Monthly Archives: July 2011

by

Yes, I Know It Is Not Saturday

And, yes, I am aware that is improper capitalization for that title. My give a crap broke, so shoot me.

Okay, funny things time.

So, Thursday I got dive bombed in the face several times by a butterfly. I told you guys all about that. Friday, I had errands to run. I stepped out onto my front porch and there was a butterfly and he immediately flew over and landed on my leg and stayed there until I got to my car. I walked really funny not to squish him on accident. I am being stalked by butterflies.

(Side story that is not funny but pretty cool and relates to butterflies: After my dad’s father died my dad was really upset so he went for a walk and sat down in a field of flowers. He sat in the field and cried and thought and mourned. After about an hour and a half he started to feel more at peace and he stood up. When he stood up all of the flowers in the field took flight and swirled around him for a second then flew off.  This is why in my family butterflies represent my grandfather and peace. I see them at odd times when I need to be reassured that things will be okay or that I am on the right path. Being stalked by butterflies right now is a good thing.)

Hormones make me crazy. I missed Tina’s daughter’s birthday party yesterday even though I really wanted to go. I just really couldn’t. I knew this Friday night and I had dreams that she was so mad at me she moved her family to Baton Rouge without telling me. Also, in the dream my family and I lived on a tropical island. I walked out to talk to my mom about being upset that Tina left and I found my mom in a shed making paddles out of found objects because there was a flood coming. All of the paddles had Styrofoam of some sort in them leading me to believe I can blame Modern Marvel’s episode on Styrofoam. This was the more normal dream of my sets of dreams.

My friend Amy Trachte Moore introduced me to one of my new favorite things in the world. I want to be this woman when I grow up. The Bloggess is flipping awesome. She is like me but only funnier and far more cool. I should be envious of her but mostly I want to be her or have coffee with her.  Seriously awesome woman. I laughed so hard I snorted.

So I started a website, Facebook page, and Twitter account for my pen name. It makes me feel completely insane to create this entire other person. Seriously insane. I have decide to roll with it and enjoy the crazy.  I am using the site to blog about the process of writing my book so if the book ever does get published I will have a “web presence.”  I need to do a photo shoot with Tina as Charly Sinclair, my alter ego, which the idea amuses me. How does one take pictures as an alter ego? Maybe I should look for a funky wig or hat or something.  (BTW, I know the website is kind of lame. I am still writing this blog, a book, AND that site. I put that as the last priority seeing how she doesn’t exist.)

Good news is Tina promised me that if she moves it will be north and that she will tell me if she moves. I am so glad she is so patient with my crazy.

 
Share
by

It Started with Frontline at 4 am

This morning I woke up with a stomach ache. It was one of those things that interjected  into my dreams. So I woke up a bit irritated and decided to watch the PBS. Frontline was on and it was awesome. It got me all riled up again about the debt crisis even though it had nothing to do with the debt crisis. I went back to bed at about 5 am angrier than hell. I laid in bed stewing. I was so mad, I was so mad that I seriously consider creating some spoken word poetry. I was seriously THAT mad.

As a general rule, I hate poetry and most of the time bad spoken word poetry is a bunch of indignant, self-important, crap. I was mad enough that I didn’t care. I thought about what I would have to do to get it recorded while I composed it in my head. I thought about having to find my webcam, getting myself looking decent,  get my webcam software downloaded, edit any video, post it on youtube, and the list kept getting longer. I fell asleep instead. The world was saved from some bad spoken word poetry by my laziness. Score one for the good guys!

I woke back up much later with an improved stomach and I was far less angry until I checked my e-mail and saw Boehner’s over tanned reptile face and read quotes from speeches he has given lately. I got mad all over again. I started ranting about all of it. Then my rant went all historical like my rants tend to do. I genuinely believe this time, right now, has a great chance to completely change the path of the U.S for the good or for the catastrophic. (I am totally not going to get into that. You guys are not interested why I believe that way and if you are I will right about it later.) I was calling Boehner everything but an intelligent, talented statesmen.

I got all frustrated again when I realized there was nothing my anger could do. Writing about my political frustration feels pretty pointless. I live in Oklahoma and I am a moderate with liberal leanings. My effect here is like throwing a hotdog down a hallway. (Think sex and you will get that simile.) I was so worked up until I saw this:

It didn’t make the crisis go away, or my anger. I am still unbelievably frustrated with this country, its politicians, and its people. I just had to laugh though. That laughing put everything in perspective. I like perspective.

There is a chance our country is going to go to shambles. I vote, I try to keep up and stay informed. I vocalize my feelings. I have done everything I can.

I realized how ridiculous this morning was with my spoken word poetry aspirations. I had to make fun of myself. Then, I went outside to take out the trash and I got dive bombed by a butterfly IN THE FACE. It swooped in and landed on my nose and flew off three times. You can’t swat a butterfly. That is the karmic equivalent to punt a cute fuzzy puppy. So, I was attacked by a butterfly. Oh how I am blessed with a feeling of the ridiculous.

 
Share
by

Snow Cones

I have good news and I have bad news for you. Knowing that most people prefer the bad news first, I am still leading off with the good news. I am such a bastard.

Good News: this will not be a preachy long blog like Saturday’s blog.

Bad News: I am pretty sure this is another ramble blog.

I finished my outline for my book someday last week. I am not exactly sure what day. I should be ashamed that I don’t remember but I’m really not.  I know I keep writing about it a lot when I have nothing else to write about but it is what is consuming my brain. I think it is supposed to be that way.

I made an active decision with this book. I was not going to go for the next great American novel. Years from now this book will not be taught in college classes. I am not aiming for literature or even good, I am aiming for people to read it and think to themselves “Oh that was cute” or “Oh that was funny” or “That was worth the two bucks I spent on it on for my -reader.” Honestly, I am aiming for done.

I am not a bastion of false modesty. I don’t pretend that I am bad at things that I know I am good at. It is uncouth and disconcerting that I will accept a compliment without argument. I do sometimes have a hard time thinking of myself as a good writer. I write because I love it and writing is what makes me feel whole. I can write witty, I can write honest, and I can write pain like no one’s business. I just don’t ever feel like I come up with good novel ideas. That held me back for such a long time that I felt so freed when I decided to aim for entertaining instead of life changing.  I don’t want to change the world with this first book, just maybe give some people a few amusing evenings.

When e-readers first came out I was very anti-kindle. I was a paper book purist. I slowly started to see the benefit to the reader for having an e-reader and to the environment.  I was still hesitant.  I am the last person to take part of any hot trend. I still don’t have a smart phone and I rarely use my twitter account. Now I see the greatest benefit of e-readers, they make publishing more accessible to everyone.

Printing paper books is expensive. Publishing new authors is almost always a losing prospect for publishers. With e-books the investments in books are smaller and more books can get published. Hell, with e-publishing a writer can buy an ISBN number (a book’s unique identifying number like a social security number) and put it on Amazon.com and call it good. I think I am going to try to find a large publisher for my book at first because of those crazy things like editors and publicists but if all else fails I can upload it myself.

Wait… where was I going with all of this?

 

 
Share
by

Human Nature

So, believe it or not I try very hard not to make this blog a self-important, pretentious, preachy rant about my beliefs and politics. I really do try. The truth of the matter is, I am a self-important, pretentious, preachy kind of person. I have strong opinions and a big mouth.  Some days, like today, I really feel the need to share my opinions.

Yesterday two news items really caught my attention and got me thinking and feeling. The attacks in Norway and the debt ceiling crisis.

What happened yesterday is a major tragedy. The death toll is now 91 and it is a distinct possibility that it will rise. The bombing is shocking enough, but it is almost unthinkable to me that someone would open fire on a camp full of children. The media is telling us all about the perpetrator’s ideological leanings. Apparently, he was a fundamentalist Christian who also belong to groups that were upset about immigration. In my opinion, the man was probably very mentally ill and his ideology had very little to do with his actions.  Extremism attracts certain personality types that are more likely to behave in a manner we consider unthinkable. It is a universal thing. Every major religion has them as does every political movement.  It is a part of human nature. We can’t get rid of religion or political movements, so the only thing we can do is try to react to the effects of extremism as best we can.

Instead of getting pissed at screaming at each other and feed the fire, maybe we should calm the hell down and talk about things. What happened exactly? How can we help? What can this attack tell us about our current political climate? What can we do as a group to try and work though our problems?

The U.S should have gotten this message after the shooting of Rep. Giffords but we didn’t. It is sneaking up on a major election and propaganda and political rancor are tools politicians use to get us to vote.   Politicians are business men. They realize that doing the right thing isn’t the best way to keep their jobs. We still live in a political climate of spreading dissension and hate is more effective for keeping their jobs than doing their jobs in the best way possible.

Why work to make the country better and uphold our constitution when calling “the other guy” names and demonizing one group or another accomplishes the ultimate goal of keeping your job better?

Case in point, the debt ceiling debate. If they do not come to an agreement, our national government basically shuts down. As far as I can tell, there are two things that are keeping the agreement stalemated. The Republicans want deep cuts in social programs and the Democrats want wealthy people and corporations to pay the same taxes as the rest of us. As far as I can tell, the Democrats are willing to compromise on the cuts on the social programs but the Republicans are refusing to tax their honey pot contributors. It seems like they would rather cause thousands of people to lose jobs and throw this country further into financial crisis and call it “fiscal responsibility” (I would buy the social program cuts as fiscal responsibility, if I didn’t see the hypocrisy of refusing to tax the rich folks who have bought them) than to give a bit.  It makes me want to go up to the capitol and shake every single politician.

I am far from impartial on the matter. I understand the strong rancor people feel when they talk about their beliefs. Sometimes I want to call people morons and tell them to use their brains. I do my best not to for one simple fact: I believe that rarely is an ideal more important than human lives.

History has times that show us that ideals are more important than the humans they effect. I promise you that the bullshit in politics currently is not more important than trying to shut up and be nice. I promise you immigration is not worth being nasty to another human being over, much less killing someone. I promise you that Jesus did not want you to use him as an excuse to bully, hate, name call, kill, or harm another human being. He did not say “Love thy neighbor, but only if he believes and behaves exactly as you do.”

I guess it boils down to my three life philosophies:

Shut up and be nice. ~ Ani Difranco

Be most excellent to one another. ~George Carlin in “Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure”

Leave a place better than you found it.  ~ Girl Scouts of America

Having beliefs is great. Expressing your beliefs is fine. Hating someone else because they are different than you is not okay.

My heart breaks for the people of Norway today. Americans know the shock and pain they are feeling. We have been attacked from both the outside and from within and know the feelings of betrayal from both. Keep them in your thoughts.

 
Share
by

Thursday Morning

It isn’t even 8 am and I am writing a blog. Tina’s house has a strange effect on my hours. Never fear I sense I will be napping in just a little bit. Once again this morning I don’t have a cohesive topic to write about. This isn’t going to be one of those great insightful blogs. This is one of those “I committed to write 500 words three days a week so I am going to do it whether it is good or not blogs.”

I am at Tina’s for awhile while her David is going to some classes for his job. I am having a blast. We aren’t doing anything super exciting or even mildly exciting, I just love being a part of this family. Little things like Tina telling Sammie she needs to not tear up the lining around her air conditioner or the bugs will come in at night and crawl all over her at night and then telling Sammie bugs are good but they need to be outside. Sammie is now wandering around saying “bugs are good but they need to stay outside.” Not only is it funny and cute but it also assures me that Sammie is going to be very hard to scar.

Caius is on the floor playing with a toy AT-AT. It gives me hope that I will be lucky enough to have both of my nephews be Star Wars geeks. I have some pretty awesome nieces and nephews as it is, but that would just be flipping epic. My only hope of being the super cool Tia when they get older is if they are both a bit geeky. I can relate and encourage geeky.

I am at one full week of writing with Kathleen. I am so pleased with how it is going. I am about three-quarters of the way done with my massively obnoxious summary outline and I have some research to do, then I will be ready to start writing my first draft. I am beginning to doubt the wisdom of setting the book in Baton Rouge since it has been so long since I have been there. I think I will be begging my Facebook friends to help me with tidbits to make the book feel more realistic in the setting.

Sammie just told me she really cares about me very much and I told her I love her very very very much and she replies “I know because I have a bandage on my albow.” Caius is angry because we are eating without him so he put the side of his face on the floor and scooting along the floor while screaming. I don’t know why it is so entertaining but it just is. Now Sammie is singing “Twinkle Star.”

Seth and Grace are the same way. Grace is a little spitfire whom lives in her own little world. She shows us glimpses of what it is like in there and it is amazing. Seth is my boy. He and I play hard but what I really cherish when he tells me stories or shows me his different Lego stuff.  I love how serious he is and how thoroughly he thinks things through.

I love my kids.

 
Share
by

Monday Night

It is Monday night. I am attempting to be responsible and write something tonight and set it up to publish tomorrow morning.  I have plans to head to the Tina’s tomorrow and I know I won’t get it done tomorrow. I know me. I have a slight problem. I have not a damn thing to write about. I have thought all day. I have nothing cohesive or cool so I am just going to do that thing where I write about about of disconnected stuff.

I realized that I am probably the weirdest person I know. (That is saying something considering Lynsie want to make taxidermy creations from dead mice.) I realized this while I was eating a bowl of fruit loops.  I know it is odd enough that a 29 year old would eat fruit loops but I like eating them for an odd reason. The taste is good but I like to eat them because I like sorting out each spoonful by color. I eat my fruit loops color coded. Of course I only do this for the first half a bowl because by the second half the colors take too long to sort out and the cereal is verging on crumbly moosh.

Also, apparently I talk and write funny. I am getting blame for my best friend’s three year-old saying “nonsense.” I can’t really deny it is my fault. Most likely it is my fault. I also taught her to call a tambourine a dirty hippie. I am the most awesome Tia ever.

My nephew’s 8th birthday is today. My sister and her family are in Turks and Caicos for the week. I think it is fantastic. I might also be a bit /jealous. My sister works really hard for everything her family has and I am proud and happy that they are able to provide their kids with so much.

I went by the library today to turn in some books that I had checked out but never read. I love the books but I just wasn’t feeling it this time. I got some other books that are lighter fun books. I also found out that I am even less capable of carrying on a conversation right now. I have always been a bit harebrained. Sometimes I would catch myself dazing off when talking to people or I would think ahead in the conversation and jump there  without bringing the other person with me. I also was famous for starting a conversation in the middle because I had been thinking about something then made a comment without cluing in the other person. Today I was literally trying to have a coherent conversation and I kept thinking about some stuff I am writing and mess up the thread of conversation.  Really, like I need something else harming my ability to be around normal people.

Good news is the writing is working crazy well. Kathleen and I spend hours every day writing. We are writing separate things but we are hanging out in a chat program to talk to each other and be responsible to each other for actually writing. My pre-writing is smashing a long awesome sauce. Things got so much easier when I decided to just write something fun. I decided that I was okay with not having a super awesome plot and just trying really hard to write a funny book with good characters.  Actually, right now I would just be pleased to get a book written all the way through the first draft. I feel like that would be a major accomplishment.  World changing literature can come later.  No sparkling vampires… I promise.

Ramble accomplished. Time to go do some more summary outline writing….. woo woo

 

 
Share
by

Long, Strange Journey

Crappy Paint Cake

I made a cake for the occasion!

Welcome, Gentle Readers, to my 100th blog post! Anyone who has stuck with me from the beginning knows I love me some retrospect and reflection. What better time to think about the progression of my site than the 100th post?

This blog started out as a place to host my Thematic Experiment blog. Thematic Experiment was an idea cooked up with Tina to showcase my ability to write about anything repeatedly on a regular schedule to show potential employers.

It started on a normal free WordPress blog site until I was picked to contribute for the fantastic Urlybits.com (then dailyshite.com) and I decided I needed to have my own site too. I have been incredibly slack contributing to Urlybits but I owe so much to Sara and Paul O’Flaherty. I learned a lot from working with them and I got some great friends out of the deal.

Anyway, I bought the domain name for the site and set off on this odyssey. I found a few surprises a long the way. I realized I really enjoy building WordPress sites. I also realized that I do not know nearly enough about them. I still live in fear when I decide to make changes to my site. Second, I found that not only could I write on a schedule about a specific theme but I was actually pretty good at it. I am not going to pretend that all of my stuff was gold but I was expecting far worse. Third, and by far the biggest surprise, people read it.

I wrote six full-ish months off theme blogs until (through some prodding by Sara) I decided to go to my more personal blog. I think those six months were very important. I had to prove something to myself and I think I did. Something happened with April and beyond though and I actually started to put myself into my blogs.

In reality, I am a simple creature. I am a pain in the ass and I am crazy but my motivations are pretty simple. I like making people happy, I like praise and attention, and I like to think that I am special. (Tyler Durden be damned.) I think do varying degrees we are all motivated by these things. Some social pundits call blogging narcissism and look down on it as self aggrandizement. (I know I talk funny damnit. Stop making fun of me.) On the surface these people are right. It is narcissistic that I write thing about myself and those around me and expect people to care. I do get a feeling of gratification for the praise I get. It does make me feel good to think that what I write might matter to someone else. So, in some ways they are absolutely right, but in the important ways, they are very very wrong.

Most humans need connections to be whole. We need to feel like people care about us and to care about others. We need to know that there are other people who are like us or who have gone through the same things we have. Nothing is more terrifying and awful than to feel like you are the only one. (Go watch that Brene Brown video on TED.com if you haven’t. Just do it, okay and stop arguing, I am right about this.)

It is hard in a society of false faces to feel these connections. So much of our society is obsessed with appearances (I do not just mean purely looks) that we have become so disingenuous that it is hard to feel connected to people. Some people can not even truly connect to the people closest to us because we are so concerned with appearance and being correct that we just do not open up. We worry about privacy. We worry about what happens if people find out. We worry what people will think. We start to judge, and forget to try to understand, and it becomes so hard to allow ourselves to be truly open with anyone that it becomes almost a heroic feat to tell the truth about some human experiences. Screw that. I hate this silence and disconnect, it breeds shame and shame is generally the most useless and destructive emotion we humans have.

That is why we read and write blogs. We get to share. We get to talk about our kids, our food, our pets, or anything else that matters. We feel connected to people when we read people’s blogs about experiences like ours. It does not matter if it is unimportant or inconsequential, it is genuine sharing. We get to have those connections we need and we feel less alone.

The blog post Strong Woman changed everything for me. I had harbored so much pain, shame, and confusion deep inside myself that was eating at me. I wrote something of myself for the first time and put it out naked and raw.  I was terrified. It was the most liberating thing I have ever done. The response was overwhelming and life changing for me.

I like praise and I like being good at things but this went so much deeper than that. I realized how hungry we all are for honest, genuine human truth. I realized that I was not alone in all those emotions that went along with the abuse.  I realized I liked the honest me that I put into the rawness there and in posts after that. Also, I always knew that my friends are incredible and my friends who read this site are invaluable to me but after that, I realized that you guys are more amazing than I ever thought.

I started writing this blog in November for Tina. I kept writing in the beginning to prove to myself that I could. I found that now I write it because I believe in it. I don’t have delusions that my writing will ever bring change or effect the world. I write now because I hate our world of polite society and polite conversation. Now, I don’t think we should run through life telling everyone we meet every detail of everything that has ever happened to us. I just think it stupid that we are afraid to be open even when we should be. I think it is stupid that we have let ourselves be so isolated and shamed that we lock ourselves into boxes. I am done with it. Fear of being judged or ridiculed sucks. I do not think it is worth giving up the chance to truly connect with those around us though. I have been advised that it would be smart of me to unlist my blog or stop writing my blog because it could hurt my chances of finding a job. It is brilliant advice that would be smart for me to take. I am not known for doing things the easy way that makes sense.

I absolutely did not mean this blog to become a big ass rant about blogging and openness. Tangents happen. I do want to say one last thing though.

Thank you.

 
Share
by

Blog or Death

“Sorry, we are all out of blog.”

“So my choice is ‘or death’?”

Sorry I had to channel and ruin Eddie Izzard there.

So, time to point out something obvious: I have been a damn slacker lately and I missed TWO blog posts in a row. The interwebs gods are writing on their little tablet computers and marking me down as a terrible internet person. How do I ever intend on becoming on of the nerd queens of the internet if I do not write when I say I am going to write?  Bah! I do have reasons…. Kinda.

Saturday I was helping babysit my niece and nephew. We did not leave to go to my sister’s house early in the morning or anything. I just did not wake up early enough to write before we left and we did not get home until late Saturday night/ early Sunday morning. It was a blast. I love those kids. My gentle readers are just going to have to suck it up and deal. The lesson I learned was that if I want to do something like that again I need to plan ahead and write the blog the night before and just set it up to publish that morning.

Tuesday I was very busy not getting a job. I had a second interview for a job I was wanting. I woke up early-ish for me and put on my grown up clothes, grown up make-up, and did my hair in a grown up style. I showed up early with a really cute business serious woman purse. The interview took far less time than it took to get ready for it. The man conducting the interview was incredibly nice but I could tell my interview was a formality. He called me later to tell me that they had decided to offer someone else the job. I was disappointed. I had liked the idea of a job and a paycheck.  I decided to take a nap in my new bed in my newly redone bedroom.  Things always look better after you sleep on them.

Here is what I decided when I woke up: I was disappointed but I was not crushed. The job market sucks right now, especially around here. I am not going to starve or be homeless. I decided to be happy that next week I get to spend some time with Tina. My mom also has made me read awful books that she bought on the cheap for her e-reader. It was torture and it was enlightening. People will buy absolutely anything for 99 cents and you can make a decent amount of money for selling your stuff cheap. I also learned that people are far more willing to buy short stuff on e-readers than they are in actual paper books. I decided I was going to use my unemployed time to do cool things.

With e-readers a person can self publish. I am going to learn how to self publish. I am going to write some crappy romance novellas and sell them cheap (under a pen name of course) just to get started and then, after I get a feel for it, I am going to try and publish my good stuff. I just need to actually do it. For me, follow through is always the sticking point. Also, I have been informed that it is nearly impossible to tell me that I should do something or that something is a good idea. Apparently, one has to lead me to the conclusion so I can see it for myself. I am a pain in the ass, it is part of my charm.

I have major insecurities about my writing. I have things tripping me up in my head.  I know, I know, everyone has these things, and I should be bold and go forth. Well, as fore mentioned, me knowing something and me actually coming to the conclusion to myself are two completely different things. So I am trying to stare the dumb self-defeating shit that resides in my head directly in the face and try to work around it.

I have a chance to be what I wanted to be when I grow up. I have support and people who truly believe in me. I think I have a chance of being good and finding a place. The good thing about being so harsh on myself is that I know some of my faults and I can work to figure out how to handle them before they arise.

I have cancelled all gaming accounts. I am not going to play Rift or World of Warcraft. I downloaded Plants Versus Zombies and that satisfies my computer entertainment needs.

I know certain things about myself. One of those things I know about myself is that if I am only accountable to myself I will not do it. I also know that if I have some I care about to be responsible to I will do what I can not to disappoint them. It is why I have stuck with this blog for so long. I told Tina I would do it. Every time I miss a blog I feel like I am letting her down a bit. This is my 99th post because I told her I would.

If I am going to do this e-publishing/ crappy novella writing thing I know I will only succeed if I have someone to be accountable to. This is where the strange miracles of late come in. So Kathleen. She came back into my life. She is also a writer. She is an amazing writer and is the direct opposite of me creatively. We are going to be responsible to each other. I feel a chance for it to work out well for both of us.

Not doing something because of fear of failure is dumb. I am filled with trepidation writing this because of that nagging voice that tells me that it could be another one of my harebrained ideas that go nowhere and now I have put it out on my blog which means that people will know I had this harebrained idea that went nowhere. I told you my head is full of dumb voices.

I have learned something about myself through blogging about myself since my life blew up: I am bravest when I am the most honest about my vulnerable self and I create things I am the most proud of when I am honest. That is why the Brene Brown video Kathleen showed me meant to much to me.

My biggest fears are failure and missing life because of fear. (And falling from heights, I am the only person I know that has panic attacks standing on chairs changing light bulbs and it is a damn good thing I am tall.) I do not want to look like an idiot and I hate feeling like I am clueless. I also do not want to not do something great in life because I am afraid that I might look like an idiot or because I might be bad at it. I have decided the second fear is far more likely to help me be happy.

Part of the reason why I crashed into the wall was because I stopped being genuine. I lost touch with that truth that I found in vulnerability. I have decided that I am going to go crashing forth in life , like I do, with the grace and delicacy of a bull in a china shop with that heady freedom and power I found in being honest and vulnerable and genuine in some of those early post explosion posts. Part of me shudders at that idea. I am not afraid of vulnerability, I shudder because I have seen some really bad honest and open writing. Some people expose their souls and they do it with bad writing.

Not writing  because you fear writing badly is dumb.

Damnit.

I hate it when I have to accept logic.

Epic ramble done.

 

 

 

 
Share
by

Smash (Turns Out)

First, watch this. It is twenty minutes long but it is an amazing twenty minutes. Trust me

I know most of you did not stop and watch it. Oh ye of little faith. Just know that this will inspire a few blogs after this one.

Saturday I reconnected with an amazing woman that had been an astounding friend for many years with. (We just went a really long time between phone calls.) She linked me this and it made me think. Thinking gave me panic attacks and yesterday everything went smash.

I felt like I had done some crazy Wiley Coyote stunt where I attached myself to a bungee cord attached to a brick wall and turned on my jet pack and eventually the bungee cord and the brink wall won. BOOM.

I am Selina, Handler of Things. When there is a problem I handle it. I sit down and look at my options and figure out a plan of attack. When I am struggling I come up with multiple plans and go through them one by one caring little about actual success just caring about keeping moving. I do this with the people I care about too. It is why I seem bossy or controlling, it is because I am trying to handle things because I want to make things as good as possible for those I love. It is just what I do.

Turns out you can’t just handle heartbreak.

Selina, Handler of Things met her match with this one.

This is how I explained it to my mom after the cord smashed me back into the wall and I realized I was hurting: I am only three blocks of better trying to run fast and be one mile of better. Eventually something is going to happen and snap you back and wake you up. I was working so hard to push push push push things to make them better, to make them move, that I lost track of were I was and stopped being honest to myself. I was so busy trying to be okay that I forgot to actually help myself be okay.

Turns out that doesn’t work so well.

It also turns out that I have to be okay with that. My tendency when bad things happen to me is to downplay them. It was just a stupid break up. He was not right for me, everyone knew (including me.) He was a big bag of jerk and I am free of him. I deserve better anyway. He was holding me back an now I can be and do whatever I want.

The life I had built for that year plus died. That Selina that I was died. I gave that relationship everything I had and I went into it with my whole heart. It causes damage.

I honestly do not miss him. I see my life as better with out him. In my mind, I know I deserve better. I thought this meant the damage should be better and I should be able to move on. Yeah, so maybe I was a little wrong there. The damage is still there and it still hurts. Turns out making plans and handling things do not work on feelings of being unworthy of love and of feelings weakness. Turns out that planning and handling just hides them.

Push push push. It pisses me off so bad. I want to be better and I should be better but I am not. I should have a job. I should have plans. I should be skinner. I should be writing my great whatever the hell it is that I am going to write to change the world. I should be out making a bevy of new friends. I should, I should, I should.

I was doing the ugly cry (the one with the red face and snot) while talking to my mom and I realized I have a massive double standard for myself. If I saw someone else going through this I would say I was doing fine. I would give them far more leeway than I give myself. I would tell them they are trying hard and that these things take time. I would tell them to stop worrying about should. I would tell them that after a crash it is okay to take a few days and hide and heal. I would tell them that sometimes in life merely doing what you can is enough. Turns out I am kinder to others than I am myself.

I am hurting. I have no plans to handle it. I am just going to feel it. I am going to take a few days to hide and heal. I am going to try to be more honest with myself and try to be kinder to myself. I am going to write what I feel and not what I think I should. Beyond that, I don’t know.

 
Share
by

Curiosity and the Cat

I have sworn off of men for at least a year because it seemed like the logical decision to make.  I love men but they do nothing but create chaos in my life and I am doing a good enough job creating my own chaos thankyouverymuch. I still think about what I want in a man (like every single straight woman does) and on occasion I look at a dating site on which I have a profile just out of curiosity. Curiosity killed the cat and I don’t think there is the needed satisfaction to bring it back.

I know dating sites are all the rage with the hot young singles these days. I have had the strangest luck with it. It is has been all bad and it has all been just weird.

The Boys of the Internet:

The mail I ever got on that site came when I was 27. The man was 56.  I when I looked at his dating preferences I noticed that he wanted a woman between the ages of 25 and 35. Ugh. I could tell he was looking for a real intellectual soul match. I felt a bit ageist about brushing him off until I realized even he didn’t want to date someone his age. Seriously, though, there is little a man nearly thirty years my senior could have in common with me mentally or emotionally. I know women closer to his age and most of them are beautiful, dynamic, smart women who would make him happier.  Plus, it would feel pervy dating someone my mom’s age.

The second guy I connected with was a nerdy, smallish man who was working on his doctorate. He was very busy (so he said) but he was very smart, interesting, and charming. One night we were on the phone and he was telling me how everything in the universe was made of the same particles that were created in the big bang. He told me everything in the world was star dust. I know, I know, I am a dork but that was freaking hot. We made a date and he chickened out and I never talked to him again. I have been told his behaviors were indicative of someone who was in a relationship and was looking to cheat. /le sigh

Third guy is known as “Hatchet Boy.” That should be your first clue that things were not awesome. We sent a few messages back and forth and we exchanged myspace pages. He had some of his writing posted and it was bad angst-filled teenage “dark” crap but with slightly violent undertones. His picture was of him holding two hatchets. It gets better. Turns out he was one of the regulars at the library and he had creeped me out there too. When he realized who I was, it got awkward and a bit scary in my head. I told him I was seriously talking to another guy and I wanted to see where that went first.

I was talking to another guy, so I was not lying to Hatchet Boy. This guy was special, the bad kind of special. He dropped out of high school in ninth grade and liked Twilight. He had a daughter and baby momma drama. He also told me on our first date that his ex-girl friend might also be pregnant. As we talk over the next few days things just got more insane. He had to go rescue his daughter from his crazy ex. He found out that the wall of his heart was too thick and he needed medicine and a transplant.  His truck broke down. He had a cousin that lived near the nerd convention in Anaheim, CA that I was going to in a few weeks. Something was going on with his neighbors dogs and shot guns. I decided that either this guy was a big liar or a drama magnet and I needed to not go there.

That was the guy that broke my desire to date. (I am amazed that it took that much.) I stopped looking at the site and forgot about it then I got the latest ex-boyfriend and cancelled my account. One night in a moment of weakness after the break-up I reactivated my account.

I have only had one contact after I reactivated it and that was enough to make me roll my eyes and swear not to use the site seriously. The guy was 47 and he was a poet. If being a poet was not bad enough, his poetry was terrible. It was rhyme scheme dependent drivel. He told me his biggest frustration in life is that all the women notice him for his hot body and not his mind, rhymes, and large man bits. Do I need to explain why this did not get very far?

I still check the site on occasion just when I get curious. I always find the same assortment of strange men who can’t spell and have nothing in common with me. It helps me with my decision to stay single.

 
Share