It's on my mind and in my palm

We were sitting in the coffeeshop and she asked me how I was doing.

I pushed my tea away and looked at her

Read my palm lady, you tell me.

Mystic Meg picked up my palm and tilted it the right way. Whats going on in your lovelife? Are you dating?

I shook my head.

Well who is that? There’s someone there. You’ve known him a long time and he’s going to be around for a long time. That line is deep and it’s unbroken. She shook her own head. You sure no-one’s around?

I’m sure.

Well if you’re not dating them now.. do you have a friend you’re not taking any notice of? Maybe it hasn’t happened yet, but this person is something like the one.

She peers at my palm some more. You also have lots and lots of extra men around. There’ll always be extra men coming from all directions, but they’re all short and nothing compared to this line. Most of these extras come from work. Watch for co-workers.

There was a time where there was two men in your life?

I nod.

She continues, That’s long gone. It’s completely broken. So don’t worry about that anymore.

She looks at me. This line isn’t SB? Are you talking to him?

Of course not, what crazy talk. That’s gone forever.

Well whoever this is supposed to be will come through soon.. God, you really liked everyone you dated hey?

I shrug. I’m soft like that.

She finished going through my career and then she settled to ask me what was going on. I gave her a condensed version [two sentences!] and I could feel her anger start to spike at dangerous levels.

She tapped the table “Men in Sydney are so fkn selfish, they’re all about themselves. Did you notice that? They say everything is 50/50 but they’ll spend more on alcohol than they will on you.”

I feebly protested “That’s not necessarily.. true… I uhhhh..” I never considered that actually. Was that true? Was it the opposite the other way around as well? I spend a helluva lot of money on my nights out as well.

And then the conversation took an eerie and familiar turn. I didn’t think that if I heard this speech again that I would hear it from her.

“Mush, you’re so naïve. You think that no-one is out to hurt you and that everything is going to be fine. But people are going to hurt you. You just haven’t been hurt bad enough yet, you have no idea what it’s out like there.”

I was going to protest that wasn't true but I couldn’t find my voice.

“The men out there? They’re fked. They’re gonna play the game so you better be prepared… and you know they’re going to make you feel bad about yourself but you shouldn’t feel any of it because you’re clear. Those cunts out there, they should be the ones with the guilty consciences. ”

The anger and despair was palpable. She wasn’t addressing me anymore, she had turned inward.

It started to rain outside.

“Protect yourself Mush. Don’t make the same mistakes twice. You’re going to be successful one day and this will all be nothing.”

--

I’ve been thinking about it since this afternoon [the fireworks just started outside] and you know what? I still believe in love and I still believe there’s someone out there for me. It’s just trial and error until I get there. For sure, I don’t doubt that I’ll be hurt a hundred more times before I find him but I think that person will have made all the hard times worth it in the end.
So maybe I’m an idiot [and I think Mystic Meg and Mexicana should form a ‘Mushisanidiot’ tag team] and once more I’m going to wander out into the world unprotected for something that might not possibly exist. But what can paeans like us do but try?

Things I'm loving 8999#

After more than five years of bartending and I don't know how many years of being professional in the workplace, my nails have by and large stayed neutral. But no more! no more I tell you! It's going to be one of a different colour whenever I can help it. God I can paint little Darth Vaders on them if I so feel like it. I'm a little dizzy with the power of it.

Things I'm loving 456#

If your head is not bobbing your head up and down by the time Quinn doo-wops down that aisle, your heart is made out of stone and you need to see a doctor straight away because you might actually be dead.

And now off to dance around to Bruno Mars some more!

Things I'm loving 3387#

"And now I see that the vision who kept me company in my loneliness was a hag compared to the beauty now before me."

"Enough about my beauty," Buttercup said. "Everybody always talks about how beautiful I am. I've got a mind, Westley. Talk about that."

Love Buttercup. Still loving the heck out of this book.

Postcard 35#

From someone else's tumblr. I confess that I twinged at it.

Sheets and epiphanies

So it's something like ten o clock on a Saturday night, and we're wandering around a suburban shopping centre looking for bedsheets [I'd like to interrupt here and point out that I'm highly aware that I used to be glamorous. Invites. Cocktails. High heels. Oh, how the mighty have fallen and insert sigh here.]

St Mary: [Frustrated] Why are all these sheets for single beds?
Mush: Because only single people shop at KMart for sheets.
St Mary: I'm not single.
Mush: Yes you are.
St Mary: ** ** ** ** ....Oh. I am.

That leap is a funny thing. It hits you over the nose at the strangest of times.

Laughing out loud

It feels so good to be laughing out loud again

1.

I'm not a Family Guy Fan but I think I woke my neighbours up last night as I fell off my bed. It's peanut butter jelly time! I think I've played it something like 28 times.. it never gets old. I want a banana suit. And maracas.

2.
So there's this guy, we'll call him Diadora because he's something like an unwanted shoe, and he's sweet on my friend St Mary, all week long he's been helping her move and whatever and I think that he thinks that this will help him to get her in good graces. Hmm.
Ordinarily if I see someone struggling like that, I'll help them out a little bit.. I'm the all-purpose wingwoman, but since I'm not fond of the guy I've kinda stepped back and let him muddle it out himself. And he's about as smooth as a dirt gravel road in the middle of another dirt gravel road. James Bond isn't taking tips. So we're all tired and they're standing there and I'm sitting in the passenger seat, when he tries to pull a move [..now? really?]- he tries to put his hand on her neck. In the dark. Out of nowhere. Of course, she doesn't know what he's doing and she shrieks like a madwoman. "WHAT ARE YOU DOING?"

An ordinary person would say "oh, just giving you a massage. I know you're stressed." or "Bug!" instead he answers ..
"I'm uhhhh.. just trying to choke you for making me move your stuff." Good save right? Auto-erotic asphyxiation! What every girl is looking for.
She just kind of looks at him, I can't really describe the look but we'll call it an-are-you-kidding-me? And I start to yelp with laughter, I know it's mean but I can't help it. The poor boy really has no idea.

3. No-one sends me penis jokes anymore. I really appreciate a good penis joke sometimes.
So I'm msging Matty's friend Seijai on my bb during breakfast and he's sending me random mms's for fun.
Seijai: This one's for Matty [poses like a Japanese schoolgirl]
Mush: He asks why you think he wants to see that.
Seijai: Was gonna unzip my pants but its quite warm 2day .. my fone camera doesn't have panoramic
Mush: HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA.. *breathes. AHAHAHAHAHAHAA

Matty is looking at me in alarm and then turns suspicious
Matty: What is he saying?
Mush: [smiling] nothing. Absolutely nothing at all.

Romance is not quite dead but I'm trying.

Ever so slightly something something on Louisiana Lemonade [I think I knocked a drink over with my handbag. Good sign.] I walked past my park thinking that the skyline was unusually pretty tonight. And then I noticed a couple who at first I thought was making out but were just standing ever so close together. He was getting ready to put a ring on her finger.

He was moving it ever so closer to her finger and then he saw me walk past and give him a weary eyebrow.. I might have rolled my eyes back into my head. [Bah humbug, people are going to look if you pick such a public place yeah? Why look at me for anyway? Concentrate on your Mrs.] and he pulled it away.

When I had gotten to sufficiently further enough where I wasn’t in viewing distance anymore, I heard him say ”Will you marry me?” and then she cried “yes!”

I didn’t intentionally try to put a damper on their special moment but forever I think that guy will remember me as ‘That girl in the red shirt who gave me a weary eyebrow before I proposed and so I kind of had to wait for her to walk off so I could really do it.’ Oh, that girl.

I don’t think romance is dead, but I will bat it like a mosquito into space if I see it in front of me. Just for the next few months. Be warned.

The last time I talk about this so I'm not dwelling

I figure this is the last time I talk about this. It’s finally resolved.

She once asked me “So what do you guys do when you go out?” and I said “We throw in as many things as we can in one possible day. On an average day, we will drive to point B, head back to T, stop at LC, go to P, there’s nearly always a macaroon run .. and that’s like in the space of 4 or so hours. “ I thought about it for a bit, “It’s as if we’re dying and we need to stuff everything in.”

She started to laugh. “Holy shit lady.”

Maybe in the back of our minds, there was an unspoken expiry date. I guess some things are supposed to be bright, short sparks of light. And I really have so amazing memories, just thinking about it makes me stop and smile a bit, that maybe it was good that it ended where it ended so they can’t be dulled by other things.

I saw him for the last time last night, I had a helluva hard time looking him in the eyes, but maybe if I had looked him in the eyes, I would be not be doing as well as I am this morning. A conscious decision to forsake ache. We started as friends and we finish as friends. And now it’s time to truly truly let go.

The other thing I noticed during the past five or so days, is the tremendous amount of support that I’m getting from everyone. Firstly, I never doubt that my friends are there but they have really come through and I’m just fkn astonished - from taking my 4am phone calls to round the clock messaging and just general check-ups, even from people I don’t know that well.. There’s never been a time over this past week when I’ve felt actually alone and like I couldn’t reach out to someone and that is.. I can’t really express my love and gratitude in words.

Secondly, the thing that’s getting to me and is really just making me weepy like a child is the kindness of strangers. I think I already mentioned the upgrade from the young guy at the rental place. When I walked downstairs to my car last night I bumped into my neighbour and he asked me how I was doing. I really have to stop with this whole transparent face thing. I replied “Could be better.” And I gave him the briefest of rundowns.

Pretty much without any hesitation at all, he said “Forward me your resume and I’ll pass it onto HR, we’re always looking for people.” He ruffled around in his bag and gave me his business card. “That email would make it easiest.” And I was stunned. I think I kind of stammered some thanks, if I didn’t start away at that very second I was going to flood inner coastal NSW with tears. As I walked off he called out “chin up, tiger.” Like he was Mary Jane and I was Peter Parker [I could by dying of cholera and I’d still appreciate a good comic book reference. Sigh. Nerds.] And I couldn’t help it – I had to smile. The unbearable kindness of strangers.

Daisies

From Batesman Bay to Anna Bay and back into the middle. Another 300k epiphany run and I was entering fatigue. More than that my up-beat optimism from yesterday was starting to wear off, and reality was running interference. You know you can’t drive this car forever and ever, at some point you’ll have to get out and deal with this. Really deal with this. Come out of your castle in the clouds Princess, and see things the way they really are.

Alvmah mentioned that very same thing over dinner once. ‘Mush, you don’t run on the same tracks as other people.’ When he saw the look on my face, he added ‘It’s not necessarily a bad thing.’

Tired, frustrated and emotional, and with a million kms til I could get home and crawl into bed, I was bereft. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw a flash of yellow and suddenly the Pacific Highway opened up and both sides of the highway were covered in yellow daisies, just big bursts of daisies in stretches. I have never seen anything like it.

A month ago, I was staring out the window into the sunshine and I was dreaming about walking out of work for the day and just taking ourselves and a book and driving to a field of daisies. I mentioned this to him and lamented the lack of daisy fields in greater Australia. We both made futile searches to find one but it was never really mentioned again. I kind of just filed it away as something of a pipe dream.

So when I saw what was going on outside my window [stretches and stretches!] I didn’t really know what to say. SPIRITUAL HIGHER ENTITY, I DON'T GET IT?? Am I supposed to take this as a sign??
I pulled over for a little bit and took it in [but obviously I couldn’t pull over for long because vehicles were whizzing by perilously close to the hired moo cow that I was driving]. It was pretty. But maybe not something you'd like to lay down in.

So I kept on driving, a bit more optimistic than before and I zipped past.. an actual field of daisies. Like a field field. I couldn’t stop because I was in the overtaking lane and people were behind me. There wasn’t going to be a U-turn point for something around 64kms. There was just no way.

I’m just going to take the entire thing as some sort of cosmic joke, well you really are not at work, you didn’t drive to but you did drive past a field of daisies, there’s a book in your bag? It’s like the Higher-ups completely misheard me. I guess I'm glad I kind of found it, actually I don't really know. I don't really know what to think.

400kms and 6 hours

So pretty right? No photoshop involved and done on my dingus camera.

He once said to me: If you don’t want to date someone, you’ll always find a reason not to date them.

I guess so hey?

So if I wasn’t going to take a one way to Hong Kong, I was going to drive off into the ether for a bit.. and I was ffs not going to tell anybody because anytime I even vaguely mentioned it, I had my head bitten off. I think people had vague notions of a) me ending up in a Wolf Creek type situation with my head on a pike or b) losing my way and driving into a canyon.. even though I’m pretty sure there are no canyons within a 600km radius.

I really really needed to clear my head and there was no way I was going to do it bouncing off the walls of my studio, so off I went to the car rental place. [I felt so disloyal to my Civic but there was no way I was going to take it into the desert or wherever I was going for a little soul searching.]

The guy behind the counter looked at me and said ‘Big day huh?’ and I drily replied ‘I have no job and my boyfriend dumped me so just driving.. away.. from here.’
He just looked at me a little more without saying anything and I wondered if maybe he had probably heard every sob story in the book already. I mean come on, it was a car rental place in the suburbs.. every 2^nd person coming through there had probably been in a pile-up, a smash-on, or was attempting a Thelma and Louise. It was not a tourist spot.

I went to the car to fetch something, and when I came back, he said very gently “We’ve given you an upgrade.” I think if I wasn't giving him big wet eyes before, I was giving him big wet eyes after.

They had replaced the sedan I ordered with a big mofo SUV, and as I gingerly climbed in there.. well let’s just say I climbed in there. I was really not used to being so high, I’m used to lowered cars and being close to the ground. I felt like I was going to squash people with it, I passed a Ferrari and I was something like three times its height. It was good and safe and totally turned me off [if the hippie in me wasn’t already turned off] ever buying an SUV. The side mirrors were bigger than my head.

So for the first few hours I just spaced out and just drove, and it really is therapeutic. You just kind of hit a blank and go on auto-pilot. I once told R6 that and he freaked out ‘Isn’t that equivalent to micro sleeping??! I really don’t like you doing that.’ I guess it’s a good thing that I didn’t tell him that when I do it, I can’t remember it afterwards either. I probably squashed a few people in my time.

And you know after a while, your head comes back to earth and you start noticing things and figuring things out.

The world is ridiculously big and pretty, and you can drive and drive and never be able to traverse all of it. So in no way, are you the centre of it and anytime you feel your problems are too big, you should go out and take a look at it- because you are one miniscule lollipop. Everything will work itself out eventually and even if it doesn’t.. we all turn to dust and ash at some point, so maybe you shouldn’t spend so much time worrying. That’s obviously much easier to do and say in a moving car than in a workplace, but it’s true.

Yesterday I messaged him for his reasons for the split and he gave them to me. [Messaging! I will never reach adulthood at this rate.] And when I saw them I was fit to be tied. There was much swearing and cursing and rock-throwing.
Yesterday, I thought they were unfair and invalid and I was going to tell him which way to go .. [left.]. Today, I still think that those reasons are unfair and invalid but I’m just … what’s the point really? I can probably call him up and argue those points til I’m blue in the face, but what is that going to achieve? Absolutely nothing. This relationship will still be an extra-special car crash no matter what I say because I think the world is round and he thinks it’s flat. So.
And you can’t make someone date you who doesn’t want to date you, he’s right, you’ll always find reasons not to do it. And I guess to make it work, you need two people who want it to work and not one. So maybe I’m not so much hurt anymore, I still grieve but that can’t last forever.
Some of the shock has worn off and I guess I can think about it more logically.

The moon in the country is big and full and yellow, and it’s just something amazing to see. When you drive back into Sydney, the moon for some reason or another becomes very small and very white.

400km, 6 hours and lots and lots of [much-needed]perspective. And I still have the SUV for two more days, but I figure I don’t need it anymore. And I think I have my equilibrium back.. I think it's back.