tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-536350286124992762024-02-21T10:28:39.860-08:00Blonde spot39, curvy, brown-brown, attorney, mom, separated. A self-deprecating, loyal, ink- and-paper book-loving, passionate nerd who is STILL trying to find her way. Born a brunette, I made lots of blonde jokes in the 1980s, only to be blessed with a golden-haired Doodle who wants her mommy to "have yellow hair like her." So as I meander through my 40th year, broke but not broken, stuck but moving forward, I vow to concentrate on fixing myself--mentally, emotionally, and financially. As a blonde.Unknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger66125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-53635028612499276.post-8335291800825295182012-02-03T11:03:00.000-08:002012-02-03T11:09:23.554-08:00Day 54: Fools like meOkay, so this year has yet to fulfill it's promise. And I have had a few very low days this past week. On the couch with re-runs of what my life will never be. But I pulled myself off the couch (with difficulty) and "suited up" (sort of) and returned to work yesterday. <br />
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It was better to get off the couch and out of the house. Even in the mitten state in late January/early February, outside is less bleak, less hopeless. Especially with the unseasonably mild air crisp with the promise of spring. Mesmerized by the twilight skyline from my office window. A bit of spring in my step as I walked to the parking garage. I cross against the light, mindful but not especially concerned about the cop car sitting in front of the building. <br />
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Then, the cop car's lights flash at me. And I think: seriously? (Yes, I may have watched several episodes of Grey's Anatomy during my couch convalescence and may tend to over-identify with Meredith Grey. Aside from the not being a surgeon [law school debt is bad enough], or the daughter of a surgeon, or skinny. But the unavailable [at least in the beginning married] McDreamy, a silver airstream, a propensity for the [wrong] boys and the booze). <br />
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Just as I am thinking that I should have extended my couch convalescence. That a ticket for jaywalking will make me the laughingstock of well, everyone. The window comes down and I spot a familiar face. Smiling dark eyes that drank me in one Summer night. As we bonded over a shared history of the ones that got away. Dark brown eyes with a bit of a twinkle, a bit of darkness, far too much pain. Way too cute. <br />
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Randomness. But randomness that made me smile. And resolve to never venture forth without lipstick. <br />
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<a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=njD5lh0vPfs">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=njD5lh0vPfs</a> <br />
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Fools like Me, Lisa Loeb, who I believe is among those haunted by the ones who got away. In other words, a kindred spirit:<br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgfm5Cc8uZ2iyVD72ASRakQRYDT8cuuIG62qwAZgbFLRxVKPe0N5kqVtkKvjLz24k9FqmObVfahmaqyos9UuvvGgSOQ-oDiVn4KqsCzpNZ_acUXTA4DrqDzXyRG0xjOaqmFPDjyqV-JYas/s1600/lisaloebtop1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgfm5Cc8uZ2iyVD72ASRakQRYDT8cuuIG62qwAZgbFLRxVKPe0N5kqVtkKvjLz24k9FqmObVfahmaqyos9UuvvGgSOQ-oDiVn4KqsCzpNZ_acUXTA4DrqDzXyRG0xjOaqmFPDjyqV-JYas/s320/lisaloebtop1.jpg" width="252" /></a></div><br />
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<span style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;">Everybody go </span><br style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;" /><span style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;">The party's over </span><br style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;" /><span style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;">I want to be alone in my head </span><br style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;" /><span style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;">In my bed tonight </span><br style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;" /><span style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;">You never show </span><br style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;" /><br style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;" /><span style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;">You must really love her </span><br style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;" /><span style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;">You think I don't know </span><br style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;" /><span style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;">But I do, yeah it's true </span><br style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;" /><span style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;">I think over is over </span><br style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;" /><br style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;" /><span style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;">I'm right back where I started </span><br style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;" /><span style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;">(when it comes to wanting you) </span><br style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;" /><span style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;">I can't have what I wanted </span><br style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;" /><br style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;" /><i style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;">[Chorus]</i><br style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;" /><span style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;">But I did, I can </span><br style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;" /><span style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;">I was, I am </span><br style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;" /><span style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;">Only human, living, dying </span><br style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;" /><span style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;">Just like any fool who ever breathed </span><br style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;" /><span style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;">If love is blind </span><br style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;" /><span style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;">If love's a drug </span><br style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;" /><span style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;">It always is </span><br style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;" /><span style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;">It always was and </span><br style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;" /><span style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;">Love was surely made for fools like me </span><br style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;" /><br style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;" /><span style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;">I know where I'm going </span><br style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;" /><span style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;">I'm tripping I'm sliding around </span><br style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;" /><span style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;">That's ok </span><br style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;" /><span style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;">At least I'm excited </span><br style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;" /><span style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;">It wasn't how I planned it </span><br style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;" /><span style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;">(wasn't how I planned it </span><br style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;" /><span style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;">Feet are where I landed </span><br style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;" /><span style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;">At least I understand it now) </span><br style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;" /><span style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;">My feet are where I landed </span><br style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;" /><span style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;">(feet are staying on the ground) </span><br style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;" /><i style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;">[Chorus]</i><br style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;" /><br style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;" /><span style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;">Fools like me </span><br style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;" /><span style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;">Fools like me </span><br style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;" /><br style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;" /><span style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;">I did, I can </span><br style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;" /><span style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;">I was, I am </span><br style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;" /><span style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;">Only human, living, dying </span><br style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;" /><span style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;">Just like any fool who ever breathed </span><br style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;" /><br style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;" /><span style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;">Maybe it's the sanest thing </span><br style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;" /><span style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;">Or just the sweetest kind of dream </span><br style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;" /><span style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;">But love was surely made for fools </span><br style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;" /><span style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;">(Love was surely made for fools) </span><br style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;" /><span style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;">Love was surely made for fools </span><br style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;" /><span style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;">(Love was surely made for fools) </span><br style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;" /><span style="background-color: #ccccdd; font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13px; text-align: center;">Love was surely made for fools like me</span> <br />
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-53635028612499276.post-38837226305334259272012-01-22T22:41:00.000-08:002012-01-22T22:41:14.084-08:00Day 53: These foolish thingsThese things come unbidden to me, striking out of nowhere. Random bits of nostalgic lightning. The sadness in his eyes as he sat across from me, eating my cold french fries. The way his body shook in the moonlight. The slow, easy way he seduced me, seduces me. Time and time and time again. <br />
<br />
Like almost always, someone said it better than me. Sang it like I never could.<br />
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<span style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px; text-align: left;">Oh! Will you never let me be?</span><br style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px; text-align: left;" /><span style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px; text-align: left;">Oh! Will you never set me free?</span><br style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px; text-align: left;" /><span style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px; text-align: left;">The ties that bound us</span><br style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px; text-align: left;" /><span style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px; text-align: left;">Are still around us</span><br style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px; text-align: left;" /><span style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px; text-align: left;">There's no escape that I can see</span><br style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px; text-align: left;" /><span style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px; text-align: left;">And still those little things remain</span><br style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px; text-align: left;" /><span style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px; text-align: left;">That bring me happiness or pain</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px; text-align: left;"><br />
</span><br />
<div style="text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px;">A cigarette that bears a lipstick's traces</span><br style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px;" /><span style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px;">An airline ticket to romantic places</span><br style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px;" /><span style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px;">And still my heart has wings</span><br style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px;" /><span style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px;">These foolish things remind me of you</span><br style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px;" /><span style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px;">A tinkling piano in the next apartment</span><br style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px;" /><span style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px;">Those stumbling words that told you what my heart meant</span><br style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px;" /><span style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px;">A fair ground's painted swings</span><br style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px;" /><span style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px;">These foolish things remind me of you</span><br style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px;" /><span style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px;">You came you saw you conquer'd me</span><br style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px;" /><span style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px;">When you did that to me</span><br style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px;" /><span style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px;">I knew somehow this had to be</span><br style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px;" /><span style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px;">The winds of March that make my heart a dancer</span><br style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px;" /><span style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px;">A telephone that rings but who's to answer?</span><br style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px;" /><span style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px;">Oh, how the ghost of you clings!</span><br style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px;" /><span style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px;">These foolish things remind me of you</span><br style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px;" /><br style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px;" /><span style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px;">First daffodils and long excited cables</span><br style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px;" /><span style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px;">And candle lights on little corner tables</span><br style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px;" /><span style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px;">And still my heart has wings</span><br style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px;" /><span style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px;">These foolish things remind me of you</span><br style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px;" /><span style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px;">The park at evening when the bell has sounded</span><br style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px;" /><span style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px;">The "Ile de France" with all the gulls around it</span><br style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px;" /><span style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px;">The beauty that is Spring's</span><br style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px;" /><span style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px;">These foolish things remind me of you</span><br style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px;" /><span style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px;">How strange how sweet to find you still</span><br style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px;" /><span style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px;">These things are dear to me</span><br style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px;" /><span style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px;">They seem to bring you near to me</span><br style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px;" /><span style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px;">The sigh of midnight trains in empty stations</span><br style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px;" /><span style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px;">Silk stockings thrown aside dance invitations</span><br style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px;" /><span style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px;">Oh, how the ghost of you clings!</span><br style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px;" /><span style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px;">These foolish things remind me of you</span><br style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px;" /><br style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px;" /><span style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px;">Gardenia perfume ling'ring on a pillow</span><br style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px;" /><span style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px;">Wild strawb'ries only seven francs a kilo</span><br style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px;" /><span style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px;">And still my heart has wings</span><br style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px;" /><span style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px;">These foolish things remind me of you</span><br style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px;" /><span style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px;">The smile of Garbo and the scent of roses</span><br style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px;" /><span style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px;">The waiters whistling as the last bar closes</span><br style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px;" /><span style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px;">The song that Crosby sings</span><br style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px;" /><span style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px;">These foolish things remind me of you</span><br style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px;" /><span style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px;">How strange how sweet to find you still</span><br style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px;" /><span style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px;">These things are dear to me</span><br style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px;" /><span style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px;">They seem to bring you near to me</span><br style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px;" /><span style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px;">The scent of smould'ring leaves, the wail of steamers</span><br style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px;" /><span style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px;">Two lovers on the street who walk like dreamers</span><br style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px;" /><span style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px;">Oh, how the ghost of you clings!</span><br style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px;" /><span style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px;">These foolish things remind me of you</span> </div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px;"><br />
</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L4jkUlClRYc">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L4jkUlClRYc</a> </div><span style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 12px; text-align: left;"><br />
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</span>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-53635028612499276.post-89216577716432071962012-01-12T11:57:00.000-08:002012-01-12T11:57:41.768-08:00Day 52: What the fuck am I doing?I have a tightness in my chest. My heart is twisted. The other night I actually googled "am I having a heart attack?" Google chided me for googling my symptoms and directed me to call 9-1-1. <div><br />
</div><div>Magical thinking. Realism. Coincidence. Fate. Signs. Chance. Serendipity. Randomness. Numbness. Chaos. Intractable. Frustration. Static. Fuck. Sigh. </div><div><br />
</div><div><div><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rphzRv8oHIM&feature=related">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rphzRv8oHIM&feature=related</a> (Part I)</div><div><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjsusy_wNXO09742ub15jiLEfniEr9JYV5htqqFvYdS3UYq6vEeLxn6SdTayJsAX1qYcNZ3l2s0nUcxCIMmxdIgHPAq0ty4W_XNve1r3944Y0-Y7L2_nUODIeRLmX7rh_DVoG53AT5hYx8/s1600/beforesunset.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjsusy_wNXO09742ub15jiLEfniEr9JYV5htqqFvYdS3UYq6vEeLxn6SdTayJsAX1qYcNZ3l2s0nUcxCIMmxdIgHPAq0ty4W_XNve1r3944Y0-Y7L2_nUODIeRLmX7rh_DVoG53AT5hYx8/s1600/beforesunset.jpg" /></a></div><div><br />
</div><div><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l3KFsm1rJVc&feature=related">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l3KFsm1rJVc&feature=related</a> (Part II)</div><div><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgUkIvdnw1Mfb5iZq0abGwxWtlqObsYggFHYS7Q3zPjJnXchwZ70Ca5iz25upDXVXef2QtHZz3VSrfzllUHO-sQF3ZVIDF_on7gAjnCcrExpGhH_qTzyl1d3dd1jTu6RTh8ZRiiVNAT_T4/s1600/beforeandafter.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="224" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgUkIvdnw1Mfb5iZq0abGwxWtlqObsYggFHYS7Q3zPjJnXchwZ70Ca5iz25upDXVXef2QtHZz3VSrfzllUHO-sQF3ZVIDF_on7gAjnCcrExpGhH_qTzyl1d3dd1jTu6RTh8ZRiiVNAT_T4/s320/beforeandafter.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><div><br />
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</div></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-53635028612499276.post-3648876596230986322011-12-19T11:42:00.000-08:002011-12-19T11:42:19.688-08:00Day 51a: A postscriptTo put it mildly, I am a fan of the postscript. Otherwise known as the P.S. I have been know to write letters and emails with P.S.s longer than the body of the letter or email. I understand that the lengthy P.S. sort of defeats the purpose but it's one of my quirks. Deal with it. <br />
<br />
Any way, I digress. I saw my best girl this weekend for our annual holiday baking gala and get together where we exchange Christmas gifts. A few days before our bake-a-thon, I sent her the link to my Day 51 entry titled "Manderly again." On Saturday, after our kitchen toiling was finished, she gave me a t-shirt that read "<span style="background-color: #fff9ee; color: #222222; font-family: Georgia, Utopia, 'Palatino Linotype', Palatino, serif; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px;">"</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: georgia, serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 18px;">Last night I dreamt I went to Manderley again." </span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: georgia, serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 18px;"><br />
</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: georgia, serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 18px;">Throughout our 20 plus year friendship, we've never discussed Rebecca--the book or movie from whence the quote came. After opening my gift, I remarked that she really must have ordered the t-shirt fast, thinking that it was chosen in response to my blog entry. She ordered it months ago and had not gotten around to reading my Day 51 entry. (The horror, the horror, I know.) </span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: georgia, serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 18px;"><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: georgia, serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 18px;">A sign? Coincidence? </span>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-53635028612499276.post-79365115238558983832011-12-13T15:08:00.000-08:002011-12-13T15:08:48.837-08:00Day 51: Manderley again"<span class="Apple-style-span" style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: georgia, serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 18px;">Last night I dreamt I went to Manderley again.”*</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: georgia, serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 18px;"> </span><br />
<br />
I have a stuffy head and sore throat so last night, I took some stuffy-head-so-you-can-rest medicine. Okay, the Walgreen's version of the stuffy-head-so-you-rest medicine but in the "death-green" original formula.** It knocked me out and back into the arms of the ONE WHO GOT AWAY. Also known as the ONE WHO CHOSE SOMEONE ELSE. <br />
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The first part of the dream was him lamenting everything that he gave up by choosing to be the GOOD GUY WHO STAYED. Passion, intimacy, himself. His true self. He continued to wage this internal war in my dream. Until finally, he snuck in and then out of Germany and back into Detroit, which in my dream apparently borders Germany and Canada. He and his friend were chased by German border agents and after their successful escape to my kitchen, the friend disappeared and the ONE took me in his arms (and on the kitchen counter tops.)<br />
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It was during the sweet-spot of this dream that the dream took another twist. As dreams are wont to do. In between passionate, longing kisses, he told me that he often thought of me, especially during play group or when reading a parenting manual when a mom named Julie was mentioned. And my heart dropped. Into my knees. With disappointment. <br />
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Then, the slow beep that builds into a series of loud beeps that is my alarm clock. Pulling me from the magic of his arms, from figuring out why the context of which he thought of me made my heart drop, from hearing all the other ways that he thought of me, from having him choose me, to be with me. To be with me for more than one night, for more than a few stolen hours. <br />
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And then all day, I am haunted. The elevator door opens as I leave the parking garage at the Greektown Casino Hotel and the first word that I hear is Chicago. Where we met, from whence he hails. Then, this long, rambling discussion with myself on the way into work. Chicago is a popular, storied city that is often mentioned. As is California. It's not unusual that people, books, music, and movies reference Chicago or San Francisco or California. It does not mean anything. There are no signs. There are only hard, cold facts from which to draw a harder, colder conclusion.<br />
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And here I am. Still at work. 90 minutes past quitting time. Still haunted.<br />
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*From Rebecca, Daphne du Maurier<br />
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**Dennis O'Leary, No Cure for CancerUnknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-53635028612499276.post-58598807596995524442011-11-22T13:29:00.000-08:002011-11-22T13:29:07.199-08:00Day 50: Time, memory, and endingsEver since I can remember, I have been fascinated and perplexed by the construct of time. The measurement of time, the passage of time. The idea that time exists as a limitless quantity, as the Rolling Stones famously sang that time is somehow on our side. We waste it and squander it and tell ourselves that there is always tomorrow. <div><br />
</div><div>Based on the Brit's recommendation, I began reading Julian Barnes' "the sense of an ending" last night and finished the final 18 pages this morning. I was hooked from the first words to the last sentence on page 163. At 163 total pages, Barnes' style could be characterized as economical but yet it is so densely packed with exactly the right words that conveyed the fungiblity of time, the fragility of memory, the mirage of change. </div><div><br />
</div><div>I admire it for both its technical brilliance and its haunting resonance. Take this passage: <span class="Apple-style-span" style="background-color: white; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; line-height: 14px;"></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="background-color: white; line-height: 14px;">"</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="background-color: white; line-height: 14px;">Or perhaps it's that same paradox again: the history that happens underneath our noses ought to be the clearest, and yet it's the most deliquescent. We live in time, it bounds us and defines us, and the time is supposed to measure history, isn't it? But if we can't understand time, can't grasp its mysteries of pace and progress, what chance do we have with history--even our own small, personal, largely undocumented piece of it?"</span></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="background-color: white; line-height: 14px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"><br />
</span></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;">It evoked Salvador Dali's the Persistence of Memory with it's melting clocks and warped landscape. </span></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;"><br />
</span></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjnVxzVrjkkt-X1NjSn8_C4hqpr00LDtRT72MnhRa_qnvchRzOLvS5EKNRy7QJmKH_z-JYiZe_Sh5jUMMMGguOLnYZ-qxwwQJ24SywlmTqFhGN4dLttYO3tEpZnzsqEjfLakWiWIwE9xzQ/s1600/Dali.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="232" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjnVxzVrjkkt-X1NjSn8_C4hqpr00LDtRT72MnhRa_qnvchRzOLvS5EKNRy7QJmKH_z-JYiZe_Sh5jUMMMGguOLnYZ-qxwwQJ24SywlmTqFhGN4dLttYO3tEpZnzsqEjfLakWiWIwE9xzQ/s320/Dali.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;"><br />
</span></span></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-53635028612499276.post-34217695984827484882011-11-21T12:24:00.001-08:002011-11-21T12:24:22.005-08:00Day 49, Pt 2<span class="Apple-style-span" style="background-color: #f9f9f9; color: #111111; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 18px; font-style: italic; line-height: 25px;">i will wade out</span><br style="background-color: #f9f9f9; color: #111111; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 18px; font-style: italic; line-height: 25px;" /><span class="Apple-style-span" style="background-color: #f9f9f9; color: #111111; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 18px; font-style: italic; line-height: 25px;">till my thighs are steeped in burning flowers</span><br style="background-color: #f9f9f9; color: #111111; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 18px; font-style: italic; line-height: 25px;" /><span class="Apple-style-span" style="background-color: #f9f9f9; color: #111111; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 18px; font-style: italic; line-height: 25px;">I will take the sun in my mouth</span><br style="background-color: #f9f9f9; color: #111111; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 18px; font-style: italic; line-height: 25px;" /><span class="Apple-style-span" style="background-color: #f9f9f9; color: #111111; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 18px; font-style: italic; line-height: 25px;">and leap into the ripe air</span><br style="background-color: #f9f9f9; color: #111111; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 18px; font-style: italic; line-height: 25px;" /><span class="Apple-style-span" style="background-color: #f9f9f9; color: #111111; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 18px; font-style: italic; line-height: 25px;">Alive</span><br style="background-color: #f9f9f9; color: #111111; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 18px; font-style: italic; line-height: 25px;" /><span class="Apple-style-span" style="background-color: #f9f9f9; color: #111111; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 18px; font-style: italic; line-height: 25px;">with closed eyes</span><br style="background-color: #f9f9f9; color: #111111; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 18px; font-style: italic; line-height: 25px;" /><span class="Apple-style-span" style="background-color: #f9f9f9; color: #111111; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 18px; font-style: italic; line-height: 25px;">to dash against darkness</span><br style="background-color: #f9f9f9; color: #111111; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 18px; font-style: italic; line-height: 25px;" /><span class="Apple-style-span" style="background-color: #f9f9f9; color: #111111; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 18px; font-style: italic; line-height: 25px;">in the sleeping curves of my body</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="background-color: #f9f9f9; color: #111111; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 18px; font-style: italic; line-height: 25px;">e.e. cummings</span>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-53635028612499276.post-73158052824413956812011-11-21T11:25:00.000-08:002011-11-21T11:25:32.352-08:00Day 49: Happy Birthday to me or why 40 is the beginning and not the endI am 40 years old today. Officially as I entered this world at approximately 2:30 p.m. <br />
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Let's review. I am not where I hoped to be where I began this blog. I had rather hoped to have myself sorted before this auspicious date arrived; a date that I have been dreading since I turned 20 oh so many years ago. The only goal that I managed was to become blonde for a bit. <br />
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The last days of October and the first couple weeks of November may have been the most challenging, frightening weeks of my life. At the beginning of October, I had a "routine" surgery to have my gall bladder removed--an outpatient surgery where I was in the hospital for less than 8 hours. October 29 found me dressed in a ball-gown skirt and at the formal wedding of a colleague. Just as we sat down to eat what promised to be a sumptuous dinner in a room that looked a mirage in a desert, a sharp pain in the middle of my chest that radiated around my side to my back chased with an intense wave of nausea sent me flying to the ladies room and home early without dinner. <br />
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A long drive home; the pain abated by a bottle of Maalox procured from 7-11. A hot shower. The pain layered with nausea that intensified as the night wore on. A call to my surgeon on Sunday morning. Hospital admission, narcotic pain killers, anti-nausea medicine, and fluids by IV into my deep, tiny veins as I began to yellow--first my skin and then my eyes. The conclusion that there were gall stones in my main biliary duct. A scope down my throat that revealed and cleared out sludge but no stones. Devils' Night and Halloween in the hospital as the pain abated and my bilirubin levels began to drop. Discharged from the hospital with pain killers after 4 days....<br />
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Home sweet home or the closest thing to it--the place where my daughter is, where my heart is. The next day a blur of nausea and pain kept at bay by Vicodin and hourly baths in water just this side of scalding. The following day the pain even more intense than the first time. Urgent care at my doctor's office. Nausea medicine and blood work that revealed that my bilirubin levels had quadrupled since my discharge from the hospital. I am roughly the colour of the cowardly Lion from the Wizard of Oz. Admitted to the hospital with nausea-laced pain so intense that I can only crawl into a ball and pray to a God that I believe in but have neglected. <br />
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Caring kindness from a nurse ten years my junior who gives me peppermint-saturated cotton balls to keep the nausea at bay and wrangles a shot of morphine until they find an IV nurse to get the pain and nausea meds into my veins. Finally, sweet relief from a strong narcotic, anti-nausea cocktail that keeps the pain at bay for a couple of hours but not the four hours that I have to wait between doses as I hurl into a small, kidney shaped container the colour of Pepto-Bismol. Residents at a teaching hospital that look at me as part freak-show, part experiment convinced that there are gall stones somewhere in the tangled, messed up region of my gall bladder, liver, pancreas. <br />
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Terror and helplessness join the nausea-infused pain. The realization that I am mortal and that I have no control over my body. A longing to return to my basically good health. Envy at the healthy people who care for me, who control the pain and nausea. A late-night CT scan that combines my pain medication with anti-anxiety medication that knocks me out as I float in cylindrical space filled with strange lights and sounds--suspended animation that confirms two stones in the duct that once led to my gall bladder. Trapped by the clip placed after the gall bladder was removed <br />
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A second scope down my throat the next morning that removes the offending stones wreaking havoc on my body. The pain begins to abate and by Sunday, I am off the narcotic concoction that has made my last days bearable. I press the doctors to go home and am permitted to have clear liquids for the first time in days. I eagerly await Monday morning's blood test results, hoping that my bilirubin levels are on the decline and that I will be discharged. The bilirubin levels are on decline but my celebration is short-lived when the resident returns to tell me that my blood test shows that I am developing post-ERCP pancreatitis, which is a common-complication from having the scope placed down my throat. A complication from a complication that throws me into despair, hopelessness that means at least one more night in the hospital and a return to nothing to drink, not even water as food and drink aggravate the pancreas.<br />
<br />
I turn to Google and further terrify myself as I read all about the pancreas and how vital it is too survival. I name my pancreas Polly and begin talking soothingly to her, asking her not to develop full-blown pancreatitis My dad died from pancreatitis, and it is incredibly painful. Yes, he had several bouts of acute pancreatitis brought on by drinking. Yes, it developed into chronic pancreatitis. Yes, he was 20 years older than I am and had many more health problems. Yes, my pancreatitis was sub-clinical and not full blown pancreatitits. And I was not in pain. But it felt like a bad sign. And made me relive losing my dad all over again. And made me think about my beloved daughter growing up without me. <br />
<br />
Finally, I was discharged after 8 total days in the hospital. The pain was largely gone, save the occasional twinge, and the nausea was much improved. No caffeine or booze and a low fat diet for one month. My strength and energy are slowly returning. The fear lingers. The sense of my own mortality continues to press upon my psyche. I am still not quite myself. I am trying to be good. To be the "perfect" mom. To be a good daughter and sister and friend. I don't know. <br />
<br />
I am incredibly grateful to be out of the hospital, to be on the mend, to be given a new chance to begin again. So, despite the fact that I have not fixed my emotional and financial issues, despite the fact that I am not where I wanted to be by this milestone, I am here and that feels like a pretty, damn good start.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-53635028612499276.post-75176648820675079742011-09-15T11:26:00.000-07:002011-09-15T11:26:24.433-07:00Day 48: One (un)true thing<b>Things that I think are true but are (1) probably are not true or (2) demonstrably false:</b><br />
<b><br />
</b><br />
1. Godzilla was part gorilla because of the "illa".<br />
<br />
2. There is a correlation between hand size and penis size.<br />
<br />
3. Guitar players are good with their hands in sexual ways, especially rock-n-roll guitar players<br />
<br />
4. Some things are meant to be, even when contradicted by all available objective evidence and logic.<br />
<br />
5. The universe sometimes speaks through signs. Like songs on the radio. The dark blue of the sky.<br />
<br />
<b>And here is one undeniably true thing:</b><br />
<b><br />
</b><br />
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</b>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-53635028612499276.post-82852926498682768192011-09-14T18:13:00.000-07:002011-09-14T18:13:45.586-07:00Day 47: True ConfessionsI am sitting in the basement, typing away with my feet on the bottom of the old office chair to avoid the rain-soaked carpet to write this. Truthfully, I had intended to write about my newly discovered or at least, newly articulated, theory about my attraction to men in transition but a colleague's post on Facebook as led to something entirely different.<br />
<br />
She, Mae West, wrote that James Cameron's Titanic was the worst movie ever and its sappy, cinematic awfulness was eclipsed only by sappy, vocal stylings of Celine Dion's song. Now, Mae is a woman with great taste. Just yesterday, she shared a brilliant, heart-rending clip of Pavarotti singing Ava Maria. She also regularly rocks some of the fiercest shoes that I've ever seen. <br />
<br />
As a movie lover and music lover, I concur with everything that Mae wrote. Logically. Which does not explain why I saw the movie TWICE in the theater. Or why I feel compelled to sing along every time that I hear that blasted song. Or why I am singing it loudly and badly and with feeling in my damp basement instead of reading my book or doing anything with a quantum of social utility. Say anything short of reading Sarah Palin's ghost-written biography and making moose-flavoured cookies or watching a "reality" TV show about housewives.<br />
<br />
Do we all have a "Jack" (or Jesse) that haunts us? A love that refuses to die, that has changes and transforms us forever? Oh dear God. Throwing up a little in my mouth....<br />
<br />
One last time with feeling......*<br />
<br />
Sigh. Damn you, Mae West!<br />
<br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 11px;">*Every night in my dreams<br />
I see you. I feel you.<br />
That is how I know you go on.<br />
<br />
Far across the distance<br />
And spaces between us<br />
You have come to show you go on.<br />
<br />
Near, far, wherever you are<br />
I believe that the heart does go on<br />
Once more you open the door<br />
And you're here in my heart<br />
And my heart will go on and on<br />
<br />
Love can touch us one time<br />
And last for a lifetime<br />
And never go till we're one<br />
<br />
Love was when I loved you<br />
One true time I hold to<br />
In my life we'll always go on<br />
<br />
Near, far, wherever you are<br />
I believe that the heart does go on<br />
Once more you open the door<br />
And you're here in my heart<br />
And my heart will go on and on<br />
<br />
There is some love that will not<br />
go away<br />
<br />
You're here, there's nothing I fear,<br />
And I know that my heart will go on<br />
We'll stay forever this way<br />
You are safe in my heart<br />
And my heart will go on and on </span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 11px;"><br />
</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica; font-size: 11px;"><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yd1uEvyzCmM&feature=related">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yd1uEvyzCmM&feature=related</a></span>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-53635028612499276.post-48111624004519939442011-08-29T09:21:00.000-07:002011-08-29T09:21:46.400-07:00Day 46: Shakabuku*.*"It's a swift, spiritual kick to the head that alters your reality forever." Grosse Pointe Blank<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zAlS_0wNUQg&feature=related">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zAlS_0wNUQg&feature=related</a>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-53635028612499276.post-58772415337936998082011-08-18T11:11:00.000-07:002011-08-18T11:11:56.445-07:00Day 45: These dark cafe days or "Jane, get me off this crazy thing..."*Day 45: Dark cafe days* or “Jane, get me off this crazy thing...”**<br />
<br />
<br />
When will these dark cafe days be over? They have gone on too long to be a phase. And I just cannot seem to get past them. <br />
<br />
Monday found me feeling optimistic and hopeful. Along with the optimism and hope came some flirty chatter. Male attention, being called doll and darlin' equals total kryptonite for me. What's that you say? 1950 called and wants its antiquated attitude back. <br />
<br />
Three days of flirty, sexy banter with a blue-eyed man with broad shoulders. Good morning doll emails, sweet dreams darlin' emails, and lots of make-the-day-speed-by-smile-inducing chatter. Then, poof. Gone like Kyezer Soze.* I just don’t get the rules, I suppose.<br />
<br />
And I cannot quite root out the genesis of my discomfort, the level of upset-ed-ness. It's only been a few days. We are probably too different for any sort of lasting R-word. Which I don't even want. But he made me smile. And feel pretty. And a little less lonely. And like there could be some physical chemistry.<br />
<br />
It is interesting, albeit depressing to watch the pattern unfold, to recognize each crease. The beginning, the middle, and the limbo. To watch from outside of myself as I make the same bad decisions, choose the same wrong path...<br />
<br />
So, it's a pattern. It's not manifest destiny. Is it? I am not one of those toiling mortals being bandied about for the Gods' amusement. Am I? I have free will. Right? Just because I have followed the same pattern that could be characterized as banging-my-head against-the-wall-and-expecting-different results, does not mean that I have to bang my head against the wall again. Do I?<br />
<br />
Even my horoscope (I generally claim not to believe in such nonsense but sometimes it rings so true) warns about my patterns and letting go: "You are trying to create healthy new routines for yourself with the Moon now activating your 6th House of Habits, but it's challenging to change established patterns. It's as if the weight of the past is leaning heavily on the present moment, restricting the potential of the future. Take the focus off your personal life and concentrate on the bigger picture, instead. This simple shift of your frame of reference can lighten your spirit enough to free you from an old habit or outdated outlook."<br />
<br />
Ask me if I have learned anything at all from any of these insights? If I have followed the same patterns today? And how, pray tell, does one shift one's frame of reference...<br />
<br />
Mantra for the day: He's just not that into you. He's just not that into you. He's just not that into you. He's just not that into you. He's just not that into you. He’s just not that into you. He just not that into you. He’s just not that into you.” (How many times till it penetrates my thick skull???)<br />
<br />
Song of the Day: Fuckin' perfect, Pink. <br />
<a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n1bcQMCZ5gU">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n1bcQMCZ5gU</a><br />
<br />
*From Joni Mitchell's the last time I saw Richard. "All good dreamers pass this way some day. Hidin' behind bottles in dark cafes. Dark cafes. Only a dark cocoon before I get my gorgeous wings. And I fly away. Only a phase, these dark cafe days." <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=igj20M84hbo">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=igj20M84hbo</a><br />
**Originally from the Jetsons, a cartoon about the future where all food was in pellet form and everyone flew space ships, through the eyes of George, "His boy Elroy. Daughter Judy. Jane-his wife." "Jane, get me off this crazy thing" was uttered by George to his wife, Jane. Also featured is the dog called Astro. <br />
<br />
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</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">"Jane, get me off this crazy thing" was introduced to a whole new fan base in the movie "So, I married an axe murderer" as part of Charlie MacKenzie's beat poetry. Naturally, a movie from San Francisco. Because I suck. Because I am unable to break fucking patterns but able to break my phone. So fuckin' imperfect. <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watcv=GlkoQ4bUE5k">http://www.youtube.com/watcv=GlkoQ4bUE5k</a></div><div style="text-align: left;"></div><div style="text-align: left;"><br />
</div><br />
<div style="text-align: left;">**From the Usual Suspects which is an excellent cops and robbers drama. As Verbal Kent explained: “Who is Keyser Soze? He is supposed to be Turkish. Some say his father was German. Nobody believed he was real. Nobody ever saw him or knew anybody that ever worked directly for him, but to hear Kobayashi tell it, anybody could have worked for Soze. <strong>You never knew. That was his power. The greatest trick the Devil ever pulled was convincing the world he didn't exist. And like that, poof. He's gone.”</strong> </div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-53635028612499276.post-44349597507758490082011-08-12T14:48:00.000-07:002011-08-12T14:48:26.082-07:00Day 44, Part Deux...FetishesThis was initially part of the random quotes section of my first day 44 post, but it snowballed. Besides, it is worthy of its own post. A disclaimer. Sex and the City--the HBO Zeitgeist television series--is sacred to me in the way that Star Wars is sacred to men who came of age in the late 70s and 80s.* When HBO cancelled the series, I actually cried. It was a loss. It was my Sunday night treat enjoyed with Peanut Butter and Chocolate ice cream from 31 Flavors. Don't judge. At least, I don't have any action figures or kitchenware based on the series. <br />
<br />
La Douleur Exquise is from Season 2. My fevered mind sought succor and insight based the following quotes and then it snowballed: Inspired by my own Mr. Big, whom/who I keep trying to untie myself from because he is unavailable in oh, so many ways. But I cannot let go. Not really, not for very long because *something* won't let me. Because, my stupid, deluded heart continues to think that, at some level, it's meant to be, and that letting go, really letting go is a mistake on par with Luke's initial attraction to Leia, who as we all know was his sister. Fuck-a-doodle-do.<br />
<br />
BESIDES, it is just a fucking great episode. I urge my sexually adventurous friends who closet their fetishes to watch this episode. You know who you are!<br />
<br />
<br />
So, these initial quotes are from the middle and end of the episode but fuck it, my head hurts and I have to pick up my sunshine girl soon:<br />
“Why do I keep doing this to myself? I must be a masochist or something. That's when I first realized it. I was in an S & M relationship with Mr. Big. In love relationships, there is a fine line between pleasure and pain. In fact, it's a common belief that a relationship without pain......is a relationship not worth having. To some, pain implies growth. But how do we know when the growing pains stop......and the “pain-pains” take over? Are we masochists or optimists, if we continue to walk that fine line? When it comes to relationships.....how do you know when enough is enough?" <br />
<br />
“There were no words left. We'd said them all. After we made love, I knew it was over. Did I ever really love Big or was I addicted to the pain? The exquisite pain of wanting someone so unattainable.....I wanted to go to him, but I felt like I was tied to the chair. Some part of me was holding me back, knowing I had gone too far. Reached my limit. And just like that, I had untied myself from Mr. Big. I was free. But there was nothing exquisite about it.” <br />
<br />
And the fact that this episode is all about fetishes. It opens in a S&M restaurant, and the "girls" including Sanford talk about fetishes. Carrie's voice-over opening:<br />
<br />
"New York City restaurants are always looking for the next new angle.....to grab that elusive and somewhat jaded Manhattan palate. Last year, it was”Fusion-Cajun.”Last month, it was”Mussels from Brussels.”<br />
<br />
And tonight, it's “S & M.” Samantha's PR firm was hired to do the opening party for La Douleur Exquise.<br />
<br />
Translation: The Exquisite Pain. Of course, we were all invited. This is what happens when the Mayor shuts down the sex shops. It pops up in your cuisine."<br />
<br />
Samantha explains: "Don't be so judgmental. This is just a sexual expression. All these people have jobs and pay their bills. They're just having fun with fetishes...We all have a fetish. The difference between us and them is: They're putting it out there where everyone can see. I think it's healthy and fabulous."<br />
<br />
Carrie leaves to see Big, with a riding crop, and reminds her friends that: "Whipping on the first date is considered forward."<br />
<br />
Charlotte has a shoe fetish and meets her Prince Charming in Buster, a shoe salesman with a foot fetish. He first gives Charlotte a big discount and then free shoes when she lets him handle her feet. Charlotte returns to the shoe store and Buster literally cums in his pants as he puts new shoes on her feet "Charlotte looked down at the exquisite shoes. The smell of leather was intoxicating. Charlotte felt like Cinderella. Cinderella in a dirty, kinky, freaked out, storybook, parallel universe." <br />
<br />
Miranda gets picked up by Jack while shopping for books on the street. Jack likes to have sex in places where he could get caught. In public (outside the house where Twain wrote a Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court), in his bedroom with his visiting parents in the next room. <br />
<br />
Sanford has an underwear fetish and goes to a gay club where the fellows have to strip down to their skivvies...Funk's your brother is playing, which might be one of the best songs ever...<br />
<br />
*The HBO series is sacred. The movies are mainly just to feed the withdrawal and the aching, gaping whole left by the series absence. The first movie was decent. And the second movie was an elaborate, extended commercial for high-end clothing and other consumer goods.<br />
<br />
**Here is a website that has the scripts from the show. In addition to text, it contains the actual audio from the episodes: <a href="http://www.satctranscripts.com/2008/08/sex-and-city-season-2-episode-12.html">http://www.satctranscripts.com/2008/08/sex-and-city-season-2-episode-12.html</a><br />
<br />
***And wisdom from Samantha from the next episode "Games People Play": "The only place you can control a man is in bed. If we perpetually gave men blow jobs, we could run the world." And Carrie observes that "at least our hands would be free to greet dignitaries and stuff."<br />
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<br />
<br />
<br />
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Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-53635028612499276.post-3472133133011959772011-08-12T14:23:00.000-07:002011-08-12T14:49:45.213-07:00Day 44: Back in the saddle again...sort ofSometimes, we have to measure our progress in small steps. Baby steps as Dr. Leo Marvin suggested, and his patient Bob brilliantly implemented. Today, I have been upright for several hours. At work. Today, I have not watched a single episode of Dexter. Today, I am wearing make-up. Today, I managed to drink an entire medium coffee and consume an entire bowl of chicken noodle soup without hurling. Baby steps, baby steps, baby steps.<br />
<br />
I am blithely ignoring the gnawing headache, general wonkiness, and dizziness. Ignoring the fuzzy hair and pale, sickly look that can only be procured from lying curled on the couch for four days and consuming only white toast and ginger ale. Ignoring the twin piles of work on my desk. (See descriptive photo).<br />
<br />
Listening to this woman [who] "was singin' my song."* Not Lisa Loeb but Florence and the Machine singing about the ghost filling up her lungs, sighing in her sleep, entwined in her tongue as she falls at his feet...one of my 2011 functional equivalents of Lisa Loeb's "Stay" who set the bar for being the woman "singin' my song."** Am perhaps a handful of people who know that she once dated Ethan Hawke. And that he memorialized her and their relationship in his first novel.*** His soulmate, who he ditched for his should. <br />
<br />
This could be why I am so very fucked up. Layer upon layer upon layer of "tangled, rusted, dented, Goddamned misery"**** from childhood and beyond. I should have been a relationship archaeologist or something. <br />
<br />
Quotes of the day inspired by randomness ranging from my own personal obsessions and stray comments made on my friends' facebook posts and the butterfly effect in general:<br />
<br />
"You're the reason that cavemen chiseled on walls." As Good as it Gets (From a friend's status update about caving in and finally getting cable and her friend's comment, wondering if she lives in a cave).<br />
<br />
"I might be the only person on the face of the earth that knows you're the greatest woman on earth. I might be the only one who appreciates how amazing you are in every single thing that you do, and how you are with Spencer, "Spence," and in every single thought that you have, and how you say what you mean, and how you almost always mean something that's all about being straight and good. I think most people miss that about you, and I watch them, wondering how they can watch you bring their food, and clear their tables and never get that they just met the greatest woman alive. And the fact that I get it makes me feel good, about me." (Inspired by looking up the cavemen quote to quote it accurately. As Good as it Gets might be one of the best movies ever.)<br />
<br />
"I gotta pee." Forrest Gump (Inspired by the fact that I've got to pee). <br />
<br />
<br />
*Lisa Loeb, Stay. "So I turned the radio on, I turned the radio up, and this woman was singing my song: <br />
lover's in love, and the other's run away, lover is crying 'cause the other won't stay. Some of us hover when we weep for the other who was dying since the day they were born. Well, well, this is not that; I think that I'm throwing, but I'm thrown. And I thought I'd live forever, but now I'm not so sure. You try to tell me that I'm clever, but that won't take me anyhow, or anywhere with you. You said that I was naive, and I thought that I was strong. I thought, "hey, I can leave, I can leave." Oh, but now I know that I was wrong, 'cause I missed you. Yeah, I miss you."<br />
<br />
** Florence and the Machine, I am not calling you a liar. "There's a ghost in my lungs and it sighs in my sleep. Wraps itself around my tongue as it softly speak. Then it walks, then it walks with my legs. To fall, to fall, to fall at your feet. There but for the grace of God go I. And when you kiss me, I am happy enough to die...There's a ghost in my mouth and it talks in my sleep wraps itself around my tongue as it softly speaks<br />
Then it walks, then it walks, then it walks with my legs. To fall, to fall, to fall, to fall, to fall, to fall<br />
To fall, to fall, to fall, to fall...To fall, to fall at your feet"<br />
<br />
***The Hottest State was Ehtan Hawke's first novel. Yes, that Ethan Hawke, and I did say first novel. His second was Ash Wednesday, which I did not read but will look for at Borders, which is soon to be closed. Forever. And also interrelated to my layers. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.<br />
<br />
****Jann Arden, Good Mother<br />
<br />
My desk:<br />
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Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-53635028612499276.post-30629097032011991962011-08-11T17:39:00.000-07:002011-08-11T17:39:49.852-07:00Day 43: Strange currencies or the ramblings of a fevered mindDay 43 of this blog and this failed experiment to see if blondes have more fun. Day 4 of a strange, painful stomach virus. Like I have been repeatedly (and literally) kicked in the abdomen, nausea (think first tri-mester morning sickness), and burning, stabbing back pains. The doctor diagnosed a bladder infection but was puzzled at the severity of the symptoms and the way my abdomen felt, so blood tests and an abdominal ultrasound next week. (And no, I am not pregnant unless somehow I am the Virgin (re-virginized?) Mary of the 21st Century). <br />
<br />
Day 4 of my convalescence. Too dizzy and weak to read. Too nauseated to drink coffee. So, I am halfway into season 4 of Dexter. Finding all sorts of parallels between myself, a Robin-hood-esq Vigilante serial killer, and his sister, who recently earned her detective shield. Like Dexter, said serial killer, all my life, I have donned a series of masks, been an outsider, a stranger in a strange land. Like Dexter's sister, Deb, the attraction to the unavailable men, opening our hearts to men who turn out to be serial killers or sociopaths (Deb--Ice truck killer--season 1; me--Toxic circa late 80s, early 90s; the Oregonian Asshat--this season) or men who leave to follow their own ghosts (Deb and Special Agent Lundy--seasons 2 and 4; Me and Jesse--circa 1995) and then come back to us, seeming heaven-sent, destiny, kismet, all that ridiculous horseshit from too many books, movies, love songs, poems, grand theories before breaking our hearts all over again and again and again (Deb and Special Agent Lundy--season 4; Me and Jesse--circa 2009, 2010, 2011. Really, only 6 months in 2009, a stolen few hours on May 15, 2010, a handful of emails in 2011. Now, silence. Again.). <br />
<br />
<span class="Apple-style-span">Season 4 with (retired) Special Agent Lundy's return has really resonated, even though his return was to track his ultimate ghost--a serial killer whose existence that he was never able to prove to anyone in the F-B-I (ala Hannibal Lecter). There are no serial killers in my life, fortunately, just living ghosts, one ghost that continues to haunt me. Anyway, Detective Debra Morgan ("Deb") was involved in a great relationship with the victim of a serial killer (The Skinner, Season 3) and had just received her detective's shield, when Lundy walked in. ("</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;">Of all the gin joints, in all the towns, in all the world, []he walks into mine."</span><span class="Apple-style-span">). Her response: "Mother fuckity fuck." Indeed. I probably talk more like Lundy but I have resolved to talk more like Deb and probably get my hair cut and return to my dark-haired girl roots. His response: Destiny. Or some shit like that--(see already channeling my inner Debra Morgan). And the push and pull, resistance for a couple of episodes after he has turned her world upside down. Again. Turned her heart inside and outside. Again.</span><br />
<br />
And this exchange in the cafe between Lundy and Deb. <br />
<br />
Deb: "Look, don't make me come up with thought bubbles to put over those silent looks of yours. Just say what you're thinking. <br />
Lundy: All right. I, I though that I could keep my feelings for you as background noise to this investigation. But in working with you, that noise has gotten... <br />
Deb: Loud? <br />
Lundy: Deafening."<br />
<br />
Then, Deb winds up at his hotel room. Kisses him when he starts to talk, silencing all the words. All the stupid, white noise. Tells him to shut up. And then he is killed after the spend the night together; she is shot. She has to survive, go on living without him. Again. <br />
<br />
Sound, noise. As the Bard wrote: "It is a tale. Told by an idiot. Full of sound and fury. Signifying nothing." My head, full of white noise and whirling noises and dizziness and heat. <br />
<br />
Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. <br />
<br />
Because my mind is beyond fucked up, the loss of Lundy makes me think of Grease 2 when Stephanie thinks that her cool rider is dead and sings this sappy, treacly song that makes me teary. Always. In the middle of the song, there is a little scene between her and her cool rider with some sung dialogue. I think that the term is recitative in opera. She tells him: "It all seems so unfair. Just when I found you, I lost you..."<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kUIwhikyo6A">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kUIwhikyo6A</a>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-53635028612499276.post-70879525140660055012011-07-23T08:23:00.000-07:002011-07-23T08:23:59.783-07:00Day 42: Superwomen, Ms. Pac Man, and the perfect stormI am blonder than ever but I am sure not having more fun. To start with, I am word-constipated, and it's even worse than the other kind of constipation. Except that it is my head and heart that feel bloated with words that need to come out, that are making me toxic.<br />
<br />
I am not Superwoman. Not even close. Not even on my best days have I stopped a speeding bullet or flown faster than a speeding plane. I don't have a cape. Lately, most days have felt held together by scotch tape--the generic kind--and a prayer or what passes as prayer for a natural doubter who feels like a hypocrite. <br />
But this week, it has taken super human strength just to get up, to brush my teeth, to breathe in and out. <br />
<br />
I am falling apart yet I cannot fall apart. But I am. Falling apart. I am Ms. PacMan, out of power pellets with all four hungry, neon ghosts bearing down on me, and down to my last life. I can hear that sound--that awful sound where the ghosts eat her alive--that mechanical, robot-y sound that signals that the game is over. That terrible sound has begun to haunt my dreams.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-53635028612499276.post-6582080002192064162011-07-09T15:56:00.000-07:002011-07-09T15:56:31.284-07:00Day 41 still going:Have cheered up a bit. The blonding not only lightened my hair; it also seems to have lightened my hair. And the thought of a margarita with one of my favourite women warriors from the gym, who has gone through a divorce and lived to tell about it. <br />
<br />
Fingers crossed that they a pomegranate margarita. Or peach. Who am I kidding as long as it is slushy and has booze, I am gonna suck it down. <br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgBHdjVClw4rsJxZYTWM4jLOtnkn-ZWg70FmKei6tAtpFkPqCWI3K_hLnsGvuB-RqlQXDp8hbyAyMypMU6drT2-sA-3fR_Uip0NRm3LmXRTTHzTqtS7LWverLH1fqzhfKPimORo17fNyBQ/s1600/blonding.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="280" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgBHdjVClw4rsJxZYTWM4jLOtnkn-ZWg70FmKei6tAtpFkPqCWI3K_hLnsGvuB-RqlQXDp8hbyAyMypMU6drT2-sA-3fR_Uip0NRm3LmXRTTHzTqtS7LWverLH1fqzhfKPimORo17fNyBQ/s320/blonding.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-53635028612499276.post-80672330121505189502011-07-09T15:51:00.000-07:002011-07-09T15:51:05.735-07:00Day 41 continued:<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: monospace;">I am not this girl. How can I still be this girl? I am smart. And kind. And attractive. And funny and fun. And loyal. And I always try to make the people that I love feel loved and supported and secure in my love. Why isn't this enough? More than enough?</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: monospace;"><br />
</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: monospace;"><br />
</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: monospace;">I am a lawyer. And a mom. And a friend. And a daughter. And a sister. I have an imagination. A sense of humour. I am passionate. I am soulful. Why isn't this enough? More than enough?</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: monospace;"><br />
</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: monospace;"><br />
</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: monospace;">I have a roof over my head. And a job. And a car. And clothes. And central air. I have my (physical) health. Why isn't this enough? More than enough?</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: monospace;"><br />
</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: monospace;"><br />
</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: monospace;">Why do I need the attention and affirmation and acceptance of a man? Why do I make such bad decisions that end in such pain and such angst and self doubt? Why do open my heart and give like this? When the ending is always the same, like a fucking Danielle Steele novel without the happy ending--me coming unglued.</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: monospace;"> </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: monospace;"> </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: monospace;"><br />
</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: monospace;"><br />
</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: monospace;">And the un-gluing is always somewhere inappropriate. Never in the privacy of my bedroom or even a dark bar. And this time? I am crying in the middle of my fucking salon. That I have been frequenting for 20 years. On a Saturday afternoon. In broad daylight. In public. Big fat, stupid tears falling down my stupid cape and onto the wooden table. While my hair is covered in foils and I strongly resemble a troll that somebody has rubbed back and forth in his hands.</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: monospace;"><br />
</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: monospace;"><br />
</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: monospace;">Why?</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: monospace;"> </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: monospace;"> </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: monospace;"><br />
</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: monospace;"><br />
</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: monospace;"><br />
</span>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-53635028612499276.post-68442560965560012712011-07-09T09:31:00.000-07:002011-07-09T09:31:42.151-07:00Day 41: The more things (seem) to change,the more they stay the same. Yes, after an extended absence, I thought that I'd begin with a cliche. But cliches are words too and perhaps we refer to them so derisively is because the kernel of truth inherent in a cliche clutches at our hearts and our failure to recognize it, how it drives our actions makes us feel even more stupid for behaving in a way that is so very cliched.<br />
<br />
Yes, it is another angst-y Saturday (wonder why the Bangles did not sing about that besides the lack of alliteration, I mean). I went to kickboxing and am not hormonal. Or at least no more than normal. I am going to get more blonded. I have the evening free to do as I wish. Yes, I remain broke and about to get broke-r. Am still living with my ex, albeit in my own bedroom. <br />
<br />
Yet, I continue to be tormented by my sweet maybes, my attraction to unavailable men who are obviously unavailable, i.e. married and thousands of miles away, and not so obviously unavailable, i.e. single but haunted by their own ghosts. What the fuck? After a kick-ass workout this morning that left me sweaty and panting but smiling and feeling strong, I drove home on another perfect summer day. Hot and blue-skied but with a breeze. A full afternoon of things that I generally enjoy--blonding, shopping, and getting ready to do something tonight. <br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi6YULpKA7Shgks3zmuNab33RaLGvCnphCIqmk8xB3GXICSD9C-14QyvAlnUdu1n2vbYSZNAaz7fAyXBxUDR1_2Abd-TsRpEIxMKPNtnbQxX2ugQMDXKs6JSVD1-lJ3yi4jMZrbLsWgb_0/s1600/lettinggo.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi6YULpKA7Shgks3zmuNab33RaLGvCnphCIqmk8xB3GXICSD9C-14QyvAlnUdu1n2vbYSZNAaz7fAyXBxUDR1_2Abd-TsRpEIxMKPNtnbQxX2ugQMDXKs6JSVD1-lJ3yi4jMZrbLsWgb_0/s1600/lettinggo.jpg" /></a></div><br />
<br />
OR<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEikhNNeniLGm-L6BO1kc6paitJ7dsSbp1hV6pzBiYYGPSnMqrIN3E0yKnRxr_sJwiQvAfV83KsGxHZ4kjFwVfcxpj-JWK8iJEEsbIyMZ9liTVbObbkCxiBb26xG2JlvvXK8fS5N2FbrndY/s1600/holdingon.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="206" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEikhNNeniLGm-L6BO1kc6paitJ7dsSbp1hV6pzBiYYGPSnMqrIN3E0yKnRxr_sJwiQvAfV83KsGxHZ4kjFwVfcxpj-JWK8iJEEsbIyMZ9liTVbObbkCxiBb26xG2JlvvXK8fS5N2FbrndY/s320/holdingon.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><br />
Then, a shower epiphany. Another one. One that has left me shaken and teary and on the verge of doing something that in my heart, I know that I need to do to move on. And have not been able to do because of the way that I have been haunted by, driven by the if-only-s, by the possibility of my sweet maybe. Such a deliciously sweet maybe. It hit me like a ton of bricks as the hot, soapy water washed away the sweat, revealing yet another pattern, a pattern within a pattern. A pattern disguised as something else that really is just another pattern. Me trying to change, to mold myself to some idea to match someone's ideal person even as it becomes clear that no matter what I do, no matter how much I change, no matter how patient I am, how much I compromise, how much I settle for, that I will never be that person's ideal. Which is really the same pattern that I, at last, recognized and broke free from with my soon-to-be-ex husband. <br />
<br />
I have to let go. Don't I? To move on, I have to let go. What will be will be, right? Que sera sera and all that horseshit.<br />
<br />
Fuck-a-doodle-do.<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MXQTWCTc0aI">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MXQTWCTc0aI</a> (Que sera sera)<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EDEEzS7OV2k&feature=related">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EDEEzS7OV2k&feature=related</a> (Goodbye, my almost Lover)<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zwtr19HHB4U">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zwtr19HHB4U</a> (Falling for you)<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rUhc8D7pQlQ&feature=related">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rUhc8D7pQlQ&feature=related</a> (Corner of my heart)Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-53635028612499276.post-4694958379328479022011-06-27T01:08:00.000-07:002011-06-27T01:08:26.325-07:00Day 40: The Distance3:29 a.m. Watching a movie about a long distance relationship that kind of broke my heart when I saw it the first time at the theater. It has been several months since I've seen it and so I thought that I'd rip the band aid off. <br />
<br />
She's in San Francisco, and he's in New York. Seeing that dramatic sweep of red iron over the deep blue always makes my heart seize. And it transports me back in time to a few days in late April 2009. Halcyon days when hope was the best thing. When I believed in magic, that I was on that elusive road to happily ever after...my at last, at last....Silly not-so-little girl...<br />
<br />
Her favourite movie is the Shawshank Redemption, which she tells him on the night that they might cute at a bar and bonded over a shared love of Centipede and bar trivia. After she reveals that Shawshank is her favourite movie, he immediately does Morgan Freeman's "I hope" speech..."I hope the Pacific is as blue it has been in my dreams....I hope, I hope." Except he does Red's voice and knows the whole speech cold.<br />
<br />
And it has the happy ending that follows the meet cute beginning as sold by Hollywood. Except, it's a bait and switch. At least in real life. I, of course, know this logically. An I know it practically. And I know it by experience. Fuck, I<br />
am a veteran, a gold-card member of this bait and switch. <br />
Yet, I still cannot give up the ghost, The illusion of one day...Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-53635028612499276.post-48470195818156326322011-06-25T23:05:00.000-07:002011-06-25T23:05:58.262-07:00Day 39: At the Duck or a progress reportAt the Duck wishing that I was really in Margaritaville instead of listening to barely legal frat boys singing about it. <br />
<br />
It's been a long while since I've been to the Duck or here to write about my bold and glorious experiment. Of becoming blonde and getting my act together. The blonding is going well. The rest is one step up and one step back to quote Bruce. Still broke. Even broker. Even more broken. In nearly every way that I vowed to fix before I turn 40. <br />
<br />
So perhaps, this should be called a lack of progress report?Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-53635028612499276.post-58855590018616617262011-06-13T09:21:00.000-07:002011-06-13T10:51:37.113-07:00Day 38: Booty callsI absolutely detest being called to court for a hearing that was adjourned due to the closure of the courthouse without any notice that today was the new date. it's like being on-call for a judicial booty call; the assumption being that I am always available. <br />
<br />
Adding insult to injury is that the clerk told me: "we're ready for you." So not only am I "that" girl, I have been waiting for 30 minutes. I showed up for a booty call and my "date" is late. <br />
<br />
As I explained recently (Saturday night) to a former booty caller, I have outgrown my booty call, beck-n-call girl days. I was so proud of myself but was it all for naught if I always at the beck-n-call of the court?<br />
<br />
Of course, if I resist the judicial booty call, the Judge could hold me in contempt of court and throw my booty into the hoosegow. Which would make me a legend but the hoosegow is icky and I am a girl about things like bugs and filth and sharing close quarters with hardened criminals.<br />
<br />
So, here I sit in the courtroom. In Lawyers Row. Waiting, waiting, always waiting like a refugee in Casablanca trying to procure an exit visa. Now, my wait approaches an hour and cuts into lunch. I am wedged between two male lawyers who apparently bathed in and then dipped themselves into vats of cologne. The cologne is so thick that I can taste it. <br />
<br />
Am back in my office and can still taste it. How does one remove the taste of cologne from one's mouth?Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-53635028612499276.post-65996799875409658132011-06-09T07:49:00.000-07:002011-06-09T07:49:58.732-07:00Day 37: The art of letting goHalf-awake, wishing that I would have not hit the snooze button so many times that it was impossible to stop for coffee without being late for my appointment. Sleep or liquid crack? Talk about a Hobson's choice....<br />
<br />
Sitting in the parking lot, appointment over, wondering if it is strange to take pleasure in the ultrasound technician deeming my wardrobe choice perfect for the procedure. Am I the only woman who prefers to wear her own clothes pushed up as opposed to being naked from the waist down, covered by a crinkly sheet of paper? Smiling a bit to myself as I thought how easy access is important for the lady parts' doctor and certain other types of appointments. Appointments that generally involve drinks and much more pleasurable probing.<br />
.<br />
<br />
Now, I have returned to my own personal den of iniquity. One of them. Sipping my liquid crack; the hot, caramelized bitterness a benediction to my still-sore throat. Thinking how hard it is to let go. At least for me. Certain people, especially those in my orbit, seem to have mastered the art of letting go. At least letting go of me. <br />
<br />
"...I am not the kind of girl who gives up just like that, oh no....the tide is high but I am holding on. I am gonna be your number one....".Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-53635028612499276.post-49230472090148819592011-06-06T11:00:00.000-07:002011-06-06T11:00:05.678-07:00Day 36: Confusion is nothing new"Lying in my bed, I hear the clock tick, and think of you. Caught up in circles, confusion is nothing new <br />
Flashback--warm nights-- almost left behind. Suitcases of memories, time after time."<br />
<br />
Oh, what are we doing? Marching through our days to the dull beat of routine. Going through the motions, turning our backs on the things that make us feel alive, gloriously alive. Because we are afraid. Because it will make waves. Because it is unconventional. Because it means risking our hearts. Or shattering those masks, facades that we have struggled for so long to perfect, to maintain, especially to ourselves. For fucks sake, what are we doing?<br />
<br />
Motion for the sake of motion is not movement. I know this to be true. But how do you know when it's time to move? That you won't be left behind, fall behind? That movement is progress and not just white noise that will lead to the same revolving cycle of bullshit that got you in the stuck position in the first place? Why? Where? How? When? Who? <br />
<br />
Frustrated. Confused. Weary. Head aches, heart longings in this lonely wilderness of the soul. And yet, sort of alive again after feeling half-dead inside, after my self-induced coma of comfortable numbness. Wound up. Feeling over-caffeinated, even though I am drastically under-caffeinated today. Listening to Cyndi Lauper sing Time after Time over and over again and wondering how in the hell anyone can get wound up listening to Time after Time.<br />
<br />
Goosebumps and the chills. Like someone just walked over my grave. What the fuck am I doing?<br />
<br />
“Sometimes you picture me-- I'm walking too far ahead. You're calling to me, <br />
I can't hear what you've said-- Then you say--go slow-- I fall behind-- the second hand unwinds” <br />
<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q1VlRqeTkE0">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q1VlRqeTkE0</a>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-53635028612499276.post-27046582702630581442011-06-03T00:44:00.000-07:002011-06-03T08:27:41.392-07:00Day 35: 2:45 a.m.Still awake and highly susceptible to what I am reading, often believing that the book was written for me, that somehow the author has some unique insight into my soul, my mind, my heart. When really she or he has the magic to translate those discordant feelings, desires, fears, thoughts, and longings universal to humankind into relatable readability. <br />
<br />
(Are there really any new stories or are all stories just a variation on themes universal to the human condition? Updated with technological advances and modern conveniences to make them palatable, understandable to a new generation of readers? This leads me to dangerous ground because one might ask aren't those faux books another medium for expressing the plight of the universal condition to a new generation? After all, ancient men inscribed their stories in pictures and symbols on cave walls and slaves sang their stories disguised in songs passed down through the generations, and the elders passed down their stories orally. And yet, there is no substitute for the feeling of the thickness of the book in your hand, the excitement of turning those first pages to get to that first sentence that leads you into another world, allows you to see the universal condition through other viewpoints, genders, situations, through another's eyes. Tangents. This entire paragraph is a tangent.)<br />
<br />
Anyway, back to my literary susceptibility. It is almost a form of hypnosis. I am worn down as my body fights off an infection. My elevated white blood cells valiantly fighting against alien invaders aided by their antibiotic ally. I slept hard and woke up and could not fall back to sleep. So I returned to my book---the Thirteenth Tale--which is a story within a story within a story. It is a story about the power of storytelling that pays homage to power of the story, to words, paper and ink books. <br />
<br />
The heroine, who works in a bookstore with her father and has a troubled relationship with her mother and who prefers books to life and who measures the timing of the resolution of the story by the thickness of the pages remaining to be read, cannot sleep. By the time that I reach this part of her story, I have been awake and reading in my own story for a bit. I know that I need to be up early, that I have to wash my hair, that I am sick and need the healing power of sleep when I read Margaret's words:<br />
<br />
"I rubbed my tired eyes and knew I ought to go to bed. But I was too tired to sleep. My thoughts, if I did nothing to stop them, would go around in circles all night long. I decided to have a bath."<br />
<br />
So, I had a bath. While I waited for the tub to fill with hot water, I read the book just as Margaret tried to work out a clue in her story as she waited for her own tub to fill. Except that the water filling her tub thundered in the background, while the sound of my tub filling in the background was muffled by the thick silence of mounds of opalescent bubbles. Ivory bodywash transformed into airy bits of magic.<br />
<br />
Like Margaret, I give myself to the steamy hot water and read several pages as the water cools while she continues to solve the mystery of her story.<br />
<br />
Back to Margaret's story which has about a 1/4 of an inch left. And then to sleep, perchance to dream? For about a 1/4 of an inch....<br />
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,Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0