'll talk and hug and then I won't see her for another six months or so. This can go on but I don't like it. IF I end it, will I move on or be really sad and fucked up about it> http://vimeo.com/4749536

Dinner with C 4.0

2010-05-14T23:53:00.001-05:00

So I finished my second semester of school. 4.0's all the way. I bought the solutions for my computer programming class, because although I understood totally what he was talking about in class, and it all made sense when reading about it in the book, when the final came I was so lost it was NOT funny at all. It was like reading latin. So I bought the solution off the internet and I have NOT ONE qualm about it because I am going to change directions again. I think that changing directions is OK as long as I do not stop at the traffic signal and stare too long. I have to keep forward motion. I don't care what I am taking in school as long as I am in school. But it doesn't look like my future holds any kind of computer programming or logic or anything like that. I do NOT like it. And I am hating math and I don't see myself struggling through another two years of it.
So I got my car at last. It's been so nice driving it around. So nice I decided to drive it all the way to Louisville. Next weekend I'm headed up there. I asked my other 'mom' if I could bring my laundry up and she said yup.
C said dinner sounded great and I have been able to think of little else.
I think my sponsor is mad at me for not making it to the meeting Thursday but I lost track of time trying to get my car to start, I had messed up the fuses when trying to install my CB radio and it was halfway into the meeting start time when I got it started. I really should wear a watch or carry my cell phone with me when out in the yard. Anyhow, she hasn't returned my text or e-mail for two days so I hope she is ok. That's not like her.
I am having late lunch with my friend M. tomorrow, that's something to look forward to. Mexican food! wee!
Work is horrid as always but I feel needed there, as my buddy Steve is struggling hard core with his problems with drinking/drugging. HE fell of the wagon spectacularly and tried to flip his van but didn't, and now is evading a warrant for his arrest that they told him was out there. I don't know how my boss got Steve out of handcuffs but he did. I'm glad it's not me running from the law.
I'm just trying to keep the noises in my head down about C. I dare to hope that she is not just being nice and really wants to see me. She was very warm towards me the last time I was up and I want it to continue but she is a very busy person and who knows what will happen but I want to spend all weekend with her, unrealistically. I want to go on a moonlit walk and talk my heart out but I know that is simply not going to happen. I want to touch her, to rub her shoulders and smell her hair but also, not happening.
So I will sit there and watch her eat and we'll talk and I'll come home and mope.
But I love my car and soon I start summer school and two of those classes are downtown. I should get a bike for that, I should. A five hour class downtown on Saturdays that starts at 9 am. What was I THINKING?
I want to transfer to UAH in the FALL> don't know if any of my classes will transfer and don't care. Going to go anyway if I can swing it. Student loans be damned. I don't care as long as I am in school and learning something and maybe if I get the loans and the Pell I can live off the pell, and only have to work a couple days a week. Then I will have time to actually study harder, and not be a zombie when I come home.

Yesterday

2010-04-13T20:58:00.000-05:00

YESTERDAY was Monday. I went hiking with pumpkin pie lady. I had asked her to go early, so I could get back, do laundry, meet my counselor to register for classes. Well. We got lost up on Monte Sano.
We were up there lost for four hours. I wasn't wearing good shoes for four hours of hiking, and I'm paying for it big time now. I was wanting coffee and internet. I was wanting to stop walking but I think both of us needed to keep our forward momentum.
I ended up calling my sister, who pulled the trail map up and told us how to find the road.
We found the road, walked to her house, got her car, drove to the parking lot, I drove her other car to her house and she took me home.
Now my calves are so sore, and the muscles at the side of my knees, and my knees. But it was something else, to be up there for four hours . Saw a lot of lizards. A couple of babbling brooks. Nothing much else. Not another human for four hours. That is pretty amazing.
Next time we go I'm bringing coffee, maps, phone, compass, and food. And hiking boots.
Personally though, I"m somewhat disappointed we never got tot he point where we had to snuggle to keep each other warm through the night.
I thought about that, then I said out loud, "We could never get any sleep up here at night : it would be way too cold.
We'd have to keep moving."
Then she said, "Maybe we should sleep NOW."
I thought that was the funniest thing I ever heard. She's a hoot.

2 YEARS.

2010-04-13T20:51:00.000-05:00

Wow. I was just reading Bruce Miller's Barksdale Blog. He has just gone to see " A Little Night Music" on Broadway . Apparently Catherine Zeta-Jones is in it. And Angela Lansbury I think?
Anyhow. I can still hear John singing "Later", I can still hear Jan, as Petra, saying "You smell of SOAP!" And I can still hear Carol's harp and see her hands on the strings. I can still see that one star shooting across the 'sky' as the play ends and the last notes fall. Each night at the end of "Night Music" I died a little death myself. I loved that production.
Well today I have been sober, this time, for two years. I went to work, did my job, came home and watched "Damages", "Nurse Jackie" and "Bones" as well as did a chapter of homework for computer logic class. Now it is 9 pm and time for bed.
I told my boss today that I cannot work Saturdays anymore, that two years of it is all I have in me. I can't do it. It nearly killed me last Saturday. He said "OK".
Apparently he is finally getting us on payroll. I can go ask for food stamps now that everything is legal again. I can apply for that grant too.
wooopee. The thing is, I'm so lonely I want to curl up in a ball and die.

Funny how these things go

2010-03-19T23:01:00.000-05:00

I had been feeling very frustrated about things and then today I had such a good day it made it all worth it.
I got off work early, Todd came in and covered for me. When I came home my Dell Mini 10v was on the porch so I plugged it in and let it start charging, then I moved my desktop into my room. Dave tried to configure it to be wireless but I have the wrong dongle. The one I have is for XP...my desktop is Window 7. Also my desktop is 64 bit. So I have to get a different dongle. Dongle is a great and funny word to say over and over again.
My friend M. came by at 5:23 to pick me up and just then my brother drove up in THE RED CAR! He was dropping it off for me to drive tomorrow while he puts new brake shoes on the truck and hopefully fixes the horn. And it would be nice if he made it so I can roll the window down too.
Anyhow , M. and I went to eat at Thai Garden. I asked for an application but they couldn't find any. I'll have to go back. Then we made it to the VBC playhouse early. Walked around. I'm glad we found each other, she seems like she will be a good friend. I have a good time with her. I'm glad her girlfriend lets her hang out with me.
After the play we went backstage and I saw my sister and I.
I gave me a hug! My second in two years! I will be going backstage to help her with the props tomorrow night. She said she needed help washing dishes. *sigh* She played an extra in the play. I managed to keep my mind on the play, I'm proud of myself.
After the play M. dropped me off and I took the red car to put gas in it so I have now driven the red car. Tomorrow I will take a few photos of it and post them. I'm so excited. I think I will take my Dell mini to work as well and play with that. I feel like a rich person. New laptop, red car. They will think me mad for being so happy over such little stuff.
But I'm ecstatic over the fact that is almost my car!
It will be a drag to get the truck back. Oh well, it doesn't matter because... tomorrow night I will be washing dishes with I.!

New Me, Meet the Old Me

2010-02-25T20:20:00.004-06:00

That'a a photo taken of me back in '82, outside the "Bus Stop" in Richmond VA. That was a bar that played new wave music on Wednesday nights; the happiest time of my life, the happiest moments were in that bar on the dance floor listening to THAT music. We went every week. I did not have a car so I rode my bike or walked. I was living near Willow Lawn at the time and walked all the way to Shockoe Slip. Or rode the bike.
I hadn't seen the photo since it was in the paper. Well, I'm sure I kept a copy but lost it pretty quickly. And since then I'd been unable to remember what year it was taken so was unable to get a copy off microfiche although I had tried my best.
Seeing the photo has brought back some memories, of course. Of that night there are few but of the whole Bus Stop time there are many. We loved that place. The dj was a radio dj and he had quite a music collection. He did play the best music. I have been collecting those songs on my iPod playlist. Lene Lovich, Talking Heads, Gary Numan, The Sex Pistols, Stray Cats, Romeo Void. Etc.
I'm looking at the photo and thinking "Really? That's me? I was that good looking? I look like KD Lang, for pete's sake. No wonder people asked me if I was her. What a waste. I'll never look like that again and the whole time I did look like that I was alone and afraid and crazy as a shit house rat. I hate the universe for that.
I thought briefly of dying my hair today, stupid photo.
Back then I had to be drunk to have fun. But I did have fun. A lot of it was horrible but those Wednesday nights were FUN. All I wanted was to find a girl, a punk rock girl who loved the same music and would come dance with me. I never did. Danny was too young to get in then, plus we hadn't met yet.
I went every week to look for a girl, and I did get to dance with some. But I always left with Richard, or alone. Richard would take me home then go home himself, and I'd brood about how lonely I was, but at the Bus Stop there was always hope that that hot punk rock chick was interested in me. But she never was.
And here I am at 47, 28 years later. A force to be reckoned with, coming into my own, happy to be alone, but I sure wish I had those looks right now. Just to have this brain, this emotional state and that body for one night.
But, that's the past.
I've gone through some amazing changes. Right now I'm just trying to maintain a 4.0 GPA, work full time without getting fired for insolence, and stay sober. I need to go to more meetings. I've had a bit of a vacation from AA the past couple of weeks and that is enough. I will be going to the Friday night 8pm meetings I think they are non smoking.
MY boss has started smoking in the office again. It's making me ill. My sponsor has a new sponsee and I'm trying not to feel abandoned.
I have a new friend who wants to do stuff, which is cool, but every once in a while she gets involved with her ex via e-mail and drops off the map. I let it go and wait for her to come back around. We're having coffee on Sunday. AT 11, instead of 10, because I intend to play CALL OF DUTY Saturday night. I bought COD:Modern Warfare 2 and 4, for a total of a hundred bucks. Expensive toys, those.
Now I want COD: World at War. I think I will get the entire series, then start on HALO.
Everything is fine and my roommate comes home next week and I wants to go to the museum with me.
J quit work and I Miss him terribly but he texts now and then. Life could be worse.

I didn't expect to live this long. Not at all. I should have been having this experience, the going to college sober thing, back then. I was 20. I should have been on a path.
But I was out looking for love in all the wrong faces, and I must never go down that road again as long as I live. It wrecks me.

TORNADO.

2010-01-25T15:44:00.002-06:00

Okay, so. I just got internet back on today, earlier...it's taken me all day to get caught up on everything. In the middle of that I got a letter from a collection agency: they have a new trick. Send you a letter saying you can pay off your debt for 1/3 the amount. Sounds good! So I called.
Turns out I had another debt with them. One that was for a hell of a lot more money. SHIT! They got me. I'm now paid off on one, and the other one is going to choke me for a fucking year. BUT, it will be paid off. I'm whittling down my debt.
So... I guess I have to put off buying that netbook for a bit. Anyhow, last Thursday after work I came home, and did my usual thing, got ready for class: and just a little while before I was to leave for class, I got a call on my cell saying "This is your WAAY weather-call. A tornado was spotted in your area. TAKE COVER IMMEDIATELY."
So... I started to unplug my computer's surge protector but then something very big hit the house and I ran for the bathtub. However, the idea of laying in the bath tub for a half hour waiting for the storm to pass was not appealing so I ran back for my sandwich and soda. And brought them to the tub with me.
Don't ask me why. By the time I had jumped back into the tub things were slapping my house and car pretty hard. I called my sister from the tub, my sandwich in one hand, phone in the other, soda on the floor outside the tub... my head pressed down to the ceramic floor of the tub.
My poor sister was working but managed to get a tv on and told me the storm had passed and was headed up Monte Sano.
So eventually I emerged from the tub with my cell phone & sandwich. I walked out into the yard and looked around ... you couldn't see very far: trees down everywhere, debris, parts of houses.
Bricks, sheet metal, wood, trees, torn up mattresses. Pillows, trash from recycling bins, you name it. I saw a transformer spark. As I looked more closely there were wires down : one wrapped around my truck (the tornado didn't last long. But long enough for the wires to get wrapped around things in crazy ways. )
Had I been out in my yard, I could have been electrocuted or decapitated (my neighbor's plate glass patio table top was laying in pieces, some of them very sharp)... or I could have been crushed by my landlord's carport. So I'm glad I was in my tub where I was supposed to be, not looking up at the funnel like my neighbor said he was right before he nearly died of fright and ran inside the house.
I lit some candles and began packing clothes to abscond then realized that, as a sober person, I might want to go out and assess the damage and see if anyone needed help. I was out in the yard with neighbors when my brother pulled up (in my red car)... yelling my name. The cops wouldn't let him pull any closer than the street corner) and I walked over to him.
He walked around with me, having a gawk, then he looked at the truck. He was upset by the fact that I had thrown away part of the hatch that had broken, and he began duct taping the hatch where the window had just blown out in the storm.
I wanted to get the hell out of there so I asked him what he thought he was doing. He got mad at me for wanting him to hurry up and he stormed off, mad at that and mad at me for throwing away the badly broken parts of the truck hatch.
And I did not hear from him, haven't heard from him. It was the first time a tornado had hit my abode, with me in it. And there was tons to do, and lots of emotions running high, and I needed someone to talk to. It was so not going to be him. He fled the scene when I needed him the most, and I do not want to talk to him right now.
If he says one word about the truck I'm going to drive it to his house and park it in his yard and leave it there after making some nice ruts in the perfect grass of his lawn.
Fucker.

It's all good in da hood

2010-01-16T22:45:00.000-06:00

Well...the wind is blowing something fierce and I am just irritated to no end by my mom. She sent two rambling letters and the last one stated she needs her scrapbook back ASAP because she doesn't trust my sister to copy it, she thinks my sister is going to do something bad to it.
Oh good lord. I had wanted my sister to scan the whole thing so I could send copies to my cousin in Scotland but now I have to pack it up and send it back right away. And she goes on and on about crap I could care less about. I'm just so irritated with life today. Work was horrid, bad. We went full fucking tilt from seven to two, no breaks, no food, barely got a drink in. EXHAUSTED. Brought my boss over a thousand dollars I'm sure. Probably more like three thousand.
And when I left he was stuffing his idiot face with a bacon sandwich bigger than his fucking hand. GROSS. I'm a bit sick of him. He's been hovering and commenting and making snark for two or more weeks now, and I want him to go back to the lovable cuss he was when he was separated from his wife.
She came in to get the grocery list for work and I told her to get at least 12 tomatoes, and a few heads of lettuce. She came back with a few tomatoes and 12 heads of lettuce.
We were all so tired today. I was limping and slurring my words when I left. J said he might drop by for a movie but he never did. I did my Algebra homework... I can't believe my textbook cost 179 bucks. FUCK ME!
And last night at the meeting I had to listen to my boss go on about how he has a lot going on at home and how it makes him unhappy and how if he's a jerk he's not a bad person and I wanted to say "Yes, it does mean exactly that".
T and I are supposed to go see "The Book of Eli" tomorrow, and it sounds like a fun time. After Music Appreciation class, and we will probably have a splendid time.
HE's an ok guy. I wish J was going too, but you can't have everything, where would you put it?
I got the books packed up to get to C. AT last.
And now I'm downloading CRYSIS to play AGAIN, going to start over and see if I can do better this time. I was playing MASS EFFECT but kept getting killed and that frustrated me too much. I don't like a game where you get stuck , and you keep getting killed because you can't figure out what to do so you have no choice but to look it up on the internet. That gets frustrating.
I wish I hadn't bought that game, I'm going to try to get my money back from Steam.
Or wonder if they will put the money to some othr game? I want to play Modern Warfare.
Or Call of Duty or one of those.
Want to get working on that junker 'puter but need to fix up the kitchen for doing that. I need to stabilize the kitchen table, it wobbles...but the light is best in there.

Opportunity Knocking?

2010-01-11T09:14:00.000-06:00

Last week we had some snow here in No-AL. The temps were so cold that the ice remained on some roads and it still there days later: this prompted my college to close on its' first day, which was last Friday.
But I have a class on Sunday: the radio said classes would resume Monday. Did they mean I should NOT go to my Sunday class? There was no way to know: my college does NOT answer the office phones. I decided to go to class regardless. When I got there I was quite disappointed: I'd heard that the new site was across from some luxury condos and that there were shops going in on the ground floor of the condos. I had expected a coffee shop at the very least. NOTHING! NADA! The shops are closed up tight and not even finished. *sigh*
There was plenty of parking, it being a Sunday and ...nothing being open anyway. A group of people standing around the old TIMES building: milling about, wondering what to do. I looked and saw a gate leading to basement stairs. I put my hand on the gate and heard "Can I HELP you, ma'am?"
A portly security officer was walking across the street laden down with his daily snack allotment. I suppose in all of that food was his security guard stuff. Anyhow he led us down the stairs to a room with a desk. This guy ... is the team leader for the company. His glasses are a hundred years old and held together by tape. Also he has let his body go so far from the time he was a Master Sargent that it's hard to recognize the soldier within. But he's good at his job and I got his endorsement to go apply for yet another crappy job.
The pay is pretty low, of course, but they do take taxes out and I'd not have to smell like hamburgers anymore. My laundry budget would go down if I had uniforms to wear: you wear the same uniform twice, that's only two or three uniforms to wash as opposed to me having to change my clothes EVERY day working at the diner. I'd be able to throw away a LOT of clothes if I got this job and clean out my drawers from all the shirts, pants, socks etc I have to have to work at a crappy diner.
And, I would get paid overtime if I got any, and maybe paid holidays, I assume they follow the law.
I'm going to get ready and go down there in a bit.

New Year, New Cheer

2010-01-04T13:20:00.000-06:00

Wow I woke up in a FUNK. I can't remember being that depressed upon awakening; with a headache to boot. If I had had a gun available I think I would have looked at it long and hard. Now that has got to be a chemical thing. It didn't last long...perhaps it was my dreams. I did dream about my computer game. A big mechanical monster was coming right at me and my (dead) brother; and I said "Look out the window! Twelve o'clock! Look now!) and yet no one made haste to get out of the monster's path.
The monster, I believe, is apathy, and I do want to get out of its path.
Today I went shopping determined to stay in the store a long time, buy everything I not only needed but wanted (I don't want much, but there are a few things I avoid buying due to cost, like the green drink with grass in it that I love) and why do I love it? Because it reminds me of my time with my dad in Alaska. The taste brings me joy.
So... I bought eighty bucks worth of stuff. French bread, fruit, squash, carrots: not one junk food item, although I did have Vanilla Wafers in my basket until I read the ingredients. They have high fructose corn syrup in them. ARGH! Is nothing sacred?
I got a notebook especially for beginning my novel. I realize that work would be made easier if I wrote paragraphs instead of playing zombieville on my iPod. It would distract me and also fill the idle time ... I have a few minutes here and there where it's not enough time to do anything significant but I want to be sitting down resting my feet yet not totally idle.
And I'm reading Mary Karr's "Lit". I told my sponsor about it and she bought it for me for Christmas. Mary Karr almost got killed in a car wreck due to drinking. And the book deals with her alcoholism and her going to AA although she doesn't mention AA per se, all the slogans and stuff are there. She doesn't say SPONSOR but she has one. For over fifteen years, the same one. I love the book. It made me want to write my story.
I have been analyzing why I don't write my book. I want to say pure lazy but I'm not lazy. Far from it. I fear not failure but success. What if my book is popular? Then I will have a lot of crap to deal with. My siblings and my mom and dad and everyone will want money from me right off the bat. When they look at me they will see an ATM card. I hate being from such a money grubbing family. Each and every one of them had support of some kind growing up: I had nothing but a crazy mom. I fight daily to shed the skin she knitted for me. She called on New Year's and started crying about how her second husband (My adoptive father) treated her. I wish mom was in therapy. That was over thirty years ago! Talk it out and let it go!
ugh.
AT any rate, I want to start writing.
For real and for earnest.
Last night I put on some music and started dancing. I'd feared I was gaining too much weight so I put it to the test: could I dance five songs and not collapse? And could I get through "Rock this Town" by the Stray Cats, dancing rockabilly, the whole song through? I could, and did. And my calves are not the least bit sore this day.
So the prognosis is not too bad. I'd like my pants to fit better but I'm not as out of shape as I feared. My main worry now is to bolt that bookcase to the wall. IF I dance just the right way in the right place on the living room floor, the bookcase bounces away from the wall at the top in such a frightening manner that I had to go dance in my roommate's room. I need to L brace that thing for sure.
And I'm dissapointed in Grooveshark: their copy of "Living on the Ceiling", possibly the BEST dance tune ever, is totally messed up. I need to write them.
AT any rate my new year is shaping up. Getting ready for classes and so happy it's not my first semester. Got my notebooks cleaned out, pencils ready, looking for a netbook to buy because I gave my laptop to my sister for xmas.
I could not really afford to do that but the damn thing brings back too many memories. I can see Bren walking into the T building at Prov, bringing the box to me, and me opening it in such a happy stupor. I was so happy that night, with my new laptop, and my lovely girlfriend, and the snow, and my job.
Why did I have to blow it all by drinking?
Because it wasn't such a lovely girlfriend after all. And I needed a way out. So I chose my usual option.
Anyhow, it's not so bad a year so far.

nihilist

2009-12-27T20:13:00.000-06:00

I don't know what nihilist means but I like the sound of it. Reading Mary Karr's "LIT" and she said she glommed on to the term like "a debutante glomms onto a ____purse". I can't remember what kind of purse it was. Something glitzy.
At any rate, I just find it hard to care anymore. School is coming and I know I will put a lot of effort into it . I keep the house clean, and I play computer games, but I can't find any passion for much of anything.
Saw Avatar. It was pretty cool. All I could think of was 'when is the video game coming out?"
I'm bored. I'm thinking of buying Borderlands even though I have the free copy just so I can play with others online. Having gotten a pirated copy, I can't get the patch to play online. *sigh*
I could, I suppose, play Left For Dead 2 online...maybe I'll do that.
C's mom sent photos of the three of them. I have been thinking about C so much lately. What am I going to do about that? nothing I can do. I'll always be in love with her. And I'll never have her. And I think moving to Oregon is the best bet. Although my sister says she won't let me go. I can't stay here. Four more years is bad enough to think about. A lifetime?
So lonely.
Well... only two more years at Drake. That's good. Then UAH. Possibly a gay student union there. I should go check it out.

Four point oh

2009-12-23T17:17:00.000-06:00

Ok not too shabby for a first semester. 4.0 gpa. I would have been happy with a 3.0. So...I'm enrolled for next semester already. And I've begun taking apart my first computer. I need to buy some thermal compound before I go any further. It sure makes a big difference working on a junker computer and working on your own gaming computer which I would not attempt just yet.
I took the heat sink out of the junker, and cleaned the fan blades, and now I need some thermal compound before I put it back in. Actually I put it back in already but only just to see if the computer was getting power to it, it is, but that is all that's getting power is the cpu cooling fan.
Oh and the little green light in the back of the tower. So the power supply is getting power and the fan is, but ...we don't know what goes on from there. We'll take a look at the motherboard. I had a good long look inside the old computer. It's an HP. It's very old. And yet it doesn't look near as scary as one might have thought. It's pretty simple actually. You don't have to know how to put a motherboard together, you just have to know where it goes and what goes on it and it's all pretty straightforward. Lots to learn though.
I got that 4.0 and now all I want to do is rest my brain.
Today at work was very very hard. Busy all day, no rest for eight and a half hours. I'm trying to be very cheerful in order to get a decent bonus. That comes tomorrow.
But I want a different job at least so I can have pain in different parts of my body for a while.
Last night went to 3 Legacies with Liz, she gave me the book I'd heard about on NPR..."Lit". I can't wait to read it.
Today at work coworker gave me a VCR tape of "Heathers". ... (What's your damage?)
that was sweet of him.
I got a card from I ; and we went to lunch Monday at Surin of Thailand. That was nice. Her hubby works at some computer place over by Calhoun. WE dropped something off over there. Very good to see her.
They live not six minutes from me... I could walk there. I might someday!
So tired. So happy that xmas is almost over.

Red Lobster and the Crimson Tide

2009-12-07T16:11:00.000-06:00

I had the idea to take my brother out for his birthday instead of buying him something: mainly because I simply can't think of ANYTHING he might want. He seems to have everything he wants or needs. I didn't want to get him a gift card this year so I thought, dinner and a movie, and invite our sister along so she could pay half.
well... he chose Red Lobster as his eatery. I sighed and smiled and pretended that was ok.
My sister was watching the Alabama /Florida game when I called her to see if she was on her way. It turns out that it was a big game night and no one really wanted to leave their tv sets. I had had no idea.
When we got to Red Lobster all the TVs were set to the game and all eyes (except for mine) were glued to the sets. It was a big deal, deciding where to sit so they could get optimal viewing positions. And of course the entire restaurant was cheering and awwwing and generally going off about the game. I tried to talk about the choices I had made recently (decided to go for my bachelor's degree) but my talk fell on deaf ears.
When we left Red Lobster we went out to the parking lot and I saw that my brother had driven the red car. I said "Hey! That's MY car!" and he offered to drive me to the movie in it. It was exciting to see it out on the road. He says he needs to maybe replace the rear end, fix the driver's side mirror, and the passenger seat won't click into place and flops around when you stop from a higher speed.
This morning I turned in my 'Orientation to College' portfolio... I really don't know why they make us bother because the teacher didn't even look at my work. I could have written anything in there. I could have written the same sentence over and over and wish that I had done that.
Then I turned in my English portfolio and I feel pretty good about that. I'm pretty sure that since I rewrote all of my papers , and they all had 90's or higher... that class is in the bag.
In a few minutes I leave for math class. I think we take the final next week. I'm stuck on finding the volume of solids...anything I have to multiply pi by a fraction, I can't find the volume... I get within 1 or 2 but that is not close enough.
Anyhow, here's hoping I can get past that tonight. I hope she doesn't make us take the final tonight since she said it was next week. Many of the teachers are confused on dates.
Saturday my boss gave me a brisket to cook, I cooked it and and it was freakin' amazing. I brought it home and have been eating off it since Saturday night. I went into Star Market this afternoon to get some veggies to eat with it and as I was perusing the canned veggies, I turned and saw a dog in a shopping cart. I thought that was pretty awesome.

Such a lovely thing

2009-11-28T19:50:00.001-06:00

My computer is all better now and working perfectly. I have two games on it now, BORDERLANDS and LEFT FOR DEAD 2. So that being the reason I got this computer (games)...I'm fairly excited about entering the world of computer gaming.
Thanksgiving was ok...I mostly rested. Played my game. And siblings and I went to see 2012 which sucked. Cheesy-ass movie.
And, Ingrid brought me a pumpkin pie. She left it in my mailbox when I was at the movie. Now that was so sweet. And the pie is delish.
And I'm thinking of going for my Bachelor degree in computer stuff. It means I would have to stick around a while longer, but it would be worth it I reckon.
Need to find another job though. This one is getting to me more every week.

So freaking frustrated

2009-11-11T21:27:00.000-06:00

I bought this computer so I could fucking play games on it as well as do homework. Being so lonely, I thought it might be fun to play some computer games. I wanted to play Borderlands. I was going to go buy Borderlands, was getting ready to go in fact, when a friend emailed me and asked if I wanted to try his copy before I bought it.
He brought over an external hard-drive and installed Borderlands but it would NOT open.
Turns out if you have AVAST anti-virus, it uninstalls Trusted Installer. "not-so-trusted-installer says WHAT?"
LOL, fuck! Now he has got to come by and install Windows 7 for me and we hope that will fix the problem, and I'm thinking about trying some other anti-virus. I don't know. All I know is I have a fifty dollar game on an eight hundred dollar computer and I can't FUCKING PLAY IT.
ggrrrrr oh well. off to bed. I'm going to go fucking read.

Lit | Books | EW.com

2009-11-04T20:15:00.001-06:00

Lit | Books | EW.com
I usually park as far away from my classes as I can get in the school parking lot: so I have a bit of a ways to walk, which helps my digestion. I hate sitting at those computer desks, I always get cramped up and accumulate gas. Hence the walk...
I was walking to my truck last night, from my Intro to Computers class. And I was feeling very very alone and lonely ... and I was thinking along the usual line of thought when I feel that lonely, 'why can't I get relief from prayer'? (Because I don't believe in 'god' per se.) Well... I was thinking to myself that even though I don't believe in 'god' per se, prayer is indeed helpful to many, or at least meditation. I haven't done it in some time. When I got in the car and turned on NPR this woman was on talking to Terry Gross. As you can see if you follow the link, her book sounds somewhat like something I want to write. I'm guessing if I ever do write that book, it will be somewhere between "Lit" and "A Million Little Pieces".
Well...when I turned on that radio, what I heard was Ms. Karr talking about how she got down on her knees and just asked for god to keep her sober in the morning and thanked god for keeping her sober at night. I knew right then she was in AA.
It was quite an excerpt to climb into the car and have pop out of my radio just as I was thinking all about that.
So I guess it was a message to get back into some kind of prayer/meditation.
And I want to read that book... gotta try to find a used one on Amazon.
I wrestled with giving that woman in that two-hour-away city the heave-ho. She's blond and cute and all that but she wasn't into writing any personal details in her emails and I told her it wasn't going anywhere, and she didn't protest.
LOL. And I have yet to hear from my friend in B'ham. And I gave Danny the heave-ho as well but I'm regretting that. I did send an e-mail asking HER for forgiveness, she didn't do anything to me.
And she was trying to get ahold of me for the longest time. I don't know why I pushed her away.
And now I've pushed everyone away and am perfectly miserably happy in my solitude. :)

Third Annual Huntsville Zombie Walk a 'bloody' success | The Bus Stops Here - al.com

2009-10-27T20:03:00.000-05:00

Third Annual Huntsville Zombie Walk a 'bloody' success | The Bus Stops Here - al.com

Zombie Walk

2009-10-25T20:14:00.004-05:00

Me and my sister outside my house:

Landlord and me:

the crowd in a tunnel trying to scare the ducks

Glee

2009-10-22T16:28:00.001-05:00

Worked VERY hard today. Came home and watched GLEE. Now I'm going to my Thursday AA meeting after which I will meet with my sponsor for my weekly check-in. THEN I think I will come home and watch DEXTER. Then I will go to bed.
***

meetups.

2009-10-12T13:21:00.000-05:00

Huntsville meetups this week. I dunno, the bagel society sounds pretty ...tasty.

Daytime Scrap - WooHoo work holiday
October 12, 2009 10:00 AM

The Huntsville Parliamentary Procedures October Meetup
October 12, 2009 11:30 AM

Downtown HSV 3-4mi evening hike with the NA Sierra Club
October 13, 2009 5:45 PM

Huntsville Alabama Old Ways Association (HAOWA) October Meetup
October 14, 2009 6:30 PM

Introduction to *AMP - October Meetup
October 15, 2009 12:00 PM

writers 'n rhymers October Meetup
October 15, 2009 6:00 PM
See more

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Friday Saturday Sunday

Feminine Forum Meetup
October 16, 2009 1:00 PM

North Alabama Freethought Association October Meetup
October 16, 2009 7:00 PM

9-to-5 UFOSaturday!
October 17, 2009 9:00 AM

Coffee Social
October 17, 2009 9:00 AM

Madison Bagel Social
October 18, 2009 10:00 AM

Horseback trail riding at 3H stables
October 18, 2009 1:00 PM

On coming out.

2009-10-12T10:19:00.000-05:00

Well, it's a bit after National Coming Out Day but better latent than never. (HA! I crack myself up.)
(resists the urge to go tweet that)
Ok..I thought I was heterosexual for many years. I will state for the record that I was sexually abused by a friend of the family at a young age (perhaps around 7, 8 or 9) and therefore (according to my therapists) sexually curious a bit younger than some were back then. Once I got to junior high, I was boy crazy. But I was very un-girlish and tended to drive the boys in the other direction, towards the girly girls. My mom for whatever reason did not teach me anything about how to be a girl, so I became a boi.
I didn't wear a bra until late in junior high when someone came up to me with the intention of snapping it and made a huge fuss that I didn't wear one at all. I didn't realize that I was supposed to.
In P.E. I was made fun of for not shaving. And when I did shave I was made fun of not shaving my toes. I had not ever heard the world LESBO until two chicks chased me around the school calling me LESBO and DYKE and MAN DRESSER. I admit I wore boy's clothing, it's what felt comfortable, and my mom had tried to get me to dress less mannish but she didn't teach me the accompanying ablutions.
What good would it have done to wear a shirt with darts in it if I didn't shave, wear makeup or comb my hair?
At any rate, I kept on chasing boys and finally caught one in the tenth grade. My best friend Valerie and I decided to lose our virginity on the same afternoon. We invited our current crushes over to her mom's where there were no adults for the week-end and that is what happened. My first sexual intercourse, and it was very boring for me. I just laid there, sort of like being at a movie. Something unusual was happening but I was just watching it happen. I faked an orgasm then, and did so with every guy after that.
And there were a few more guys. I'd go home with a good looking guy, but I never enjoyed it and half the time they were great big fags anyway. IF they were gay we'd become friends, if they were straight they usually ended up calling me dyke. I didn't know what dyke meant until I lived in Pasadena for a summer.
My mom packed me off to live with a gay friend of hers in California for the summer of '78. He worked at the Pasadena Antique Mart with a whole bunch of wonderful characters. Two of which were a lesbian couple who (and I shudder to look back on this)liked to have me get things out of the loft because they got to watch me going up the ladder a lot. (ew)
I was crushed out on my mom's gay friend, and his gay boyfriends, but I knew they were gay so I kept it to myself. I stayed as high as his pot supply would allow, to dull the whole stupid scenario.
My mom's gay friend needed a break from me two months into my visit so he sent me to stay with his good friend and her two teenage daughters. I was so vastly different from them: I had jeans, overalls... they had girls' clothes. I remember it clearly: I was watching one of them get dressed and was suddenly so turned on that I thought I would melt. I'd never felt that with the guys: with them it was some kind of just longing for something, but when I got in bed with a guy I was bored.
This was pure lust and I watched her take off a pair of pants and put them on and wore them all day. It was my first girl crush. I never told her or anyone about that. And I forgot about it for a while, until I met someone at a bar that was having a 'gay night' and she asked me to dinner. I went, and she asked me to stay. I was drunk, she was drunk. It would have been great except that her breath stank so bad I wanted to vomit. It was so horrid that I could not go through with the sex. Bad experience. Plus her legs were very hairy, and I had been taught that that was gross. So I was repulsed and regretted it and felt it must be the wrong thing for me.
But I told my mom I was bisexual that year. I told her in her bedroom and she started to cry and ask what she had done wrong, wringing her hands and calling upon God to give her strength and she went on and on about how she had failed again. I didn't know it then but my brother David had come out to her not too long before I did. And I'm assuming she had the same reaction with him.
I hadn't even done more than kiss a girl at that point but by then I was into punk rock and hanging with the 'bisexual punk rock girls' at school in the hall. We were tying each other up and pretending to be in an S & M dungeon so people at school gave us a wide berth. It was a very confusing time.
My mom at some point said that if I was going to be a homosexual I should abstain from sex so that I could get into Heaven. I guses she thinks she's going to Heaven. More power to her. We don't talk much about my sexuality since then: she does say from time to time "Well you know I think it's wrong" or "You know you're not going to be able to see me in Heaven, right?"
Which to tell you the truth suits me fine. Mom is the only one in my family that has ever been uncomfortable with my sexuality. No one else gives a rat's ass and that's something I'm very grateful for.

Paint Creek

2009-10-12T00:31:00.000-05:00

Can't sleep. As I wrote in my diary, it's bad some nights, when I am laying there staring at the ceiling and then for some reason I'll think about my dog Crash or my brother David. That makes me start saying "SHUT UP" to my brain,I can't let those thoughts in, not in bed where I have plenty of time to think about them. But then some nights it will start off with thoughts of David (he died in October, and every October I get very sad before Halloween, and don't know why, then I remember) but end with thoughts of Carol.
I wrote her a love letter, that I have no intention of sending, wrote it two weeks after I saw her last. I just re-read it and I'm glad I didn't send it: It's not my best work. It could use some finesse. At any rate, it would most likely be the end of her talking to me.
So I was thinking about her tonight and I turned the light on and wrote about Paint Creek. Carol was moving me from Richmond to Louisville in her station wagon: my mannequin 'Sinead' strapped to the top (which made me love Carol all the more, her driving all that way with a nekkid mannequin on the top of her car like a modern day Joad family that happened to have a masthead). We passed over a creek that was named PAINT CREEK and one of us looked at it and said something like "Why that's just plain water."
We got to speculating on why it's called Paint Creek and thought perhaps it was full of Red Snapper.
And Bluefish. And Rainbow Trout. And Bluegill.
And that went on for a long time, sometimes it would take us minutes to come up with one but come up with one we did and say it nonchalantly and then we'd bust out laughing, laughing until we cried.
But like all good things it came to an end and we ran out of fish; that is I thought we did. We got nigh to Louisville when Carol said, out of the blue, "Orange Roughy".
I gotta tell ya to this day when ever I see a fish that has a color in its name, especially Orange Roughy, I really want to run from the room or start crying or both.
One day, driving to work from my home in Anchorage, I passed the marquee of the seafood store on the corner and it said RAINBOW TROUT/Halibut/Orange Roughy/Pink Salmon and I stopped, got out of my car and took a photo of it, sent it to Carol's mom (Carol and I were only just saying hello to one another now and again, we weren't talking like we are now) and told mom to show it to Carol, that she would know what it meant.
I thought about her that whole day and every time I passed that stupid sign I silently prayed they would change it asap.
Tonight, I mourn the fact I can't call Carol like I used to, no matter the time I could call her and she would read to me from Winnie the Pooh , or the Tao of Pooh, or from 'The Wind in the Willows'. And all would be right with the world. I wonder what got me down back then . Probably the same thing that is geting me down now: that I can't have Carol, nor can I have anyone like Carol.
I laugh at myself and hope now I can get some sleep.

Nice day in Five Points

2009-10-11T17:10:00.000-05:00

Woke up late, that was nice. Birds woke me up. Was dark and gloomy-ish before but now the sun is out and it's been out. Was warm enough to make yard work somewhat sticky. I got the yard cleaned up: I think I had a total of two handfuls of leaves. Wow is that fine with me.
Want to go buy a printer but can't bring myself to do so without my sister who gets the best deals on everything. Her boyfriend is visiting and she hasn't invited me to come meet him. I know why: he's a total alcoholic and I'm guessing they are drinking it up this weekend. I hope they are enjoying themselves.
I have the door open, just the screen door closed. Nice. Birds are going OFF. For some reason our across the street neighbors have some kind of tree that attracts massive amounts of birds. Those are the same neighbors that have the barky dogs. Dogs that, when I get out of my truck or walk out to get in it, they stand there and bark at me incessantly. Irksome.
I've been so lonely lately that it's really getting under my skin. I walked around this morning and took my laundry to have it done at the laundromat; the woman that works there just called to tell me my laundry was in. "w00t" I wanted to say but she didn't seem the type to appreciate the word w00t.
I only know one person who uses the word w00t in conversation anyway and that's Carol. Totally endeared her to me further.
Rocky Horror is playing in Birmingham on the 29th of this month. On a Thursday...which goes against the law of Rocky Horror. Go figure. I can't make it anyway. Which totally bums me out. I'd rent the movie and play it here if I knew anyone that could or would come over to watch it with me.
I'm debating ordering a pizza. No, wait, I had pizza last night. *sigh* Got one of those California Pizza Kitchen pizzas; I always burn them. Well, not burn but over cook. I have to remember that next time. It was like cardboard but I ate it anyway. So really I did not have pizza last night, I had cardboard.
I'd like a hot steaming tasty pizza. That would make my night better so I think I will do that.
I wonder if there is a anything on TV. FML.

PURGE

2009-10-10T12:02:00.000-05:00

Trying to make my insides feel better, I'm doing a purge. JUNK must GO. I put my computer boxes in the garage, put my espresso machine on FREECYCLE, (I'm using the French Press now)...trying to find a place to take my Akubra hat to get it reblocked. Mom sent it in a flimsy cardboard box and it got THRASHED. The older I get the more I understand how I got to be what I am today (Or, should say, who I was). Mom means well, sends a box of my old stuff, but she puts it all loosely in a box and doesn't pack it with filler, my hat, that she got me in Australia, is crushed beyond anything but professional help. The box had been not only crushed but gotten WET at some point. WHAT the HELL, USPS?
So I'm trying to unclutter my house. I want to give away a large amount of towels as well, I REALLY do NOT need this giant stack of towels. It's not like I have any visitors whatsoever. Yes I think the towels will go too. I only need two, three towels tops! Not a two and a half foot high stack of them, how silly.
Also these beans can go. Steve means well giving them to me but I'm not going to soak them. Someone will use them.
I'm feeling better already, and now maybe I can settle enough to do my homework.
I went through my jeans as well and giving away my 'skinny' jeans. I know I won't make it back to size 31. I kept the 32's... might lose five pounds, but not twenty.
So... also go the stupid shorts I bought that don't feel right, I need to promise msyelf I will try things on before I leave the store.
Need to buy a bra: found a size on one of mine, thank the UNIVERSE because that is the WORST thing, not knowing your bra size: I got my sister to fit me for a bra about six years ago and still have the same ones. I need new ones, but I had not written down what size I was. I could JUST see the print on the label... so now I know where to at least start. You CAN try on bras, can't you?
I don't know. I guess you can, since we did that one time. Ok... good. I need to buy a few of those stupid things. I hate them with a serious passion!
ugh.
The weather won't sunny up and let me do yard work. Ok, that's fine. Let it run wild.

break.

2009-10-10T00:31:00.003-05:00

Who am I anyway? Why do I feel sick to my stomach when I see someone dressed the way I wish I was dressed, but I don't know how to do it? I can't dress that way because: I don't know why. Why can't I sit down long enough to write something decent? What is wrong with me?
I want it, I wish I could. Who am I? And how did I get so old and raggedy? Where did I go?

Spore & the Evolution of Self

2009-10-04T21:23:00.000-05:00

So...I was sitting here at my new computer playing SPORE. I'd been at it for hours, feeling good about having something really fun to do despite severe cramps and rainy weather outside. I'd evolved onto land from sea and was doing some hunting when the game told me I had evolved enough to form a tribe. And the game then does this little ceremonial thing where the creatures form up a tribe and their brains get bigger... and I actually got to thinking about what evolution has meant for us as a species; how far it has brought us: how some abuse it and some utilize it, etc.
And then I thought about my own personal evolution: how over a year ago I started this blog to document my recovery from alcohol abuse. I was living with my sister in a tiny one bedroom apartment, sleeping on the couch, we were fighting like cats and dogs and I was making six dollars an hour working six days a week and driving her old Toyota with no air conditioning and the only thing I had going for me was my laptop and a few hundred dollars in a bank account.
My skin was horrid and my brain was fried and I hated life like only someone who has recently lost their job/car/wife/clothes/books/etc. can do!
And so I joined AA (AGAIN) and kept going no matter what and just kept going to work. Every day no matter how bad I Felt I just went in to work. That is the secret it turns out!
Haha, who knew? So here I sit, with my brand spanking new gaming computer, playing SPORE, which I had bought in Anchorage and found I could not play due to the laptop not having a decent video card, and admiring my new 'puter, with the giant monitor, that will hold two full sized web pages side by side.
And tomorrow I have class. And the day after that and Wednesday too. And soon I will have another Cavalier just like the one I left in
Alaska.
Only red.
And with a fin on the tail. And manual. So...
I felt a huge wave of gratitude. I'm meeting a new friend for coffee on Tuesday, this guy recommended by my friend I. from the theater. His name starts with a Z. I find that interesting.
HE's pretty funny. And he too has a phone phobia just like I.
I'm hoping that maybe he and I can get together now and again and hang out. That would be pretty awesome. I know that I. is hoping for that too. I know she wishes we could hang out more..in fact she wrote and said she wished we could have chatted more. But her husband was eager to get home. I told her he was a great sport.
Anyhow, it's not great but it's not horrible, my life. I can't wait to go see my friend in Birmingham next weekend and totally catch up ...she's gotten in a relationship and I barely hear from her anymore. I hate it, but it's life. The universe never closes a door but it opens one up: Perhaps that is where Zack comes in.
One can hope.

Birfday

2009-09-30T20:23:00.000-05:00

It's my birfday!
And... my computer did not come. I got home from English class just in time to see the UPS truck pull up, but the driver did not have my computer.
I was standing by the truck salivating! *sigh*
Well..today at work I thought it would be cool if I wrote a book focused on the memories behind certain songs. "Tones on Tale". Not sure if I could use that title due to the group by the same name.
Anyhow, it would be accompanied by MP3's somehow. Or at least links to the songs.
What a great idea.

Horse Shoes

2009-09-26T23:07:00.000-05:00

Last night I got a call from Danny. I hadn't heard from her in a couple of days other than a quick text to tell me she would be in touch soon. I didn't really want to talk to her: with the romance gone from the situation, I don't really feel as inclined to put up with her ramblings and her stubborn viewpoints and hanging on the phone while she feeds the dog, talks to her roommate or neighbors, chases her roommate's kid or whatever the hell she might be up to at any given moment.
And we got into it about my intentions to buy a computer new online. I told her I wanted a 900 dollar (ish) computer from Cyberpower. She went totally ballistic and yammered on and on about how I should build my own, or better yet get her brother to do it for me.
I stood my ground as I am want to do; and she called me stubborn. She said "You're not listening" and "You don't hear what I'm saying". And I told her I was suddenly glad I was single because if we were in the same house as a couple I'd be needing to sleep on the couch or strangle her.
Well... she started going on about how she got paid but it was only a couple hundred bucks and she had to buy animal food (she has a horse, a dog and a chinchilla), and had only seven bucks left over. I asked her if she needed money for gas.
She said she really wished she could get shoes put on her horse, as she would like to ride but can't unless he has pads on his shoes. (he had a stone bruise and the vet recommended she not ride him without the pads.)
I said I'd send her enough to get him shod, and also get a tank of gas. It would be the second tank of gas I've bought for her. The first shoes, though.
We did have a nice conversation after that, she kept going on and on about how she would pay me back. I told her I NEVER loan money to anyone that I can't afford to lose, and I never expect to be paid back. I told her not to worry about it, as someone helped me when I was her age, and that she needed to pay it forward.
So tonight she called and left a message thanking me again, I didn't answer the phone. I don't want to talk to her: it stirs up too many emotions. But the message she left ... that voice. A voice from my past, and from my present. I dont' know if it is a voice from my future or not but I do know she'll be able to ride her horse soon.
And that made me feel pretty good.

The Coroner of Oz

2009-09-20T12:06:00.000-05:00

Was listening to NPR yesterday at work. Apparently they have digitized 'The Wizard of Oz' and will be re-releasing it in December. To mark that occasion they had "The Coroner of Oz" on NPR.
And that little devil could recite his lines in song and was quite happy to do so. I felt quite honored and pleased to be able to hear him do it. And I thought, do one thing, and do it well.
What will I be remembered for?

A triumph of the will

2009-09-19T23:14:00.000-05:00

Well. I set my mind to get over D. It was great thinking something might happen, to feel... to dream. I was mistaken in thinking that having so very much in common with her precluded getting together. I don't know what I was thinking. So I set my mind to get over the whole thing. I told her I needed to get over it and she agreed. I had a hard couple of days over it, not eating, feeling very adrift after exposing my jugular. And she just keeps texting and calling like nothing ever happened. So I get on my laptop and surf the web while she talks. I know that if she asked I would do anything for her, and if she ever asked me back I'd probably go but meanwhile back at the ranch I'm still in the same lonely island I was before I went to see her.
Her life is to chaotic for me anyway: I KNOW it is a good thing we didn't hook up. She's scattered to the four winds and claims being a free spirit but you know, I like a tiny bit of order to my life, if only to be able to know where my next tank of gas is coming from. At my age, I could not live as she does. Although I was doing that at her age (42). So she has some time to catch up ...
I got my Pell grant today. My worries have faded. It was a weird hard week but the week is over and my life is back to normal. Really, if I'm going to be flying all over the USA looking for love I have to be totally ready for some disappointments, right? And I am willing to go looking. I'm in a good place, and lonely, and I've been single plenty long enough.
Trying to plan a trip to Alaska next summer. It's only about 780 bucks to fly into Seattle, stay two days, fly to Vancouver, stay two days, then fly to Anchorage. not bad! So D. has a friend she wants to visit in both those places. Then we'd go on to Anchorage, hang out there a day or so... and hopefully somehow get out to the homestead. Oh we might have to fly in to Cordova instead of Anchorage... if my dad can fly us on to McCarthy. I wonder what it would be like to spend a week on the homestead with Danielle. A week on the homestead with someone will make or break a relationship of any kind, it broke my last one. Hell just the drive was stressful.
Most people can't hack it. The outhouse, the skeeters, the digging potatoes, the carrying dead bison and moose to the plane... seeing dead bison or moose hanging in the tool shed. Chainsawing and driving the earth mover, carrying a rifle around, shooting ptarmigan out of the truck window for dinner. Standing in the creek with waders on counting salmon... it will test her for sure. If she is what she says she is she will love it. If she is full of it she will hate it. At any rate i would hope she falls in love with it as I have done: everyone should get a chance to fall in love with the Alaskan bush. I suppose if she hates it we can pack it in and take off for Anchorage and stay with Misty for the remainder of the trip...

Chard

2009-09-18T06:24:00.000-05:00

My friend Richard blasted me in an email yesterday, accusing me of 'texting, calling and talking about D.' the whole time I was with him. He said he thought I had come there to see HIM and that for him, it was boring. He went on to say he couldn't get caught up in my 'drama'... and I told him to dismiss me and let me go. And so he has. And so I have. On top of that; I do not like this turmoil in my gut surrounding D. and not knowing what she is thinking or feeling, unable to bare my soul to her about it because the timing is off or whatever. I have decided that I must take matters into my own hands and put mind over matter: squash this bug.
I go off to work today a bit jerkily, as I am trying to thrust off the mantle of oppression that has been layered on me. I don't need this right now, or ever.
when it is right, it's right, and I don't need to hover over some unclickable link.
GET OUT OF MY HEAD! I'm not going to let her live in my head rent free. Fuck that.
ugh.

Pitch and Roll

2009-09-17T15:28:00.000-05:00

I'm playing Roxy Music's "Love is the Drug". I used to think that 'they' called love a drug because of its addictive properties, as are outlined in the song. But there's another reason: it courses through your bloodstream changing your ability to reason, your heart rate, your emotions: against your own will, no matter how solid that will might be under normal circumstances. "stitched up tight, can't shake free"...
And this stupid drug was injected into my ass entirely without my consent.
Someone slipped me a 'rufie'! I will admit I was having some feelings for D. before I went to Richmond, certainly I'd be an idiot not to consider having a relationship of some sort with someone I have so much in common with and whom I still find attractive. However I was not in the least prepared for my current state of 'illness'. I'm pregnant with uncertainty: witness the morning sickness. I'm diseased: riddled with bullet holes. And nothing is more upsetting than the hostile takeover tactics. I thought I was standing around feeling kind of sleepy and watching her hair move in the breeze but apparently I was having my brains sucked out and replaced by that alien jello mass we think of as love but is really some kind of fungus in our brain. I should have known it when, Saturday night, I was standing at the edge of the mosh pit (it's fun to stand there: your job is to push people back in the pit as they bounce off you. It's a way of being part of without getting your head cracked open) when she backed into me and sort of stood there. I don't even know if she knew who I was... she had to have. She kept getting pushed into me, and at one point I could smell her hair. I leaned into her hair and sniffed a long sniff, happy. But then...then she put her hand on my shoulder and rested it there. So familiar, so unforgettable. And then she was gone. And so was I.
now I wrestle with this. I want it gone. I hate it. I struggle against it, and I have no idea if it is mutual. Am I making it up? Can I stop it before it is too late? I'm angry now... I vacillate twixt pure hot anger and cold cold desire. When did it happen?
Over the whole weekend of course. Perhaps it was when she first smiled at me and hugged me. I want out of this. Now.

the wait

2009-09-14T11:38:00.001-05:00

I just spent three days walking my old stomping grounds: come to find out everything has changed, and nothing has changed. I spent the first half of my weekend with R. R is the same. Completely the same. All he talked about was drugs, sex, men. Drugs, sex, men... and Wigstock. This guy is in arrested development. He said it was because we were visiting old haunts that he was drinking like he was. He drank heavily both nights. And he smoked like a chimney. And he said he does neither on a regular basis. He asked me to get some pot from D. I was appalled. I'm an adult in recovery: she's an adult in recovery. Why would he ask us to score him some pot? I am so over him I don't want to take the time to write about him. ugh.
As for D... Oh, how I want her. Not in that "Oh baby you are sooo hot" kind of way : although she is pretty cute. It's that "OH MY GOD your BRAIN is amazing! How do you know all this shit?" kind of way. I'm convinced that the universe put her in my life the first time to imprint her on my brain so that when she became the person I want as a life partner, I'd know 1) her name 2) where to find her and 3) what she looks like so I could pick her out of a photograph on the internet.
Neither of us were able to be any kind of supportive or anything back then. But we sure did remember each other and have, for some reason, an instant connection despite the fact things did not end well.
I spent my last part of the weekend with D; I didn't say anything about my feelings until I felt forced to by circumstance. She asked me where I wanted to sleep "You can sleep in my room, in the kid's room, or on the couch". I should have picked couch, so I could get some sleep, but I picked her room, because I wanted to see what would happen. She had taken a sleeping pill and was dozing in and out when I felt the need to ask her if she had any interest in a relationship. She shot me down and said she really needed to know herself first, and that jumping into relationships was her M.O., etc.
I know it was really bad, awkward timing on my part, and I know I should have asked her before I went up there, and I should have not slept in her room because I was tormented by wanting to hold her; but it was what it was. The next day I felt FRIED and HORRID and useless. What a bad weekend for traveling: I had cramps and my heavy nasty period was just ending when I went up. And R. has no patience for women and women's problems such as needing the toilet more often when menstruating. Then my period ended and I did get some sleep one night but the next night I was out very late and got NO sleep and spent the day in the sun watching harness races and steeplechase. And of course D. and I did not get to talk much about the elephant in the room until we were on the way to the airport. D. missed the turn due to talking and we got me to the airport with ZERO seconds to SPARE. I bought a water at the kiosk so I guess I had about forty seconds to spare, actually... they were making motions to close the airplane passenger door when I went through it. One person came after me so I didn't feel quite so bad. At any rate, although she was telling me NO, I was getting the signal that she really enjoys my company and the talk was going so well that I felt as though it were not me being told no, but me being told to wait.
I can wait. I would wait a long time for her. We were walking along the James River, along a trail we both knew well from olden days , pointing out places we used to hang out. I was having such a good time being with her. We came upon the old 'church' down at the Iron Works : she told me she didn't believe the date written on the placard so she said she was going to 'douse'. I thought she was 'dousing' for water, as that is all I had ever heard of dousing being used for. But she was dousing for information. She cut a branch off a tree and started saying the years, I don't remember what they were, but it was like "1888, 1889, 1890..." on and on until she came to the right year. And the dousing stick was turning down as she recited the numbers until it was down and she said that must be the year the building was built. I took a photo of her dousing because I did NOT know what to make of it. I sort of ignored it, almost embarrassed by it at first but then; I became enraptured by it. Whether she truly believes in dousing or was showing off to me, I don't care. It was so endearing that she would do that in front of me with no qualms that I decided if she believes it then that is all that matters. This woman moves through the world in a way that is hard for me to describe but I am totally enthralled by it. She is always looking around in wonder, eyes wide open, a ready smile. She's always noticing things, as I am, and although I do not comment on everything I notice, because people dont usually care , she does, and points them out. And we had fun, figuring things out together.
For instance, her horse has laminitis brought on by eating too many persimmons. So she is keeping him locked in his stall as much as possible when not there to monitor him until the persimmons have all dropped. She let him out of his stall and he came out with his head to the ground,sniffing.
Usually this indicates a horse wants to ROLL. They are sniffing out a place to roll. But he kept walking. D. said "Go ahead and roll, you silly horse!" and I asked myself, do I want to tell her what is really going on? Will she be offended if I tell her he's not looking to roll? So I did. "He's sniffing for persimmons." I'd never seen a horse walk along sniffing the ground as far and long as that one did: it had to be what he was doing. Earlier D. had shown me a persimmon. She said "Can you smell it?" I said no. So we held it to my nose. I could smell it then. So we both deduced that her horse was sniffing for persimmons because you can't smell them until you are right on them, even horses who have such great big nostrils can't smell them without getting close.
And she looked at me and said "Huh. I thought he was getting ready to roll." We spent the weekend like that, figuring things out, putting our heads together, it was great.
Also she ropes. She has a rope. She was going to give it to me and I wanted it. But I can't take her rope. I can't believe she likes to practice roping. I love doing that.
*sigh*
We were in the car on the way to the airport and got back on the subject of why she should not be in a relationship and I told her how if I had made a list of things I wanted in a partner, it would look like her. I told her how it is that I keep ticking things off like :NPR, check. Classical music, check. Practice with rope, check. Horses, check. Reading, check. Punk rock, check.
It's amazing and I get so excited when she texts me. I don't know of any thing else i can do other than let this go where it will and explore it as far as I can.
It feels so surreal.
And so I heard this on the way to my sister's...
********************
And the Cantilevered Inference Shall Hold the Day

by Michael Blumenthal

Things are not as they seem: the innuendo of everything makes
itself felt and trembles towards meanings we never intuited
or dreamed. Take, for example, how the warbler, perched on a

mere branch, can kidnap the day from its tediums and send us
heavenwards, or how, held up by nothing we really see, our
spirits soar and then, in a mysterious series of twists and turns,

come to a safe landing in a field, encircled by greenery. Nothing
I can say to you here can possibly convince you that a man
as unreliable as I have been can smuggle in truths between tercets

and quatrains on scraps of paper, but the world as we know
is full of surprises, and the likelihood that here, in the shape
of this very bird, redemption awaits us should not be dismissed

so easily. Each year, days swivel and diminish along their inscrutable
axes, then lengthen again until we are bathed in light we were not
prepared for. Last night, lying in bed with nothing to hold onto

but myself, I gazed at the emptiness beside me and saw there, in the
shape of absence, something so sweet and deliberate I called it darling.
No one who encrusticates (I made that up!) his silliness in a bowl,

waiting for sanctity, can ever know how lovely playfulness can be,
and, that said, let me wish you a Merry One (or Chanukah if you
prefer), and may whatever holds you up stay forever beneath you,

and may the robin find many a worm, and our cruelties abate,
and may you be well and happy and full of mischief as I am,
and may all your nothings, too, hold something up and sing.

Held at arm's length

2009-09-06T10:43:00.000-05:00

Danny had been calling me more than I am accustomed to and talking much longer than is the norm for me. I felt a need to structure, to organize my 'talking time' with her and set a 'date' for calling...a week ago I said "Let's talk Saturday afternoon or evening, shall we?" Which put something to look forward to in my week and gave me the foresight to choose a time, a place for the call. Totally un-spontaneous, I realize. But she has 'anytime minutes' after 7 and mine do not start until after nine. How to remedy that, and do I wish to remedy that? Perhaps. I have to acclimatize myself to her style, listen to what is between the lines and formulate a tactic for conversing with her. Because I think I really do want to know her but she doesn't know herself. She says she does but she sounds just like me ten years ago: it's all swirling around in her brain and she just spouts out what is currently at the exit port.
Last night we were talking about how we both loathe the way some folk desperately need to define the artistic process behind certain works of art or literature. Danny says "If you want to know, ask the artist or author. If they are not available, you CANNOT know what they were thinking, so why speculate for hours and write dissertations and such? Just enjoy the product." And I said it was fun, to wonder what an artist or author was thinking when they were in the process, but she's right, one can never know for sure unless the artist /author is there in person to ask. And even then they might not tell you the truth if they even know it themselves.
Somehow we got on the subject of Dada. When she mentioned Dada I was floored. First of all, it is very rare I come across a person in this area who has even heard of it outside of Art History class. Secondly, it is even rarer to talk to someone who ENJOYS Dada. But Dada is a running thread throughout my life and I must come to realize that it is a code word: when I hear it or hear something connected to it I MUST LISTEN.
On the refrigerator in this house there is a poster for Tom Stoppard's play 'Rosencrantz & Guildenstern are Dead'. It is a connection to Dada, and a key factor in my realizing right off the bat my roommate is someone I wanted to be involved with because he was IN the play, and something about that spoke to me deeper than anything else might have. Which sounds kind of superficial but one must pay attention to the road signs in the vast weird universe, mustn't one?
Well anyhow once Danny mentioned that Dada was one of her favorite art movements I felt a need to sit up and listen that much more intently. Is it possible that we started off as lovers, albeit annoyed with one another and completely incompatible, spent twenty-some odd years apart living life largely and learning everything set in our path, every lesson and every hard knock; only to be thrust back together (thanks to the internet!)?
What if that is the case? I intend to propose to her that there are so many signs that we ought to look at: the way she and I both are starting from scratch, financially; the love we both have for all things equine; our similar art appreciation; love for books and writing; love for punk rock,classical music and NPR...ability to empathize and sympathize with people and yet keep our own heads clear without succumbing to others levels of despair, using laughter and faith.
There are many other points of mutual interest and I daresay that had I made a checklist of things I wanted in a partner that she would have come the closest to ticking off all the points as anyone has or may ever come.
We talked for two and a half hours last night, and I really listened. She is kind of stubborn, sort of a know-it-all and likes to toot her own horn in the brain capacity department. At first I found that annoying but now I find it interesting: like I said, I want to get to know her. She's insecure despite the fact she maintains the opposite. We'd be good for one another, of that I am sure: can we be 'together' separately until I graduate? Will she even consider it? Is she still attracted to me and vise versa? I suppose we shall find out next weekend.

As Surreal as it GETS

2009-08-30T16:04:00.000-05:00

So... went from just working my ass off six days a week and coming home too tired to think much less do much of anything to working my ass off five days a week and going to school three days a week and talking to my ex most nights into the night and having lots of cool stuff planned for the fall; my life has finally arrived and it only took a year and a half of not drinking.
D. has been calling quite a bit. I'm not used to talking on the phone so much, it's disconcerting. Not that it is necessarily a bad thing. And she's so very helpful. But I have never talked this much on the phone to someone who was not 1) my lover or 2) Carol.
I have been trying without success to fix my computer problems but have given up. I did defrag and all that, its' running fine, just a couple of worrisome issues, I'm sure my meddling will cause a crash sometime soon. I wonder if maybe I shouldn't order a new laptop just in case. I hate to dip into my Pell before I get it though: but my computer is worrying me.
I thought about getting a MINI... I don't know. IT's just a thought. Something to keep me connected to the internet while my main laptop was in the shop. and where would I take the laptop if it did crash? Geek Squad?
I dont know.
At any rate, I have one paragraph to double space and then I'm caught up on homework. Not too bad. I did read four chapters yesterday... cleaned the house today...when not talking to D.
I. sent a photo of her on the CN tower...and J. drinking a beer on what looked like Queen street in Toronto. Oh how I miss Toronto.
I got an invite to the NOAH awards; I wonder if J & I will go, I am dubious about going. Despite being nominated for an award; it's probably going to be a boring night. Food sounds good but ...it's going to be a buffet on sterno..who really needs that.
So it's very surreal to be suddenly thrust into what for intents and purposes seems to be a relationship with one's first girlfriend, whom I have not seen for over twenty years. She really seems to have a good heart, and we have a lot in common... for instance, we both listen to NPR & classical music exclusively when in our cars. She drives a Cavalier, I'll be driving a Cavalier. She likes sculpture & welding...so do I. She likes pottery and wants to take a class from Kim..so do I.
She likes punk rock, rugby, English...opera. She has a horse. And most perfectly she has no money and is just now thinking about getting a steady job... sometime soon. We are a great match in my mind: both of us starting from ground zero due to a troubled past.
I have to bite my tongue when I want to ask her "What are you wearing" ... fear of rejection. I have no idea if we'll fall back into romance the way we fell back into friendship.
Not that we ever did have a friendship: i was a huge mess. she reminds me of what a mess I was... every now and then. She will say something about the past that makes me shiver, I was such a huge dork, totally insecure. And quite shy.

Whew.

2009-08-21T07:03:00.002-05:00

They told me at my college that I couldn't buy books until the day before classes start, that's today. I am going to have to shell out four hundred plus bucks for the books. And I don't know if I got a Pell Grant yet or not.
It's starting to get a little scary; what if I don't get the grant? Oh well. I don't see why I wouldn't but they are sure cutting it close. WTF? I think it's all due to some bumbling on my Voc Rehab counselor's part. I know he's busy, but he keeps saying "Oh I forgot" to do something...and I'm wondering what else he forgot. I like him and all but he's maddening. He didn't know that there is a special place on the Drake campus where you can fill out the FAFSA in person and they process it in a couple of weeks, whereas if you do it online you suffer the same fate as me: wondering WTF?
Yesterday I had coffee with I. I had chai actually. Man it is hard sitting there with her, I just want her to sit on my lap. She's so adorable and she is so funny and so mysterious. I did ask her some personal questions about her upbringing and it turns out she has clinical depression coupled with acute shyness. Which explains just about everything.
I have no idea if she will ever contact me again as I was pretty much my socially inept self and talked about some things that really don't usually come up in polite conversation. How we got onto those subjects I'll never remember but get on them we did and now I fear she knows more about the core of me than most people in Huntsville.
*sigh*
Why did I have to go and tell her I was a dungeon master at an S&M clubhouse in San Francisco? And why did I have to top it off with taking my top off and doing the Gay Pride parade half naked with another topless woman, dancing on the top of a newspaper vending machine and getting our photos taken?
*UGH*
I think it was to demonstrate how I like to do things to the fullest, not just attend an event but BECOME the event.
She seemed to enjoy the stories. She said she wished she could be like that. I wish I could give her that gift.
Talked to D. for an hour and a half: turns out she was a crack head for six years. Also she spent thirty days in jail for DUI.
My little D. ; it hurts me to think of her in jail or suffering from crack addiction. Oh but she's glad it happened, as I am glad for my alcoholism, as it shaped us and we are now strong.

GARH!

2009-08-16T16:57:00.000-05:00

I'm sitting at my table, typing away on my laptop, minding my own beeswax. I was sort of expecting this dude from Freecycle to come pick up some Doc Martens' that are on the porch. (I found out they were made in China: that explains why the size is totally off. Says women's 9 but it's more like a women's 10.)
At any rate, I hear a knock on the door and I go look: it's my brother. I'm now deflated. Immediately I go on the defensive. I look around to see what he might make fun of or pick apart.
He sits on the couch and begins opening a package. He's got some kind of JB - Weld like stuff he wants to put on the muffler to see if that will stop the noise the muffler makes on the truck .
A dog is barking across the street, and he says "What dog is that?"
How do I know? I can't see it any better than he can. I say "It's a dog, a dog I'm going to kill one day (It barks a LOT) ... I'm going to feed it anti-freeze and have some peace!"
He says "Don't be killing no dogs."
THIS from a guy who regularly shoots dogs that come on his property. With a HIGH powered rifle. I've seen him do it, I've helped him bury the dogs.
So I say "I'm NOT GOING TO KILL it, good grief! I'm just fantasizing about it."
IT only goes downhill from there. He wants something to lay on to get under the truck. Sorry, I'm fresh out of cardboard boxes, and I don't have a creeper on me either. He uses the rug on the front porch. It's not a great rug, but it isn't mine either...
He parks the truck in the alley way beside the house. I say "You parked in an alley!" He says, "I know."
I say "People come through that alley a lot. If they come down and the truck is in the way, they'll drive around it on our lawn or the other people's.."
So he and i push the truck off the gravel alley way, into the grass I didn't want anyone driving on.
By this time I'm pretty frustrated, and he goes in the house to wash his hands so I have to follow him in to make sure he doesn't get grease all over my kitchen. I hand him paper towels and tell him to use the DAWN. I don't want grease streaks all over the kitchen.
It's a really nice little clean house. He comes in with his shoes on, tracking grass, and grease on his hands, and disturbs my writing. And didn't call first. He just shows up and takes over my house. Because I have his truck. He feels he can do as he likes.
I can't wait to be free from obligation to be meek around him.
When he took the keys out of the truck he tried to bring my water bottle in with him. I said to leave it in the truck. He could NOT comprehend why I want to leave a water bottle in the truck when it is so hot outside.
I told him to put the water bottle back in the truck. He didn't want to at all. How can I explain to him that decades of living in Arizona have made it mandatory for me to have water in the truck at ALL times or I panic?
He would just laugh.
He left without saying very much. I fear he felt unwelcome. I fear that he was, in fact, less than welcome. I don't understand why he can't call first, or why he feels the need to pop in every other day these days. It's so uncomfortable when he comes into my tidy little house, he and his brusque ways and his making fun of my ways.
I said to him "Well, I'm sure you have things that you do that don't make sense to other people, but you do them anyway. This water bottle is just one of those things."
He went on to say "I can see it in winter, but not summer."
He wont let it go. I can't take it ...some days.
And he wanted me to use the little plastic vial the putty came in for some kind of storage. "Keep this, you can put something in here to store it."
Yes, that's exactly what I want to use for storage in my house, a plastic vial that had toxic putty-paste akin to JB Weld in it.

The Struggle

2009-08-15T21:51:00.000-05:00

I often wonder if other people struggle with this: going about my day, some days I have really good experiences, and they might seem run-of-the-mill to anyone else but since I try to be in a constant state of gratitude, the smallest things can make me happy...
such as, tonight I was driving to my sister's, it's a long drive across town. Maybe twenty minutes. I was listening to NPR and heard this great song by an ENGLISH truck driver with a song about NOTTINGHAM (where Holly lives...) the song being about how a beggar came up to the truck driver and asked for money but the truck driver thought "If I give money to everyone who asks there won't be any left for me" and he didn't give him anything. But then the truck driver saw that the beggar had a friend who put his arm around him and then the beggar pulled up his pants leg and there was a wound to the bone. And the truck driver said "and then I knew my chance to help the guy would never come again."
Other songs by the same guy came on, about how it's the same in every country, truck driving that is. They were really good songs. You could tell the truck driver didn't have all his teeth as he sang, but it was ok because it was the blues.
And it made me happy to hear these songs and to think about Holly in Nottingham... to think about the UK in general.
So I was grateful for the long drive, enjoying the music. The STRUGGLE is... when I am enjoying myself like that, I have to make a conscious effort to NOT wish someone were there with me to enjoy it with. I stop myself and think aloud "Why do you need someone here with you to enjoy this? "
And I keep trying, keep searching for the way to enjoy life alone, by myself. I struggle because I want to get to the point where I don't have to make an effort, I want it come all by itself, just enjoyment of a moment. Being in the moment, I've gotten that: being in it alone, that comes next.

Saturday, all day

2009-08-15T15:25:00.000-05:00

What a day. I thought it would be great to get to work early but it didn't work out that way. I had to sit on the toilet a lot longer than usual...and that was that.
T was in a crazy place when I got to work...she's been acting out a lot lately. I haven't seen her at meetings; wonder what has got her so messed up. She dropped a tray of drinks all over the floor and tables and when I had cleaned it up, the other server slipped on the wet floor and dropped HER drinks. And I immediately turned and made non-slip shoes mandatory.
It was a hard day, very very hot, very busy: non-stop. I never did stop. I ate a biscuit with jam and butter. I had a large mug of coffee. I worked my ass off and my back was hurting but I got through the day thinking of the tv show I saw last night about a fish processing plant aboard a huge ship on Alaskan waters. They work 16 hours a day bent over this conveyor belt pushing fish into slots... it talked about how bad their backs hurt and how it takes a certain kind of person to push through that pain and keep working for weeks on end.
Of course they make a hell of a lot more money and get four months off at a time.
K was in a bad mood at work too. I wonder if it is the heat; I have learned how to keep my sense of humor despite the heat but others have not managed that so far.
When I left work all the night shift as well as S were gathered round me listening to me talk about my upcoming punk rock reunion. Someone said "You have all this cool stuff you are doing lately" and I said "I have to. I worked hard for a year with no fun at all, it's time I had some fun."

Pathetic

2009-08-14T23:20:00.002-05:00

I went to bed early. After a two hour walk, part of which was halfway up Bankhead, I ate some pb&j& banana, drank some milk, ate an ice cream bar and caught up on e-mail. Went off to bed around eight thirty or so. Got my head on the pillow and attained a comfy position when I heard the little plink my cell makes when I have a text.
Got a text from Danny showing her and Dave. CUTE! I was a bit annoyed so I sent one of my head on the pillow. I'm such a grump. She was just trying to show off that she was hanging with GWAR.
At any rate I felt bad about it and sent another text saying "You guys look like you r havin fun!" But I didn't hear back.
I'm feeling a bit pathetic. Lonely... I read for a while, a Dean Koontz novel I think I already read before but it doesn't matter. I got sleepy again and laid my head down when I heard some huge vehicle coming down my very quiet road. Flashing lights accompanied it, but I didn't make it to the window in time to see what the hell it was...so... I went outside, and all the trash cans were knocked over.
What the hell was it?
I am now unable to sleep. Bleeding heavily from my period, wishing I had someone to talk to; but Danny is out having fun at a band, M is asleep by now, R is asleep, no doubt. I'm sick of not having a partner or lover over at least once in a great while for slumber parties where we share not only ourselves but the night.
But, everyone annoys me so... LOL. I'm here alone.
The text Danny sent ... GWAR. I remember thinking of her when C and I went to see WILD AT HEART, and there is that scene where there is a band and the lead singer is wearing a GWAR t-shirt. So many unattainable women in my life.
And I thought about the night I first saw GWAR, when I came out of the concert covered in green slime and fake blood, my hair dripping, wearing the leather jacket Graves had given me...well, not given. Traded for eighty bucks from the door money at Benny's, so that his g/f could have an abortion.
For as long as I had that jacket, the zippers would stick, due to the GWAR fake blood and green slime in the zippers.
I left that jacket in San Fran, with Izzy. Izzy, who's name I carved on her arm with a scalpel, at her bequest, in front of about fifty people at a play party. Sober as a judge, and she... wearing the brand: next time I saw her, years later when I went back to San Fran for pride and was drunk as a lord, she showed me her arm. It had healed nicely, and as she had asked me to, one of the 'Z''s in Izzy stood out more boldly than the others. I don't know what she was on, probably heroin, but she hung out with me a bit and we lay at the foot of the ...that big building in San Fran...we lay at the base of it looking up, on the sidewalk next to each other.
when we parted ways she said she was going to come back for me the next morning but she never did. I will surely never see her again, as I never saw Graves again.
But she has his jacket, or had. And she had the mannequin I brought with me from Theater IV. I wonder what happened to that too.

Benny's

2009-08-14T16:17:00.002-05:00

Well. The Benny's reunion is shaping up to be a big deal. A lot of bands are playing. Old bands getting back together. Or they never broke up, I don't know or care, as I never really paid that much attention to them.
The people were the reason I went out to the punk bars: the way people slam danced and stood around looking angry and drinking and smoking and spewing angst.
And now I'm going to go up to Richmond and my old bar is going to be 'open' for one more night. It's truly amazing to me that Benny's amassed such a loyal following. I can't believe I'm willing to blow 300 bucks to fly up to Richmond just to be glared at by people I never knew or even liked.
Such a weird week it's been. Talking to my first girlfriend of all time via phone and internet, talking to my BFF way more than usual, and also an old 'friend' who was quite a vexing person back then, and now is sober and in AA many years. One's a teacher, one's a potter, one's in I.T.
Me: a student. Still a punk at heart. How will it be to roll up in that bar full of old punks, still dressed the same way after 24 years. Just the wrinkles in my skin and the turkey neck to betray me.
R and D and I will turn back into twenty one year olds for a night, scoping out the crowd and making up names for people, laughing and making very dark jokes and doing punk things. they say you can't go home again but the feeling I get about going to this Benny Fit tells me otherwise.
And to do it all sober for the first time. It's like I get a second chance to see my youth through sober eyes, how interesting. If only Graves were still alive... we intend to visit his grave, then maybe go to the Village Cafe for nachos.

the kid

2009-08-08T22:23:00.000-05:00

So: when I was 21, I was: living with three lesbians on Monument Avenue in Richmond, VA. I was confused, drinking too much, playing rugby, working some dead end job. In my spare time I was a bouncer at a punk rock bar named "Benny's"... which went down in the annals of Richmond's underground scene. I was a part of punk history in that town. A bouncer at Benny's was at the heart of it all.
I remember this kid coming into the bar with BMX leathers on. It was her Halloween costume. I was hooked the moment I saw her: there is no doubt she was the cutest, hottest punk rock girl in town back then. None were cuter. She was sitting on the pool table ... in the back. I don't remember how but we hooked up and lived together for eight months.
I didn't realize it was eight months until I spoke with her on the phone just a couple of hours ago, for the first time since I last saw her. that makes it the first real relationship I had.
I was a drunk. She tells me she was always doing LSD. I didn't know at the time. I was pretty stupid: ignored her to obsess on some rugby player in Boston that I had met on the pitch.
Talking to D. brought back a lot of emotions: I did not dump her, she dumped me. And I missed her for a long time.
Well she has been through the wringer with alcohol just as I have been...but she managed to get her masters' and other degrees, the lucky dawg.
And now she has asked me if I want to come visit. I am not sure how that would work... she is sober, and she's into welding like I am, and horses. she's into art and photography. And opera.
Now I think it might be an ok thing to go see her... but I'm not sure I should stay with her, although ... I gotta say it's a definite desire to do so.

The scone. Oh that scone.

2009-08-06T15:35:00.003-05:00

The whole time I was in Scotland I was looking for a good scone, a scone as good as HERS. I found one in Nairn, near Cromarty Firth. At a place called THE PANTRY. On HIGH STREET.
OH it was the best meal I've had in a long time, and I gotta say whatever coffee they use for the lattes is ...the best I've ever had. I wish I'd thought to ask what kind it was.
And I want to learn how to make scones. I need the best scone recipe on the planet.
:)
work today was NOT MAGIC. But coming home to emails from my Scottish family about how they really liked having me and can't wait to see me again, that IS magic.
*sigh*
I am waiting to hear from HER. I think she's out of town, traveling. I sent her a picture of the lovely scone I found that was as good as hers. LOL!
Oh dear. And; I got a call from someone who wants to date based on some e-mails from a Craigslist ad. I was at work when she called and now I haven't really the time to call, well I guess I do have the time but I don't call anyone until after nine if I can help it. I should probably call her and explain my AT&T minutes.
She sounded kind of hoarse on the phone. She says she is a 'polite social smoker'. hhmm... dunno how far that can go. I never did like the way some people are always needing to go outside to smoke, like during movies, or ...dinner, or whatever. It disrupts things, if you ask me.
At any rate, we'll see what happens. I got an email from this chicks' best friend talking her up. Which I found weird until I figured out that this chick doesn't have a computer. How far can I go with someone who isn't into tech and smokes?

Jet Lag

2009-08-05T09:17:00.002-05:00

I do not like international travel. I think it would be a lot better if you had a day or two between airplanes. Perhaps in the future I will remember to book tickets that way. Take a taxi from airports, to a hostel. Take a shower, relax, walk around the neighborhoods. Come home, sleep, wake up late, have espresso, catch a plane later in the day. Yeah. This waiting for five hours in airports is for the bloody birds.
Not that I don't heartily appreciate the free plane ticket I was given. The thing I don't appreciate is the way they treat you at airports. Newark was horrible. I walked a million miles, to customs..had to claim my luggage then get it back to check it in. And that, my friends, was pure Hell.
Delta's check in was swamped. It was all self-service kiosks but let me tell you right now, there are a bajillion folks out there who have no idea how to use those kiosks and need help. I needed to ask a question, that's all. "Is it too early to check my bag in for a flight that's five hours away?"
I asked that and the woman, this older (much) black lady, short and dour looking, haggard, took my itinerary and walked off with it. (I had another copy, but still...) then she got swamped by very rude large loud black hoodlums asking her questions. She asked one of them to move so she could get to the kiosk but he refused. So she reached under him and managed.
Somehow she got me settled while answering a million questions from this group of ill-dressed hoodlums and then she told me it was fifteen bucks to check my bag in.
So... I gave her a twenty and she took off with it. She came back a while later with my change and I thanked her profusely and told her to have a nice week. I wish I'd gotten her name. She was a big help in that sea of rude Americans.
I hauled my carry ons a million miles away to the gate and sat there listening to power saws twenty feet away ...I couldn't hear my iPod. *note to self: noise canceling head phones!*
I did the whole "look around frantically for a hot wall outlet* thing; I kept finding outlets that worked for five minutes then didn't. I suppose that was the construction. They do have cell charging stations : not ideally situated for laptops but, I managed to find a seat near an outlet and got online, which cost me seven and a bit. But it was a lifesaver. I was ready to pull my hair out. It's not a friendly or pleasant airport, to say the least.
Nor the cleanest. It was cool seeing the Statue of Liberty way off in the distance, and the Isle of Manhattan. Too bad I didn't have the guts to go exploring, I certainly had the time. But really I panic if I'm not at the gate sitting listening to the people behind the desks.
Finally got on the plane for Atlanta . It was Air Italia, no tv or anything. An old plane. It was a two hour flight, I read most of the way: got to Atlanta and had...many many meters to walk. I could have used the moving sidewalks but needed to stretch my legs. LONG LONG walk to the proper terminal but I was still pretty much ok...however another long layover and another search for outlets. Finally found one, near a seat, and that helped tremendously, being online sure helps when you are too knackered to think straight, too tired to walk about, but lonely and wanting to be connected. Too tired to read.
Atlanta is a pretty nice airport. It's big! I was not prepared for it to be so bloody hot. When I finally got on the plane for Huntsville it was getting pretty late and I was feeling done in. Tiny plane, I had the seat next to me empty so I snoozed a bit, and woke up to the plane landing.
It was so hot when I walked out of the airport I thought I was going to cry. Truly, I just sat on the sidewalk and held in the tears. I didn't want to be there, looking across at the big, fat, loud, sloppy, crude cab drivers waiting for fares...they were gross ...and made me remember the taxi drivers in Glasgow & East Kilbride. All were older men who were very clean, polite, neat. And if they did listen to the radio it was softly. The taxis were immaculate and the drivers professional.
Anyhow, my sister showed up and she had brought her bloody dogs. The dogs went ballistic and I was not in the mood, not at all. And my sister started talking about our mum and I had to tell her I was not in the mood. She started in saying inane, totally inane things and I wanted to choke her.
I guess I have to reaclimate.

Highland girl

2009-08-02T03:28:00.002-05:00

Here is a little video of a girl dancing to the pipe band we heard last night in Strathpeffer. She was adorable.

this is redonkulous

2009-07-27T16:53:00.002-05:00

She wrote me back. About four sentences, a paltry submission, and I'm totally happy. How frustrating it is to be human and ruled by emotions. Well...I'm not ruled by my emotions but they sure do have their say. They sure do let me know they are unhappy when not around certain people...how on earth can I be as happy without her as I can with her?
Isn't that the 50,000 dollar question! How , other than using drugs or alcohol, can a person be as elated as I am when I am around her, when I'm alone?
UGH. I got my return email and it gives me nothing to go on and now I'm back at square one and I have to just let it go.
This is crazy. I am so glad I'll be on a plane sleeping most of the day tomorrow. Although, if I am on a plane and the plane has wifi, you KNOW I'll be duty bound to email her from the plane if only to say, "I'm on a plane emailing you! Isn't that cool!"

The howl within

2009-07-27T05:44:00.002-05:00

Yes, I have been silently howling. The pain is great: I miss her. It has been a hard hard week-end, and I am officially joining the ranks of the zombie. However, I haven't the strength to shuffle about seeking braaaaaaiiiinnns. I suppose I shall starve.
I was riding a gargantuan high being around her every night; seeing her lifted me and transported me and all that happy crap. Saturday was surely the worst day I've had in a long time: Friday night I had no sleep whatsoever: due to her, my thinking of her, and agitating and cogitating over asking her to be my friend, anticipating missing her, all that claptrap.
Saturday morning I went in to work and I do not remember driving there which means I should have called in sick. But there is no one to come in for me. Except my boss, who doesn't answer his phone until ...whenever. So I went in, and tried to work. Oh hell, I did work. I worked hard for three hours. It was busy as all hell. I did a lot of work in those three hours. I broke three monkey dishes and I managed to gouge a hunk out of my hand (the dishmachine has sharp edges: all I was doing was reaching in to get some dishes out. )Then I rushed home and got ready just in time . I was not in a good space when she came to pick me up; but once we got to the theater and got everything ready and sat down it was all fine.
When I saw my sister she blew up at me, cussing me out in front of some of the backstage crew, which of course made me look around to make sure SHE wasn't in earshot: oh please, universe, don't let her see this horrible drama unfolding, this dysfunctional unfunness.
I went and immediately called my sponsor, the only thing for me to do when my sister does that kind of thing. It's highly dysfunctional in my opinion to say the F word in a sentence at top voice while yelling at your sibling in front of adults in a supposedly creative and fun setting. I talked to my sponsor for the better part of an hour. SHE was listening in. I wanted her to hear , I was glad she was listening. She heard how I talk to my sponsor, it was made clear I did not buy into that yelling and screaming and cussing in front of adults thing.
After the first show we had espresso and scones...she had made scones especially for the interval between shows. I had brought my espresso machine. We set up a table and had coffee and scones. It was heaven, although the whole time I was on edge from wishing it would last a while longer. I was hyper aware. I was hating myself for not just relaxing and soaking it in but I also knew it was too surreal and not going to last.
Some time during the last show I got up the nerve to ask her if she wanted to be friends outside the theater and she said yes, that we had already done the coffee thing, and I said we could hike, she said that would be great since her hubby doesn't like hiking. He doesn't like bugs. :)
So... I managed to ask her, she said yes. But ... she has a history of not responding to my emails and I don't expect her to actually go hiking with me...
Yesterday I managed to make it to the strike. We unloaded the truck, and I watched her; I showed off. I went to help a guy lift the chop saw; I asked him if the saw was stable on top of the chest it was sitting on or should we carry it separately. He said, separately, but that it was "Heavy as all get the hell out". I said, 'Define heavy...is it, a hundred and fifty pounds?' he said, "No..." and I lifted up my end and found it to weight about the same as a full bus tub at work. I said "Oh, you had me worried. This is not heavy in the least."
I carried every heavy thing I could get my (torn up) hands on. I made her laugh when I was unwrapping the breakables and tossing the newspaper over my shoulder in a fusillade. I was leaving, and looked at her and said "So we'll go hiking when I get back" and she said she would be gone for most of August. I said "after that then" and she said yeah but I don't see it happening.
I think she shined me on. I'm so frustrated and now I'm so sad: my heart is pining for her, and I'm actually crying. And it's just the stupidest situation I have gotten myself into in a long time. There is no help for it but to get on that plane tomorrow and weep all the way to Scotland. Although I'm sure I'll be done weeping by the time I get to Detroit.

Couldn't do it.

2009-07-24T23:02:00.000-05:00

Oh and I had the chance to ask. But I couldn't do it. Ok...so...turns out I'm a coward. I give myself one more chance: during the break between shows tomorrow. I'll have a couple of hours to ask her while we eat the scones and drink the espresso.
The phone thing is bugging me: she said if I changed my mind about riding with her tomorrow to email her before 12:30. I said I could not email her , as I'd be working. What is the deal with her not giving out her phone number?
She also talked about being "so fucked up in the head" right now...AND that her father is an alcoholic: in recovery.
I'm starting to see the light.
At any rate, tomorrow, if I don't ask her, I'll be the sorriest excuse for a human being there ever was and the opportunity may not arise for another seven months.

Mom's birthday

2009-07-24T16:36:00.000-05:00

I happened to be reading an old text on my cell when my mom called me today at work: I'm so glad I caught the call: she was crying. She had just opened her gift box and found the BOSE WAVE II radio inside. She was 'blown away'.
Now that friends is a great gift given to me by my Higher Power and Sobriety through the program: able to coordinate with cousins in Australia and buy my mom a fancy schmancey radio she's been wanting for some time.
It cost a lot of money and it was totally so worth it I'm already trying to figure out what to get her next year.
:)
I've decided to go with the spirit of the day and give myself a treat: I'm going to ask that gal to be my friend. Whatever she says, I need to do this.
I am not a coward, and I do not back away from a fight. What is the fight? The fight to meet decent people in this cultural desert and keep them in my life at all costs.

LE SIGH

2009-07-23T23:30:00.000-05:00

Let's see... I waited all day for the moment I'd get in her car. When I saw her pull up I was mostly ready to go: she was three minutes early so I had to pull my phone off the charger and ...by that time she was at my door. I had not expected her to come to the door.
I told her it was open and she stepped in. There she was inside my house for only a brief moment but it was enough to shake me. I handed her a crinkly plastic grocery bag and said "This is for you."
She said "What is it?" and I said "Chicken salad." But that wasn't enough, I had to go on: "it's from the first batch I made today, and no utensils have touched it, no one has breathed on it, it was only exposed to air for about long enough for me to mix it up." "Well your hands touched it" she said. "I had gloves on" I replied. "Oh".
Then we got into the car and ... wow it is a nice nice car. So clean and so sleek and ...she started to talk about how her car is very neat and her house is NOT.
And I was in her car and time was suspended and I was trying to analyze how and why it had gotten to that point where I was in her car and making it such a big bloody deal. I barely said two words the whole way to the theater. If I did talk, I don't remember.
when we got out I made sure to linger by the door and not follow her in. Then through out the play we were sharing stuff about Zombie films and she said something about how the best part of "The Night of the Living Dead" was when the girl ate her father. (hhmm...)
And then she went on to say that she wanted to see a sit-com about Zombies. How there would be a goldfish floating upside down in the fish bowl. A Zombie goldfish.
And I said, "oh it would be just like on the "YOUNG ONES" when they zoom in on a matchbox and the matchbox says "Don't look at me, I'm irrelevant!"
You should have seen her eyes when I mentioned the YOUNG ONES. She got so excited ... and then she was viewing clips from the Young Ones on her iPhone on You Tube while people were trying to talk to us. I was saying "NEIL! Vivian!" and making her laugh.
At that point I realized I was totally fucked. She likes the YOUNG ONES as much as I do. Maybe more.
She said she was in therapy, that she had just started going. She said her husband wouldn't like for her to go to the cast party tomorrow night.
Oh no, this is not good and it's going to be over in two days. It will get more intense with every passing moment and then Saturday we'll say goodbye like we did at Rocky Horror.
Then I'll forget about her except for the occasional thought; until we do the next show ... in seven months. Good grief. I'm glad it's almost over.
I was getting out of the car and she said "Same time tomorrow. And I'll be expecting more food."
Then she zoomed off into the night in her Mazda. I truly need to cut my losses here.

Thanks, BOSE

2009-07-19T09:41:00.000-05:00

I ordered a BOSE radio for my mom yesterday. It was over 400 dollars all together; what with the gift box, the 2nd day air shipping... my mom has mentioned going over to a friend's house and listening to their BOSE radio and wishing she could have one.
Her life is pretty simple and she has few pleasures but she does like to listen to her radio at night to fall asleep or while she is sculpting...and she thought it would be nice to listen to such a nice radio that comes in so clear.
Well, my cousin in Australia asked to get in on it and they sent a hundred and ten bucks. I told my brother I would say the radio was from him although I would not ask for any money from him since I owe him money.
Well I was stressing about the huge purchase this close to leaving for Scotland ...Since I wanted to have some extra money in the bank just in case. Guess what? BOSE takes installment payments. I put a hundred and some odd dollars down, and now I get to make payments. Of course I'll pay it all off soon as I can but it's so great not having to give them four hundred bucks off the bat.
So...that was such a relief. I'm sending the radio a couple of days earlier than her birthday but maybe she won't open it until then... who knows. I'm just glad it's taken care of. I don't think I've ever sent her anything decent for her birthday. One year I did send her some Alaskan coffee beans... and some salmon.
My brother was like "What day is her birthday on?"
My roommate is leaving for Chile today... I'll miss him. He's a great great guy and I'm suddenly sad he is leaving but it will be nice to be alone for a while and do some soul searching and hopefully some decent cooking that I would feel too nervous about with someone in the house. I always feel like if I cook I get in the way. I need to feel comfortable in my own place. I keep forgetting that this time I'm on the lease, paying nearly half, (he has the larger bedroom and pays a little bit more)... this is not me sponging off someone, this is me living life like a real person. And I need to take control of my own life and do some cooking, in my own place, get comfortable with it. Sit and watch some TV in my own living room, instead of hiding in my bedroom.

Messages from the universe

2009-07-18T09:09:00.000-05:00

My brother is not particularly good at taking messages from the universe. He had a boxer and said boxer got out quite a bit, chasing the neighbor's cows. Brother bought an invisible fence but never got around to putting it in.
Boxer got shot by neighbor and neighbor buried boxer, in neighbor's yard. Brother went over and dug it up while neighbor watched.
Brother got another boxer, soon after. That dog got run over by a car in front of my brother's house.
Brother got another boxer. That boxer got out last night, when my brother took it over to a friend's house to spend the night. One of friend's kids left the gate open during the night (?) and ...despite the fact that my brother KNOWS I am exhausted and desperately need my rest after the most excruciatingly hard week I've had since working commercial construction...he calls twice to tell me he needs help looking for his dog, which is in my neighborhood. I gotta tell you, that dog...has ZERO discipline and runs around like a whirling dervish, the tasmanian devil of cartoon fame... oh, it does not bode well for that dog, it's probably on a plane to Zimbabwe by now. Seriously, that dog is probably running itself right to death with its freedom. My brother wants me to put 'an ad in the times' with a reward.
Every time his dog gets out or gets killed it becomes a huge family -wide crisis because he has no one in his life to share these things with.
I do not want to get out of bed, but I fear I must. There is no telling where that dog is...

The glimpse

2009-07-12T13:53:00.003-05:00

So this is what it is like to live alone: you turn on the radio, make espresso, have a bagel that was given to you by a very nice friend in another city who came 90 minutes to help you move.
You clean and you putter about imagining what you might put on the porch in the way of plants while you chuckle and guffaw to "Prairie Home Companion" then "Car Talk"... you make Jell-O and look forward to eating it while you watch a movie you got on Netflix.
You make a list of things you need for your upcoming trip to the UK while waiting for the heat to abate outside just enough that a walk about the neighborhood would not be totally uncomfortable in every way.
you put away your laundry and find yourself stopping to listen to an opera aria on PHC. You check your email and Facebook and notice that your friend in Nottingham has made a comment on something you wrote earlier about Anthony Bourdain and you get to thinking about travel which is something you have always done out of desperation and very very seldom out of pure desire, just for entertainment and soul searching.
My 'other brother' Tom called me earlier. I was stumped by the area code but when I heard his voice on the voice mail I was stunned. I have not talked to Tom in a very long time. I have not seen Tom in so long it breaks my heart.
Tom gave me much advice about Scotland and it seems that my plans are good ones, founded in good advice from people on twitter. It was good to get his nod.
Tom says that if "mom" wasn't in Kentucky he would go coach in Scotland , in a New York Minute. He loves it that much. He told me to start a travel journal and so I have thought of going to find a good one today at the mall. Also want to get some vitamins from GNC so I very well might venture to the dreaded dreaded mall.
Tom sounds so much like his sister C. in his speech patterns it always makes me think of the time I first laid eyes on Tom and "mom"...they were sitting on C's loft bed in her apartment in Richmond ... they were visiting C. and had stayed to observe the first reading of "The Nose". I remember young young Tom and younger mom up on the loft bed looking down at us and laughing often.
Tom is very busy as a coach and said something about his team being on NBC later tonight for something. I wish I had paid more attention to that but I don't know if I would actually watch ...
At any rate, it was good to talk to my 'other' brother and he does sound very well. He's been to Europe quite a few times and he loves it. I am sure he does. I bet I do too.

Love

2009-07-10T21:04:00.000-05:00

It seems when people talk of love, or make videos about love, or songs, there is great imagery, momentous upheaval, wings and skyrockets, flashpots and fog machines symbolizing some great longing and a desire to own and to conquer.
I'd love to make a video about love that was nothing more than a photograph every day of the same spot in the heavens.
That's love, my friends. Never changing its position but always changing its relationship to the earth. The stars don't move about us, we move about the stars, as we move about love: it's a fixed and unknown thing. Can't get rid of it, it just is.

down

2009-07-04T22:31:00.000-05:00

I have not been this down for quite some time. I worked today, we closed at eleven but everyone bolted and left me there alone to clean. Which is what usually happens but today it hurt more than usual. I worked so hard all morning, busting my ass and giving everything I had just to keep up... all those people having breakfast before they enjoyed a nice cookout somewhere, hanging out with their families. Me,
I went home and laid down and napped. Then I watched "American Gangster"; now I am house sitting for my sister.
I'm so lonely. And I simply can't think of anyone I could call to hang out with. There simply isn't anyone that is good for me to be with. Only my roommate, who is... well I can't figure him out. He was glued to the computer all day doing something with math.
I guess I could have asked him if he wanted to have dinner but I'm so down, so tired and so lonely; lonely for ... the company of a lover.
Yesterday I was sitting on the porch reading. My roommate came home and went inside, then a car pulled up and a cute woman my age got out and walked up, saying she had come by to meet me.
Roommate came out, and sat down on the steps, and this woman sat there too, and we all chatted a bit. Turns out she has a woman's writer's group, and her hubby is a magician. The writer's group has now been mentioned about five times and I still don't have any contact info for it. Why push it if you aren't going to tell me where and when?
I was amazed that there were 3 of us sitting on the porch: rare that that ever happens around here, well not with the people I know.
I went inside to eat and told Dave I was afraid that a party would assemble if I sat out there much longer: while we were all sitting there a friend of theirs walked by on his way home from the drum circle at the coffee shop.
This house sitting is for the BIRDS but it's the only way I can get unlimited internet until the 7th when I get my cable hooked up.
Man I'd give just about anything to be sitting having dinner with a partner. I do miss it, that's for sure.
I told my story last Tuesday at an AA meeting. It was quite ...weird. I kept getting very lost. but, now those people know me way better. My friend L came and that was pretty cool.

Moved

2009-06-28T21:00:00.002-05:00

I have been housesitting for my sister the past two nights...she's taking care of a client that requires sis to stay over night. This morning I got up and went to my old place and got my stuff ready for moving... my roommate was still in bed. I'd told her I was coming, and with people.
My friend came from Birmingham to help me move which I am very grateful for... my brother showed up first and took immediate charge and brooked no nonsense. We got all my major stuff over to the new place with his and her help and then he split and she and I moved the rest of the stuff.
We had just enough time left to go see 'The Taking of Pelham 123' and then she had to bolt to go home.
My brother and my friend got to meet my new roommate. And now I'm back house sitting and tomorrow night will be my first night at my new place. I won't have internet for a few days I guess, until Knology comes by to hook up my cable/internet. I'll have my own basic cable, I've never had cable before.
so I'm living in a grown-up house with a very smart roommate and living in a very decent neighborhood where people walk around for exercise.
I feel good. I'm tired and overwhelmed with gratitude to those who helped me move today; tomorrow I have to go up to my brother's to take photos of his extra cars so I can make an ad to put on Craigslist so I will be missing rehearsals unfortunately.
Anyhow, it's so good to have such a great friend as M.
She even brought me a bag full of great books which will come in handy ...I'm almost done with this current book.
I sure wish I had another day off! Oh I could sure use it.

How can I explain....

2009-06-25T15:59:00.000-05:00

When there are few words I can choose... (thanks Erasure).
I don't know how to put it into words. I've been mulling it over all day trying to think of a turn of phrase that would describe how it is, how it was to see her.
For one thing it was as though we had grown old together, seeing her at this age did not seem weird to me at all.
All day I have grasped and groped for that one sentence or sentence fragment that might give a reader a clue as to how it is to see someone you loved so thoroughly, so all uncompromisingly, and to be wrapped in that feeling all over again, in its full intensity, as though we had never parted.
I can only liken it to traveling in a very hot car with the sun beating down upon you for years and suddenly the air conditioner starts working again for a bit. The cold arctic blast that refreshes and enlivens, the 'other' ...the newness of it, the awake of it.
And then the air slowly loses its chill and you find yourself back to the sweaty itchy humid air you had before. And all you can dream of is that cold air that , although it froze your skin and made you uncomfortable in its extreme frigid temperature, was so ... unexpected and delightful that even though you KNOW you could not stand it for long , you want it back.
You want it blowing on your face.
Yeah, it's like that. There is no middle ground, no off button, no slider that reduces the cold, mixes the air to make it comfy.
When I'm around her, it's ON, baby, ON... and I'm sitting there staring, staring at one part of her as though it were the thing I needed to memorize in order to gain the keys to the kingdom. Her lower teeth, her bra strap. Her hands. One glance frozen in time and etched onto the retinas for life. Or at least until I see her again.
And I cannot tell her this. She would not like to know that it is the same for me as when we parted: the only difference, now I know how to deal with it, live with it as though I lived with a super-power I can't tell anyone about. I do, and it's called real love, that does not diminish, and won't diminish.
When I carried her groceries into her house it was the most surreal sensation: at once the most natural thing in the world and the most unexpected and strange: like walking into a MacDonald's somewhere in Nepal or Tibet. And finding enlightenment in the french fry oil.
I"m making no sense because there is no sense to be made here. It is what it is, and it is irreversible, it's a foundation, a wall, a river, clouds. It's velvet and cactus: it's everything and it is nothing.
Why I was selected for this thing, this love, I don't know, but I was. It happened to me, and I am at once grateful for it and cursed. It is the quintessential YIN/YANG situation.
And I vow to always meet it with gratitude and acceptance.

Sham Meh

2009-06-21T17:16:00.001-05:00

Upon arriving at my destination in Kentucky I was told that C. was waiting for us at a restaurant. We had to try to hurry before it got too crowded. I was amazed: had not expected C. to have dinner with us.
It was quite a nice Ethiopian place. You use some flat bread that is rolled up and looks like a cross between a crepe and a pancake... to sop up any juice or to pick up the delicious food with. Sort of like a ...shammy.
I said something about wanting to video a Sham-Wow commercial but that I was restraining myself in order not to embarrass mom. C. said something about the flat bread wasn't a vibrant enough color to be a sham-wow, it was more like----- wait for it----- a 'Sham Meh'.
We lost it. We were cracked up. I had to lay my head down on the table and I managed to stifle all but one snort.
I saw C. again the next morning when she brought me a big pot of coffee; and again later that day when she had dinner with mom and I, and then we went Ogering (the Kroger sign used to be neon, and the KR was once burned out. "Let's go OGERING"... was the in joke at the time) and went to her house.
I helped carry in the groceries and met the dogs and we had lovely refreshing diluted cranberry juice with lemon (or was it lime?) slices.
And sat and talked into the night until half past midnight: it was glorious. I do love spending time with her... it was almost like old times.
She looks fantastic, and I wish I could have spent more time talking but it was way past my bedtime. As I was leaving I noticed my coyote table was right by the front door. She says it has been there ever since she moved there. I am happy to see it is still in use.
All is right with the world.
ETA: how I wish I could have packed her up in my backpack and carried her home with me to gaze upon a little bit longer...

Poor Boss

2009-06-19T09:06:00.000-05:00

My boss just called. It's 9:00 a.m. I could not figure out why he would be calling : I thought maybe he was going to wish me a good trip to Kentucky.
He was wondering where I was. He had forgotten that I was leaving today. I had put a note up on his wall by his desk and cleared it with him. We had talked about it. Last week, on Friday, I said to him "Next week at this time I will be leaving for Louisville".
I think I covered all my bases and yet I still feel guilty. The poor guy has no dishwasher and he's going to be having a hard day today if he doesn't find someone.
I feel for him but I think reminding him a week ago was good enough on my part. I shouldn't have to remind him daily leading up to my departure. The guy is so flying by the seat of his pants it is incredible. And to think I thought he was calling to wish me a bon voyage.
lol

OFF I GO

2009-06-16T22:01:00.001-05:00

So, tomorrow I go off to Kentucky. I must say, it's the first time I've had three days off that I wasn't very sick. (at this job, that is)

The right move

2009-06-14T13:15:00.000-05:00

Oh if I had any doubts about moving...
Last night I went over to my sister's to watch her dogs while she worked an overnight shift with a client. I stayed there from eight pm to noon today: came home a bit after noon, and...my roommate was still (is still, actually)in bed. Her bedroom is next to mine: her door was ajar, and her dogs came out of the room and burst into MY room as I tried to enter it, they came in my room, the dirty smelly bastards, jumping all over me and my stuff.
Made me drop my laptop case. I laughed it off...she actually did yell at them and tell them to quit.
When I came in the house, the living room smells like dog, and the kitchen: dog poop and dog pee all over the floor. So much for my appetite. I'm totally disgusted with this house.
And now there are six cats. I'm trying to keep a pleasant demeanor but it seems that she isn't even going to get up anytime today and let her dogs go outside.
I'm grossed out. I don't know how you can live like that. I'm guessing depression.
Untreated.

DREAM

2009-06-07T14:12:00.000-05:00

When I woke up I was in a dream. In the dream I was working in a kitchen not unlike the one I work at now only much bigger. The same folk were there, and a few more. I was on a search through the chaotic mess for my mop. There were 3 mops. One for the dining room, one for the slop sink, and one for the kitchen. I had to have it. Trying to find it was proving difficult but I was on a mission. On my mission I encountered many flirts from people, many jokes, it was a good light atmosphere at work.
Then I turned around : I had heard TOM's voice. I looked at Tom and he was walking in the door with C.
My heart lept up and I felt a bit dizzy. There she was, walking into my kitchen. Her hair was short, and she was wearing a skirt (unheard of back in the day) and a black leather jacket, quilted at the shoulders. Also a scarf. (It must have been winter!)
She walked in and began asking if the food was good, was she going to regret eating there..I was still fiddling with my mop. I looked at her in wonder. I had conjured her into my dream world.
So good to see her that I lost contact with the floor. I was reassuring her that the food was ok to eat, that I would make her any thing she desired. She was smiling so broadly that I remember thinking in the dream, "There are those famous teeth, that famous smile." Ear to ear with the grin, and I was trying not to run up and hug her so hard that it embarassed us both.
We made each other laugh in that small time span. And I woke up very reluctantly, still seeing her standing there smiling at me from ear to ear.
I hope that means she will be in Lousville when I go.

whew

2009-06-04T19:51:00.000-05:00

I have too much going on. I am signing the lease this week, putting stuff into boxes...going to Louisville in two weeks, and doing the actual move that week following.
I will have three weeks in my new place to settle in before taking off for Scotland. I have to register for fall semester at Drake the second week of July as well.
Rehearsals have started for Blythe Spirit and now I don't know that I can do much for the show when it opens. I will go to rehearsals on Monday to see what will be needed.
I have bitten off a great deal of life this summer. IT's a far cry from what I thought the summer would be. This is moving forward and having some fun. When my future roommate goes to Chile for six months in August: I will be living completely alone in a house for half a year. And only paying half the rent. It will be a heaven I have not ever had in my life before... the closest I have come is living in my own mobile home on my mom's property: not quite the same, but I did have the place to myself. However it was delapidated and I never knew if the roof was going to fall in and therefore I was afraid to buy a decent tv or even a radio, LOL...
This is a NICE house I'm moving into. Tiny but NICE. And there is a woodshop I can use...I would love to make some nice shelves for the tiny room I'll be in.
Maybe I can find some wood projects... get back into that sort of thing Maybe do some wood carving again.
The possibilities are endless...
My sister told me her alcoholic boyfriend is incommunicado...so she's not going to go see him like she thought she was, and probably not moving up there. He promises her the world until she actually goes UP there to see him and then he's a dick.
So...she's thinking we might want to try moving in together after all but I'm singing a six month lease this week. I told her to hang in there for six months, because after that it's a month to month lease. I'm pretty sure my future roomie only wants a roommate because he's going to Chile for six months and doesn't want that strain on his bank account while he's not working, hence the SIX MONTH lease (I hope he doesnt think I don't see that).
So...maybe my sister and I can find a really nice big place for cheap, a fixer-upper with a yard, like what I live in now MINUS the roommate that never gets off the couch> and whose dogs bark incessantly.

Not too bad

2009-05-30T23:31:00.000-05:00

All in all it was an ok day. I got a text message first thing from Larry. That was really sweet. it said how nice the morning was and how it was all due to the twelve steps and our higher power. And it said for me to have a nice day.
I saw him at work when I got there, he was animated about renting some gangster costumes (my idea) to take photos to post to our Facebook profile for Mafia Wars. I thought it sounded like a fun idea. Maybe we could do it on Halloween.
The day was very busy for me. Two cooks, three servers, one dishwasher. You do the math: I was very busy. VERY. I keep telling myself I am getting stronger and stronger: I'm a rock. A solid rock. Well, parts of me are flabby but...most of me is rock.
Later on after work I got a text from my sister asking me to come over and watch a movie and eat dinner. She cooked a delicious flank steak and some sweet potatoes. Delicious. I've found I dig the Splenda brown sugar if not the white stuff. The Splenda brown is great on sweet taters. Must have more.
The steak was really good and the movie was...North something. Oh what was it...James Woods...Kyle McLaughlin... Northface, no, Northpark?
It was sort of Twin Peaksy. Pretty cool movie. But you know, although it was cool to have a steak and watch a movie with my sister, when someone calls she feels compelled to answer it. I feel like ...hey, turn the phone off when I'm over, you know? I come over rarely. And that's why it's so rarely... she's always on the phone with someone. I do not like that. I turn my phone off when I'm hanging with someone.
Well, I'm going to try to go to bed. It's been a sober and not too fucked up day.

Mafia Wars

2009-05-25T19:15:00.000-05:00

I don't understand, but I want to.
I've been alone most of the week-end, resting my back, relaxing, watching movies. No one called me or anything. I just laid around resting. I needed it.
I got excited though because late last night I was on Facebook playing Mafia Wars and my friend L (the one who sent me the plumber who fixed our bathroom) was on too and he IM'ed me asking me some questions about Mafia Wars which I could not answer online, I told him I had to get him to a computer and show him some tricks, like how to bookmark on Firefox etc.
Anyhow, I told him I'd meet him at the noon meeting, and we'd go afterward to a computer. In the IMs it was said we'd go to his house,after the meeting. When I went to the noon meeting he was not there, and I was sadly disappointed. I had had some trepidation about going with him to his house but the more I thought about it the more happy I was to be taken into his inner circle, as he is a great guy but so hard to know, I was happy for the 'in' link to him, I wanted to get to know him, look around his house, meet his dog. Because I know so little about him.
At any rate, at the end of the meeting I realized he was sitting in the back row..he'd snuck in. We went to his place of business. We had to rush through the things I wanted to show him and then he had to take an employee home so...I found myself being thrust into some loneliness. I had thought we were going to bond a little bit. It didn't happen, and I feel pretty let down.
I am going to tell him that. I really was hoping to get him in some conversation and get to know him but that will have to wait I guess.
AT any rate I got to see his business and it's pretty nice. (skating rink). I want to go there sometime and hang out. But I don't skate....

Zombeh

2009-05-24T13:23:00.000-05:00

So...I am a zombeh today. It's raining. I'm not up for a damn thing. Other than researching rain wear for Scotland.
Do I need to buy a serious rain coat for Scotland? I'm told that the wind makes umbrellas impossible to use. I'm told that the wind and the rain can make the summer days COLD. Well, damnnit, I wish I had my artic gear from Alaska but *sigh* I do not.
So...I'm perusing Cabella's, Lands' End...etc.
I will probably end up going to that hunting goods store up the parkway...get me something on sale I Hope.
Something that will keep rain out. And that I can store my wallet and sunglasses in...
(Not that I'll need the sunglasses eh)
I won't be carrying around my backpack, or I might, just might line it in plastic.
I'm being told by the folks over at Scotster.com that the jacket is a necessity, bar none.
Also they tell me that there are no dogs in the pubs.

Heart Shaped Box

2009-05-22T18:21:00.001-05:00

I keep my hopes and dreams and fantasies locked tightly in a box. Sometimes I surf the web and come across things going on in other cities and I shut it out. I click on something else. I can't watch while other people LIVE ..I'm merely surviving right now.
I have such hopes for the future, if only I can stay on track and finish school.
But my heart and my soul are so hungry for stimulation.

Printed the ticket

2009-05-17T10:44:00.002-05:00

Well, I printed the itinerary, not the ticket... I Guess I get the ticket when I go to the airport and scan my bar code.
At any rate it's now set in stone and it would set my mind at ease if I could get a phone number for one of my cousins in Scotland but at least I have their street address.
They did say to come on ahead. I'm assuming they said that after reading the itinerary I sent. I know it's bad to assume, but... well, worst case scenario, I have to take a train to East Kilbride. I'm guessing I can figure that all out.
I'm sick... I want to go to a doctor but it's Sunday, I just want to lay in bed. Are those walk in clinics open on Sunday? I bet they are. I'm also afraid of getting something worse by going there..such as SWINE FLU better and more affectionately known as H1N1. Someone said "H1N1? What is this, DROID flu?"
That cracked me up.
Spent some time with that maybe future roommate guy yesterday. He seems pretty fun. A little bit spacey, but that's ok. however I don't think I'll be riding in his car again anytime soon.
He's got an ok older import BUT the windshield wipers are falling apart, and I'm pretty sure we took our lives in our hands driving me back in that downpour. lol
I met his landlord. I know I would like it there BUT I can't get past the fact he has no internet or cable. I don't know if I can afford to pay that extra ... in fact I'm sure I can't. Unless he comes up with an alternate plan such as we split a cable/internet bill, I dont see how I can swing it.
Right now I pay 350, everything included. Granted, the a/c is shit. And the internet is ...iffy sometimes. The fridge doesn't work too well. There's a dog tied up in the kitchen.
however, I'm going to pay 300, plus utilities, plus some kind of internet hookup. Twenty more if I use my cell as a modem. Sixty or so more if I get a hookup.
If only I could get him to go in half on internet.Maybe I can.
I think I need high speed for school this fall. I'm pretty sure dial up would drive me insane although he said it wasn't as slow as dial up he said it wasn't as fast as DSL.
Maybe he can let me try out his laptop and see how slow it is.
I'm excited about Scotland and finally , C is out of my head. I had a few days of insane rambling thoughts but it's all under control now. *whew*
I wonder why my 8 key isnt sticking now. It was for a while and now it's not.
I'm so not wanting to go back to work tomorrow. I so wish for that week off NOW. It's so hard to go in there knowing how hot it is going to be by the middle of the day. and the flies are getting bad despite the screen door. I fear he's going to make us shut the screen door soon due to the fly problem. At which point it will be even hotter. And his second hand smoke will be even worse.
This guy sees nothing wrong with smoking in his office while people eat out in the dining room thinking they are in a smoke free place. He sees nothing wrong with me working in that airless, hot room and not having any prep space and no one ever mops the floor ..that's what the flies are attracted to no doubt..the floor in the kitchen which I can only mop on Mondays. Because I'm the only one who does it and that is the only day we're not open at night.
I am so burned out. I'm glad i have Scotland to look forward to!
It was so funny when possible future roommate dude came into my room to check out how I live. He poked his head in and , thinking it was my ROOMMATE's room, said "Is she a PUNK?"
I said "that's my room. I'm a punk, you gotta problem wid dat?"
LOL

Glasgow/Inverness/Strathpeffer

2009-05-13T03:58:00.000-05:00

I could not sleep so I got online. It turns out to be a good thing I did. Apparently my cousin Luke only gets online when he's at work. So although it was three a.m. here, it was eight a.m. in Strathpeffer. So I caught him on Skype. Good thing Skype lets you use IM ... I'd have woken up my roommate had I had to speak with Luke.
AT any rate, he says that Gran, Agnes that is, my mom's half sister, is in frail health but would love to meet me. Mum has prepared a scrapbook for Agnes; a scrapbook highlighting mum's dad, Joe Valli, who was a bit of a movie star in Australia back in the day.
I've yet to see Joe in a movie but apparently you can get copies of his movies from the film board in Australia, they will dip into the archives for you if you have a good enough reason. My cousin Wendy in Australia has been requesting them for a while. Too bad I can't take one of those over...
It looks like I will get into Glasgow, and stay at a hostel for a couple of days, Colin not having much room. Then Luke will pick me up and drive via Inverness to Strathpeffer.
He tells me it's the most dangerous road in Scotland! I wonder how it will feel to be driving along with my Scottish cousin in the highlands. I imagine it will be breathtaking and over way too fast.
I'll need, I imagine, an adaptor for my laptop; I'll need Scottish pounds; I'll need a bazillion power bars. This is going to be golden.
On the home front, the reason I can't sleep is that I have received not one but two emails from C.
And I also realized I have to change the name of my blog. She didn't say "What if I pushed the harp over a hill?" That makes no sense! She must have said "What if I pushed the harp over a cliff?"
LOL. The first email was quite stiff, the way I'm used to them being, but the second one was flowing and open. And she said she wants to meet me. And about twenty years of love for her that never dissapated has begun to flow out in tears. I have no idea what will happen if we meet. I don't even know if she'll be in town when I go: she might be at a dramatic workshop with a university.
What if she hugs me and kisses me on the neck like she did last time? Will I be able to stand?
What if we sit and talk into the wee hours? What if... oh, the what ifs. I have to let this whole thing go, as there is no telling what will happen or if she'll even be in town. But the emotions are rolling back and my love for her, having been on a slow boil for two decades, continues to bubble, bubble, toil and trouble.
You can't deny that two decades is a long time. And just a few words on a computer screen can turn me into a driveling idiot...it's like she tossed a very hungry, very sad and lonely dog a juicy bone.
But then again, it would seem she was a lonely old dog herself... she spoke warmly of me. I know that I walk a thin line with her. I can only pray that if we do meet, I don't frighten her by blubbering and dissolving into an insipid puddle of goo.
There was one time at the height of our friendship, when things were mostly good, that we had been hanging out all night and I rose to leave. She hugged me and...the hug lasted for twenty minutes. I had my coat on but no matter: the sweat rolling down my back, we held tight.Very tight.
And we cried. And we cried. And between the sweat rolling down my back, the tears rolling down my cheeks, and the tears from her cheeks, I came away from that hug soaking wet but so full of her love that I wanted to be somebody.
I don't know what that hug was about but I always suspected it spoke volumes we couldn't say to one another. I fear that if I do see her again on this trip, if we have another one of those hugs, I may not come out of it intact.

You don't live rent free in my head anymore

2009-05-10T23:05:00.000-05:00

I'd sent C a short little email about how I was planning on coming to Louisville and how it would be cool to grab a latte and catch up if she was free during that time.
What I got back was a long diatribe about how she was still upset at her mom for allowing me into C's house when C wasn't there...(long story short: C wasn't home and I wanted to see the dog I'd helped train, the dog I'd called my soulmate for years and hadn't seen in years)...
Wow, that was back in '02 and C is still upset about it. And all her mom did was open the screen door so I could wave hi at Phoebe. OK, C feels totally violated at the invasion of privacy. Never mind that C is living in her mom's parents house rent free. OK, we fucked up grand.
C said she didn't want to go to dinner with me and her mom as that whole episode would be hanging over her head while mom and I pretend everything is hunky-dorey. Well.. guess what, C, everything IS hunky-dory.
For me, any way. So, I wrote back telling C it's cool if we meet up or cool if we don't, just wanted to give her a chance to meet and if not, she'll know I'm at mom's and won't be surprised or blind sided.
I also told her that the reason I wanted to see her was only to let her see me for once totally drama/drug/alcohol/worry/baggage free. I wanted her to see the me I have become, as I owe my recovery to her, well, she got me started on the road.
I told her I'd just wanted to thank her for putting me on that road, and then I said, well I've told you what I wanted to say in person so ...you feel free to meet with me or not as you see fit.
LOL, good lord. The student has far surpassed the master. I don't know what road to recovery SHE is on but I think she took the wrong fork in the road.
Sounds like a bitter person to me these days. I hate that for her but hey, we can't all be so buoyant as I am.
It's been about twenty or more years. This shit is OLD news. Ever heard of letting bygones be bygones? and her a supposed Buddhist?
LOL!
Anyhow, the good news in my life is good. I am rethinking going to live in Five Points. The guy called me back. He said he had met up with a LOT of people who wanted to rent the room from him but I was the only one he was seroiusly considering.
We had a long funny serious talk on the phone about politics and the sheeple and Carter and Reagan and ... the peace corps, etc etc. It was great. He told me he was going to be gone for six months in August.
I'm trying to imagine what living by myself in Five Points through a Huntsville Winter would be like. I imagine it would be totally glorious.
I think I would be in hog heaven.
I'm pretty sure I would dance around and sing to myself and be light and good.
Well my friend in B'ham has offered me a possible ticket to Glasgow.
My friend who I am driving up to L'ville with. I am looking forward to that trip... it's always good to see "mom".
I wish Tom (C's brother) could be there too but he lives ...where does he live now, Minnesota or something . I've known them for so long, watched him grow up...he's on my Facebook now, getting grey hair. My brother Tom.
Mom's excited about my visit and so am I..she's never seen me sober. Nor has she seen me totally happy with myself. She's going to fall over when she sees me with long hair.
At any rate my friend in Bham and I have these great phone conversations that I really enjoy so I imagine that the ride up will be fun. As fun as driving can be that is, it's not a great joy to me.
I'm happy to have found a friend in this state that is intelligent and decent and doesn't smoke pot or drink to excess or smoke . It's a great thing, having a friend.
I wish she and I both weren't so tired all the time and I wish we lived closer but it is what it is.
I take my compass test for school this Tuesday, I wonder if he's going to make me work that morning ... probably.
I wish I had teh whole day off. *sigh*
it's getting late but it's been an amazing Sunday. Usually I just watch TV but tonight I spoke with the new possible roommate, my mom, and my friend in Bham (M).
Even my mom was pleasant. It was such a good night.

MREs

2009-05-10T18:24:00.000-05:00

When I first bought my box o' meals, I was excited. I ate a couple, and then I sort of just walked by them all the time, wondering when I was ACTUALLY going to use them... I mean, the Zombie apocalypse seems to be taking its sweet time, and the great recession isn't really so bad as we had thought it might be so ...
A few days ago I decided to use one of the MRE heaters and ... wow. Those things are cool... you just tear the top off the bag, put the MRE in with the heater, pour in a little bit of water, close the bag, shake it some, and then ... let it get hot.
And it gets HOT. I ate a spaghetti MRE with one of the wheat bread rolls and some diced pears for dessert. It was pretty damn good...
And I've been eating them up pretty steadily since then. I have about ten heaters left and about thirty MRE meals.
I thought about what I had spent on the box of about 150 meals... seventy five or so bucks.
I think I actually came out pretty well on that deal, since I have been able to eat dinner after dinner out of that box.
IT appeals to my thrifty nature, my sense of adventure, and I get to not cook. It occurs to me that this might just be the way to go if one could afford it. Had I paid full price for those MREs it would have cost me a few hundred dollars.
Earlier the white trash neighbors were arguing up a storm. They went for a walk around the block apparently one trying to get away from the other but they ended up back at the house. He was saying that she hit him in the eye and she was saying "BUT I apologized!" over and over.
My roommate says she had talked to them earlier and the woman had just gotten a job but the guy doesn't have one and is feeling resentful.
I suppose the fact that they drink and smoke dope all day might have something to do with his not having a job.
I went to buy that bedframe yesterday and when I got home with it, the neighbors and their riff raff were standing in the street smoking so much dope it was making me worry about inhaling and driving.
one of them offered to help and I declined, mostly because I didn't want them to see any of my belongings in the house (I can see them seeing my laptop and wanting to steal it and sell it for dope money) but also because they were so high I could not see them navigating the stairs.
I've been looking on line for boxsprings: WHO KNEW they had these cool box springs that fold up, they are delivered in a box. You can put them together by hand, and the slats just roll out. Its' a 'foundation', and they are about two hundred odd dollars. I guess that would work pretty well...
I decided not to move to that place in Five Points: 1) I'd have to pay for laundry.
2) I would have to pay for internet
3) I would have to pay for cable OR buy a convertor box and antennae
4) The room is wicked small and the guy wanted to store his desk in there.
5) I would have to pay utilities
So... I think I will brave it here and just make the best of it. I would like to have a deck. I wonder how hard it would be to build a deck. I'm dreaming of course. No one is going to build a bloody deck on this ramshackle house.
I'm drinking a Mountain Dew Throwback. Tastes so good with real sugar in it. Who knew that one day a MTN DEW with sugar would be a rare treat.
We are so dependant on Highly Fucked Up Corn Syrup (as Terri Noble calls it)
I wrote my mom and then called her, no answer. I'm off the hook!
I hate talking to her. She sounds so small and feeble, although she's not feeble. She's just small.
She's gotten a bit of a dowager's hump the last few years, I hope I can avoid that... I had better get to that gym.
Need to go to Goodwill and take this stupid 'beach body' system my brother ordered off the tv or whatever. No one is going to use those rubber fucking bands to get in shape.
I need a treadmill OR a bowflex or just to go to the gym. I can use my sister's gym probably: I need to keep on that, get the number or the entrance card from her..
That would be my solution
I have simply not done much today. It takes me all of Sunday to feel normal again : my back to stop hurting, my head to stop pounding from the constant constant heavey lifting and running at work.
I had a delcious MRE and some MRE mashed potatoes and some MRE lemon poppy seed pound cake. I am totally suited to those things. For a snack I will have the diced pears or the pineaplle.
Makes it so I never have to come out of my room on Sunday if I dno't want although I did go get my bed frame off the bloody porch.

On the verge

2009-05-07T21:30:00.000-05:00

Man I'm on the verge of just packing up a duffel bag and taking the hell off. To where? that's what's stopping me... where would I go?
but I want to go just the same...

Kewl place

2009-05-05T21:17:00.000-05:00

So I went to meet this guy who turns out to be an engineer. (Well, he works with engineers...at any rate). He has a little cozy house in the coolest part of town. I like him, he's pretty cognizant. I was pretty honest about AA and my alcoholism and that I'm in Voc Rehab. If he is at all worried about rooming with a non-professional he didn't show it.
This fellow has a "Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead" poster on his fridge. His television has writing on it. And, a Joyce Carol Oates novel is on the coffee table.
There is a back deck. The room is small but it's a lovely area, very quiet, well maintained. There is some storage.
The guy has no cable. He reads. And plays tennis. I felt bad telling him I don't recreate much other than walking and volunteering for theater. But he does understand my love for the internet. He uses his phone as a modem. I've been wanting to try to do that myself...he uses Ubuntu. I'd like to learn that too.
Anyhow he did say that he would like to talk again so.. here's hoping.
I like him. He's a very cool dude.

Five Points

2009-05-04T17:56:00.000-05:00

Got a call from the guy in Five Points this afternoon. He was quizzing me about me. I can imagine he might be a bit concerned about me not being a professional: but that doesn't guarantee much these days...in the recession it appears that diners are doing quite well.
At any rate we're to meet tomorrow afternoon and I'm to see the place. It's three blocks from Star Market. I will love that. I looked it up on google maps street view: Lovely! A garage being used as a shop, too... I didn't ask about that just yet but if it's a woodshop I'll be in hog heaven.
I got a package from my cousin W in Oz: Vegamite! One for me and one for my boss. Also, an Aussie flag, a dream time bandana, two dream time themed writing pens and a lovely card showing the area she lives in, it's amazingly beautiful.
Boss and I had a talk about the night manager at work and the night shift in general: he agrees, he's going to have to fire someone to set a fire under their asses. I hope he does this soon, it's getting to be a nasty mess in there with no one taking initiative to clean it up.
I'm truly hoping to move to Five Points... there is a porch and a deck. The landlord, he says, is the best ever and lives NEXT DOOR. (!) (handy)
Plenty of parking. IT sounds too good to be true for the price... I wonder what the problem is. Maybe the price is low because there is only one bathroom. I dno't mind sharing bathrooms with guys... not at all. As long as they can aim.
He said there was some storage, that would be nice.. and I can have a BED and a BED FRAME again. Stupid current roommate, I wish she would have let me know that a boxspring would never fit up these stairs before I brought it over.
At any rate, I hope this goes well and the guy lets me move in soon. I hope I get my deposit back from current roommate. I hope ... it's good to have hope. I'd be close to the good coffee shop in Five Points, the good grocer, and the good hiking ...

Cowpunk

Printed out the manuscript

Portland

One more day

well it had to happen.

That which burns but does not kill

The hotter they are, the bigger they fall

Portland State University

All over the map

words, where you be at

Such a letdown.

She's on her way.

I don't know, man.

And there you have it. The L word.

David Lynch

The ocean I crossed

WHEW

suddenly

Interview

getting better

that dream

Flagstaff

Caroline Chocolate Drops

Wow, that's a lot.

Transition

Monkey Spit

good grief.

I want to put my blood in a centrifuge and spin her out of it.

Dinner with C 4.0

Yesterday

2 YEARS.

Funny how these things go

New Me, Meet the Old Me

TORNADO.

It's all good in da hood

Opportunity Knocking?

New Year, New Cheer

nihilist

Four point oh

Red Lobster and the Crimson Tide

Such a lovely thing

So freaking frustrated

Lit | Books | EW.com

Third Annual Huntsville Zombie Walk a 'bloody' success | The Bus Stops Here - al.com

Zombie Walk

Glee

meetups.

On coming out.

Paint Creek

Nice day in Five Points

PURGE

break.

Spore & the Evolution of Self

Birfday

Horse Shoes

The Coroner of Oz

A triumph of the will

Chard

Pitch and Roll

the wait

Held at arm's length

As Surreal as it GETS

Whew.

GARH!

The Struggle

Saturday, all day

Pathetic

Benny's

the kid

The scone. Oh that scone.

Jet Lag

Highland girl

this is redonkulous

The howl within

Couldn't do it.

Mom's birthday

*LE SIGH*

Thanks, BOSE

Messages from the universe

The glimpse

LE SIGH