Sing a Tale of Turkey

A very happy, healthy, warm, and safe day of Thanksgiving to everyone!

May your lives be each touched today by some nugget of love, joy, inner peace, whatever you hope to find.

(that was meant to be published Thanksgiving morning,but I was late getting ready, rushing out the door---)

In retrospect, how was your day of Thanksgiving? Tell me your favorite part!

Sometimes my favorite part of a holiday spent with loved ones is simply soaking it all in, leaning back and watching my late-in-life cousins and my cousins' children chase one another through the house and yard so intent on their imagined adventures, simultaneously appreciating their individuality while imagining that is how it was when my peer-group cousins and I were that young, and my aunts and uncles and parents our ages;
missing our grandparents, blessed and enriched by the addition of cousins' spouses and babies;
aunts reminiscing the years when their adult children were small, uncles full of tryptophan and red wine still falling asleep on the couch;
enjoying the ability to know my aunts and uncles adult-to-adult and old enough to know they have wisdom to impart.

Happy holiday season to you~!

Before I go today, I want to share one more thing:
At 3:30AM this after-Thanksgiving morning, as I read blogs like bedtime stories preparing to tuck myself in for the night, I stumbled onto a link at 'mom on a wire'-

A link to http://ashesandsnow.org/


In that near-sleep state of opened-soul, with headphones on in a sleeping house, my soul was re-energized, my core of peace and dreams enlivened.
Very recently in watching my younger sister, I've begun to remember the energy I once had, the dreams and drive to find my truest place and fix the world; and began to wonder what happened to my plans, began to see how unbeknownst to myself I am settling into blind comfort.
Thank you mom on a wire for sharing this- Inspiration is an understatement.

Go, look, listen; Experience.

I 've been Poison'ed

Strolling my slippered feet onto the bathroom tile several minutes ago, I quietly sung, "UN- Ski-knee Bop-BOP!"
And stopped dead to quietly sing, "What the F**k?"

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quietly missing Nate

Perhaps it is something in the November air, or simply the first November we have been apart since before we came together.
Last night I found myself unexpectedly transported to our old apartment, our home.
I know it was winter because I welcomed the heated air that wrapped itself around my body as I stepped into the kitchen from outdoors, and it was night- the lights were all on inside; this is also how I knew he was home.
I called Hello loudly down to the living room and he instantly rose from his chair and came out to greet me with a hug, ask me how my day had been- more than twice my size, his warm body wrapped me up entirely.

Retrieving things from my storage units I have opened boxes containing the smell of that home, the smell that will never be exactly created anywhere else ever. At first it was painful, grinding my self-made loss in deeper; now that the pain has become something smaller and gentler and part of me, I sink my nose into those sheets and clothes and bath towels- bury my face and do my best to breathe up every last molecule.

Sometimes, when we are emotionally strong enough, it is nice to visit these places we will never ever get to be any more.

Ass attack

I slipped into my workout pants a half hour ago. Yes my body was quite shocked! Did you buy us new pants? it asked. I don't remember ever wearing these before.
To which I said, Oh just shut up!
And then I said, Why does my new underwear suddenly feel so snug on my butt? It fit fine two days ago!
I don't get my period, ever, but I get some of the other stuff like gaining nine pounds over night, like needing a box of Kleenex and a hug to get through a grass seed commercial- and I am really hoping my butt is answering the call of the end of the month.
Because a girl who cut back on the sugar in her Light Soy Milk coffee, doesn't eat dinner any more, and stopped her cookie treats altogether should not be growing out of her underpants!
If it isn't the hormones after all I'll blame it on the wall squats- my glutes are just getting bigger!
But that doesn't explain my top set of cheeks looking chubbier now does it?
Damn!

Fat raindrop, deep pond

It ended in the same place it began, in the place she hired me, in the place where I met her son: where I confessed my crush one Saturday when I'd been called into work and there he was picking up his sister who was then but a sophomore in high school; and there in the whirlpool room that cold November morning he asked me to the movies that night and gave me a hug. Around the corner, one Thursday morning nearly three years later, I surprised his mother with my engagement ring- nearly as much a surprise to me. I had known for two years I wanted to marry him, but then there it was. I told my mother by calling to say, I am engaged, I think, whilst staring at the ring on my finger with incredulity and disbelief.
And we were off and running; engagement changes life in ways I wouldn't ever have known without being there.

In that same building, three months before our wedding, three days after we'd supped at her home, and three before she was to dine at ours, she found out I was gone- No wedding, no shower to throw, no family coming from Belgium; no mother of the groom, no in-laws to be gained; no rehearsal dinner, no photographs for the hall.
I knew as cold feet grew that leaving would cause great upheavals, would create a giant mess, but it is only now I am beginning to comprehend the ripples of my decision.

Sweet tired

Tonight I am the tired with the constant weight of a yawn in the back of my throat; the tired with so warm they nearly itch eyelid edges; cheeks feeling weighty, gravity too heavy on me tonight; and my body knows the bed will take it tonight the way a tub of maple syrup accepts a lump of pancake- soaked down, down, down into enveloping velvety warmth.

Gotta grow me some fur.

Holy Hanna BarBera and big men in little tights- first I'm whiny cause it's 70 degrees in November, then I'm covered in goose bumples and "Brrr..."-ing all over the apartment because the heat is too expensive to turn on and I'm wearing only one sweatsuit!

P.S. I wish someone would bring me a steaming plate piled high with buttered and syruped blueberry pancakes! Does IHOP deliver? Shouldn't they? For a bribe?

I am not surprised.

You Are the Swedish Chef

"Bork! Bork! Bork!" Your happy and energetic - with borderline manic tendencies. No one really gets you. And frankly, you don't even get you. But, you sure can whip up a great chocolate mousse

The Muppet Personality Test

Karen's Confessions #12

I love raw batter and dough- which means running my finger along the inside rim of the pancake batter bowl, repeatedly, and licking it off througout the pancake making process- then doing the same with the ladle and the almost empty bowl when the last pancake-worthy batter has been dumped into the pan.
It means saving one or two uncooked specimens from every container of Pillsbury tube biscuits, for eating cold and squishy and gloriously tongue-bitingly yeasty while the rest go about their merry cooking.
It means sneaking back-end pinches off risen bread dough, so chewy between my teeth before sacrificing the loaf to the oven.

Autumn Cleaning

Well I have deleted a few of my previous posts, and turned others from published back into drafts- sometimes I throw out old journals, crumple and toss therapeutic letters I wrote never to send;
so here I occasionally toss away what I no longer wish to see.
I do truly apologize if this should inconvenience any one, as I do have readers who are kind enough to not only read but even enjoy my writing week after week and I am so glad you keep coming!

an evening's walk

It gave me goose pimples walking the boards when the horizon was purple, the dunes rustling East, and the church bells chiming off 6 '0' clock.


I looked up to find dust bunny clouds on top soaking up the color of raspberry popsicles from the spill of a good-bye sun and the shyest slice of northern moon barely making itself known.

11/02/02

When there was nothing but the sky and the silhouettes of you and I
I remember the dark and the jagged pine branches along the horizon ,more stars than ever I'd seen and puffing our breath out misty into the cold where it floated and died absorbed into the night. And it was only us in the cold in the black with the stars over our heads and our voices that wandered and faltered and fell silent again heads turned up as we cuddled the very first time.
Just you and me and your breath on my face

Say Satisfaction

The wind whipped up this afternoon after the sun came out- sitting in the car in my scrubs facing West at a red light on my journey home from another day's work I smiled with pleasure at the breezes coming forcefully through the driver side window cooling my face and ruffling my hair; looked straight up and smiled again at the macrovisible speed of the clouds- cumulus? never got that quite straight- across the sky somehow against the wind.
It certainly all changed the tempertature in the apartment. At 7PM I closed all the windows, stood my goose-pimpled, white fingered body under shower water so undeniably hot it sent sparkles of shiver from my scalp down my spine.
And I grinned some more.

A little estrogen goes a long way.

I am terribly cranky today.
Dropping the bag of recyclables into the bin whose top edge meets my chin, I tipped the bag too far toward gravity spilling empty glass and plastic containers into my face. I mostly behaved- the previously-mayonnaise jar clanged satisfactorily after being whipped top speed at the bottom of the dumpster; I did not wing it at the asphalt though I craved the sound and impact of shattered glass.
My driver side door lock finally turned under the key, after I kicked the side panel while my three canvas bags and 25 pounds of groceries worked at sliding off my shoulders.
Groaned at work when the 3PM showed up at 3:45 and all my nauseous tummy wanted was to go home two hours ago.
Just plain grouchy today- Princess Irritable. Wherefore art thou, Prince Valium.
I am blaming it on normal monthly hormonal cycling. Some months I weep over Anderson windows, others I restrain myself from putting my foot down hard on the accelerator and annihalating the elderly woman who took the right of way cutting me off on the traffic circle then, once on the circle afore me, stepped on her brakes and- Stopped. In front of me. In the middle of the circle. At rush hour. As traffic rushed up behind me. I behaved myself and though my teeth were grinding satisfied my homicidal urges with two toots on the horn.
I don't menstruate without a uterus, but it is the third week of the month, and my boobs are snugly filling up my bra, sweet chocolate is unsufferingly calling to me for the third day in a row (I nearly went out in my pajamas in the rain at 11PM last night on a Hershey's quest), I had a headache today, and yes the urge to strangle basically everyone, unwarranted or not, is strong.
I'm blaming it on the hormones.

Ode to a Charlie Brown kind of dog

Get Fuzzy by Darby Conley

Your Daily Get Fuzzy
http://www.comics.com/comics/getfuzzy/archive/getfuzzy-20061017.html
http://www.comics.com/comics/getfuzzy/archive/getfuzzy-20061018.html

Get Fuzzy is one of my sweet addictions. Though it has lately waned some in the giggle soliciting factor, I still read it religiously. I adore these little cartoon guys and I never know when an entry is going to crack my grin wide open.
I have nearly all the books, except for the anthologies- because, I have all the books. Some were gifts, one of them a Christmas present from Harold who so patiently and lovingly answered my pleas of "Hey (Harold), Come 'ere!" and left what he was doing on the computer over and over on single nights just to stand at my bedside and read yet one more Get Fuzzy cartoon that had me in stitches. I devoured each book in a matter of hours, unable and unwilling to put it down even though it meant staying up past my self-appointed bedtime.
He liked them, too. At one point I would sit in his lap and we would take turns reading the comics out loud with me doing the voice we were sure must belong to Satchel, and he handling the role of Bucky. With Rob, we just took turns.

Roll 'em

I have avoided blogging lately because, let's face it, my life these past six months is monotony on a roller coaster- strapped myself into stupid and the lapbelt jammed.
I have four modes now- into some new guy who is shooting babies and white picket fences out his ass and is going to make me Donna Reed with plane tickets; missing the living bejeesus out of Nate and whining about such; done with men and Nate and finally on my way; or avoiding blogging about it all.
In other news my posture was evaluated earlier this week- to put it mildly, if I don't start straightening the fuck up when I walk, my next career move will be ringing the bell in the tower and frightening village folk.

What my little heart desires

Am I dangerous just now or ripe for the picking?
I had a personal trainer assessment tonight and at several points he touched my body- to take my measurements, to point out particular muscles- fingertips along my back, hands against my waist, the palm to palm of a handshake- and I reveled in it all, the sanctimonium of touch.
I am not truly worried about slipping and having sex with someone I barely know, (I'm actually more worried I'll never surpass the gut level cringe when a date tries to touch more than my lips): it's a greater risk I'll snuggle a near stranger.
Because that is what I always miss the most being single, in a way I often don't notice until I'm having a crappy day and two arms holding me tight would make it all better if only I could find someone to hug me; until someone absentmindedly or companionably touches my body and every muscle relaxes in a way that makes me realize how tight I've become all over.
Someone who makes me feel peaceful, someone warm and snuggly who holds no sexual threat as I am oddly threatened by sexual advances these months- to come and curl up with me for a few hours.
Go hug a single person today!

Irony

When I was 15 my parents separated (to later divorce and bitterly scorn each other to this day)- and my father left, among other things, his rowing machine which I began to use while watching television in our finished basement.
I had to sneak.
Because my mom would yell at me, telling me as she so oft has through my life what I did and didn't want for myself.
"Karen, I want you to stop using the rowing machine- it's ridiculous. You don't want to have big developed muscles."
At age 25 I started to lift free weights, and continue til this day. Last spring a mandated college fitness course arose and of the choices available I opted for weight lifting. Finally my trepidation in the weight room, so predominately a man-populated area, began to wither. Now I feel like I belong there as much as the often 100% male population that surrounds me on the benches. Guess I knew my own mind on that one.

When I was 14 it was suggested by one of my many revolving psychologists - my mom is also big on diploma'd psychology, and no one could figure out why Karen had such low self esteem (my guess is natural shyness and introversion coupled with ostracism at school and in public) or diagnose my tics- anyway, it was suggested I volunteer at the hospital as a candy striper. The duties of a candy striper were explained to me by this therapist, and it all sounded fabulous to me. Please, Mom!
An absolute NO. Because, like so many others things I've wished to do and done, it would be too dangerous for me. Too many germs.
I never got to be a candystriper, but I am a nurse now; clinicals done in the hospital, work days in various longterm care centers and physician's offices. I've worked around flu, pneunmonia, hepatitis, AIDS.
So much for protecting my from the world and myself, though she still tries.

I did not choose nursing or weight lifting to spite my mother- rather I found myself involved in these things before remembering her wishes against them; just two more veins running naturally through my life.

Excerpts

(from The Mininster's Wooing, "The Sea"; Harriet Beecher Stowe.)
"And ever and anon came on the still air the soft, eternal pulsations fo the distant sea,- sound mournfullest, most mysterious, of all the harpings of nature. It was the sea- the treacherous, soft, dreadful, inexplicable sea."

(from The Chimney Corner, "Conversation"; Harriet Beecher Stowe.)
"Real conversation presupposes intimate acquaintance. People must see each other often enough to wear off the rough bark and outside rind of commonplaces and conventionalities in which their real ideas are enwrapped, and give forth without reserve their innermost and best feelings."

pearls and caviar

I was reading This Fish archives (http://thisfish.ivillage.com/love/archives/2004/08/my_confession) and reminded of something- I am a high maintenance friend, always needing cleaning-up-after.
I'm flat broke, my love life is dead, my car is falling apart, I'm having an identity crises- it's always something again.
But I know I am high maintenance and thank the good people who persist in loving me no matter how often they have to step in and put me back together.

And they're off

How can I convey the humor of an old and bent over grey haired husband and wife, she in a printed cotton dress and green sweatpants and taller than he, each hunched over a walker yet vibrant and energetic- He yells, Where are we going? from behind; she calls back, Follow me! and off they go, speeding in their own way down the corridor, one tailing the other.
Would that, could that, be me and a long-loved spouse some day?

Ode to the NJDMV

There once was a child of four
Tossing a fit on the DMV floor
Mom grimaced and sighed
Silently counted to five

My sympathies lay
With the child in tears
His wailing and kicking
Assailing our ears

I'd have been there myself
If I weren't twenty seven
Dear God move this line!
I invoked to the heavens

Then to my right
A Suit hit the floor
Screaming into his briefcase
Down went one more

Ladies in dresses
Kicking and cranky
The Blue Hair beside me
Bitching into her hanky


The cashier was frenzied
The child dumbfounded
He counted to five
Then yelled, You're all grounded!

Generation X (cellent!)

Things to be unknown by our grandchildren:

1)mercurochrome
2)mercury thermometers
3)the Twin Towers
4)carry on luggage
5)television station sign-off signal;
and sitting in front of the television early in the morning,watching the technicolor vertical bars, waiting for television stations to come back on.
6)Bob Barker
7)Johnny Carson
8)cassette deck
9)walkman
10)station wagons
11)...and 'riding in the way-way back.
and your sweaty thighs sticking to the vinyl bench seats in the summer.
12)roller rinks-and roller-skating birthday parties.
13)hand written letters; S.W.A.K.
14)missing a phone call if you were out
14)typewriters
15)...and typing or writing out school papers before correction tape and white out;
ergo, ripping up the page and starting over if you made a mistake- even if you were on the last line
16)owning your first complete set of encyclopedias
17)the importance of the no. 2 pencil
18)knobs on the TV for vertical hold, color, and contrast
19)playground structures made of metal and cemented into macadam
20)Tang with breakfast
21)playing the original Atari when it was brand new- and Pong was cool.
22)buying something new on a 33rpm- or borrowing mom and dad's 45's
23)getting up to change the channel
24)waiting for the theater movie to come on television
25)dialing the operator for assistance
26)asking the operator for an address and getting it
27)flash cubes
28)at the airport meeting/leaving someone directly at the gates
29)chicken pox as a childhood given-Do you have a pock scar, too?
30)Your turn!!!



Can you think of anything else? Something from your generation?

Karen's Confessions

1)I jump on the bed in hotel rooms. There's a reason kids do it- it's fun!
2)I double dip at Continental breakfasts- I figure at 90-100 per night they can afford to feed me a second frozen bagel and cup of coffee.
3)I also make or strip my hotel bed in the morning and gather all my used towels in the tub! and pilfer all the samples. (but none of the linens or toilet paper!)
4)I empty the rest of the bread basket into my napkins to take home (except at fancy places)- it's getting thrown out anyway!
5)I recycle my foil and ziploc bags until they have holes.
6)I've literally clotheslined people (Jay!) with drying laundry strung at my height across the kitchen.
7)I fell ass over teakettle down hardwood stairs onto ceramic tile when I was six knocking myself out cold and gained a concussion-
to this I attribute all lacking mental capacities ;)
(I was in sock feet cradling marshmallows in a napkin instead of hanging onto the railing)
8)I talk to myself everywhere- yep, even in public places. It's increasing with age.
9)I try to get away with mouthing the Happy Birthday song so no one will be tortured by my singing.
10)In desparate times, I've eaten bittersweet baking chocolate- and almost liked it.
11)While sleeping I somehow pull the topsheet to the right, and the quilt to the left- I even them up in the morning and wake the next day to find them pulled opposite directions again.

Not alone

That morning I flipped through the radio as usual on my short 8AM drive into work.
I stopped at 95.5- Ray Charles singing America the Beautiful.
Smoke spreading through the sky from a nearby woods fire seemed appropos.
Within a mile the tears started, and it was comforting to be certain there were other people crying for the very same day.
By the time I arrived at work I was a little weak, nerves jangled. Not alone there either.
Through the day we talked of 09/11/01, and of how we were feeling that 09/11/06; spoke with each other, with the patients.
People sported little flags, stars and stripes shirts, ensembles in pieces of red, white,and blue.
There was talk of loved ones lost that day, of where we were, of how we first reacted, of how on 09/11/06 we watched the news, listened to the radio, thought about it all and cried.

Five years down the road

How did your world change? What do you remember?

Visit the artist's Website!

N.G.B.

just little memories, the rain falling down, how I miss you sometimes,
wonder what happened to our bed
our home so warm your face against mine never lie in those arms again and i miss you so sometimes
we're gone it's gone our home so warm your hand in mine and I miss you so sometimes
someone else's pain makes mine so fresh today your voice your love your skin against mine and I miss you so tonight.

every new season that comes brings fresh memories
the things we had, the things we did, those we never will
one day more with you or take back what I did, Iwould

Just make the coffee

So it is back to the work place tomorrow! Spoiled by this third day of a weekend, looking forward to the next short work week! Which will be Thanksgiving, for me.
I hope you all (how far is that really from Y'all?) enjoyed your weekend, long or short. This is the first Labor Day I've had off as holiday since 1993. (and I am thankful.)
Another summer come to a close- it's bittersweet here. We are lucky for the tourism money we receive- our state is so financially corrupt (okay, not just financially) we need all the help we can get! It is also nice watching those who don't have daily access to an ocean shore enjoy ours.
All the same, here on the coast September and October are some of our favorite months- the beach weather is still lovely but the badge mandate has gone, as have the crowds. We have our parking spaces back, traffic is lighter, lines are shorter, gas prices are lower.
Some tranquility returns.

How to mold an Emmy from Wonder Bread

My girlfriend (one of the two I met that first esteem-crushing month of belittleing high school) informed me last night, as I walked along so innocently beside her enjoying the evening's beach air, that we have a 15 year class reunion being planned for next summer.
I said, (wailed), "Noooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo!!!!!!!"
Or maybe I just thought that.

One year. To get married, adopt two kids, buy a house, lose 10 lbs, become a professional body builder, finish my BS, and get a face lift and breast enhancement.
Holy crap, it's gonna be a busy year!

I told her to make me go- meaning, drag my kicking and screaming self all the way there and push me through the doors.
After all, the last time I saw these people we were nigh on 18- I'm hepped to see the bitches turned fat and greasy, the mean guys have supremely bratty children and marriage bellies.
And cavort with the rest of the people the aforementioned made cry.

Well, a little.

Truly it's a bit frightening and a little exciting to imagine finding out what everyone has done, how life has gone. Who has grey hair and kids- wait, the kids come first, then the grey hair, right?
What a time warp this might be.

Ease on down the road

Phew! I think I have again successfully evacuated my head of unwanted contents-can't promise nothing important went out with the trash.
After encouraging myself, supportive words from friends, a long and very pensive walk, I think I am back out of the ex-fiance quicksand.
Treading carefully away... . To a safe place to skip.

Saner than I sound

P.S. Do I sound yet unstable in the previous Nathaniel post? I hope not, cause I'm actually standing on strong legs again.
Here-
Did you ever have a very bad wound? One that hurt terribly every day for a long time.
Eventually it heals to the point that days and weeks go by without you remembering it's there.
Then one day you walk to the bathroom in the dark and don't see the wall in your way and WHACK! You smack the crap out of that nearly healed wound and GOSHDARNIT SONS of HUCKLEBERRIES does it smart.
So you dance about a little holding it and shed a few tears; then you put some salve and a band aid on it from the first aid kit that's been in the cabinet all along- and you go back to bed.

That's what it was like before, during, and after talking the other day to the man I almost married.
And now I'm going back to bed!

I've a task for you...

I love hearing "how we met stories". I also love to hear "how we got engaged" stories. I like them all.
So tell me if you will...
How did you meet your spouse/significant other?
How is it you got engaged?

for Nathaniel

Tuesday night I had a fretful time falling to sleep and dreamt of my ex-fiance when I finally nodded off. Not knowing he'd left a voicemail on my charging and therefore turned off cell phone shortly before I went to bed. There's a vein in my life of mild clairvoyance. Awareness of things in my world prior to them actually making themselves known.

But that isn't what this is about. This is about Nate, or to Nate, or for Nate, though he'll never read it (unless I am struck with selfish meanness and send it to him.)

When we were talking yesterday it felt like old times- just you and me on the phone. It felt good and I wanted to talk to you more. What can I say- I didn't leave because I didn't love you. I left because I was homesick and having cold-feet anxiety attacks that got worse and worse and I couldn't make them stop.
After I left I wanted to talk you but I was afraid of what you might say, I didn't know what to say, and I decided to suppress any desire to talk to you because I had caused you enough pain; in other words, I thought, I left and now I have to stick by my decision-if I start changing my mind it's only going to be cruel to Nate. As if the way I left wasn't cruel but at the time it was all I could do and in the immediate weeks after I left I was in shock my self.
It's only now, five months down the road, that the dust is clearing and I am thinking Oh my God, I just up and left? I can't believe I made you wake up into - finding your fiance gone. What hell that must have been.
You see, for all the things I thought were problems, I got all wrapped up in myself.
I loved you. I got so scared and caught up in it that I forgot the importance of how I still loved to sit on your lap and cuddle, to make you nourishing dinners and cinnamon rolls, to cuddle you when you came to bed in the morning, to sit at your feet and watch dvd series together while you played with my hair, to watch your expressions at the movie theater, to hold hands and rub feet under your parents dining room table, to ride somewhere listening to Car Talk or short stories on NPR, to snuggle with you after sex, to wash your hair in the shower, to go grocery shopping with you, to go for walks and listen to your stories, to skip over to Gifford's or Soup for You or the Homestead in the morning for breakfast before you went to sleep, to be there when you woke up, to go camping or hiking, to make out any old place, (including sex in your front seat at the drive-in theater on my birthday), to have Christmas and Thanksgiving with you, to stack the wood you split in the cold air.
Everything we did together- miniature golf, bowling, driving range, cooking, WalMart, ordering out, staying in- we had fun together. Every thing. How did I lose the importance of that? When did I stop asking you to go for a walk or to play cards? When did we stop getting naked all over one another outside?
I miss your parents and your brothers and sisters and your grandparents. I missed Jebediah graduating high school. I missed celebrating your black belt with you.
I sometimes wonder, what would have changed if I'd gone to church with you that last Sunday or if I'd tried to talk to Father Roger about my fears.
I had a rough summer- I was very suicidal for a while and depressed but I brought it on myself- who knows what you went through because of me. I'd been doing okay, moving on, but talking to you yesterday made me want to talk to you again.

All or Nothing Karen.

Two nights ago I dreamt of my exfiance and of his family. Last night I dreamt of my ex-fiance. This morning I had a voicemail left last night while my phone was charging.
It was my ex-fiance, asking if he can send any of my things. I was able to call him back on my lunch break today. It was the first time we spoke since the emotionally horrid weekend in May that I moved out of the apartment in Maine. ( I purposely left some of my things for him to use- some furniture, my radio, drinking glasses. Other things I forgot like two serving trays I adore and the Lenox bud vase my mom gave me for Christmas four years ago.)
Oh, I called his cell phone once or twice over the summer to try and reach him.

It was great to hear him again and he talked with me some too. I miss all the good we had and if I have to forcefully refocus myself. Even that doesn't totally work. What does work is remembering how much I hurt him and how unfair and unkind it would be to put myself back into his life after what I did.

equinox musings

I am feeling unequivocably lazy this week (unintentionally outdoing last week's lassitude?)
Like all else, there is a time for industry, and a time for relaxation and content.
A time for multitasking and a time for taking stock and gearing up for the next big energy burst.
The seasons are readying to change; so too am I.

I've continued to run the engagement and leaving through my head- it's kind of constant circulation until the puzzle is solved. Well, today it dawned on me - I left because my gut knew I could not for the rest of my life continue to be who and what I was in that relationship. Finito.

The millions of reasons and problems not solved that snowballed- they are why I could not sign myself up to be that person for life- but the final reason, the real driving force, is the fact that my gut knew what my head and heart couldn't see and wouldn't admit; I couldn't truly be myself and it had already gone on far too long.

Just for fun...

I did another. Actuall rather accurate.

Men See You As Understated
You are an intreguing mix of girl and woman.
You're feminine, quiet, and a total mystery to most men. Yet they often feel the urge to protect you, even if they don't know you.
You *are* a flirt, but you usually only flirt with those you know well.
http://ynr.blogthings.com/howdomenseeyouquiz

~ morning coffee ~

* "And the rain, rain, rain came down, down, down... ."

It seems I am going to grow my hair out again; ergo, I am willingly going to look like a neglected chia pet for the next year. That is my life- over grown shrubbery with brief hiatuses of well kept- I grow it, I cut it, I grow it, repeat.
I've been asked more than twice what super power I would have for myself and never can answer; how silly. I've got two.
First, to borrow from Inspector Gadget, I want the ability to extend my arms and legs at will to get the box of frozen peas off the top shelf in the freezer, to reach things on the counter while maintaining my hold on a surgical site, to reach the touch lamp from the far left corner- and only comfy divot on the futon- of my bed when I hit the ultimate cozy position in full lamplight.
To maintain visibility in a crowd! To see the band instead of some mans' sweaty back. To see the Penn Station exit not backsides and diaper bags.
Second, to grow my hair with arm abductions. Who remembers the commercials for the doll whose hair grew when you pumped her arm? I'd have locks to my waist in ten minutes! Cool!

You Are a Plain Ole Cup of Joe
But don't think plain - instead think, uncomplicated.
You're a low maintenance kind of girl... who can hang with the guys.
Down to earth, easy going, and fun! Yup, that's you: the friend everyone invites.
And your dependable too. Both for a laugh and a sympathetic ear.
http://ynr.blogthings.com/whatkindofcoffeeareyouquiz



An aside- my younger cat is cracked. Oh, I love her and I'm proud of her like any cat mama- but she's a bit of an egghead. A few nuggets short of a full box of kibble.

*(as sung on an original Winnie the Pooh record)

A Saturday evening's musings

My sister has this cat that feels like a sack of silky cartilage when you pick her up - her meow is the cry of a baby doll turned up side down, or a real baby in the tightest corset.
Labor Day is coming again and with it our shore is returned to us- even though I'm a clamdigger in bennie clothing, rolling about with Maine license plates, I was, like it or not, born and raised three miles from this seashore. I know what these towns looked like 25 years ago and almost every year since. The wood floored over priced restaurant in Manasquan wasn't long ago a dust covered dark laundromat where I played Frogger in the early 80's while our clothes rolled in warm places and my parents waited for a new dryer (and I waited for a new box to play in).
The molded plastic swing set at Orchard Park once had jagged screws and rusty chains like those that tore off my cuticles in childhood. There was a merry go round there, too, on concrete- I remember falling off the edge and landing on my head when I was six during my mom's softball practice. Mom never knew about that one!
And the houses you live in? The developments you call home? One was a patch of woods where kids rode dirt bikes and smoked cigarettes- other things too I'm sure- lit fires, made out (made babies?), drank beer and left the cans. Another was a working apple orchard with a friendly horse. That's why you have a road named Old Orchard Lane.
Have you ever seen Grosse Pointe Blank? (great movie!) Do you remember when John Cusack goes to visit his childhood home and finds ... a convenience store in its place? Sometimes living back here feels a little like that and I laugh. Well, sometimes I cry first. But when I make the reference, I laugh.

Today

All is wet, coming in pinpricks of cold on my cheeks; the leaves are dark green, cars spraying puddles on the lawns and pedestrians. In turqouise T-shirt and khaki capris I'm slightly chilled by breezes coming freely in. The cats lie easy, curled in C's in kitchen chairs.
Tonight will be the slumber of cool cotton striped sheets and fabric softened two seasons worn in two piece pajamas, snuggling in deep under my blue-flowered quilt.

Glee

I have a best friend who is also my cousin but feels like a sister we grew up so closely- sometimes I find myself thinking of her as my sister until I remember we are cousins!
We are mostly all grown up now at 29 and 32, and still we get the giggles together; the giggles that leave us lying on our backs gasping between the stomach cramps, the giggles that are so good we egg each other on and put up with the cramps just to keep the laughter going.
When is the last time you laughed so hard you couldn't even breathe and loved every minute of it?

Spraying the sky

One of the absolutely coolest beans things ever about living in a house in West Long Branch, north of the scungy parts and one block from the beach- besides being one block from the beach and the ocean breezes billowing my lacy white curtains out into my Westport Blue bedroom in the fall and spring-
was being able to watch Long Branch town fireworks from; the front lawn, the glassed in front room, my bed.
Very cool.
Always a sweet surprise to suddenly hear fireworks happening and plunk down on my quilt to enjoy.
I was reminded again of this when I came out of WalMart and found the weekly Point Pleasant fireworks happening far beyond the parking lot.

Up in Industry, Maine there is a farm that lets out it's fields every July for Independence Day fireworks- we're talking hundreds of cars. I sat on the roof of my car reading a book and eating my snack for two 1/2 hours, listening to kids running around the field, the laughter and companionship of innocent tailgate parties.
And then the deepest, biggest, loudest, most colorful fireworks I ever remember seeing. May have been the environment rubbed off on my perception of the display.
(I miss that state.)

Odds and Dead Ends

After my session at the gym last night I swung over to the inlet and laughed after getting out of the car and walking a few steps- my quads were so plumb tired my body wanted to fall down at the knees. In Tae Kwon Do I learned the 'so glad I came to class today' drill- and it's awesome on the thighs; go down into a normal stepping front lunge, hold for 3-5 seconds, then in controlled fashion stand bringing the rear leg up in front in a high kick, and down in front into your next lunge- Repeat around the room. Love 'em!
For one summer, years ago, I went with a boy named Jason- the experience left with little other than intimate knowlegde of the inner workings of a bowling alley, and my first glimpse of phosphorescent jelly fish which hail our way in late August (which I accidentally saw last night- lovely to watch them nestled down among the rocks in the dark water, lighting up every time the water rolled over.)
Thinking of Jason and the bowling makes me ponder the lives I've been privy to through my relationships. I've dated a many-years-clean-and-sober rehabilitated heroine addict, a Radio Shack manager, an artist, a bowling couch potato computer buff who went on to make a very sweet salary, a nurse's aide, a Volkswagen Bug afficiando business man, a jobless weed smoker, an employed high school teaching (what the hell DID he teach? ) weed smoking deer hunter... and many more but I think my brain is sparing me the recall.

My Daily Reads

http://aylathegrump.blogspot.com
http://2carolinacats.blogspot.com
http://littleblackfurball.blogspot.com
http://2tabbys.blogspot.com
http://missmaggiemay.blogspot.com
http://fatericandfriends.blogspot.com
http://thesmitten.ivillage.com
http://smittenkitchen.com
http://www.mightygirl.net
http://gardavson.blogspot.com
http://funnymom.ivillage.com
http://willows95988.typepad.com
http://www.dadgonemad.com
http://grrlgenius.ivillage.com
http://thisfish.ivillage.com
http://paisleywallpaper.blogspot.com
http://fumblings.typepad.com
http://www.alphamom.com
http://themater.blogspot.com
http://playgroupdropout.clubmom.com
http://mamatulip.com
http://wordgirl5.typepad.com
http://kathompson.blogspot.com
http://forkinthehead.blogspot.com
http://charmed35.typepad.com
http://ex-veggie.blogspot.com
http://blogs.abcnews.com/scienceandsociety

A bike ride

My boss is a wonderful team player. He appreciates his staff and expresses his gratitude every single day.
Every Friday he asks us each personally what our plans are for the weekend (as every Monday he asks each one of us what we did over the weekend, and how it went.)
I told him that I hope to go for some bike rides, since it didn't work out last weekend. (after I left work last weekend I started feeling feverish and a little odd- I spent the night and all weekend dehydrating myself with one mother of a virus.)
I told him how I've loved riding a bike since a was a kid, how happy I feel every time I'm out, how I bought myself a good bike a few years ago but just don't get out;
and he told me about the bike he bought himself when he was coming out of med school, over twenty years ago. Same bike he just had refurbished- frame in fabulous shape, needed new parts. Same bike he rides several mornings a week.
And then his face lit up and excited energy suffused him as he spoke of the wind through his hair, rushing around a turn-and concurrently in myself rose the thrill of speed, of human power, of being out in the elements just you and the bike and the ground under your tires, the earth flashing by on both sides because with every muscle in your body you are flying.

notes from August 1st

How can I feel so young and so old in the same morning?
Young- my life agead of am me barely half there decades ahead and room to be something new twice in each one.
(In my twenties I was seven different girlfriends. I went to college and dropped out. I became a nurse. I moved out of Moms'. I moved to Pennsylvania and Maine. I lived with Jason. I moved in with Nate. I bought a horse and started Tae Kwon Do and learned to kayak. I got my first passport. I had my first plane ride. I got raped. I lost 10 pounds. I gave blood. I taught myself how to bake bread and sew blankets. I adopted my cats. I owned my first rat, raised over fifty fancy mice, and buried a fish. I learned to like fish to eat. I started to run.)

Old- watching Jill come home from out all night no wrinkles in her face slimmer hips like I had once- but I had my chance. I was 26 once too and staying out all night just because the fun was too good to sleep, and coming home at dawn to nap.
I had my time to be 26, and it was good.

And here right now is all I need- muscular calves coming out the ends of rolled up pants legs pores tingling with melanin release, book half lifting off my thighs in the morning wind, eyes closed to the sun falling over me, flames from far away.

Will I sit some day curled up in your a sweatshirt of yours?
I remember sharing my blue fleece mittens on the inlet, one for me and one for you. I think your arm was in a sling.

You're a good man Charlie Brown.

Many a good word for Mike who did call me at 12:45 that following morning and did make plans with me for last night. In the end the whole thing didn't work out- but what a sweet, gentle, fun,loving and repsectful man he is.
It ended very amicably- it's a shame we can't stay friends but I've pulled that off just once in my life; and often over the four years since, there have been rough spots requiring serious elbow grease.
So amicably it came to a close- not quite there enough for either of us. It happens.

Back in the saddle again

aka Dumb fucking saddle aka Don't let the door hit you in the ass- Oh, that's my ass the door is hitting, right where your boot struck it!
So, it was great for a few days; we had chemistry, he liked me and the sound of my voice, called me lots, kissed me and didn't try anything else. He thought I was cute, told his friends about me, took me to watch his softball team.
We shot hoops, snuggled on the couch, flirted on-line... until he asked me if I was on birth control, and I had to tell him what I'd planned to tell him in person tomorrow, what you don't tell a man on a first date or even a second. I can't have kids. Just can't. And there it ended.
Best to get it out of the way now I guess.

Just this side of sleepy

I can feel a cinnamon dusted cereal crumb in my slipper. My neck feels like silly putty, my throat filling up with impending yawns, the rims of my eyelids extra warm. I am growing hungry because my breakfast time is drawing close.
My cat wouldn't let me change the bed sheets tonight. Okay- it was partly my doing! She climbed up and laid down smack center on the bed as I was about to begin and as she is deserving owner of much of my heart I didn't want to disturb her. To the friend or two who read here and know this kitty, I will say- Sylvia.
This is the kitty who was rescued from behind a restaurant at 1 1/2, the kitty who barely let me touch her and swatted my face if I got too close when I first adopted her six years ago.
This is also the kitty who spent five days lying on the foot of my bed staring at the floor the first time I took a vacation and left her at home (with Harold who loves her and gave her excellent care).
The kitty who will lie awake beside me watching me and protecting me from what disturbances she can prevent- for days if need be - whenever I am sick. The kitty who comes and rubs my face then settles quietly beside me when I am sad.
The kitty who absolutely gets bed preference tonight if she is snuggling comfortably amongst the quilt rumples.

Happy Birthday to me

My birthday was the 18th- I am officially 32! I was treated to a lovely dinner out with my mom and stepfather, and we shared a wonderful BBQ -indoors!- on Saturday attended by most of my friends. Standing at the sink sharing dish duty with my cousin, Jen, I realized being surrounded and celebrated by 15 people whom have shared my life no less than 10 years each, is a very happy benefit of being back in NJ. Wow- three 'shares' in one paragraph- somebody get the thesaurus! Quick!!
I have watched my closest male friends become husbands- grow the little bellies of contentment and nights at home, enbroil electricity and plumbing in their conversations and weekend duties. I am now watching them become fathers- carry diaper bags, cuddle tiny daughters, nurture pregnant wives.

Photo

I am the brunette 'down in front' holding the flowers- this was taken prior to my cousin's wedding in October 2004.

take one down and pass it around

Welcome to the world of Kleenex Dating! Take one out of the box, use it, toss it down. Maybe one will be a handkerchief to stick in your pocket and keep.
I am not complaining-how unique for me. Those who would know would agree on the novelty.
For those who don't know, I haven't truly dated in over seven years. My last two boyfriends I met, we went on a date, and spent the next 3 1/2 years together. Which does indeed take us back to early 1999.
And up to online dating. It is pretty cool for the likes of me who does quite poorly meeting people without assistance. I am completely not gregarious.
So to post myself like a yard sale commodity is ingenious.
I have been on three dates in two states in two days. But it's physical speed dating. I want to play the tease game wherein our proximal hands play squirrels-around-the-tree the movie theater arm rest for 90 minutes until that first all-telling blissfully tingly hand clasp. I want to spend the first date or two snuggling really close because we want to kiss so badly but are both
too shy.
On the good side, the head games have fallen away. You don't talk unless you like each other's photo. You don't meet unless you have a good IM session. And if you have a weak meeting, you move on.
I am totally enjoying all my conversations and have met three super-nice, handsome, funny men whom I wouldn't have otherwise met.
And meeting them has been fun. It's also kicked me out that terrifying door into DatingLand again.
One-man-at-a-time girl feels a little socially guilty for dating three people in one weekend. But that's the rules of the board game.
So on I go hopefully with the rest of us hopeful romantics and lonely people and friend seekers.
Wish me luck, and fun.
And yes, wonderful concerned friends of mine, I am being careful- my gut is turned on full alert!

In lieu of a time machine

Either I'm going through puberty again or my acne missed the hormone greyhound and is REALLY damn late.
If it's puberty again, I want some boobs.
If it's early menopause, I want a six-pack.
I thought the years of spot-bleaching my pillowcases with Clearasil were over!
I say I want a date. I've said I want sex.
What I do actually want is some male friend company. I want someone just to go for walks at night with me and talk and laugh;
someone to get up in the morning and call to say, "Hey! Let's drive to Maryland today!"
Someone to call over for movies on the floor on a rainy Sunday.
Over the years my guy buddies have gotten married and made families, or in my absence just gotten other lives and I really miss them. I like their wives and their children; I like the advancements in our friendship and the time we do have together.
But I really miss the 'hangin out'.

How it should be...

Grocery Cashier- Hey, Depressed Girl, where do you think you 're going with that two-pound tray of iced brownies?
Depressed Girl- Home???
GC- I don't think so; Brownie Intervention on Aisle 4!
BI- Here you are Miss, One square today- tomorrow come back and I'll give you another square.
DG- What are you doing to my ankle?
BI- That's a Brownie Alert Bracelet, Miss. All grocery stores and bakeries are connected by computer. You're profile is on alert to keep you from purchasing baked goods elsewhere until your depression is over.


This is how it should be. Otherwise Depressed Girl might sit down on a hot July day and eat herself literally ill on two pounds of icing laden chocolate brownies.

that's what you think

I did not slop hot, soapy water out of the kitchen sink- I was mopping the floor. And my slippers.

my first train ride alone

Me on 9:30 AM train into Penn Station yesterday morning- perky in curve hugging pink Calvin Klein T-shirt, slimming khaki capri pants, shampoo scented hair in a clip, smile on my face.
Me on 7:07 PM train out of Penn Station last night- hair out of clip hanging bedraggled on my shoulders, sweaty T-shirt and socks balled together stinking up inside of backpack and soaking through papers, round trip ticket soggy in pants pocket, blue gum stuck on left butt, pen mark on right knee, suntan lotion smears on left shin, general dirt markings on right.
Who gets so messy being bored? I had a most excellent day!
And slept extremely well on that thin futon mattress that felt incredibly good last night!

Eat your vegetables!

Eating a bag of brussels sprouts for breakfast two days in a row does strange things to the tummy. (!)
I like mine steamed to just this side of mush, salted. Another nurse at work likes hers sauteed with bacon and garlic and onions. Sounds good to me without the bacon part.
Is there anyone here who doesn't know what 'asparagus pee' is? I actually knew a person who ate asparagus and hadn't ever noticed the pee.
Our father (my sister and I are living together now) gave us a potted tomato plant and there is one gorgeous green baby getting bigger every day! My first-ever garden in Long Branch NJ had very fertile soil. I threw a half eaten squash on the dirt, and got yellow squash the following summerfrom a three foot wide vine trailing bush. I threw the previous autumn's Indian corn out the following July, and we had corn stalks in August. Apparently someone dropped some tomato beside the front steps once- what a nice surprise to have a productive tomato plant appear!

da da da dum

I need something superbly awesome to do next Saturday, my planned but bailed-on wedding day. If I wore my wedding gown on the train up to the Metropolitan Museum of Art would I be mistaken for an installation? If you cross paths on the 1st with a petite brunette in misplaced trailing white chiffon, send me a wave!

I am into smelling people. I was about to adjust that statement but, no, it's true. If you are hugging me, I am going to sniff your clothes.
The sniffing to which I was about to allude is the getting caught in the cloud of strangers- the flavor carried by the wind away from the bodies of passers-by.
Granted there are occasional wallops of stank that force me to hold my breath until my lungs try to burst.
But most of the time it is soap and shampoo, laundry detergent and dryer sheets, delicate eau-de-toilettes and pheromone-antagonizing colognes. Each personalized by the individual bearer's body chemistry.
Yum! says my nose.

a hobby

The sky was crawling up over me sending the cool wind ahead of it to soothe my neck and lift my tendrils from my behind my ears and across my ticklish cheeks, into my eyelashes to catch and hang.

I hurried, appreciating how quickly my bare feet and calves propelled me up the seaweed spattered concrete. Fishermen began to take up their lines, call to one another. "Hey Bill- It's gettin' close; you goin' in?" Bright flashes came from behind and atmosphere-shivering grumblings. The daylight was lessening. Another bolt.

I hovered at the stairs, one foot in the sand, caught in an onslaught of wet surfers and their boards. They know better than I when it's time to vacate; I oughtn't go, I thought. And lingered still. Near the metal Keep Off the Dunes sign, beside the metal flagpole. And reluctantly turned up the stairs to join the wet-suit-clad in the gazebo.

Stepping precariously across a white, sex-waxed fiberglass five-footer I settled my bum on the floor boards feeling the cold water seep into my pants, the tracked-in, blown-in sand granules settle against my weight. Oohs and Aahs, Cool!, Did you see that one? came from all sides and soon I was leaning under the eave myself to watch the somehow still glassy surface rollick and roll, a trawler enter the inlet tipping sideways, a personal speed boat hammer for harbor as lightning struck down between the jetties. My arm shot out to catch roof drizzled rain in my palm.

Silent, I absorbed talk of wind in high pressure areas being drawn into low-pressure areas, stories of surfer-worthy waves created by Hurricane Cindy riding slowly up the coast in the late 90's, 200 miles off-shore. Did you know as soon- as very soon- as a storm subsides on the West coast, surfers head for the water before the wind dies and leaves the water despondent?

Daylight was growing again stronger and the rain fizzled to sporadic drops. We hadn't seen a bolt in several minutes. I stepped over the tail fin rudders of a red board and headed for the concrete again, pausing to splash the sand from my feet with a puddle. Walking westward on the side of the fence closer to the ocean I watched starkly white seabirds diving toward steel grey chop for surface visiting fishes.

Trying it on

I've been unsure exactly what people have meant saying I need to get used to being single. It is Friday night. I don't have any plans. I don't have money tonight to take myself anywhere, or the gas to get far. The friends I called aren't answering the phone. And they live too far away to just stop by, or ask the same of them.
So it's just me. And the cats. And kind of lonely.
What did I do before? If I had money would I go into Red Bank? Is the Downtown Cafe still there? Still having bands? If my car weren't going through oil like I go through a bag of chocolate chip cookies, would I take off?
I made popcorn on the stove, started a movie, played solitaire on my bedroom floor while watching.
I have always loved riding horses and have even owned- would buy a horse again before a house. There are stables around. I tried golf lessons once and liked that. I'd like to skydive, skuba dive, learn to sail. Love to kayak. There are things. Do I try them now?
I want someone to do these things with, but is the point of it to do them solo?

unexpected packaging

In my life I am hardly ever out of anything for long. Just when financial destitution is hitting I get a refund check or find money on the street. Just when the fridge is as empty as the dip bowl after a slumber party, my dad calls offering me frozen vegetables he would otherwise throw away.
Just when I was certain I had forgotten my grandfather's laugh-after all, seventeen years have come since he left- a client comes into the office where I work with a laugh that wraps itself around my heart and squeezes. When I told this man how his laugh reminded me of my grandfather's, he said, "Then I will have to laugh more!" And bless his joyful soul, he did.
I told one of the other nurses the tears balancing in my eyes came in a good way.

I was a Jersey Girl wandering Maine on an extended road trip. I am back in Jersey now full time but with a little of Maine attached.

Jersey has my roots embedded deep so returning always feels like coming home. But this time I came back to find someone had redecorated Monmouth and Ocean County. Which adds to the strangeness. It's like wearing a blindfold and being spun for pin-the-tail-on-the-donkey. I knew I was still in the yard when the blindfold came off but had difficulty getting my bearings.

I haven't been a single girl for seven years. After being committed to a relationship for so long I am still relearning what being single means. It is different at 32 than it was at 25.

What I always miss most is snuggling and someone to talk to at the end of the day.

And we could have had sex- but the snuggling was so important.

I Want Your...

Alright. I can amuse myself for days, months, years even. Even through a Maine winter. But three months single and I've had it. I want to go on a date. Actually, I want to have a Newport and a glass of wine on the porch at 2AM, swim naked in the ocean under the night sky, and get me some sex.
Yes, sex. What's a girl to do to get a clean one night stand with a hottie with sexy shoulders? I am wondering if hitting a bar in my short dress and heels might help. That might rule out the clean part. Plus alcohol breath is nasty and drunk men are foolish.
Is there a stigma associated with these needs? Who out there thinks less of me now? Who has felt the same way?

Afterlife

My particular experience was unique: no two assaults are the same. I am not alone in having been assaulted. I know there are men and women all around me every day who have been affected personally and secondarily by sexual assault.
Two weeks after my rape, when I picked up my last paycheck, a waitress whom I had mutually befriended told me she had been raped five years previously. Five years! At the time, I was counting off every day one by one- one more day's distance, one more day survived. I was so impressed at her five year mark that it became my goal. If she could survive five years and seem so normal, I could too. Now I've doubled that and it no longer marks my calender.
It's been a long journey.
I went to counseling the summer after my December rape. I cried through my first visit and often during subsequent visits. Some days I just didn't want to deal with it, didn't want to live it or go through the anger and fear. Sometimes I just cried and cried for the person inside he had killed, the me I would never be again. Sometimes I burst into tears in the middle of a store. What right did he have! I could scream and scream and beat him in my mind, bite chunks out of him and how I wanted to- I wrote often in a journal, and kept a pad of paper with me at all times never knowing when the need to write it out might strike. Still I had scraps of paper stuffed in books, notes made of brown shopping bags, receipts taped together end to end.
I dreamt of him sometimes and woke up panicked. Other days I would spend all morning puzzling over my inexplicable anxiety to remember by noon him haunting my dreams the night before.
It was embarrassing and frightening telling my parents. They still don't know the details. My dad was furious and wanted to go to Pennsylvania with a gun. My mom is certain I brought it on myself by living there and she didn't feel it was appropriate to tell the rest of our family.
These days I think of telling them but wonder if my own relief is worth what pain or discomfort I might cause.
I don't know what it is like for anyone else. For me it's been hard. It isn't over but every time I face it down I heal a little. For me hearing the stories of others, reading the stories of others, was reassuring. Just to know there were others who had been there and healed, others who would understand.

All by myself (don't wanna be...)

So, when I was first single again, for the first time in seven years, I felt invigorated, invincible, inspired- now I feel single and dumpy. What happened?
I should be enjoying this time and making the most of it, not hoping it doesn't last forever. I can do almost anything I want right now- my goal posts are wide open and unmanned.

Howard "Bud" "Buddy" Joseph Tarleton
__________________________________________

On another topic altogether, yesterday- June 3, 2006- was the 17 year anniversary of my maternal grandfather's death. I was almost 15 when he died.
He was a salesman for Kimberly Clark after he got out of the army. He was a WWII veteran, but never, ever talked about the war.
He was my grandmother's second husband- she was a WWII widow the first time around. She and my grandfather met right here at the Jersey shore while she was vacationing here one summer and they moved here permanently in the late 60's, just several years before I was born and after 3 of their 4 children were married. I grew up less than five miles from my grandparents and saw them several times a week plus Sunday dinners and sleepovers on the sofa bed with the steel bar that broke our backs all night. My grandmother laughed about that bed for the rest of her life.
My grandfather was a fisherman and a golfer, too. He retired from KC in the late 70's and in the 80's he took a job at Spring Meadow golf course in Spring Lake.
He often fished at the Manasquan Inlet and had coffee almost every morning at the Freedman's Bakery in Manasquan. Almost everyone would say so about her grandfather, but he really was an extremely kind person. His was the kind of name you could mention if you wanted to find friends. Just by being Buddy's granddaughter I had an instant welcome.
My grandmother is buried with him now. Several days after her funeral I went to the site and laid down on top of the grave under the tree. Thirteen years elapsed between their deaths. It was comforting to be with the two of them together again.

A voice-for mature audiences only

In December of 1995 I was living naively in a rooming house in Columbia, PA. I was 21 and waitressing, eating free bread at work and canned soup from a hot pot for supper- actually, that was my food for the day. No sheets on my bed. A beach towel for a blanket. But I was gonna make it on my own. I was.
One night I sat on my bed at 11PM feeling oddly anxious and apprehensive but managed to fall asleep. Two and 1/2 hours later came yelling in the hall and pounding on my door. My first thought was to grab my keys and take off to my friend, Todd's, in Millersville, twenty minutes away. But the man in the hallway was after me. When he grabbed me and said, "Take off your clothes," I thought, I am going to be raped.
I broke away three times, finally making it out to my car (and losing my room key along the way). I sat in the driver's seat, my perpetrator somehow (I don't remember how he got there) in the passenger's seat, and the sounds of my sobbing astounded me; like a terrified animal. There were words- lots of threats on my life, and the landlord there by now, standing outside my door, laughing (yes, clearly laughing) at me.
What can I say? Yes, I went back inside. Where else could I go? My keys were missing in the dark parking lot. There was no where to run he couldn't catch me. And he would shoot me if I tried. Or so I was coming to believe. I don't think he even had a gun. But how could I risk being shot in the back at now 2AM in a silent, dark, impoverished neighborhood?
I next remember being back in the room, and eventually naked. Stopped shaking or I'll kill you! over and over.
It lasted near to three hours. Rape, sodomy- both ends, punches to the back of my head, one prolonged strangle hold. And he bit my cheeks. But left them intact. Why? He had plans to prostitute me. Can't ruin the packaging, I guess.
What did I think? My mind strayed away and let just my body stay. I thought of suicide. My main concern became keeping myself useful to him.
And I maintained this plan as he kidnapped me to Philadelphia. To prostitute me. Which thankfully never happened because I'd left the condoms at the rooming house. Oh, he didn't wear one. But he certainly didn't want to get anything from any customers I might have.
Staying useful. Playing sweet and dumb. Playing dumb got him talking to me like a friend.
Once we got to Philly he paraded me around a while, showed my tits to strangers- then took me to his aunt's somewhere deep in Philly, from where I never would have found my way out. He raped me once more and let me go to sleep.
I woke up several hours later to see an older woman smiling at me kindly while she braided a young girl's hair for school. She'll be dead in a year, she said as she looked at me. And I started to cry, and to pray harder than I ever have. To silently mouth Help Me. Help me.
Here is where I go foggy. I don't remember her leaving the room. I do remember HIM coming to my side and taking me to the kitchen to say his aunt had told him to let me go, I wasn't ready, and out of respect for his aunt, he would.
How wierd was it to be taken upstairs and snuggled into a bed made on the floor by my rapist, covered up, taken to breakfast later, even questioned about dating. I just kept playing my cards, being nice, promising never to tell, knowing that was my key home.
He told me he raped me because he saw a rich little white girl, and he really didn't like that. I think he was high when it happened and over the hours he realized I was a person.
I didn't take him to court- I only filed a report. I regret it now.
But when I got home the following afternoon I forgot how I'd always said I'd go straight to the hospital or police if I ever got raped. I forgot. I laid in bed dazed, and then I took a long, long, very hot shower. And the next day I went to work.
I stayed with a friend the rest of the week until the night she worked late and I decided I couldn't take it any more and drove home to my uncle's in NJ.
When I quit my job over the phone, saying I'd been raped, the manager didn't believe me.
For two years I was terrified of shifty looking black men (I am sorry)- I believed he did have mafia connections and had told his hitmen who would find me and kill me. He'd had my license plate number- I believed he could find me that way.
For two years, I didn't have a clue who I was. In one moment the girl I had been- well I don't know what happened to her. I remember her clear as day, but have never seen her again. I wasn't anyone. For two years an undecipherable personality hung on me- a personality I didn't recognize as me but knew must be me.
Every night I looked at the dark back yard, cars occasionally idling in front of the house- every night I was terrified.
It didn't occur to me once that night to bite him or to hit him- to hurt him back. These defenses are unnatural to me.
Now- now if anyone tried there is a rage in my so strong and deep I might kill before he got anywhere. With my teeth, with my fists, with every piece of me that will never, ever be raped or have my living in someone else's hands again. Somewhere in this once all sweet, all trusting person there is a ferocity of hate and revenge. No one is will ever hurt me like that again.

Smorgasbord

I peeked over a shoulder last week to read "Never make someone else your priority when they are making you their option." Maybe the time has come after all to stop reining in my own momentum- let myself go forward full throttle down a new path.
I have my own plans now. I want to finance a newer car- my old girl's eleven and she's stood strong through the 70k miles we've logged together but under my pedal leg she's telling me retirement or plastic surgery and a car-diologist are due. I am thinking retirement for her. Besides, financing a car would help improve my steadily improving credit- which would help me get approval for a mortgage next fall.
I would like to apply for adoption by 35, or in three years. I would like to adopt domestically and I would like a newborn, at least for the first child. I know there are needing children of all ages all over the world but this is the truth of what I want to experience at least once. International adoption is impractical for my life as it is now and will likely be in three years, and I've dreamed for decades of burping and bouncing and diaper changing, getting up all night long-rocking and snuggling and wiping up spit-up- teeny undershirts and tinier socks- pacifiers and sterilized bottles, crib sheets and teething rings- baths in the sink and food thrown at the dog. I love the sweet smell of Desitin and a warm munchkin falling asleep in the crook of my arm or snuggled into my shoulder.
I fell in love with babies at the age of three, and never fell out.

and she was...

Yesterday I got it.
During a mutual hug with the wife (wondeful, wonderful, kind, sweet, and beautiful- I am so happy for him and thankful to her) of an old friend, and older ex-boyfriend who has had double his share of trips around the block and hard knocks- I got why men like to hold us so much.
She was warm, and soft, and smelled so nice- gentle as new apple blossoms on your nose.
I wonder if it is anything like this to hug me.

Waking up from Harold

In a gentle place, his face in my neck, in my hair, warm breath, lips dusting and taking... falling inside his arms, so safe and loved, and home. I would have stayed in that dream all weekend. Instead I'll carry it with me all day and softly, happily long for the real thing.

A pig and a popsicle

I actually created a personality profile on the GenX personals web site! Only I haven't paid a red cent so I can't check any of my incoming 'flirts'. Or see if the person I flirted with has flirted back! I mostly did it out of curiousity. Like trying a new brand of popsicle.
(Now I want a popsicle.)
All I want right now is someone to play with outside! Go for a bike ride, take a hard walk, kyack with me. And TALK! Talking would be fun.
Sex? Hmm. I didn't really like it until my early twenties. Around the same time I finally learned a guy could fool around with me without it meaning anything emotionally to him. I thought that's what it was about!
Now that I've had two serious loves, and lots of emotional sex, part of me wants none! (this little piggy cried wee-wee-wee all the way home, and this little piggy had none).
Even though I had an illicit dream about a certain ex last night and felt everything.

Good News

I have relocated the source of gluteal globularity! sometimes one has to make up a word of one's own.
Bicycling! Oh there is hope for a quarter-bouncable, do-my-panties-proud butt in my future!

clearing the dust

When I get all wound up emotionally I'm almost manic spinning my legs like the roadrunner and kicking up so much -mental- dust that I don't even know what's going on inside me any more until my feet catch a hold and I can break free of the cloud.
Last night lying in bed on my back before sleep, before evening prayers, I felt the difference between Nate and I. I asked too much of him emotionally. He is a wonderful man. His heart is true and boundless. But he is very- direct. I don't need jewels or cars or cruises, but I am very needy with the mush. I drove him nuts being needy. He drove me nuts being stoic. And it wasn't all that bad on either of our parts. But it was enough. Just enough.
I am able to miss my home and my life with Nate in small bites now without intense discomfort. I miss the sunlight in the morning kitchen, my falling asleep spot in our bed with the kitties fighting over my legs, how his body felt and smelled crawling into mine and with each hug- smooth and warm and sweet. I remember holding the hands I see in his pictures, and wish I had one of his handsome, sexy, very masculine feet. (a picture, not a foot!)
As for Harold, I have finally eased my mind by speaking my heart to say that I need to speak my heart but am choosing to wait for a better time. And I now will myself to take a needed step away. Too much going on here- lot of intense old and new feelings. Plus the friendship rock strong somewhere in the center standing solid while all else whirls around.
The single people around me are hooking back up with the potential 'One' s left behind years ago. It gives me more hope that Harold and I could find our way back together.
I can't walk away from something so strong after so many years. But I am stepping away from something so simultaneously delicate before I step wrong and knock all the coagulating pieces into oblivion. Let it form and settle more then come see what was created.

Close your eyes then bite

I had just sunk my teeth into the meat when my cheek was bombarded by something soft and wet. That's a good cream doughnut.

I'm just wild about Harold

I had to sit on myself yesterday and wound up at the inlet at 10PM singing my little off-tune voice out behind closed (but unfortunately for the public not sound-proof) windows. I want to give Harold space and quiet and support and time because he is going through a very difficult relationship decision of his own.
Then there's this half new/ half revived part of me in sweet agony- queasy and lightheaded, scared and giddy, unable to sit still, wanting to plop on his door step to meet him with the morning sun and tell him, ala When Harry Met Sally New Year's Eve party style, that I want to spend the rest of my life with him. I am still in love with him, AND I am falling in love with him all over again.

unreliable sanity

I am no longer hysterical. I did not cry once yesterday. I even fell asleep without hopeless arms. And without Tylenol PM.
I would like to try Tae Kwon Do again. I'm rather flexible and it was fun, and challenging, learning to use my body in different ways. My initial experience, in Farmington, ME, was with students who were like family to each other. Maybe it is always that way; after all, you trust one another with the safety of your bodies. Go ahead, give it your best- I know you won't hurt me. And with support- you can do it, you're doing great, one more time-take my turn, here try this... .
I worked muscles in my legs I've worked no where else. Learning how to effectively punch, sensing my technique and strength improving, is empowering and invigorating.
Each time I did a take down I hoped to the heavens I was doing it correctly and wasn't hurting my partner. Every time I was thrown I couldn't help laughing a little- flying through the air felt so silly!
I'm 5 ft and 110 wet- my fiance was 6ft+, 270 and very strong- I loved it when he'd scoop me up, flip me around, toss me about at home. As long as I relaxed and trusted he'd never drop me, and he never even 'almost'- it was wonderously fun!

Wouldn't it be a kicker....

Wouldn't it be a kicker if that was normal cold feet for me because with the Tourette's my body physiologically and diagnostically handles stress ineffeciently;
and what if all the intensity of the homesickness was because I was engaged so far from my family, and would have dissipated after the wedding?

To steal, as I often do, from a song:
We can't go back again, there's no use giving in, cause we'll never know
What might've been.

And:
I wouldn't trade one memory, cause you mean too much to me,
Even though I lost you (girl),
I wouldn't have missed it for the world.

Nate.

Clusterf*%k. When I was 18 (long ago when my butt was firm and round) a new friend said this word and I had no idea what he was talking about. Now I know. Not only do I know what it means, I know how to make one.
In the weeks before leaving my fiance I was up and down and three times around why and why not, couldn't tell my head from my gut from my heart from my gravitationally pulled ass.
I left one morning while he slept because I was freaking out, I didn't want to put him through that any more, I didn't want to inconvenience 180 wedding guests if I decided to cancel after the invitations went out, and I knew if I waited until he woke up and was standing afore me I wouldn't want to leave.
Clue hammer(Jay's term) hitting head- foot kicking ass......
Maybe that was my heart- maybe that not being able to leave, that wanting to stay because I loved him, was my heart saying.........STAY!!!!!!!!
And after I left apparently I had a window of a few days in which he would have taken me back. Well, I didn't know that and I was too numb and shocked myself the first two weeks to know much of anything. It took me weeks to settle down, get my priorities straightened out, figure out that I wish I hadn't left. But it's too late.
He doesn't trust me anymore, and my chances to earn that trust back are gone. Done.
And now I can't believe how all that tenderness, love, joy has gone from I love you honey, how was your day, let me rub your feet, fix you dinner, go out and buy you pencils and a sharpener for your math class (typical sweet and thoughtful Nate) to ........ I forgot my toaster. The End.
This sucks.
Nate, I love you. I miss you. I miss putting on your music just right when you were sleeping unsoundly, rubbing your shoulder when you were stirring in a bad dream, feeling you smell my hair, watching you come home down the driveway in the morning, snuggling on your chest, feeling your body spooning me, sitting on your lap at your parents', riding places in the car with you, saying I love you before you left for work, hearing your stories, sitting at your feet watching movies while you played with my hair, hearing your I love you at the end of a phone call, fixing dinner for you, being there to wish you well on a karate tournament or test and congratulating you at the end, the smell of your pillow, sheets that were ours, playing with you at Irving's, taking walks, tennis courts, Yahtzee, our Tae Kwon Do days before I stopped going, the mornings of Cardio together and getting breakfast after class- the thousand and sixteen special things you did for me and you unconditional love and support.
I miss you and I love you and I am so, so, so sorry. I wish you could know all this and believe. I wish I could go back with what I see now and get us premarital counseling or at least go talk to Father myself. I wish I could get us back.

Fudgesicles make me feel better

Especially six in a row. (i rearranged the garbage in the can to cover up the sticks and wrappers and avoid the' You ate six fudgesicles!' confrontation. )
I hope there's chocolate on my face.
I ate some Oreo's before, too. Doublestuf. Man were the Oreo cravings kickin last night- must've seen a TV plug-
fed some to the dog; he hasn't barfed yet.

Puzzled

I'd gotten tired of seeing my neurosis in print- needed a break. I shouldn't have erased my reader's comments but did in my panic to erase the outbursts I didn't want to see onscreen any more- Afterwards, I owe you an apology for erasing your thoughts, too.
I can't imagine feeling stable again, though my subconscious, and my friends, say stability will return some day. I am caught off guard, but by different things all the time- which means each new thing that upsets me is handled and discarded; dealt with and I move on just a little.
I need to deal with myself, too - what to do with this person who left her fiance. Abruptly.
I remember our date at the movies, five days earlier- grinning with love watching his expressions, lying my leg across his, holding hands- flashing him on the way home, feeling great to put some silliness back in our relationship.
Dinner with his parents and grandparents the very night before- smiling at each other across the table after dinner, touching legs and hand-rubbing knees during. We spontaneously stopped for ice cream on the way back to our home, had sweet and good sex before he left for work.
We loved each other. We liked each other. And the next morning when he came home and got into bed and fell asleep- I had no idea in four hours I'd have an anxiety attack and leave.
I miss our dates- Just five days earlier, we sat at the movies- Us.
I don't get it. What must he think? (comments welcome!)

Finally

It starts inside a church- people sitting down in the pews- and being ejected out of them. A homosexual couple, a non-caucasion person, someone with facial piercings, a woman possibly homeless and apparently unwashed judging by the crawling away reaction of the man she sits beside.
Then;
God doesn't reject. Neither do we.(www.ucc.org)
Exactly.
I've never understood devotedly church going, prayerful people faithful to a God who loves all, who teaches us to walk in his image and not to judge;
who turn around and point others out of the Church and away from God because apparently God has given them the right to do His picking and choosing of whom He will love and accept.
(Author's intent to pass along, not plagiarize.)

what to do with it

I have been standing strong for two days on those words, the words that crumpled me, words of finality and untold feelings- I have nothing to say to you.
Doesn't that reinforce how hard it was for us to communicate? I ask myself. I left him three months before our wedding, and he has no comment. He loved me deeply, but he keeps so much inside- especially the problems.
Tonight I picked up the necklace he made for just me, his second attempt at crocheting during a quiet spell on his night-shift job ( the first attempt gave me a bracelet). I examine every weave, picture his fingers making them, and want deeply to call and hear his voice. I love the $200 earrings- both pairs- and $300 matching pendant he gave me, and I appreciate them; but I am in love with the bracelet and the necklace. His hands. Made them. For me.
I linger a while, on the tide line of remorse.
Then tell myself, Enough. I think.
When does enough become Too Much? What if it is Too Little?
Look ahead, I say. To what?
To your life! your whole life.
but it is spinning around my head in pieces.

Pitter patter of water buffalo

Light on cat feet? HA!- obviously not referring to an 11 lb Maine Coon persuing a 7 lb tabby through the living room, a sound more appropriately labeled as 'thunder'. Or that same Coon cat leaping four feet from the dresser onto my bed at 5AM- jack rabbit from the sky. THUMP!
Although seeming average size, Sylvia is indeed a petite feline- most notable seen parallel to Annie; it's like a watermelon and a zucchini. Sylvia pounced Annie frequently up until the first time Annie realized she could pounce back- I think I heard Sylvia curse.
(no one ever gets hurt, not even me...! they swat with nails in and the three times I've heard a cry like discomfort I've stormed in yelling quite effectively.)

dummies for romance

'...being real or just putting up a facade...'
A thought to shake me out of my fairy tale, a thought I've been shunning.
I like a good story, so I certainly like living one. And it is so nice to have someone (at least claim to) want and need my affections.
I was incredibly spoiled by Harold and it's often difficult to remember why I left- Fiance and I didn't sit up and talk, we didn't look into each other's eyes or ever mention being crazy about each other; we didn't kiss in public, or kiss much at all the last two years. Reminiscing was called 'silly'; no slow dancing; no meaningful songs, no letters or notes to me- twice a response to mine when begged for. No I miss you's. I love you's were down to the ends of phone calls, and before he left for work if I said it first. I'm sure there was something he liked about ME but he was never able to think of one, nor could he ever say why he thought we should be married.
He poured wine in my fish bowl, said not-nice things about my mom, made up stories to string me along about why we weren't getting engaged, cracked jokes when I was upset and needed someone to listen, made me cry three times in our first month of dating.
And I almost married him ... gullible, foolish, stubborn- I am not wise at directing my heart.
If I were any good at relationships I would not have lost Harold. Maybe I should finally put on the shawl, pick up the yarn ball, and start knitting sweaters for my cats.

Soon

Is it okay to have happiness in my life so soon?
I do- I have happy. I have someone giving me lots of happy.

Ain't No Mountain High Enough

Do you ever feel like a song is playing just for you? I've come across Ain't No Mountain High Enough, or its come across me, maybe fifteen times since I hit the road home-bound from Maine. Diana Ross', Michael McDonald's- How do they know?
I know somewhere is a quote about knowing who your friends are when adversity hits- who will stick by and keep you from falling through the bottom.
The support I have is- absolute. Phone calls, words of encouragement, invites to visit, to live until I get it all back together. Quiet when I need it. Kudos for being strong and doing the difficult thing.
I hope Nate is getting all this support. It is certain his family, friends and coworkers have rallied around him and he does not doubt himself the way I can. Hopefully he will eventually decide I am gone and forget me except for those passing breezes of light memory.
He still wanted to marry me after all the doubts I expressed through our engagement- doubts often met with silence, sometimes with anger. Certainly that wasn't happiness for him. He'd use humor to say he hoped I'd show up at the altar. It can seem insurmountable to deliver a big hurt, but hurting someone over and over, like hundreds of hits just hard enough to bruise, can warp your essence and purpose.

One night I had an anxiety attack that lasted two hours- my hands and lower legs eventually went numb and it felt like I was going to pass out. So I had my doubts about the marriage.
But one day we had our regular grand old time together- dinner with his family, stopping for ice cream on the way, hitting the sack before he left for work; and 14 hours later I was on the road bound for New Jersey with only the essentials - which definitely includes my two cats.
From engaged and living together, to strangers. I expect it to feel odd. It does.
I miss sitting between his legs on the floor while we watched movies and he rubbed my hair. He found a way to quiet my Tourettes and he'd pause his sleep to rub my lower belly until I relaxed. No one else ever found a way to do that.
I miss the little things... isn't that what happens always?
In pop rock style Peter Cetera landed it- "Leaving your memory behind me, hoping that nothing reminds me, praying that I can forget." Okay, not healthy, but sometimes it helps me look ahead when I can't seem to stop craning my neck to stare behind.
Won't I ever get this relationship thing right?
I say I am no good for men, I should spare them from me. But I don't.
When I was 21 and visiting my cousin she took me on a baby sitting job with her. The mother was a woman whose husband was unable to handle the responsibility of two young children, and he split. That isn't the good part.
The good part, the part I've been chasing, is the relationship they had before he left. They were best friends, buddie, comrades. They were deeply in love pals.
The photographs were evidence to the tale. That's what I have been after.
And I think it might have found me.

My cats are nuts- and yours?

Does anyone else's cats have spasms? I mean sudden millisecond entire body flings into the air from a standard sitting or walking position- and then everything is fine again.
How about the I-just-pooped full throttle laps? Do they feel that much lighter and freer, or are they running from the hideous smell?
I used to laugh hearing my neighbor yell at her cat- I felt like part of a club.
"Get down!" she'd boom. I was pretty sure it wasn't her husband up on the counter.

The Apartment and the Procrastinator

Me- Hey, did you know the oven is grey inside?
Apt-Did you finally clean that thing?
Me- I've been wanting brownies. I almost tried cooking them in the microwave.
Apt-I remember the black smoke last time you turned the oven on.
Me- Yeah, I guess two years of turkey grease and overflowed casseroles aren't good.
Apt-I'm amazed you haven't lit me on fire yet.
Me- Whaddaya mean?
Apt- Smoking ovens, Christmas trees up until March... .
Me- I liked the lights!
Apt- That's a good thing- I think the strands were holding the branches on.

Two year itch

I hate packing- long gone are the days I could relocate all my belongings in two car loads. I hate floundering in strangers' mystery dirt, fighting the heebie jeebies with elbow long rubber gloves, hip boots if I had 'em, an illicit love for my Dirt Devil rug shampooer (please don't tell the mop-we're most touch and go.)
I love our back/den/family room (in a walk through with piece meal furniture, how articulate can ya be? have you seen the living/dining/computer/library room?) Unable to find a square enough carpet stray at Home Depot I jimmy-rugged for two vertical country-blue and one horizontal (the front 1/4)aqua- with pressed board pine color TV stand, white book shelves, cherry end tables, black metal futon with blue sheet, raspberry armchair massacred by the cats, and cream walls- but I've played off the blue and bright and it incredibly works. There's a photo of a sunrise over the carribean in Cancun, our last full day there- off to the left the rays are gold caught in the clouds and a sailing boat anchored down. Sometimes I accidentally take a great photograph. I blame it on the camera.
Plus my walking routes. Best times to walk- sunrise and after supper. Summer mornings while the dew is still droplets and I can smell the roses I pass, stop 1 mile from home for something to drink and read on the last leg.
So this stuff is great but it's been two years and I'm ready to go- redecorate, make new walks, gain different views, chance more windows, better daylight, bigger closets, a change of sleeping and waking sounds, try gardening another soil and suncover.
The Big N is careful with money- something about savings and having enough. I tend to answer others' concerns with I don't know how I'll do it - but I will . I'll be fine. So in the argument of We can't afford that! Sure we can- it'll be fine! he tends to win. And I tend to sulk.

Wonder Lost

I have never tried typing with one edge of my butt barely on the chair but my kitten is kindly sharing her nap spot so I will try!
Oh, it's been a long five days of wondering if I go through with this wedding.
See, one of the most fabulous words I've ever heard is 'wanderlust'. I get shivers of thrill when upon sighting a U-Haul. My dream auto is a mobile home. I dread packing but love to move somewhere new. Stagnation is my biggest discomfort and fear. I want to live in different states, work different jobs. Is that ADD or being unfocused, noncommital?
Or is it wanting to sense what I can because, as far as I know, I'm goin' around in this life just once.
But I love my fiance. And what's more impressive, he loves me. Unconditionally. (I ask what god he pissed off in a former life to get this gig.) He is willig to move, some. I will still travel and travel alone is good for the spirit.
The wedding is in 15 weeks. Last week the bridesmaids finished dress needs and the order went out and I dropped off my wedding gown for alterations. Then I had an anxiety attack. Just a little one. I think this was me going over the premarital cliff.
I've had major support lines - thank you Mom, Jason, Kelly, and Jen-and am slowly calming down.
15 weeks - Holy cows!!!

Talented Kitty

My fiance asked, did Annie do that?
Yes, I said. While I was sleeping she dragged this giant purple towel from the laundry basket, draped it over the chair, and made herself a tent. (She made a lot of noise hammering in the pegs, said my friend.) Wasn't I surprised when I got up and saw it!
He just smiled wryly.

I'll have the C cup with fries

My stepfather once told my mom how nice it would be to go to the Bar and Griddle Factory for lunch.
Maybe-
except it's the Bra and Girdle Factory.
Stuff get so much funnier misread!

http://www.sleeplittlekitty.com

2:30AM. Me and a bowl of broccoli and bags of wrinkles under my eyes. Fiance snoring in the bedroom. At least he was when I gave up on sleep two hours ago.
http://www.mum.org/catrules.htm This was cute! If you think kitties are adorable and amusing when being persnickety.
My little grey tabby, Sylvia, and I met six years ago. She was a kitty who'd grown up on the streets of Asbury Park and was picked up by a family run pet shop in Sea Girt. The day I met her was her third day off the streets. Her spay stitches were still fresh. Hers was the second cage I looked into- she let me snuggle her , I fell for her face, and two days later she came home.
It's difficult, literally, to remember our first months together.
The Sylvia I know now is the kittie who spent a week lying on the bed and staring at the floor the first time I went on vacation and left her (at home with my live-in boyfriend whom she knew well.) This is the kitty who leaves my side just long enough to nibble, drink, and litterbox any time I am sad, or sick, even if the sick lasts for days. The kitty who climbs on me for snuggles, keeping all her nails tucked in, even if she has to teeter on the side of my leg.
But in the beginning she would have none of snuggling. She'd climb up my leg for her food. If I got down to play with her she'd swat at my face claws extended. All this was okay.
I assumed she had never lived in a house with a human and that my getting down to play was to her an attack. If she hit my face I backed off and we tried again later. In baby steps we learned each other.

Oops!

I changed a phrase in my first post from rotting muscles to rotting mussels-a little difference there!

The Graceless Me

I've been around people with a grace so honest and smooth it's brought tears to my eyes. Me? I'm the type to knock your sandwich on the floor and step on it when what I wanted was to help. The girl who calls out the answer to the other team in Charades. One of my two historical moments among my friends was asking So how's Katie? to the man just dumped by his girlfriend of three years. Eliza Doolittle at high tea with the Queen? Yes, those anti-social skills would be mine! I'm quite familiar with the silence that follows a guffaw; I've caused many.
Harold once gave me his dog doo analogy. You step in dog doo and lift your foot to scrape it off, but stumble and put your other foot in it then step in it again with the first foot while trying to clean the second, and so on. I remind myself of this story when I have made a mistake and the harder I try to fix it, the worse and worse it gets.
Have you ever had a day you're so tongue tied or clumsy it becomes fun because of the crazy situations and phrases your befuddled mind creates?
How much more tantalizing are headlines when you read them incorrectly? The governer did what with four crayons and a sheep?


Do you know aside from the getting married part of my wedding day I am looking forward to the cake part the most? Actually, to the icing part. I hope the cake will be good but to me cake is a crap shoot. Sometimes the cake is really worth eating- but the icing is always good!
One more good thought for the day- Maybe it's a 2-for-one special.
I grew up and lived most of my first 28 years within 3 miles of the beach (dried seaweed and rotting mussels are two of my favorite scents). Other favorites of the beach? Watching this skinned peach globe of a sun skirt the edge of the ocean and rise upward lighting the boats and the sea in pinks and golds.
Feeling the urge and the fury of grey rushing waves in my wind burned sand stung flesh standing counting lightning bolts traveling swirling skies up the coast.