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Friday, October 05, 2001
Tomorrow:
"You know what's going on in a room before you even enter it. The Gemini Moon makes your sense of timing right on the money. Everyone expects the best from you, and no one is disappointed. The star-crossed are destined to meet any minute now. A blind date becomes a window into a vision if you allow it to happen. If you pride yourself on keeping an open mind, this could be quite a weird and wild night."
Sunday:
"You've been training for the kind of situation you are bound to encounter today for most of your life, Aquarius. Even as a newcomer on the scene, your past experiences make you uniquely equipped to take command of the current situation. As you begin your leadership duties, someone is sure to be reeling under the sheer force of your personal magnetism. Even though your words may come out a bit jumbled at first, no one has any doubts about what you really mean."
***
Man. Wouldn't it be cool if these little daily hunks of BS had any sort of relationship to the lives we actually have to go 'round leading?
Man oh MAN is my fireplace a pain in the butt to paint.
I didn't even finish it.
Pretty thing. It is.
But - dental moulding. What a time consuming, paint-drip-inducing *pain in the butt*.
Thursday, October 04, 2001
Wow-wee.
16 people are confirmed for my open house on Sunday, the 14th. I'm pretty positive about another half dozen or more, too.
Um. Gonna be a big 'do.
:-)
And there are at least ten for the Saturday night ho-down. (Oh, wait - I'm not going "ho" for that, it'll be a regular party.)
Woot!
Every day, there is another story swearing up and down that Osama Bin Laden is responsible for the attacks in our country. Now, I'm not going to pretend that I just don't believe it - because, the fact is, I don't know enough or care enough to judge the question - but, after the *first* eight stories about it, it started to read like protestation. Now that we've had the second dozen assurances that it really, really is all Osama's fault, and he's the debbil, let me just say this: "Too much".
I get it, is all.
Mind you, by the third or fourth day after all this shit hit all these fans, I was sincerely doubting that a country comprised of the better part of three hundred million people truly has only one enemy, and that it's a single man. But it's not as if he DOESN'T hate us and do what he can.
It's just scary, to me, that the focus was set so damned quickly, and that it's never budged a bit. No matter how many people shook their talking heads and said "We're not rushing to conclusions" or even "We *shouldn't* rush to conclusions" ... well, the conclusion sure seems to have been reached. They're making so much a point of assuring us and the whole world of it that I am tired to death of the song.
Quit singing it. DO something.
Tell me where my dear Cap'n is, while y'all are at it. Tell me he's safe.
And shut the fuck up, all of you.
Still cannot get into the Brunching boards. *Grumpiness*
My head tries to think of ways to proceed, and my honesty second guesses the most obvious course.
THE DIALOGUES
My head and my lying little heart say, When he leaves, you must cut off from him. You'll never be able to be the sort of friend who'd deny having all those messy, unwelcome feelings he doesn't want to return. You'll never satisfy yourself with less than there is now - with the pretense that you're genial, wholesome friends. You'll never stop feeling what you do, and then you'll never stop resenting having to *hide* it.
And you would have to hide it ... pretty much from the day he leaves this state, little girl. Don't you forget it. Once he's gone, the ship has sailed.
Maybe you should just let it go and know that you'll never see him again. Maybe you should tell him that, maybe you shouldn't. But you certainly can't play the part of a sometime buddy. You know that you will never kiss and taste that beautiful mouth again when he's gone, you know you'll never be even as much as you are now.
Be satisfied for him. Get over it. Don't try to keep in touch, not at all.
...
And then the honesty somebody left inside me at some point steps in, and she replies.
You no more want to let him go than you want to go to your Daddy's funeral, girl. Both might be inevitable, but don't force the worst to happen. Don't script the punishment of yourself *and of him* for feelings You. Still. Treasure., even if you know that they are wasted. Don't ruin the little because you can't have the grand.
And you don't have the strength, anyway. If you said to him any of that BS, you'd only be doing it in hope that he'd want to - try to - prevent you vacating his life. And he might not do that, little child.
Take the genial friendship he can afford you. Take the distance and the slow deterioration of memories, and take the sadness it all causes you. Take, maybe, the pain of knowing he's with someone else - with a series of someone elses. Take the occasional brief, empty, friendly email, and try to remember not to send anything heavier yourself.
Take your demotion.
Take your medicine.
You know you don't want to take any defeat which is clean and quick AND SURE. You want every iota of friendship he can offer at all, and you'll press them in your memory as the rest of whatever y'all ever had fades and dissipates. You'll wonder, often, whether he regrets anything about you - and you will tell yourself, in the dark, that he does ... and you will tell yourself, just as often, that he doesn't.
You can't know, girl. And you can't be anything but the person you are.
You'll do it, and maybe even prevent yourself from finding anybody else to feel such things for; they are sacred, you can't spend them elsewhere - not Just Yet. For a while (for too long), you will wait for magical change. That is your nature, little Skeezix.
Know who you are. It is all that you have.
...
And then my heart weeps, but stays silent.
Wednesday, October 03, 2001
Two years and two days ago, I had two cats. But, also two years and two days ago, I had one cat only.
Byshe (pronounce it "BY-she") was the big boy, the sweet-smelling thing, the kid who was evil of temper and unhappy to be kind to mere strangers in our abodes. Bee and I were together the longest, of the quartet made up of me, Beloved Ex, Smee and him. Before we got married, BE took Smikitty, and I took Byshe. And, like my old teddy bear and at least one pet before him, Bysh seemed to have a personality of long-suffering and sadness.
He didn't especially like people, but he demanded a lot of us. He didn't think I petted him quite well enough, but he still required the attention of it.
I miss him.
I remember taking him to the vet. It was the first time either of the boys had been to a vet in at least a couple of years, and I called the doc who had lived down the street from my family when I had been a little kid. It turned out to be a good move. Dr. T understood all the problems Bee was having, and said that I was not a monster for considering putting him down rather than trying to deal with them all. Because curing the problems, you see, wasn't an option. And Bee wouldn't have liked to live in any way compromised.
So we agreed to put down my boy, and I took him to the office on October 1, 1999. It was a pretty day, and I had taken off of work, and was planning to go to - yes, I am this callous - the State Fair after leaving the office.
Dr. T felt just awful when he had to prevent Bee from escaping the room by catching him by the tail. And he was kind, as he administered first one injection and then a second, the fatal one. He left me alone with my guy, and I stood there, watching Byshe slow down and then subside onto the metal table. He tried licking his little freckled lips, and was so weakened that he couldn't pull his tongue back into his mouth. I tried to poke it back, knowing the boy's dignity, but wasn't able to get it in.
I'd learned, after putting our first cat down when BE and I visited my parents years ago, that cats' eyes do not close when they are put under sedation. I had learned that picking up a cat who has died, though you don't realize it, is a horrible experience. There is no word in the world to describe the extreme laxity of a little body whose muscles have given up the ghost.
But I picked up the Bee anyway, I couldn't help it. I patted him as he'd never have let me pat him in life, and I cuddled him as his heartbeat slowed and stopped. I cried over his big orange body, and for the first time was able to inspect all the fleas and the damage and the minutiae of his chunky body without his protest and escape. I got closer to him, physically, than he'd ever tolerated; his eyes just fixed out past me, and were probably even unseeing by the time I lifted his bulk.
Unlike that first cat, Bee's body was so dense that he didn't flop and feel deadened. He was still, and heavier than I ever remembered - but he wasn't liquefied by the relaxation of his muscles. This was a cat with big bones.
To this day, people see the little bullseyed boy who still lives with me, and they call him fat or big or whatever. I've seen that cat at fur an bones, though, and know that he is the right size for himself. He's round not because I feed him salami slices (which I don't - he gets Purina), but because he is meant to be round. It has passed me to be offended, or to defensively explain.
But he's dear to be, a pearl beyond price. Not because he's so nice, which he is. Not because people say he's adorable (that, too). No, he's my treasure because he and I are all we have got, sometimes.
When I came home that day from the fair, he didn't comment upon Bee's absence, and sort of reveled in being alone, having me all to himself. I was sad, and he did that thing where he cuddled with me. He kept doing it for days, for a week - and then, he finally realized that he was going to have me all to himself forever, now. That Byshe was gone.
His voice that night, for the first time in his life (but not the last), took on the wailing timbre of Byshe's own. He cried, with his departed compadre's strength and quaver and smoothness, and it freaked me the dickens out, man. This kid usually has such a cracky voice - sometimes no voice at all. But this, the first cry of his life, sounded just as rich and melodic as Byshe's voice.
And it just killed me to hear it. Not only because it was like being haunted. But because I knew just how awful the little thing felt.
"Poor t'ing", as my brother tends to say (of his daughter).
He became more than just cuddly then, for many months, Smikey constantly needed touching. When I lay on my side on the couch, he'd perch on the topmost side of me, just behind my arm and along my ribcage. It was the dearest thing in the world.
Even now, he falls asleep sometimes with his head in my palm, or curled up by my armpit. Yes, my longstanding habit of keeping sleeping pets out of the bed died with Byshe - to leave Smee to mourn solo all night every night (to leave myself alone, at that) was impossible. And I still let him come in.
He's judicious about it. Since the new house, he's adopted a spot on the floor a few feet from the bed and - after a little trial and error with me in the darkness - well out of the way of the door. He comes up with me for a few hours every night, and he definitely stays close when the temperature dips. But he doesn't balk when I shut him out at five a.m. on occasion, knowing he'll just keep me up for that last precious stretch of sleep if I don't.
He's good shit, my Smikey.
And I just wanted to say so. To pay tribute, a little, to our lost companion - and to say how much I dig my extra heartbeat. Without that boy, life would be much less bearable.
Go pet your beasts, fella babies. I'm about to leave to go cuddle with mine.
:-)
It is cold again in here. The temp outside is 85, and I am sitting here with frozen fingers and a nose so cold that the palate inside my mouth is actually chilly.
Note to self: If and when brain and/or fingers thaw - email Wicky Poo.
I did remember to send good luck interview vibes to DB in DC, even though he won't take the job if it is offered. You gotta send the interview vibes anyway, that's only right and proper. And good drive vibes, at that, for the flippin' drive up and down I-95.
Man, I would like to get out of this fridge.
94 minutes, 94 minutes, 94 minutes ...
The Brunching board keeps giving me "bad gateway" errors. I can't go catch up. How annoying.
A couple of guys were running one of those "Hey, science is really neato" type booths in one of the first exhibition halls. One looked at us peeking in the microscopes they had set up (sulphur, dog hair, bread, exciting materials to look at like those), and asked whether we had any questions. I said, "I'm a physicist's daughter, I have very few questions left". The other guy piped in, "Where?" and I answered dad's university.
And he goes, "Wayne!?"
When I confirmed the guess, he laughed and said, "Your dad's great fun on a road trip." He works at the accelerator, I realized upon looking at the badge. He hasn't seen papa-san since retirement. He asked about dad's convertible. So I told him about the sale and the BMW, and about the diagnosis.
And then I walked away, pointedly not thinking about daddy.
It is all you can do, really. Tell people, watch them not really understand, walk away from the encounter and don't think about what it is they don't get.
No, I mean really. Pretend you know all the bad shit about me that I leave out of any internet persona, so I can try to look all cool and sexy and intelligent. Pretend you aren't rooting for me to get what I really, really want. THEN read the last post.
Makes more sense, if you're objective, doesn't it?
Oh, shut up. I need to prepare for this, and am very well aware that it's self-indulgent as all hell.
Like that's anything new.
SHHH. Just don't say it.
Thank you.
Something smells like a Chef Boyardee pizza in the office this morning.
***
Dad went to the doc yesterday. Mom went with him, to get the progress report. Apparently, from what Bro tells me, they were expecting the worst - but it wasn't that bad. Then again, it's easy to see that he's not doing better, and is getting worse.
Reminds me of TEO's doctor's words to her, not so long ago. Except that nothing can help my dad, there's no saving him from all this.
He can't go up stairs now. He doesn't want to get one of those chair lifts, but can hardly climb to the second floor. And there is no room on the first which would be convertible into a bedroom, really.
He's never without the wheeze, now. His breathing has not come to him silently for many weeks; that time is gone.
It breaks my heart, too.
***
Yesterday, DB and I went to the fair. Such a hot, sunny day - it was in the 80s, and it was the perfect, perfect day. I have never had so much fun at the State Fair, and I *always* have fun there. But he was just exactly the person to enjoy it all with. The animals, the people, the foot-long corn dogs, the smells. He likes the same things I do, and doesn't like the same things, too - just looking at the "extreme" rides gave him vertigo, LOL.
He had his first taste of Mrs. Fearnow's brunswick stew. We talked belt buckles with a little old man who wouldn't give us free pencils because he thought we were in a hurry to leave his booth. We looked at the incredible train set, and he told me that his dad is a famous model trainsman (or whatever they're called). Last month, a couple of guys from New York even found out where he lives and came knocking on the door wanting to see his train sets. We checked out the bunnies and the moo-moo cows and the turkeys and the horses. We wandered the exhibition halls, and sat in front of the fake waterfall fountain, watching plastic ducks bob in the water. I asked him how long it'll be before he leaves for Kalamazoo. I kissed him on the cheek twice, and he grinned like a kid again.
We ate lunch and went back to see the ducklings climbing their little ramp in their little water tank. We patted draft horses and baby holsteins and saw the pig races, and I discovered that blood and bovine afterbirth sort of freak out the uninitiated. We saw the yodeling guy and rodeo clown at the rodeo, heard corny jokes, and watched a few guys on bucking broncos. After a couple of steer wrestlers, we got up and wandered along. And then we finally left.
It was perfect.
At the rodeo, they presented the Colors, and played the national anthem. It was just a tape, and it was just Cher, but it still got to me; I realize that I've tied up September 11 with my friends, with my dad, with Cap'n ... with DB leaving. The national events do matter to me, but I can't tell where my personal mourning ends and my patriotism begins.
***
DB may still be here by Hallowe'en, but he's certain to be gone by Thanksgiving. And that is good, and I am glad for him. It is time his life turned to let him in, rather than leaving him waiting on the doorstep. He'll be near his family, he'll be able to work hard again, he'll have the chance to re-balance the financial scales.
He'll forget about me, I do believe that. No matter what my best friends say about me, I know DB, and I know that he's got expectations of steel. And there's no compromising those, no matter what. He expects to leave and move onward, and I know that he will.
And I'm glad, for him.
But it's hard - knowing that I'll never fit, for him, again. Knowing that I'll become The Past, no matter how good now feels. No amount of half-assed love given, and no amount of nice memories of being together is going to change that I'm simply not negotiable.
Even without the thought that he'll date and maybe get infatuated and all the worse thoughts ... Just knowing that I'm over is a hard thing.
And yet, I'm so happy for him, that this limbo is over. It rends me to pieces to think about going forward - even though at least I know what my heart's capable of now, even though there must be other people in the world I can love ... It's just that DB is so wonderful.
I can't see accepting the true demotion to surface friendship, to complete denial of my feelings and strict geniality. And I can't stand the concept of divorcing my life from this person, who is so FUN, who is so lovely, who is so close to my heart. Why does he have to be flawless? Why does he have to care about me at all? Strange ... it would almost be better if I thought I didn't matter.
Because, one of these days, I won't be allowed to, or any importance I have will be forgotten. His will is strong, and his expectations for the future are clear, and I don't fit them, and tailoring me out of any possibility will be the natural act of a will as clear as his is. And it's not even cruelty or selfishness, it's just the nature of differences between people. Some of us are ready to accept what we are ... some of us rail and protest against everything.
Gods, I love him. It's just too bad that, like my marriage, that isn't going to be quite enough.
Monday, October 01, 2001
Mein kopf tut mir veh.
No, I mean. REALLY. I have a headache which slightly surpasses the very word headache. And it is difficult not to wonder about the funny chemical smells I noticed coming through our air vents and the extreme speed with which this headache occurred after my noticing said smells.
It's 25 minutes early, but man, the phone hasn't rung but once today, and that was the boss finding out that nothing's happening here. I am out of this popstand, babies.
Oh, man. Now nausea and hot flashes. *Checks menapause-o-meter* Nope. Not fifty just yet. Must be the fucking noisome AC.
Seeya on Wednesday,
--Maimacita
AIEEEEEEeeeeeeeee ... eee ...
There was a banner at the top of the last page I visted, saying "See Bridget Jones' Diary again and again and again!"
That's not an ad. That's some sort of THREAT.
*Runs away, frightened*
Eeps.
Okay, so I bought a swiffer the other day. Have hardwood floors, will obey (Zuba told me I had to use 'em).
But I cannot see the hubbub, bub. People have been raving about these (expensive) little substitutes for perfectly free and available RAGS for a couple of years now, and I have to say it: What da dilly, yo? They're handily sized, and soft. They would be great for light coatings of soot dust - and I have very little soot dust in my life, you see. They are NOT, however, the much-adored solution to all my cleaning problems ...
It was at BUST I first ran across the Cult of the Swiffer. The same girls who dig Target like a double wide grave were on about how Swiffers changed their lives, in terms of cleaning. And these were the cleaning-type chicks, see, so I could dig their opinions myself.
But, now that I've invested in the Swiffer mop thingy and the Swiffers themselves ... I don't get it. I don't, for one thing, get how a flimsy little cloth is meant to significantly affect the cleanliness of my floors. Because my floors catch more than single molecules of dust, you see - they catch actual debris now and again. Massive things like small pieces of string, or stray fragments of carpet fiber. Things much too large for a Swiffer to handle.
So I have to sweep, for the BIG stuff like that. And, after a sweeping ... what's the point of the Swiffer, again ... ?
Seriously. Explain to me what the point of these things is.
Because, for wiping up regular surfaces, they don't exactly get me exciteable either. I mean - as I say, nice little cloth; bit flimsy for my needs, but better than a scrap of Kleenex - they're fine for pulling up the six molecules of talcum powder you spilled a week ago ... but where is the CLEANing part of these little "cleaning" cloths?? They don't do anything but pick up single cat hairs (more than one, and the little guys are groaning under the weight), and - no - they do NOT magnetically hold onto all dust and the like. They just don't.
So - the point, please? I am serious. Explain to me, please, how these majorly-marketed little beasties are supposed to improve in any way upon the old standby (to which I'm returning next week) of a hardy, very lightly moistened rag.
Thank you.
So it finally happened. The Dream - the dream that DB wants me and jumps in, and everything's all Happy Ending ... you know. The inevitable illustration of the inevitable Hope. It was on Sunday morning, and it was okay. I didn't wake up with unhappiness and disappointment with reality. I just had a very good dream.
They don't all have to come true, but they're still nice things to have.
This weekend was busy. On Friday night, I did some more whitening on the dining room walls, and it made the room look just huge. The loss of that wallpaper is definitely not a bad thing.
And on Saturday, it was just Go Go Go Go, all day long. I was up at nine, mowing the last bit of lawn which hadn't been finished when the mower ran out of gas earlier in the week. Then mom and dad came over, and mom groused and painted the top-two-inches-before-the-crown-molding bit of the dining room, and dad worked on the light fixture in the bathroom, and I somehow just ended up running up and down every stair in the house for a long time. When mom got unbearable, I went outside for a bit, and watered plants and weeded. Then, lurking down in the basement for some reason, I heard dad looking for me, and re-emerged.
Mom and I were, surprise of surprises, pretty snippy, so dad and I ended up going for lunch at some point. We picked up Arby's sandwiches for the two of them, and I abstained from the eating. Then dad and I got to recovering the barstools, and mom went back to the last bit of painting.
Finally, dad left, and mom and I sat in the living room, talking turkey about the paint choices. We came to an accord - left to our own devices, we always do ... And then we went to the big Stuff For Your House store, and bought a bunch of paints and little things.
After she left, K and I hit the grocery. How I made it, wilting with mom-fatigue and hunger as I was, I'm not sure - but certainly K can verify that I didn't exactly sail through the whole place.
There was no question of continuing the fast, with the half-mile of stair climbing I had done through the day and the complete disinterest in prettying up and going out on the town. So I collapsed for a while, and then popped in my Terry Jones documentary about the Crusades and started painting the red in the dining room.
Everyone in our country - and in fact, everyone in the Taliban - should watch that documentary about the Crusades right now. It really ought to be mandatory, because it illuminates so much of what history is repeating itself NOW.
Anyway.
Yesterday was by far lazier. The highlight was IX calling, to tell me that he and his girlfriend would not be able to come to the housewarming. But we talked for a while, and it was good - we haven't gotten to talk in too long.
He has changed his advice on a key point, too. He thinks I don't need to worry about things so much anymore. And, with everyone in the world telling me what they think and two very important people even offering me their support vibes - it is IX's opinion which truly seems to carry weight (though it is TEO's and Spicy's prayers which sustain me, too). So I'm feeling pretty amazing.
And today is Monday, but the boss is out of the office, and DB and I are going to the fair tomorrow. Days off of work are Most Good, so that is a fine thing.
And that is the weekend report.
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Sites I visit often:
The Brunching Shuttlecocks:
Lore Fitzgerald Sjoberg is my hero.
Donnie Green:
Get your eyeballs smacked!
Mr. Cranky:
Provides his inimitable, aptly named movie reviews.
The Straight Dope:
Get it here first, last and in the middle too.
Take Our Word For It:
A weekly etymological magazine for people who're as linguistically geeked-out as I am.
Ronald Everett Design:
Buy clothes which are beautiful, and get great service too.
Or peep him on ebay:
Ronald Everett auctions
My friends:
DykeLove's poems
AthenaDreaming
Girly Gurlglitter
Erica
Zuba
Now you've gone and done it:
My online photo album. Go. Look. Love me.
Best viewed:
1024x768 with IE 5.x
Tested in:
Netscape 4.7 & 6, and
IE 5.x & 4.x
If you can't hang with that,
talk to the designer.
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