This is the beginning

This is the beginning, almost, of 2006. It's a good way to start the year having cut loose that part of me, my life, that wasn't working. I'm not here for that anymore. I won't be locked in a power struggle that I cannot win. Walking away is winning.

Bunny Hop

I'm trying to remind myself that healing isn't linear. Sometimes you have to re-cover old ground to move forward. I'm getting caught up in old things today, sparked by other old feelings, perhaps. I'm trying not to let that make me feel that I haven't moved a long way forward. Because I have.

Aftermath

It's over, we have the house back to ourselves. Quiet.

I feel mixed about having to pay J's rent this month on top of everything else we've tried to do for his family. I'm trying to remember that we're so lucky to be in a position to be able to help, and that we're doing the right thing, but I feel that we are going to end up having to do this regularly and often. There's no good answer. If you help, you're enabling - if you don't, you're letting a family member suffer.

I think what bothers me most is that I can hear my mother's voice in my head and I'm struggling not to say anything that she said when she was helping to support Nana and my sister. You make the right choices in life and your reward is that you get to carry the ones who didn't. These are adult people ~ why aren't they taking care of themselves? There's no free lunch in this world. I'll be so glad when I have no one suckling at my teets!! Her voice is loud inside my head and my reaction feels almost reflex, like I've been conditioned to resent something that I'm not even really sure I resent. Maybe I do resent it. Maybe I'm just like her. I don't believe in lending money; I believe in giving it. And I don't believe in holding those things over people to control them later. I've watched it and it's why I've never asked them for money for anything. I think it's quite likely that I'm not a very nice person. I seem to have picked up, against my will, the prejudices that I hated, in spite of recognizing them at a glance.

This has been my first Christmas away from my family, ever. And it was way harder than I thought it would be. I think having my mother-in-law ask me (about fourteen times) if I missed them made it harder.

I really don't like people very much. Not in large doses like that. Just a couple of hours here and there is enough. I'm becoming more neurotic the older I get.

Ingrate

It would be a yukky thing for me to say here, on Christmas Eve, that I feel lonely tonight and that I wish I could at least be lonely alone.

Test Shot 2

Test Shots

Shawn took a lot of pictures today and I realised that I am much uglier than I thought. The dogs are cute though. Big Pup is doing well in the cast. Only a week and a half to go.

I Miss

I Miss Misti.



I really really do.

That's all I ask of you.

Next week is Shawn's Christmas party.


I might be too thin-skinned to be a crusader. But I'm trying anyhow.

Steve

Steve has some grave doubts about my intentions. He would like to reassure himself that I am not allowing my religious, cultural or moral biases to influence my opinion about the issue at hand. Steve is an important author who wrote a book about the CFL. I wish I'd known this before I'd replied; it provides an amusing backdrop to our discussion about censorship and personal beliefs. I thought I was talking to a Ph.D., and perhaps I took Steve's everso slightly snarky letter a little more seriously than I ought to have.

You're embarrassing me/ You're embarrassing you

I hate when I get near the end of a book and I don't want it to be over.


I never felt sicker over a book than when I read The Way The Crow Flies.

I have White Coat Syndrome, by the way. That means I'm scared of doctors. I'm not sure why; I can't remember one ever being anything but nice. But they make my heart pound, and consequently most of my medical charts indicate concern over a very fast heart rate. Just watching them reach for the stethoscope sets my heart racing. In fact, it even happens at Shoppers Drug Mart when I put my arm in the little blood pressure cuff. Something about knowing it's being checked makes it go crazy.

I wrote to Y tonight. That was an odd thing to do.

Electricity

Winter is all about static electricity. The car door zaps me every time I get out of the car. My hair stands on end when I pull my sweater over my head. The puppies zap each other when they run across the carpet and then sniff each other. ZAP! Nose to nose, sparks fly. I don't like winter for a lot of reasons.

Dangerous Clots

The man on TV just told me that no matter how formidable I may be, I am no match for a Dangerous Clot.

Don't you put me on the back burner

There are things I need to do that would be more important than missing the things and people I have lost.

Like... I need to keep trying to find an out of the house job. I was wrong about working at home. It doesn't work for me at all.

I need to quit wasting the time I do have. I waste it now, waiting, wishing, searching. Instead, I want to use the time productively. To write.

When this damn cold finally passes, I want to get back to working out. A few missed days makes me feel like I can never do it again.

I want to start eating. I keep skipping breakfast and lunch when I'm alone because there's no one to eat with. I want to stop that, and do better at eating properly.

I want to be a better housekeeper. I don't want to be an obsessive housekeeper, but I want to try harder to keep things under control. There's no reason, with all this time, for it to be any other way.

Maybe this can help. With the guilt, the boredom, the loneliness.

Careful what you wish for.

Snowfall

The first one of the year. Little sparkly bits floating before the headlights when I drive to pick him up from work. It's nighttime so early. It's winter so early. It's October so late. What am I going to do?

The Hours

I have no self-discipline.
I need deadlines.
I need a paycheque.
I need a harried boss nagging and hassling me.
I need a spanking.

That's all

Things were easier when I was grown up.

Ah October

Ah, October, there you are. You're late.

I'm not stoic. I'm not devoid of the human tendancy to exaggerate and embellish. But some things are simple.

October is later this year.

I have lost someone dear to me.

I miss the way things were.

Home for a rest.

It's nice to be home. I've had enough of the cat hair and cigarette smoke.

Napping

This afternoon I took an afternoon nap, for the first time since I became worthless. I've been resisting that, because it feels more worthless than anything else to spend the days sleeping. It wasn't a real nap because I didn't actually manage to fall asleep. But it was real in that I laid out flat on the couch, covered myself with a blanket, cuddled the dogs, and closed my eyes. It felt nice.

Weekend

I'm going to Kat's house for the weekend. And spending Halloween with the little one.

This is what I need, exactly. To do real things with real people. I need a job again and some good old fashioned stress. Living like this is too luxurious. It makes neuroses necessary just to pass the time.

Reality Check

I think it's time to rejoin the real world. I cannot function successfully in this one.

Angry angry angry

I'm so angry. I'm so sad.

The last two days have been awful. I feel like I've lost the only person who meant anything to me in the godforsaken pit and I want to go there, to the Idiot's house, and punch her in the mouth.

Boohoo poor me, my heart hurts more than anyone else's does. My sensitivities matter more, I'm more delicate, I'm more fragile, I'm more important.

I don't know how I got here from where I was a week ago.

I want to smash everything.

Lost

The last thing I said was whiny.

So I don't entirely regret that it's been eaten up somehow.

If these kinds of spaces are only used to complain, whine, vent and cry... then it appears as if the owner is a bit of a kook, no?

Because she writes nothing when she's happy.

It's a terribly onesided universe.

Trying to Remember

My first reaction when you criticize me is an overreaction. Being hurt makes me angry.

But now I'm trying to remember not to be hurt by or angry at your constant criticism and correction. I have no way of knowing what you expect. You are the only one who is an expert in your own bullshit. I won't be corrected. I am not trying to attain your levels of narcissistic self-absorption.

The Great Gazoo

I didn't bother with issue 2.

I see that we're just pretending. I refuse to dangle.

The Great Gazoo is not pissing everyone off. Mostly just you.

You are either:

a. a malicious cruel intentioned bastard who likes to hurt children, or

b. a hamhanded insensitive clod who accidentally hurts children.



In either case, why bother?

The Issues

There are two issues, as I see it.

I want to talk about them bluntly, for a change. I'm so often caught up in trying to preserve my dignity.

1. This is how I feel. It doesn't mean it is real or true or reflective of your reality. It's just how I feel and I want you to hear it instead of denying its truth. The truth remains that it IS how I feel and I would like to work toward changing that feeling in one of several ways.

I feel, when I speak to you, that I am being cautious, almost all the time. I am afraid of being too loving, being too sentimental, in case it upsets you and even more, in case you do not share my feelings. I feel like I'll be rejected and because of that, I don't want to get too close. Sometimes I want to climb up on your lap and be held and rocked and I am afraid that if I try that, I'll make an idiot of myself.

I want a close relationship with you very much. I would like to talk with you daily. I would like to assume I'm going to see you on a regular basis and not have to book appointments. I would like to feel safe giving you love.

I want you to define for me the level of affection that is safe to demonstrate, and is safe to assume will be reciprocated.

running

I went running tonight. I feel my body stronger again, the way it was the last time. I'm getting stronger, I'm getting better. More and more in control of me. I love that feeling.

If I act normal.

If I act normal, if I act like I don't care, then eventually maybe I will feel normal and no longer care. Is that right?

This morning we talked. I said, "I feel much better now. I was being overly dramatic yesterday." Is that true? In part, yes. But not enough.


I have no right or reason. It's almost like I'm just as annoyed by the idea of someone else getting something as I am by the idea of me losing something. And that's petty. I am petty.

"Kathy I'm lost," I said, though I knew she was sleeping.

I have no right to be angry. I have no reason to be sad. I'm tired of competing for shreds of invisible nothingness. I forfeit. This time I'm not playing.

I wasn't even in line.

And I continue to not be in line.

Associate / Facilitator

I think I applied for the wrong job. I think I applied for a job that doesn't pay anything. Oops. That's a fairly significant error and also one which likely increases my chances of acquiring the job. Sigh. Perhaps I'm misunderstanding things. Perhaps this is a necessary step to the paying job? Maybe I won't get any job at all.

I am preparing to say goodbye to so many people and it doesn't even seem real.

Paul

And you are?

Paul.


There were so many that he was wrong for me, wrong for my family, wrong wrong wrong. But in some very big ways he was exactly right. A trade-off. I know I am right in my choice (though Paul never offered me a real choice... it's not that I don't love you...) but the ways in which Paul was right for me then, and still would be now, can weigh heavily at times.

Jason, Jeff and Dave

I have never in my life had such good friends as Jason, Jeff and Dave. Now that I think about it. I don't think I realised how lucky I was when I knew them. I don't think I saw how truly unusual they were. What boys, when you're seventeen, want to go to the university and sit on the grass and talk about ideas for writing books? What boys, when you're seventeen, sing James Taylor and Don McLean and know all the words and most of what they mean?

Ain't it just like a friend of mine to hit me from behind.

I asked Dave what that meant. He said he didn't know. He wouldn't.

Jason came from a good family with a Nori and a Jeff and I forget his father.... but they loved him. They came to his plays, they smiled at his friends, they kept their kitchen clean. Dave lived with his father and maybe the father's girlfriend (now that's a spicy pizza!). One of the first things I remember Dave telling me was about his stepfather locking him outside in the winter in his underwear. I thought he was joking at first. Jeff. Jeff went to a private school and wore a jacket and tie in his school picture. I guess they had money. I don't know if they were kind, but I think so. Jeff lived like a rich hippie. VW van, harmonica, nothing but leisure time.

They were good to me. They almost never hurt me. They did what they promised, they always showed up when and where they said they would. They listened when I talked and they thought about who I really was in their plans. I didn't realise how rare they were. I really didn't.

It almost makes me ache inside to think about those years, how good they really were. What beautiful people I knew, what wonderful friends I had. I miss them now.

But I have promises to keep And miles to go before I sleep

When I am lying in bed waiting to fall asleep, I usually think about how things should be. That means I think about what you should have done and should have said, and how if you had said and done those things I could have said and done the things I was supposed to do.

But most of the time things don't go that way, and most of the time I fall asleep before I get it all straight in my head, the way it should have been.

Rain

It's raining again. It's been raining for days and days and days and days. I think it's likely the basement will go back to being submerged before it is fixed. I don't believe that the fix is really going to fix it either. I am concerned about selling it. I am concerned about selling this problem to anyone else. I am concerned about not being able to sell this problem to anyone else.

Today is a day of freedom from the crush of waiting. Today I said goodbye. Today I said I get what you're saying, forget I asked. That's not really supposed to feel good, but it does. Well, it feels better, anyway. Better than waiting.

I miss Shawn. I miss having a normal life where I live with my husband. I hope our new home will facilitate a new life. I hope I won't have to wait and wait and wait.

Writing songs I can't believe with words that tear and strain to rhyme.

It aggravates me beyond belief that I am still being controlled. That I am still allowing him to decide how I feel, still letting his neglect and pedantic pace rattle me. Why did I answer at all? Why not let HIM wonder and worry? (But would he...?)

I am fed up with this.

I have got to stop letting him have this kind of power.

Perhaps my banishment will serve me well in the end.

He answered

He answered me after that. He sounded pouty. He pointed out how I had been the one to tell him not to talk to me, I had been the one to pull away. That is true. He also said I still love you, I'm still in love with you, It just won't go away. Somehow, tragically, that makes it easier not to speak to him again.

Brenda Miller

Brenda Miller wrote me a letter of complaint. I wrote back. It was extremely satisfying to respond to the letter without the usual concern about the job, the administration, the future. I almost enjoyed it.

Last night I was stupid enough to write an email. How can I be so lonely when Shawn was home so long? Maybe it made it worse. I have no one to talk to about how this feels.

So the spiral has turned inside out again and I'm screwed. Totally screwed up. Lonelier than ever even with Shawn here beside me all week. How do you go around loneliness when it's gotten that big?

Tomorrow I'll go back to work. I'll talk to people all day. Might that help?

I'm more lost than I've been in a long time. Running around in circles. I have no one to talk to.

With Him Home

With Shawn home with me, everything feels different. Because he's been gone so long, when he's home it feels like we're on vacation. Even with all the jobs we need to get done.

I think my favourite thing will always be waking up before him and sneaking out of the bedroom to here, where I sit with my coffee, sipping quietly and listening to him and the puppies breathe heavily while they sleep.

My real family means more to me.

Sometimes

Sometimes I think that I'm going to talk to you again. I imagine what I would say if I did talk to you. I make up conversations in my head. Of course when I make up your words I make you say the right things, the things you stopped saying and the things that used to mean everything to me. I think about gifts I would send you- even start the process of putting them together... stalled suddenly by the realisation that it's completely inappropriate. I told myself I would never.

Never talk to you again unless I could do it with clear intentions. And I know that by the time I have those, there will be no reason to talk to you ever. Again.

Sometimes I think after two glasses of wine some Friday night I will just start talking again, whining maybe, crying even. Asking you to explain who you became, or asking you to rewind and do everything my way.

I always knew this would happen. I always knew. Maybe in knowing that I made certain it did. I don't want you in my life. I never want to feel that way again. And yet I miss the familiar pain of being last.

Painting

I am painting painting painting over everything that used to be here. I'm hiding all the dirt and the dents and I'm watching my home grow beautiful and unfamiliar. I'm leaving here. I'm going to begin a new life.

I want to stay here.

But I want change. I want to grow. I want my husband next to me while I sleep.

He will be home on Friday. That's only two days away. Then maybe painting over my old life won't be so lonely and sad.

goodbye

Yes it's time to cut her
from your personal resume
and congratulate yourself heartily
if she hears the cutting
and is at last able to draw a breath
that is not pinched by
your arrogance and
narrow
self-importance.

Moving

Shawn did it. He got the job. We're moving! I'm excited for him... I'm excited for us. I'm scared too. But mostly excited.

wanting

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Crazy Big Eyes and the Condo Biddies

Yesterday I found a note in my mailbox from Crazy Big Eyes. It said, "Lisa, Mary (that's Denim Hat) and I were doing building inspection and noticed that your cedar tree needs pruning. Call me. We can help." Then she left her phone number.

That confirms that Crazy Big Eyes and Denim Hat are on the board, which I assumed before but wasn't certain of.

Damned if Crazy Big Eyes and Denim Hat were going to come over and help me.

I took the hacksaw outside this afternoon and cut the cedar tree down from 12 feet to about 6 feet. There. I am covered in scratches and blisters. I also noticed while I was hacking away that MY neighbours' yard is strewn with beer cans. I wonder if Crazy Big Eyes and Denim Hat left them a note too, or if my tree was really a more pressing problem.

I have to let myself relax and believe that I am not the only person in the neighbourhood who receives these assinine notes, but they make me very angry. I guess you can't really hear the tone of a written message, but I felt condescended to. I felt like penning a response, "Crazy Big Eyes, I have pruned the offending tree. See you in five minutes."

I was briefly in a quandary as to what to do with the remains of the cedar tree, knowing that disposing of the branches in the community dumpster across the street would undoubtedly illicit another note. I considered lighting them on fire in my backyard. I even went so far as to go inside and get matches. Then my Little Censor guy cut in and said, "What on EARTH are you doing?" and I realised that the chances were high that I would burn the entire neighbourhood to ashes. So, I threw one branch in the dumpster and hid the rest under my barbeque. I will sneak one branch into the dumpster each day until they are all gone.

Luxating Patellas

The physiotherapist says that Ophelia has luxating patellas and will need surgery on both of them. The poor girl has everything wrong with her and I am afraid of what else might be wrong with her that we don't know about yet. Not because of vet bills, although they are huge, but because it's too late not to love her. I don't want anyone I love to suffer or hurt or die. I thought today was going to be a very good day because we would be on the road to healing the weak leg. And that is still true. I just didn't expect to find out that only one of four legs is healthy. I hope we can make her better.

A good Friday

This day is a good day, even with the rain. It's a day of finishing my course, and a day of Shawn coming home for the weekend. Today is a nice day for me.

Outside Edge

Now I've made it around the spiral to the outside edge again. That means that I'm running again, I'm laughing again. It means that I feel better. I'm glad. I am going to imagine the circles getting tighter and wider at the same time, so that the insides are far far far apart, and the outside edges are long and looping and last longer each time around.

Angry

Do you remember what we were talking about the night that you accidentally typed your cybersex conversation in my window? I'd be surprised if you said you did. I don't know whether it's a bigger insult to me or to her.

I remember what we were talking about because of the irony. We were talking about KJ and how poisonous she'd become against you because she felt you had led her to believe she was special when she was not special to you after all. And she was angry with me for continuing to talk to you after you'd hurt her.

I wish you remembered that.

Interesting

I think it's interesting that the post I thought was lost is not lost. Perhaps this means I am not lost either.

The Spiral

Earlier this afternoon I said some things about the spiral of healing and then they got lost in cyberspace like I am lost here inside myself.

The Spiral

Healing is, for me, a spiral and not a line. I mean, progress spirals back on itself repeatedly, making ground and losing ground, rather than demonstrating steady improvement. These last two days I have felt myself on the inside loop.

When I am on the outside edge of the spiral I am far away from you, far away from us, who we were and I am looking at us with enough distance to say, yes, I am right. This is right. When I am on the inside loop I am too close. Close in such a way that I start to miss you. Not who you are, because I realise that I don't really like much of who you are. But close enough to miss who we were when it was new. That's when I lose ground and start imagining things I could say or do that would make things different.

All this is about choice, for me, now. I have the option of going back there and wandering around feeling abandoned and lost and angry forever. When I'm on the inside loop I am tempted to do it, and wish it wasn't my choice. But not having choices is like staying sober while you live inside the Betty Ford Centre. Big deal. I am trying to make right choices even while I'm floundering, and hoping the spiral turns soon.

I think it's sad that when I look back on our history, I realise that I never fully trusted you, even at the best of times. So I wonder if I sabotaged it by expecting it to fall apart, or if I was just being sensible. But, if I was truly sensible, would I have entered into something so nonsensical to begin with?

The meanest thing you ever said to me was show off. If we became friends again, I would never forget that you took something you pretended to understand and made me ugly with it. Just like an actor-ego. Those things hurt the most when you're afraid they're true.

Thank you

I love you too, my husband. Thank you. I miss you, by the way. In case you forgot.

this is a test I love mischiefgurl