Category Archives: stuff

Probably should play catch up after 3 months of silence, but no….. I will start with the now and onward.

sooooo tonight could have been one of those booger flicking nights but it isn’t. I’m enjoying just being. Watching the fantastic eyebrows talk about his race car, seeing the enormous power button on the xbox 360 flicker as halo3 powers down, talking about best ways to rid my parents of their cat that is the bane of their existance, making sandos and veggie packets for the cute boy that will finally say out loud that he likes me… I’m just being. Being a girl that is one of the guys. A girl that is comfortable backing a trailer and wearing stilletos. A girl that likes listening to the boys talk about the stupidity of putting the clutch at the back of the motor as much or more than getting my nails done. A girl that’s as comfortable in a room of guys as I am anywhere. Yeah, tonight… no targets on the wall and I’d say no to the inappropraiate yet handsome guy if he asked. (again). I think I hear my name.

tonight has been way gnarly… I’m writing this after the funeral of one of our town’s most beloved bartenders. I’m also writing this after 3 (okay in real people terms 6) shots of Bushmills Irish Whiskey. So be warned my grammar may be waaay off of it’s normal mark. Whatever… This blog is actually not about any of that, it’s about me. I’m at my friend’s house. My friend that I have morphed relationships with over the last three years a couple times. I know I can’t date him and he thinks he knows he can’t date me but for different reasons. He made me feel good tonight. Better than the boy who thinks he does make me feel good – that way. But I said no. Truth reeeeeeallly hard, still said no. I’m not ready to give up on the boy. Okay, There it is.. I’ve been faithful to someone I have no commitment to for 6 months… when there is a fucking hot man that just walked out of the shower. I gotta go.

wtf mate? I think I must be an idiot. Wait, I know I’m an idiot. I got hit on by someone available, handsome, successful and entirely inappropriate. I let him because I needed it. I let him because my need to be complimented goes unfilled. I sit here watching the boy I am “dating” play video fucking golf and I could be home in bed. I could be having an intilectual conversation with said inappropriate guy. I could be reading. Hell, I could be picking my fucking nose and trying to hit targets on the wall. But nnoooo, I am watching Tiger Woods 2007 on a ginormous tv with drunk boys discussing the finer points of our father’s tv habits….. what have I done to myself??? What have I signed up for? Oh wait, I remember. I didn’t sign up I just let my idiot shield lapse and not I am laying in my frosting. Maybe I can use that to my advantage. Maybe he’ll lick that off.

A couple weekends ago my roommate and I hosted a bonfire – “Burnin Down the Toxins” we called it. (If you listened you could hear burnin down the house as well as disco inferno.) We have both been through divorces in the fairly recent past and are both cleaning out the closet of old memories. When you start to look through you find some toxic shit. So we started a “burn box” of photos, journals, wedding books and other randomness that frankly needed to go up in flames. We finally invited a bunch of our girls out to burn their shit too. We packed food and beer and wine and a positive attitude about what would come of the experience. It was fantastic. What a catharsis! Releasing the toxic energy from all that had been done over the past few years, conversing with friends (both old and new) and BURNIN SHIT! Women (and a few brave men I might add) came over to our fire to check it out. We were extolled for our ingenious idea. One lovely lady brought me a beer from her husband who said we were awesome for letting go. I highly recommend this to anyone who needs to get stuff off their chest.

The burn-fest and the hangin out was great fun, but the funniest part of the whole thing came in the form of an extremely intoxicated woman named Heather. Heather’s boyfriend had lost her car keys in the sand (he had also told we were cool earlier, hmmm). I’m thinking this should be a sign considering she could barely stand. So she came by the first time and asked if we could hang out with her dog while she searched for the keys nearby. It was a cool dog. Now I’ll admit. . . we were being silly, some of us more inebriated than others, and made comments about how we’d be pissed. We might have to dump a boy like that. Mind you, we were laughing and smiling and not giving off a negative vibe. Apparently Heather failed to notice this. When she couldn’t find her keys (did I mention it was dark and 10pm???) she came back to where we were and started moving things. She also proceeded to tell us how mean we were and that we were all a bunch of cunts. Yup, cunts. What a fantastic word, cunt. It evokes such emotion. Nearly all of us stared in disbelief that she not only came into our space with a rude attitude, but called us the grand mother of all names. It was seriously comical. She blathered on for a good five minutes and threw out the “c” word again. She never did find her keys – thus we could drive home safely without fear of being mowed down by Heather.

Honestly, I’ve never been called a cunt and walked away smiling. Maybe the toxins were released. I think I want to get it in script on a necklace. To remind me of just how much fun release can be. . . and why boys like fire so much.

I want it to be pink, pretty. I want it to smile and feel warm.

I’ve been sitting in front of this screen for twenty minutes with stuff to say… I keep getting distracted. I’ll be back.

When something breaks your writers block… speak! I just did my taxes for ’06. Can we say wake up call??? Yeah (shaking head in sadness). It’s very defeating to realize that you made 14 thousand dollars less than the year before. Yes that was one four. The $7,000 pay cut doubled because of time lost. Spending time without pay sucks ass! There really is no way around that. The last few days have brought some low blows, I’ll admit it. I lost a whole lot more than money last year (and I’m no – not referring to my hair). The whole year was a melting pot for loss, mixed with sadness and shame, brokenness, smashed feelings and hurt pride. Cooked over the flames of struggle with self defeat. A stew of negative emotion completely different than I’d ever been made to force down my throat. HOWEVER, it wasn’t all bitter. In between bites of sour, foulness were moments of tender friendship, new beginning, the amazing taste of self discovery and the spicy depth of change. I experienced a challenge to my palate, and I’m still recovering.

Saturday I listened to my brother place nails in the coffin of a friendship I held out hope hadn’t died. (pardon me while I generalize about men and forgive those of you that I love that fall outside – well outside of these statements) Sometimes boys (men) don’t realize their words are painful, that what they’re saying, as harmless as it seems is shredding to my heart. The little details of the party they’re going to that you aren’t, in a land of non-closure are making you tear up behind your rock-star shades. Listening to the sober driver arrangements (that was your job of past) is ouchy. Know that the friends that are talking are all people you once made arrangements with – but now don’t have anything to do with you. They’ve chosen someone else to be friends with and not made room for two. (thanks for the latitude) The worst part of all of this isn’t the words, or the party or the arrangements but the lack of closure. It really hit me on this day – such an important day in the life of a friend, a milestone birthday. My tears flowed over the whys I don’t know and the understanding I don’t have and never will. Last year the party was taken care of by me. Arrangements were made, little details taken care of, people safely driven home, so many laughs had. The coffin is closed.

In the end, we will remember not the words of our enemies, but the silence of our friends

~MLK, Jr.

I will bury it next time I am with the people who love me most and have shown me the give part of give and take (I didn’t know that went both ways!!!). Those amazing beautiful souls that were waiting to catch my spirit as if fell, fell, fell.

Each friend represents a world in us, a world possibly not born until they arrive, and it is only by this meeting that a new world is born.
~Anais Nin

I suppose that stew turning out okay. I keep mixing, and adding and mixing and adding. Eventually it will be just right.

“The Odds”

Maybe we’re the lucky ones
‘Cause we can choose to turn it off
Maybe we’re the lonely ones
‘Cause we decide to shield what’s soft

I’m sure you’ll learn to dance and drink and dream
but you might still feel lost

And I see myself in you my friend
but I would break where you would bend
I’m calling on what you defend and tonight I won’t hold back

Just don’t waste all your years
believing in the fear
You’ll choke out what’s alive and make
What’s wrong be all that’s real

I can see you’re weakened at the seams
And trying to swim upstream but can’t find a way

So here we are again trying to hold back
the tides behind our eyes
lucky ones trying to drink from both the wells we claim are dry
I guess I’ve found some freedom in
embracing every time they pry

We’re both the same
You’re just like me

And when your skin finally sheds
You’ll find your nerves all in shreds
The price may be to keep your heart you’ll lose your head

12/24/06

‘Twas the night before Christmas and all through the house. . . absolutely nothing was happening. Thus leaving me feeling completely alone and very sad. I have no real reason to be all up in my head like this, but. . . there’s always a but isn’t there? This year has held some intense emotions. I’ve laughed and cried and caused laughter and unfortunately some tears too. I’ve loved and I’ve lost and I’ve been lost and found on occasion. In the end I find myself sitting at Denny’s on Christmas Eve (ironically in a booth that holds some funky memories). I’m sitting here because I couldn’t bring myself to brave the downtown crowd alone again. To see the same faces – or not, and lump myself in with “them”. You know “them”. The lonely ones, the sad ones, the ones you feel bad for when you’re all dressed up and out with your friends. The ones you feel sorry for because there alone on Christmas Eve drinking to feel better. It’s not the drinking to feel better that I’m craving, but the company. Don’t misunderstand, I have friends and they love me as much as I love them. They are good and loyal and mostly far away. They have lives of their own. I don’t so much have a life right now. I work, I wander, I wait. I wait for my phone to ring and hope it’s a call from the love I can’t have. I wait for a call from an unhealthy boy that I’m not sure even likes me. I wait for my friends to call and tell me about the fun stuff they’ve been doing, I wait to hear about the lives they’re leading so I can feel like I have one too. I wait for my mom to call because it’s a consistent call. I’m lonely. I’m not alone always but I’m lonely. I need to be okay with the state of my life until I can change it.

That is the upside. . . I’m headed for changes in the coming year. Big changes, good changes. I’m going to leave the town I’ve called home for 14 years. I have much to leave behind. There’s much I’d like to keep, but more I’d rather leave. 7 years of sadness, struggle, and pain dominate my memories. I will leave behind the places and all of the associations too. Knowing everyone has advantages for certain, but (there it is again) it has major drawbacks too. It means never being able to put the past and it’s bad memories behind you. It means seeing people out every time you go somewhere and hearing about it later (regardless of how innocent it may be). I can’t even sit at Denny’s on Christmas Eve without knowing someone. It also (maybe most importantly) means my dating pool is the size of a Dixie cup. Everyone knows someone I’ve dated or is their friend or worse, is friends with my ex. Beyond that it’s a college town so half of them are too young – no, no, I tried and have tapped out my reserve for 21 year old boys because even at 31, they’re still boys. I am ready to move on and leave behind the rollercoaster of emotion I’ve had for the past year. It was just too much. I want to put all of the sadness in a box – losing my best friend (or so I thought – and maybe that’s the worst part about it) and the fact that I still don’t understand why and have no closure on the situation. Giving away the last piece of my soul. . . the one I’d held in reserve for so long to a boy who taught me more in 24 hours, than I learned in seven years of marriage. Or the unhealthy boy that calls because he needs me to take his drunk ass home or he needs an ear to hear him and keep his secrets or he needs comfort and a warm body in his bed. . . or the hurts I’ve caused to those I love and even those I didn’t. I want to seal them up and label them “POISON! Do not open!” so I can stop being numb and I don’t know start living my real life.

–> –>12/25/06

I try to believe, I want to believe that there is this great fat man in a red suit who’s been watching how good I was so he can reward me with goodies. If I go to sleep can I get one of those tickets for the polar express that will help me believe? Maybe I’ll find the faith I used to have. The one that made “Christmas” an actual holiday for me rather than some overly commercialized non-event. That faith I used to have in “the reason for the season” is shattered and lying in pieces with the memories of good times or at least my illusion of them. I used to believe Christmas was beautiful, special, and amazing time. I went all out and decorated, baked, cooked, planned. I was full of Christmas spirit. I knew all the truths, the baby was really born in summer, the Christians decided to have it in winter to get more pagens to join in their reindeer games, blah, blah, blah. . . I still believed in all that the holiday stood for and meant. I’ve defected. Not because I’ve stopped believing (well, not completely – but I am in doubt about most all of it.) but because I don’t feel like celebrating when there’s no one to celebrate with. Don’t get me wrong, I have a nuclear family (though none of my siblings or I practice any type of religion). And I have a nephew that makes the fat man part fun. Otherwise the closest I got to actual celebration of a “holiday” was solstice and that’s not really a holiday – it’s an event. Scientifically occurring twice a year every year, no hypocrisy or commercialism involved. I miss celebrating. I need faith. Not the radical craziness of my youth but real faith found on my own. I want a reason to celebrate in December. I want to gather beloved friends for a celebration. I want to eat, drink and be merry with them, celebrating – life, friendship, love, seeking, finding, everything. I don’t want to spend Christmas Eve at Denny’s (unless of course I’m craving fries at 2am with my friends) even if Christmas isn’t the holiday I choose. I want to leave a coke for the fat man that can magically make it around the world to every house in one 24 hour period. Maybe, he knows my secrets and won’t stop after all. Or he’ll leave me a sock full of coal with a note saying be better next year. –> –>Either way the coke will be gone and I’ll know he was there leaving a sprinkling of faith behind to refill my spirit.

Even with all the sadness I felt this weekend I still have a smile. I know that the dark cloud is moving slowly by and that next year brings hope for brightness. I will make the sun shine, even if I have to string flood lights in the living room. I will leave the sadness and heartache behind and make a new home. The thought makes me grin even this second.

The flood of things on my mind is completely overwhelming. I went from not being able to write anything to having so much that I can’t get it all out. I’ll try and we’ll see where it all goes.

I got this new job and it’s so much fun. Some days because I get to help someone that really does need it and some days because of the sheer number of idiots that stand in front of me. At this point we all know the rules, we’ve all heard the commercials, police ads, whatever – telling us “DON’T DRINK & DRIVE. It’s the law!”. Funny, they aren’t joking. Why do you think they tell you in school not to do it and show you the lame movies in driver’s ed and make you know the BAC for different things or even what the hell a BAC is??? Because, you shouldn’t drink and drive. Now I’m not perfect and I’m not saying all cases are cut and dry, but jesus people! Is it really that difficult to say “hhhmmm I’ve had a couple (three, ten, whatever) drinks. I feel fine, but the po-po won’t think so, I should call a cab, or a friend or my mom or ask that sober person over there to be my friend and not drive myself.” Maybe that isn’t exactly what you’d say. But you should think it. No I’m not a PSA and I’m no saint. However, in the three weeks I’ve been at my job I have heard so many different stories of I felt fine or I only had two drinks or I was sleeping it off in my back seat or the cop was a dick. On some rare occasions the person may be justified in their thought that a full blown DUI wasn’t appropriate for what they were doing. Fact is they were drinking and then drove. Now they get to see my smiling face when they come and give me money and realize that for the next three, nine or in the case of the really stupid, eighteen months they get to see me and pay me every week. It’s awesome.

On the vain that I do enjoy my job. . . I’m enjoying the crazy variety of people I meet everyday. They guy who was driving his boat and his friend set his beer down in the driver’s cup holder and he got a wet reckless for it. (yes he was breathalized and blew a .05, so technically he deserved it) Had the friend set the beer somewhere else he would not be at my desk. The guy with 5 DUI’s dating back 15 years wondering why the ones tat are 10 years old haven’t dropped off his record yet. Funny, if you don’t take your classes, you will have the DUI forever, or at least until you do. And 5 DUI’s??? How do you not learn from these things? I guess jail and embarrassment and fines and probation doesn’t affect some people. But my favorite are the students that get pissy with me because the classes we offer don’t fit into their class schedule. Well, sorry bro, but you should take that into account before you blow a .22 next time. You fucked up, don’t get mad at me because daddy couldn’t pay off a judge or get you an attorney that had more pull or whatever. None of this is my problem. I still smile and all that, because it’s my job, but it makes me sad that these guys are so arrogant about a mistake they made and should be embarrassed and humbled by.

I think I’m going to design some kind of tracker that I can post to show how many people come in every day to sign up for a DUI class, ask me about when their certificate of enrollment will go to the DMV so they can get their restricted then leave my desk, get into their car and drive away. Hhmmmm. Not smart. But it wasn’t your incredible brain that got you here in the first place now was it?