At least I'm still making an effort to write something.

There once was this blogger who used to WRITE give or take three times a week.. and then one day she just ran out of things to talk about. Completely flat. What the heck happened? She was probably too busy posing in front of mirrors. Probably. I'm not trying to show off my new jacket or anything.

Jumping off that cliff

So it turns out I actually had some sort of undiagnosed tuberculosis and then I lost my voice completely. Not so good for me, possibly good for everyone else.

--

I've been thinking a bit about whether I should talk about this- because possibly too early, too soon and probably I have a feelling I'm not going to portray myself too well in this post- so avert your eyes.

So there's this new person in my life, we'll call him ND and because I [am/was?] on a sabbatical, I was extremely reticent about going out with him.. well he doesn't know that. It really isn't you, it's me!

And so in hindsight, I started making excuses to myself and to my friends about why I shouldn't do this.

a) Firstly, he's not my ordinary type and when I say not my type- I don't know if you've noticed but since I quit with SB, my type has been precocious party boys. I figure if you lined up Coffee, R6 and DS against a wall and measured liver function, there would not be a working liver among them. I apparently like my men on pre-destined dialysis drips.

b) I let a random stranger press my buttons. Who listens to random strangers? Me.

c) He's too good for me. And when I say too good for me, I don't mean as in he's punching below his weight, I mean as in [following on from the whole type thing] he's a good guy. He doesn't drink much, he doesn't smoke, the guy doesn't even drink coffee. And me? Have you met me? If you flicked holy water on me, I might explode into a pile of ashes. Where can a relationship go with such uneven levels? an exorcism?

You know how I always mention that I have really good friends and they're good because truly they never sugar coat anything and they're not afraid to bitchslap the holy crap out of me when they know I'm being a fuck up. So here is what Ms Smith said to all of that [paraphrasing]:

"What are you saying?! You're not going to date him because he's good. You won't take a chance on him because he's not a party boy. You would rather date someone who just goes out and messes around all weekend and doesn't call you when they're supposed to than someone who doesn't. Isn't he good and kind and nice? How is the whole dating party boys thing working out for you anyway? "

"......Fantastically."

The thing is that you may think someone is good and kind and nice and then they may turn around and throw you under a bus anyway. I honestly think that I'm really not emotionally prepared enough to go for another round of relationship roadkill. But that whole conversation really made me stop and think about what the heck I'm doing. How I'm letting my commitmentphobia run the show, how I might be letting go of someone genuinely good because I don't want to dump my hand in the water and so what if this one throws me under too? What can possibly be the worst that can happen? I'll be here in three months time feeling mopey and stupid and blogging about it but I'll get over it. Eventually. I really suck at getting over things as we all know.

So we're dating. I really like him and we talk about obscure history and he really makes me laugh, so here's to closing my eyes and jumping off that cliff. I am ridiculously petrified.

It was only just a dream.

[Yeah yeah I just gave one of the least deserving artists in the world a shoutout.]

Errr.. I'm just going to talk about this dream that I had this morning, it really bothered me and I'm going to start navel gazing about it [but I'm going to cover the names again so that my friends don't start hammering me about my demented subconscious tomorrow if they get past the 2nd paragraph.] so feel free to tune out in 5, 4, 3, 2....

--

So I wake up in the dream [yeah I woke up in the dream- how fricking weird is that? It's a bit backwards] and I'm discombobulated, I'm in a bed in my aunty's house and ☼ is standing over at the end of the bed and he's smiling. I think he says "Wakey wakey."
I'm confused and I look at him, "What are you doing here?"
He laughs and says "Why wouldn't I be here, we're in a relationship!"
And now I'm completely baffled, "uhhhh.... we are?" (no-one's told me that! What the hell!)
He smiles again, "Sure." and then he crosses the room, leans over the bed and kisses me. On the mouth. It's one helluva kiss and when he finishes up.. ummm.. okay I'm convinced! That works for me!
But maybe I should get out of bed yeah? So I swing out of bed and my foot kicks this make-up palette, I pick it up and open it and it crumbles everywhere. I have make-up all over my hands and I've made a mess. I put the palette back on the floor and when I look up he's gone. I figure ☼ went off to another part of the house, I have no idea.

I would look for him but I'm distracted by noise coming from the window. I walk to the window and I can see that the house next door is having a party and ◙ is standing right in my view. I'm not sure if he can see me looking but the next thing I know, his girlfriend runs up to him in this ridiculously beautiful blue dress, wraps her arms around his neck and gives him a hug. And the dress. It's cornflower blue with ruffle straps, a fitted bodice and a flared skirt and she's not beautiful but the dress makes her beautiful if you know what I mean.

He leans down to kiss her and as he does, he opens his eyes and looks at me. He knew I was there the entire time and he still did it. The intent and malice of it takes my breath away and I'm upset, I'm hurt, I'm jealous and most absurdly of all I covet her dress.

I run out of the house barefoot [the make-up is still on my hands] and I make my way to the nearest comic book store where I hide behind the counter and try to bury myself in comic books.

--
You don't really need a psychoanalyst with a specialisation in ridiculously obvious metaphors to see where my head's at.

All downhill from here

She said on the phone, "I was thinking this morning- have we reached a pinnacle where we're so disillusioned that we're not even impressed with nice guys and goodness anymore."
I think she might be right.

I just wanted to show off my glasses. And the view. And talk about the song.

"And if you feel just like a tourist in the city you were born/
Then it's time to go/
And to find your destination/
There's so many different places to call home

Sometimes the best intentions are in need of redemption/
Would you agree?"
-You are a Tourist- Death Cab for Cutie

Seriously Ben Gibbard speaks to me in a way no other songwriter can. Loving this to death.

Take one feminist and stir. Stir damn well.

and so I had a huge fight with my parents this week and I was very much snuffly and upset when I answered the phone.

Fark, I know she has the best intentions and loves me very much but sometimes I look at her and wonder how we stay friends if we truly don't understand each other.

Me: *snuffle snuffle*
Her: I know you don't listen but listen to this. I think you're much happier when you're with someone.
Me: Say what now? I don't know if you're advocating what I think you're advocating.
Her: Just find someone and be happy
Me: ..............................................................................................

There. That. We're from different planets. Look I get where's she coming from. Having a partner would make life easier. I'd be doing less heavy lifting for one. Money would be free-er. And my parents would be less worried that they're going to leave me alone on the planet. But I chose to walk away from all that. I very methodically walked away from marriage and a walk-in closet (I still dream of walk-in closets) knowing that none of it was going to be easy and truly if you've been following this blog even somewhat, you'd know that breakup was and will always be one of the defining moments of my life.

And I guess as my friend or even as a damn random acquaintance, you'd know just how highly I prize my independence. I don't need a partner to be happy. If they come by and ake me happy then bonus! But I won't place my happiness on their shoulders. Some people are just not happy unless they are in a relationship and that's fine, she's clearly one of those people.

And we've come around full circle because truly I don't know why she said it when it really has nothing to do with the fight I had with my parents!

The Neighbourhood Bulletin

Amended (With photos!)
I swore I wasn't going to come on the internet tonight because I'm just a tiny bit feeling like I have tuberculosis, but do you see this?




That's an entirely full bulletin board full of passive-aggressive notes [from four different neighbours!] about dog poop. I am going to go take a better picture later on because I didn't want to hang around too long and have people think that I'm a dog-hater.

But as I was readng it in fascination, some [fairly okay looking!] guy poppped up behind me and said "Oh haha. Haven't you seen that?"
And I was "No! This is crazy! That's so funny! Don't mind me I'm just going to take a picture to document. (click) Are you new here? I haven't seen you around"
"I've been here for two years, my name is Alex."
"I'm Mush and I live upstairs. I've been here two years as well."
"The people in this building are always complaining! Last week it was something about books."
"Oh. Really. Odd."**
He turns to leave and says "It's nice to meet you Mush!" then he winks at me and gestures towards the board, "Don't get involved."

Okay well he's pretty nice and the neighbour that calls me Tiger is pretty nice, but the rest of them and I'll repeat for the record. Again. My neighbours are fucking crazy. I'm starting to think that the building is built on some sort of Indian burial ground, it's cursed and it's all going to drive us eventually all mad. I would not be that surprised.

**I wasn't complaining. I thought it was a valid question!

Life is absurd.

As I sit here thumping my head against the desk. Struggling, struggling, struggling. The pornstar next door is screaming and getting it on. It's really hard to be openly miserable and sorry for yourself when ten metres away you can hear her having this ridiculously long orgasm.