show me to the neutral shades please.

my ass, large a target as it is, is not the point here (more of a rounded curve really), the point is me, sitting here in some strange apartment across the hall from my parents (with whom i eat the majority of my meals), learning how to live life on my own (sort of, if you can consider scooting a walker in front of you to be ‘on your own’, which i do. have you ever seen one of those old ladies pushing a walker? five words: get out of their way.)

shit, i’ve lost my train of thought. shocking, right?

so where was i? here. that’s right: here i am, mildly freaked out, but sipping a small glass of kaffir lime vodka as i open and sort months worth of mail and bills and pay stubs and retirement accounts and new checking accounts and car dealership slips reminding me i have to get the car’s oil checked (don’t get me started now, i’m on a roll**) and i watch the ever dwindling difference amount in the difference cell of my expenses versus income spreadsheet and “mildly” freaked out suddenly doesn’t apply as i edge closer to full on panic attack, but here’s the cool part:

I AM ENJOYING THE SHARP TANGY FRUITY LIMEY DELICIOUSNESS OF MY VODKA!!!

ok, technically it’s my husband’s vodka since we bought it while he was paying the bills, but it’s here now and he’s not. plus he’s a god-damn sweetheart.

this is such an incredible break through I can hardly believe it! look at what happened! I just capitalized “I” and I did it again! and again! and AGAIN!! OMG, WTF!!!

it seems kind of sad, right? pathetic little ernestine living across the hall from her parents, working for her parents, eating with her parents (whoa, i hope this turns around soon, i’m feeling a little iffy on my progress…)

but it’s not sad. it’s part of my journey. my weird twisted internalized nepotistic journey.

and i’m ok with that.

i keep meaning to send you an email to apologize (really? apologize?) for not staying in contact more. i don’t expect you still like me, even though i hope so.

i’ve been sad. and sad. and busy. but mostly sad. with short bouts of ‘what the fuck am i doing’ followed by sad. there have been brief moments of OH GOOD HEAVENS THANK GOODNESS and WHAT THE FUCK AM I DOING? but for the most part, i have been glad when it’s foggy and cloudy; confused and a bit irritated when the sun came out.

and then i saw this really great guy. and he was all “rules? have there been any rules so far?” and since he is my husband of eight years, the last five months of it on the opposite coast as me, and since he said it with such honest sincerity, i actually feel better. shockingly so.

on therapy tuesday (how i wish i went on thursdays!), i shall overly discuss whether this means we are meant to be together, if we have too much invested to not work everything out immediately, or if it is just relief i feel at finally being truly honest with the man i’m married to. (he thinks i look into things too deeply.)

not the first time i’ve heard something like that.

speaking of, can we talk about how much dithering i have done over whether or not i should publish this particular bit of inconsequence? christ on a crucifix. i do over-think things.

—————

**does this title have anything to do with the contents of this post? only if you drink a beer after a metamucil dose…after a beer…before a glass or two of wine…after a vodka tasting…with tequila. meaning gets very fuzzy at this particular point in the cycle.

isn’t that nice?

besides, i’ve been dealing with other larger issues. life, meaning, work, sex, money, marriage, death, aging, morality. it’s been nice but really ________ hard. working on my issues that is. nice but ________ hard. i can’t say much more than that obviously, given my new word restriction.

what else can i say? gosh. lets see, i fit in smaller pants which makes me faster, less stupid and thinner. hooray for nice side effects! i had three cups of coffee before my recent physical – my heart rate was 112! i thought, hmmm, sounds like a warning sign, maybe i should drink less coffee? then i thought, that’s so COOL! caffeine really makes your heart beat faster! i love scientific proof – neat-o! i almost started smoking, to see if nicotine or whatever really causes cancer. ha!

i also wondered if that elevated heart rate could be counted towards exercise.

like i said, only less stupid. but i’m ok with that. it’s nice.

damn near cuddly

two hours later, when i finally got a moment to myself in the toilet, it was found. it’s curled blue hat peeking out safely from the front pocket of my pants. sigh.

i think it deserves a name now.

poor winston

i have a new perspective on that. and it’s not even a complete view. just one woman’s shallow look into and experience with the every woman’s depression.

and it is lonely. surrounded by crowds of well-intentioned individuals who only want the best is a little person who can still look at that bottle of tequila or the water below and not see a single reason why they should say no. so they don’t.

it seems so easy when you are on the other side of baseless sorrow, or even reasoned sorrow. you know, from experience, that there is a way through, there is a light at the other end. but living in that dark place, where it seems there will never be a reason to smile again, it is not so cut and dried. even if the day before you had a moment of levity, a precious hour of actual life, the next there doesn’t seem any end to the darkness and worse there doesn’t seem to be a path out.

the sharp pain of tears and dehydration become your only companions, the only source of comfort. long nights sleeplessly twisted in bedsheets while the errors of the day, the day before, years before, tortures you with certain proof that you are in fact useless and replaceable. probably replaced already.

doesn’t seem to matter what the cause is; once the red sea of worthlessness opens all you can do is stand ankle-deep in the mucky bottom hoping the waves will end the pain soon. or not. when you’re just waiting it doesn’t seem to matter much either way.

get some exercise, pull your self up by your bootstraps. that’s the advice you hear. it does feel like you should be able to shake it off. so you grasp those straps and they cut into your fingers like senseless barbs but all you see is smooth leather lying in your hands. leather that once brought you pleasure. this is a reality that is hard to shake. this is a hard reality to understand. with so much to love and appreciate in the world, how can a person not find something to value?

it’s frighteningly easy.

i have no advice on how to help. maybe listen, listen and do not judge. accept what is said and just hold it. push for help, but please push gently. the edge is jagged and the bottom far away, but it can be far more enticing than you imagine. but do push.

and maybe stir an anti-depressant into the coffee.

and for the insomnia? here’s a bottle of sleeping pills. use wisely.

therapeutic thai massage. you need to go get one.

i’ll bet these folks could kill with their bare hands without even thinking about it. i was so relaxed i wouldn’t have cared. what an experience. i don’t know where to start. the incredible feeling of trusting a stranger with hands as strong as silk cables to contort my body at will? the sensual pleasure of lying in artificial twilight next to a babbling brook on a divan wreathed by some mysterious relaxing thai incense? my wobbly-relaxed legs and their near inability to function after?

maybe i should begin with how incredible it was to lie for an entire hour with no expectations: no wondering what’s going to happen next, what am i doing with my life and how does it make me feel. suspended in time and space while this tiny little woman manipulated every muscle in my body, sharing such close physical contact with another human in so indescribable a way, it was, dare i say, spiritual.

if you are a mother, if you survived the holidays, if you are perpetually sick and in hospital, if you hurt in any way, if traffic seems too busy and intrusive, if it’s monday, you need to have a thai massage. go.

Welcome to the World Baby Girl!

Birth was hard, huh? For you and me both. I’m glad I did it without pain meds because you are going to need every ounce of your brain power to navigate this life. You’ll need some great friends too because life’s pretty fucked up from here. One day you’ll look back on the pain of birth, medical exams, broken bones, broken hearts, even giving birth and realize it wasn’t so bad after all.

I don’t want to scare you, Baby Girl, it’s just that the world is kind of screwed up. Your mom? Bat-shit crazy. Not like your Auntie, she’s different crazy. You’ll love us and learn to appreciate our eccentricities, but eventually we’ll make you nuts. You’ll wonder what the hell happened to us and worry you’ll turn out the same way.

You might.

Sorry. I’m not a sugar-coater. Life’s a bitch. Adjust. React. But most importantly, act. On your own terms, for your own welfare. Be a good person, please be a good kind happy woman: be free and committed, be deeply in relationships and true to yourself, be generous and selfish. Learn and listen to your own voice. Speak it firmly and confidently. Do not equivocate. Do these things for me, your maybe-mother-to-be who did not begin to know that true independence could be hers until she was thirty-five.

Why do I ask so much of you already, Baby Girl?

As my life lessons passed, with each opportunity I missed, I’ve wondered what could hurt more in life? Today you were born and with each contraction I bore, each push against your tiny body, I wondered what could hurt more? But you’re here now and with you a love so great and so fierce that it is my sharpest, will be my most sustained pain yet and everything else fades away. Everything.

I ask because I want you to have it all; the things I saw but could not reach. Everything I imagined but could not create. Go and get yours, Baby Girl.

It’s all for you.

but we adjust, huh? it’s the end of the world as we know it and then a favorite song plays on the radio or you get a good nights sleep. you return to what’s comforting in some small way and deal with the new shocking thing a little bit more everyday and you get a handle on it. again.

and hopefully you remain an optimistic open-minded romantic.