Saturday, January 24, 2004
fear of exercise
I'm just practicing a little avoidance before I plug in that nasty videotape. I'm on the last pack of cigarettes so maybe I'll go find a nifty little counter for the site so everyone can see just how much longer I'll be around to annoy everyone.I don't know about being a born adventurer, e, for me, the time had just come to leave. I've always had very mixed feelings about 'home'. I don't miss the people so much as I miss the places, everything there is packed full of memories in a way that Calgary isn't. It's a bit weird. My favorite thing to do on the odd occasion that I do go back, is to take someone with me so I can show them all the great 'secret' places that tourists don't know about. I like watching someone else discover the things that I have loved.
I think I'm over the initial whiny shock of talking to the guys again. I have missed them and I regret that I didn't keep in touch with them after I left. I wasted time. Time that I may not have had to waste.
The problem back then was that I never had a plan and I'd never learned to trust myself. I didn't believe I was worth anything good. Scott was a privileged child whose family's resources were such that he could have done anything he wanted, he was a calm steady center who had a well-considered reason for everything he did. From what the boys have told me, he went after what he wanted and got it. I was the exact opposite. Even if I had gotten it together back then, it never would have worked. I know that. And maybe it's not fair to either of us for me to wander back into their lives but it is something I need to do for myself and he'll have the choice to come along or not. A large part of me wants him to know that I finally figured out how to love myself, that I did find my center and that he was justified (that's a bad word for what I'm trying to say) in being the first and best person to love me. That the problem wasn't with him, it was with me and it wasn't that I didn't love him but that no one could have loved me enough to make me believe. I don't know if that makes much sense to anyone but me, but there you have it. I don't want him back, but I do want them all to be a part of my life again.
So, yeah, I'm done with being all dramatic and sentimental about it. And, in the last couple years, I can finally say. "I have a plan." That feels pretty good.
Of course, the plan for today is to do the pilates, maybe go for a sauna, do some laundrey and stay inside and watch the snow fall. Next weekend will be the big Superbowl party. The 20th one in a row that Dave has had (which blows me away) and I'm looking forward to seeing all the people I only usually see at his party.
Thursday, January 22, 2004
so...
Most notable quotes from 'the boys' the last 24 hours as I've re-contacted my childhood....I still see those cool people from high school. All the time. They're still working the till at the local 7-11."
(in a graduating class of 360)
"Yeah, the 10 year reunion...20 people showed. Cause, you know, that was the same night that the local Speedway had SEMI racing for the first time ever. There were 120 of our grads there."
This is my roots.
And to hear them talk about Scott. Cause they do, even if I don't. I'm not sure if it's because they don't like what he married, if they miss me or if they feel somehow that I'm supposed to pay for not being able to love him enough back then. I don't know. They're all so damn proud of him. As am I. He's somehow become the hero of their lives.
Thank god they don't know what I've been doing all these years.
I feel a bit like that Suicide Diary girl today. Bits of information but nothing substantive. I'm not completely sure I can write about Scott. I don't feel I can do him justice. I'm not sure I can explain what happened, what I felt, what I did and, all these years later, what I still feel. And maybe that's the problem. If you can't do justice, why do anything at all?
So, being one of the oh.....three...people that left the island, it's a bit fitting that this song has been on my computer all day.
Train
So your tired of wakin up on empty
You left for something that ain't real
So you think a couple of familiar faces
is gonna turn it all around
You wanna be where they still pump your gas for you
where they remember your name
They think that you are some beauty queen
or somethin better
where they remember your name
Ain't it good to think about the weather
Doesn't seem to be time for that no more
It's hard to hear when you're busy sayin what you want said
Well what you want said, it ain't clear
You wanna be where they still open doors for you
It's not hard for them to remember you at all
They light your cigarette and tell their friends
you used to love them
Where they remember your name
More forgiveness
More time away from feelin like you do today
More forgiveness
More time away from feelin this way
It's easy when you laugh, reminds you of you
It's easy when it's easy, it still ain't easy at all
So you're tired of wakin up on empty
You left for something that ain't right, ain't right
You wanna be where they still pump your gas for you,
where they remember your name
They think that you are some beauty queen
or somethin better
where they remember your name
More forgiveness
More time away from feelin like you do today
More forgiveness
More time away from feelin this way
luckycharm @ 4:31PM | 2004-01-23| when the time is right , you will write. maybe the right time will never come. maybe the words you need for that don't exist. that's okay too.
Jen @ 10:36PM | 2004-01-23| thanks lc, I don't think the words exist (I like that idea) but, now, I need to try. Even if it's a horrible attempt. You'll have to tell me if I've succeeded in explaining it/myself. That would help. If I can make someone else 'see' it, then that would be all I'd need.
Tuesday, January 20, 2004
bits and pieces
Lelu saved herself by bringing me cigarettes from Cuba. Such a nice girl. I've forgiven her for going somewhere warm. As I sit, surrounded by the bluey signature americany smelling smoke, I again ponder the usefulness of causing myself pain to quit. But...today is not a day to go into that, yet again...Shari has just called, with tickets to some comedy club, tomorrow evening. Hey, Wednesday's a typically dead TV night, so I am off to yet another new experience in the big bad city. Not that I haven't been to comedy nights back home, in fact it was one of our regular stops, but have yet to attend one since I've lived here.
I guess it's just my year to get back out there.
I put down the phone and realize there is dog hair everywhere which Shari and I both, to be honest, are quite used to. Regardless, I felt the need to vaccuum (why does that look wrong now matter how I spell it?). Coming out of the laundrey room from putting the nasty little machine back in it's berth, I spot Herself, apparantly upset that I'm 'screwing with her stuff'...I don't know if you can feel the suspicion coming off her but I sure could.
and, e...I think I've said the exact same thing at least once to everyone I've ever known, right on the spot there! Mostly during one of those times they've told me to "stop talking to strangers". They don't know what they're missing, do they? (putting it here cause I don't trust outside servers....)
I'd go further and say that many people find difference distasteful and would rather that everyone fitted their neat categories of pre-defined person types. I think that everyone has a story to tell, and an interesting one at that, and this it is our duty as human beings trying to connect with others, to get even those who have trouble communicating to tell you theirs in any way they are able.
This is of course why I'm frequently waylaid by total strangers wanting to tell me their stories. A casual remark, a small feeling of connection with a fellow human is all the encouragement many people need. And they want to tell you who they are; it's up to each of us to listen and prompt in a non-directive way. Many people feel they don't have time to find out about other people though I suppose. Having said all this, I am hardly what I would call sociable. It's all one big paradox.
A final note to PB (he of the spotty comments designed to frustrate my attempts at wit)- "One does not raise his own reputation by lowering others." "A wise man opens his eyes and shuts his mouth." et al. ad nauseum. and other literary terms I can't think of at the moment. There's a reason for all those little sayings, my boy, take it from someone who lived through the exact same situation as your children. I don't think I need to tell you who'll have their respect, in the end. Chin up, little camper, leading by example sometimes does prevail.
And with that, I bid you adieu.
PB Curtis @ 2:53PM | 2004-01-23| Thanks for the kind words. I am calmer, and more enthusiastic about my dismay and anger than I was. Poor old dysfunctional klinkfamily comments. Everyone is deserting them.
Monday, January 19, 2004
I'm so tired, I just lost that last post.
So, here I go again. Isn't that a Whitesnake song?I have two quotes that say what I was thinking better than I could in my exhausted boobie state. The origins of one I know and one, I don't (as usual).
Sometimes I wonder if everything is already known and each of us simply selects the facts that work for us. Is that why we all go through life so disconnected? Not only are our minds these singular islands, each separate from each other, but we're not necessarily operating in the same reality. There's a consensual no-man's-land that we pretty well agree on, but beyond those basic reference points that we're given as children, we're on our own.
We run into trouble communicating, not because we lack a common language, but because the facts I've selected don't usually fit with the ones you have. Lacking common ground, it's no wonder we find it so hard to communicate.
He meant that, when I spoke my name, he believed me, he understood who I was. There are no words to say how very much this pleased me. I think that almost every word we speak to anyone is a way of trying to explain to them who we are, and almost always we fail, and that is why I would rather not try. It is a great wonder to be able to speak a single word, your name, and be believed. There is only one of you in all the world, there has never been another, there never will be another, and once you know this, it is a hurtful thing to be taken as someone else or like someone else. You begin to try very hard to announce yourself to everyone, knowing in your heart that it is as foolish as proving the existence of the sun, or water, or pain, and as useless as trying to disprove any of them.
Theodore Sturgeon
I could tell you something I consider to be inconsequential to who or what I am and your spontaneous decision to make it important will color how you see me and treat me, forever.
I still believe it's worth trying.
And I believe that we have a duty as intelligent human beings, to each other and to ourselves, to recognize this flaw, give each other the benefit of open-mindedness and above all remember that we are each of us, the sum of our parts. Good and bad. To go a step further even - that my definitions of good and bad may not be the same as yours, which doesn't make them wrong, only a difference that I should explore and do my best to understand.
I do know that this place has helped to allow me to care less when I've failed and to pay more attention to what others say, in the hopes that I can help them succeed.
luckycharm @ 9:01PM | 2004-01-20| a beautiful, meaningful post.
ricochets and a guest blogger
In the last couple days, two things I have read have been banging around in my head.It's distracting. There's something in there trying to get out. And coupled with the measly 4 hours of sleep I got, I can barely concentrate on staying in an upright position at my desk. I want to be awake and at home, scribbling things down.
Thing #1 - it's time to stop living as though I'm dying. JadedJu. That has to be the single most 'truest' thing I have read over the last year. I mean, really, how many of us are doing that, when you think about it?
Thing #2 - If we are not what we communicate ourself as being to others, then what are we? No More Ozone. (no comments is making me nuts, btw, just so you know - it's that old cliche about not needing to do something until someone says you can't)
Anyways, I have something somehow to say, which I can't right now. More about thing #2 because thing #1 is so big it scares me. In fact, I've just realized I've been sitting here making fish in a tank noises - a combination of time spent on JJ site and a feeling vaguely like being trapped. "bloop" "bloop"
Moving right along to the guest blogger. Yet another friend 'out there' somewhere, blithely unaware that they've become a blogger rather than an email updater.
For a price...you can break any law in Thailand. Yes, the price is even posted on the sign ("No Smoking 4000 Baht". "No Marijuana 10,000 Baht". "No Jaywalking 2,000 Baht".)
We opened a cupboard door in the hotel room we're staying in, and the back of the cupboard is a window...into the adjacent room. There's nothing blocking our view from watching the people next door...freaky.
A subway tunnel was recently built throughout Bangkok, but it's not in operation. Why, you ask? Becasue someone forgot to order the trains....no joke. We've bartered for absolutely EVERYTHING
Our hotel room was 800 Baht, and so we said the majic word "Discount??" Without much trouble we got her down to 600 Baht. An hour later we saw the posted price as 350 Baht. Ah...you win some, you lose some I guess.
When you approach the bathroom the people working there take a look at you and assess how badly you have to pee. Girls hunched over in a convoluted position while jumping up and down pay 10 Bahts. Those who casually walk up pay 5 Baht.
Sunday, January 18, 2004
entranced again
I can honestly say I have never spent six hours so absolutely involved, without a moment's boredom or desire to move from my spot, in my entire life. Which, as I look back, is a bit pathetic, really. 'Angels in America' is over and I'm saddened.But cheered by a line such as this...
Of course he can't. He's one of those spectres stores employ for the sole purpose of haunting customers by drearily moaning "Can I help you?" while they rattle their acne.
...which is in here...before kitting up to take the dog out and then off to bed.
And reminds me of shopping on Boxing Day -
me: "Shari, help me find some pants."
Shari: "I don't know what you like, Jen. Surely there must be a salesperson who can help."
pause here for effect and look pointedly at three salespeople before again declaring, quite loudly. "I say, surely there must be a salesperson who can help."
A clone of aforementioned acne ridden juvenile slumps over to stare at something over my left shoulder.
me: "I need something low-rise, NOT stretchy, NOT flared and not freakishly 'processed'."
Employee stares at me blankly, ushers me to a small room, locks me in, goes back out to scrabble through the piles and proceeds to hand me seemingly endless variations of processed, stretchy flared jeans.
Honestly, I think Scotlands exporting them. It's a conspiracy. Some grand plan to drive us all insane. *twitch*
NO, get away! Back, I say! *twitch*
Can you imagine what I'd be like at this point without a cigarette?
new approach
Okay. I folded. Crumpled in a spectacular way. And right now sit with a fag hanging from the corner of my mouth and typing happily.In that scary way that the human mind can rationalize...well, anything...I've just decided on a new approach based on the following....
16 smoke free hours was a good start.
In the 23 years I've been a smoker, I never even entertained the thought of quitting until the last 2 years. And I've even made a couple of serious attempts.
Okay, maybe that has more to do with the big C, surgery and radiation than any other decision making process, but I don't think so. At least, I don't think I think so.
In the last couple years I've managed to get down from six packs a week to two or three.
I've never been particularly good at causing myself physical pain. Emotional pain, now that I've got down to a science.
And, really, it's not my fault that the bank didn't take out my mortgage payment on Thursday like it should have, thereby leaving money in my account. They should know better.
Besides, everyone knows that forced abstinence will never be as effective as truly wanting to quit.
Now, don't get me wrong. I'm still going to quit. I'm just taking more of a baby step approach than a cold turkey approach. Besides, all I've got is 25...er...24 cigarettes to last untill payday. And that's roughly 5 a day. I'll just pretend I'm in a prison camp and must ration.
Of course, I could just be completely full of shit.
