My girl parts smell ripe right now. Not in a bad way, I just smell like sex.
He would have liked that, or he said he would have. He said a lot of things.

I don’t stink because of anything fun. Just some coconut oil and toys.
Add a low grade depression that had me skip my shower yesterday and a low pressure system that dictated a few layers of clothes.

We haven’t seen the sun in days. Couldn’t tell you how many. 5 at least.

There was a thick blanket of fog that settled in over the weekend, but the winds came yesterday taking away the unseasonable warmth and the low lying clouds. That sense of security that I find in heavy mist went with it.

I do so love the fog. When I lived in the cabin in the woods it was easy to feel like I was the only girl in the world.

I was never the only girl in the world, and I most certainly wasn’t his.

I mentioned last week that someone had come to me seeking answers and comfort, and as the betrayed we started piecing together facts and timelines, words and selfies, patchwork held together with the common thread of lies and more lies.

This has got to be the ugliest quilt ever.

I finally admitted, drunkenly on Saturday night, that I am indeed a little depressed. Had a good whiskey cry on the porch at 3am. Had I been sober it might have been cathartic. I just woke up late on Sunday with my eyes swollen and sore.

It’s just a slight sadness, I have had worse. This is akin to a low grade fever that simply adds a small amount of pain to any movement and sucks ones energy and makes mundane tasks seem like mountains.

My son asked me what I wanted to do yesterday afternoon I replied ‘sleep till spring and win the lottery’.

I am exhausted. No drama, no exaggerations, I just can’t seem to get enough sleep.

I get through the days doing the bare minimum.

I should probably head to a tanning bed, get some artificial sunlight. I remember him saying I couldn’t shower for 24 hours after or the vitamin D wouldn’t sink in. I blindly believed him.

I blindly believed him about everything.

The only glasses I own are rose-coloured it seems and I see the good in everyone, even monsters masquerading as men.

I back slid. I used to go months without thinking about him and now little things are triggers and they are adding low-grade nausea to the low-grade sads.

Masturbating is usually enough to put me in a good mood but yesterday there was no joy in Mudville. All I could think about was all the sex I am not having. All the ones that left me unceremoniously and the granddaddy of them all who turns out to be an overweight, alcoholic narcissistic catfish with a cyber-harem of pretty, intelligent, talented women that he takes turns breaking for his amusement.

It’s one thing to have an inkling, it is another to have concrete proof.

Habibi said, upon hearing I was wandering down this road “this isn’t your fight, stay out of it.”

I didn’t listen. And I am paying the price.

It didn’t feel like a fight. I thought knowing would be better somehow. But when you exhume a body you never really know what you are going to get. This must be what zombies smell like. Like dust and rot and putrescence.

I am trying to finish the book and all I can see is a balcony littered with cigarette butts. All I can hear is ‘if you love me you will show me your pussy.’

That’s a bad romance.

I am trying to pleasure myself and my mind goes back to phone sex we had or pictures I sent to essentially just a dirty old man. And my body just goes ‘ew, nope.’

I am disgusted by how much he gave them and how little he gave me. Not because I want or need material things but because of the loyalty and depravity I showed for literal crumbs, a phone call, a message or being allowed for a few days here and there to be added as a friend on Facebook.

Nothing about me has changed, I am still the same dumb girl I was in high school. Loving someone who wouldn’t love me back or if he did he wasn’t brave enough to show it.

The same stupid girl that stayed with a habitual cheater, with another and another and another.

And so it goes.

This time I threw pearls before a chain smoking, plagiarist, couch potato. And I am scrambling to find the silver lining.

Maybe there isn’t one. Maybe all I can do is throw my head back and laugh. Do that thing that everyone says I have to do before I can be loved and just love myself.

My only love sprung from my only hate.

I don’t hate him. I feel sorry for him actually.

I know what it is like to be so insecure that all I could do was lie and lie and lie some more. So sad about a life gone wrong that I couldn’t get off the couch. Hating myself so much that I spewed hate.

I launched myself back into the grieving process and I am stuck in depression. Soon with come anger.

If love be rough with you, be rough with love.

Or we could just skip that part and go straight to the acceptance.

I can’t change what happened.

I was a fool following a fool.

If he knew me at all he would have realized that my body responds to kindness. I get wet from intellect. At no point did it matter what he looked like, just how he treated me. Which was the ugliest thing of all.

I have to forgive myself for not knowing what I could not possibly have known.

(Italics = Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet)

Once upon a time…

I thought Lover Come Back by City and Color was a good way to start my day.

I’ve had worse ideas. Not by a lot, but definitely worse.

And down the rabbithole I went.

YouTube logic dictated some Lumineers, which was the direct exit to the magical land of Mumford and Sons.

4:40 into Lover’s Eyes, Marcus Mumford does this wail. This is the sound my heart makes. He does it in Little Lion Man too.

Soundtrack to my feelings.

Which is a slight bit better than the theremin noises I been hearing in my head all day. Logic seem to have taken herself a walk. We’re coping, sorta.

My sister met Sarah Harmer in an airport once. When she told me the story she said, ‘I gushed a bit, she writes the background music for my relationships and just makes me feel less alone you know?’

I knew then and I know now.

Oh Marcus…

I think I am going to have to fire you from your position as musical director of my life.

I will wait I will wait for you.

No.

No more.

I don’t wanna.

All I do is wait.
For them to come to their senses. To see me for what I am. To come back. To leave again.
Always waiting for the leftover footwear to succumb to gravity one more time.

I am Cinderella on an infinite loop, but I don’t bail at midnight, they do and I’m left naked and crying with one shoe in a mess of pumpkin guts.

Talking to my Fairy God Father…

Me: I’m grown but I’m dumb. I have a boy addiction.

DJ: That’s fine, just pick em better. You’re feelings are always dialed to 11 which is one of the things I most love about you

Me: I’m taking a break. He’s the last straw. I thought no way this kid can hurt me. He found a way.

I want to spin these straws of mine into gold and I don’t know how.

The rule coming back was NO BOYS.

Blew that the first night.

Truth is I never quit.

Wolfling messaged while I was away. I didn’t expect to ever hear from him ever again truth be told. More truth, I wasn’t overly surprised even though he has been gone a year now. I am never surprised anymore.
(What would really be shocking is if just one guy I liked showed up and stayed, that would be weird.)

And I answered him. Didn’t do anything about it but I texted the fuck back.

So it goes…

Wolves scratching at the door and I let them in. They feast on my heart and I feed it to them over and over.

Then somewhere up in the heaven’s some tricksy god yells “plot twist” and my heart hurts again.

I am the goose who lays the golden eggs and these ignorant fucks gut me and leave me for dead instead of just feeding me, taking care of me and letting me keep giving them the gold.

“He had access to my most bomb pussy my most warm bed my most amazing cooking my most talented mouth and he sold the key for 300 bucks.”

They all keep the keys and bail actually.

And I never lock the door anyways.

Few exceptions. Hit me, stalk me or steal from me…I will channel my inner Scorpio and ignore you so hard you will question your own existence.

Panda and I were discussing the graveyard of fuckboys I have built my house on.

“I don’t know how you do it. You must be exhausted.”

I truly am an exhausted princess in some fucked up fairy tale with no happy ending in sight.

I drink myself to sleep, eat poison apples like I am starving because I am.

And every time I try to take a nap some prince shows up, kisses me, wakes me up, fucks me for a few weeks and never texts back.

This has to be The End

Happily ever after pending.

I am having a little difficulty adjusting to home.

I had these grand plans, was gonna get up early, drink all the water make all the money. Renounce Satan aka boys

Ya, that didn’t last.

I have had 3 glasses of water in 2 days, I got drunk last night and slept till 11am this morning.

That scene from Kill Bill is replaying in my head…

O-Ren Ishii: You didn’t think it was gonna be that easy, did you?
The Bride: You know, for a second there, yeah, I kinda did.
O-Ren Ishii: Silly rabbit.
The Bride: Trix are…
O-Ren Ishii: …for kids.

O-Ren Ishii: Silly Caucasian girl likes to play with Samurai swords.

I did want to play with a sword. Cutting out the bad parts in my life like The Bride mowing down the Crazy 88’s.

She managed. I am still at the wiggle your big toe part of the journey. I am frustrated.

Knowing is half the battle apparently.
But I know a lot of things, some of them not so good and I am definitely at war.

Just with myself.

Panda wrote us a motivational board. First thing I saw when I walked in the door, and I already broke 2 of the resolutions. One within an hour.

I have pontificated at great length about how I coasted for 3 years on one vast leap of self-improvement.

I am bored of me saying it now.

Herein lies the problem.

I know, I know, I fucking know already.

But now what?

Well first things first I had to unpack and clean the house. Walk the dog and get my ass into work. Try not to drink and hustle my ass off.

I just talked to Panda and said “I am not Sephora level of financially comfortable yet. But we can go out for dinner. “ Money shit went sideways and like most people I know I am emulating Drake, or what he claimed to be doing which is ‘starting from the bottom’. Excited about the ‘now we here, now the whole team here’ part.

I just want to get there.

I know the journey is supposed to be a good thing unto itself, but it’s winter and it’s grey outside and I want to fly away.

But first I have to work work work work work.

I promised myself I would start looking after this body of mine and yet I just had a cigarette and have done zero squats.

I have never been a terribly patient person. I have avoided doing things because I want to be good at stuff I have never tried. Makes no sense, but for some weird reason I have a disconnect about the process. I look at girls who kill it on the pole and I want to be that way, but I forget that at some point in their lives they had no idea what it felt like to wrap their fingers around a tube of cold brass.

I didn’t make it to the gym yesterday. Woke up late and crampy, shoulda powered through but I didn’t.

I am postponing the inevitable inevitably.

I have got to stop.

I have never been to a gym before and I am intimidated. I know this. But a nice juicy peach butt is on the other side of my comfort zone.

I know it’s going to hurt but look at how many things I do on the daily that hurt me, mostly the boy thing.

I managed to do a couple things on my list and a few things that weren’t there but required immediate attention. Anyone else add those things to the original list just so they can get crossed off? I totally did that.

To be a little kind to myself, quitting boys is hard, they are my drug of choice and have been for 30 years.

It is shark week and body doesn’t always listen when that happens.

While we were away average bedtime was 11pm and up by 6 or 7, now I am rolling into work at 7pm so things are a little screwy.

I am alternately sipping water and coffee right now and the OPUS is open on my laptop at least.

Baby steps.

Rome wasn’t built in a day. Just because I have a late start doesn’t mean the whole day is lost. And the boys have been downgraded from boo to bootycalls. I am not going for sainthood here.

My friend Jeff has timers set for himself throughout the day. Labeled things like ‘drink water’, ‘eat’, ‘start writing’, ‘stop writing and get ready for work.’

I think it’s time to admit I need this.

I think it’s time to run.

Stay down

Won’t quit

True love

“What are popular knuckle tattoos Alex?”

No I am sorry, the correct answer is “what are that girl’s mantras” (points at me).

I stole the title of this entry from a Ubiquitous Synergy Seeker song. It’s called Hollow Point Sniper Hyperbole.

“Here’s the map to my oubliette”. USS

He knows exactly where I am. He left me here and I didn’t budge.

I had my freak outs and my epiphanies. And then epiphanies about my epiphanies. Clarity came and went like an eye exam. 1 or 2, 3 or 4. We got all the way to 17 and honestly, 1 was the best it ever got, it’s just blurry now, obscure. We dropped back to negative 220 and made it back to one before. We will see.

The things is, he’s a ghost. See-through, transparent, doesn’t really exist. So the seeing thing…hard to explain. I have to believe it to see it and all I have left is a word document folder full of porn and some archived messages I cannot let go of, oh and his words echoing in my ears.

Told you I was mid-purge. Cleaning out old snippets of articles I never finished.

This was written a year ago right around now.

He’d stopped by to say hello again and disappeared as quickly as he came.

Quelle surprise!

Finding out now that my earlier suspicions were true. I was 7 of 9

And he doesn’t exist.

I am out the other side now but I remember the angst of day one like it was yesterday. Day one came and went a few times and I kept letting him back in every time he scratched at the door, muddy boots and gory blood trails to be cleaned up at a later date.

Today I change the locks on a house he has never visited. (Frieda Khalo)

An acquaintance messaged me this morning, asked me to help a girl.

I cannot help but help.

There is no gloating here, no envy, no pride. Just a hand up.
“Welcome to the support group my name is Sarah and you are not alone.”

When the call came early this morning I was afraid of ripping the Band-Aid off the wound. Haven’t checked to see if it ever healed, just been avoiding it completely.

What to my wondering eyes should appear, but just some skin where before there was a gaping, festering wound.

I’ve been avoiding all of it. Promised myself the book would be done over and over but I couldn’t open it. Same fear of the gangrenous open gashes.

I am officially unafraid.

I finally did another thing I was so afraid of doing and opened old messages from him. Found 7000 usable words. My own.

Katherine Porter said “I finished the thing but I think I sprained my soul.” I empathized.

This new light that has been shed now leads me to believe that when I finish the thing I will free my soul.

So, this article gets written and then I write the book until it is done.

I’ve accepted my flaws so they cannot be used against me anymore.

The opposite of love is indifference.

I loved who he presented himself to be, but that man doesn’t exist.

I stayed true to myself and I have found peace.

I forgive myself for not knowing what I had yet to learn.

This is the final nail on the coffin and he will be buried with the rest.

I had a giant horse once. 16 hands high. Basically gargantuan. I fell off him.

He took me next to a manure pile and let me down softly into the shit, so it wasn’t that bad.

How hard we fall can be offset by where we land. A manure pile can feel like a feather bed under the right circumstances.

On that note…

Can I have your attention please?

Excuse me…over here. Just hang on while I climb down off my high horse, down off my soap box, now just a little lower

Lower

…

Lower

…

Even lower

…

There you go.

Down here in the crazy underground garage below rock bottom.

This was low even for me.

I say with great regularity “I’m not that girl anymore”. That’s the New Me talking, with great pride even.

Well, apparently I am not, until I am.

Not enough sugar in the world…

Here goes.

Forgive me father for I cheated, with a 19 year old.

Besides myself and 19, 5 people knew about this. And now all y’all know.

Sometimes I post things here and expect the intended audience of one to read what I wrote and they don’t.

And sometimes the last person I expect to see things stumbles into a mess I made ages ago.

I accept the consequences, I always do whether I want to or not.

Three things cannot be hidden long, the sun, the moon and the truth.

I did do the thing after all.

I have people I confess things to depending on what response I want.

Sunshine was involved. Others too.

I have done some fucked up shit in my day but usually with no witnesses. Not this time.

I then told The Hulk and Biker Body Pillow. Our Sara of Lords and finally Habibi.

Hulk said “Oh really? A 19 y/o who thinks an older tattooed stripper is hot…I could swing a cat and hit 19 more just like him.”

I told Sara I needed church, she knew what I meant.

Once upon a time I met a boy at work.

Gangsta looking little shit. Figured he’d be good for a drink and a fight.

Thought he was 26 or so and a coke dealer

It was seriously dead at work, my choice was made by smell. Everyone else looked stinky, he looked clean. So I sit and we chat a bit. And he is actually nice and smart and funny and not a coke dealer

And

19

I was drunk and gave him my number.

19 messages the next day asking how work is. I say ‘weird, roomie is here and it’s dead’. I tell him to pop by if he wants. So many shenanigans.

I am pulled a typical me (age 16-36) right now. It’s almost comical. Like New Me is watching Old Me and saying ‘so this is what we’re doing now?’ okay baby.’

Like I regressed in my sleep

Maybe I’m pulling back before launch? Still not enough sugar to coat this.

Roommate had the shittiest date ever, rolled into work and it was a shit show. 19 shows up and ends up consoling her. She invited him back home. We talk and spoon and sleep. Wake up looking and feeling like death, he leaves at 7am.

Thought that would be the end of that.

But he kept messaging, like he didn’t see me looking like warmed up shit in the morning or get harassed by my friends or any of that. Instead he asks if we are still on for Thursday. Fuck it, why not. I’ll feed him before I tell him I have a boyfriend. Padding for everyone.

I figured he’d leave, call me a name or two and that would be that.

Instead…

He said “I understand, you gotta do what’s best for you.”

What in the actual fuck?

The terrifying part? As he said it I realized, I have no idea what that is.

I cannot justify what I did and I’m not trying to. But I kinda feel like the gods sent me this random boy to remind me what good attention feels like.

I can see clearly now that I got comfortable in something that on many levels works for me, but something is still missing.

Even though ‘Old Me’ had made a sudden surprise appearance, ‘New Me’ knew better than to make rash decisions, especially when the moon is full, Mercury is heading into retrograde and I am bleeding.

I got confronted with a choice, fight… flight or freeze. I stood still.

I said what I needed to say.

Something had to give, I had to fall, either from grace or the lack thereof. I am grateful for my place to land.

Hot neighbor came by late one night. I had been waiting on the porch to see if I could catch him after work. I saw him disappear into the house across the alley, waited a bit longer and he came out and called up looking for Visine. He had a mote in his eye. Poor darling.

Washed it out with colloidal silver for him.

It’s only fair, he had been tending to my wounds for over a month back then.

I fix everyone and he was the one who fixed me.

Rubbed his back, fed him and proceeded to fuck the shit out of each other.

It’d been a long time coming.

We spoke of DMT, we spoke of lots of things, but that was really important.

I think it’s time for me.

I want to try this thing.

I need a hard reboot.

DMT is the chemical released by our brains when we die.

The ‘spirit molecule’.

Historically, it has been consumed by indigenous Amazonian Indian cultures in the form of ayahuasca for divinatory and healing purposes. (Source Wikipedia)

Some days I cannot wait to die. Not in a bad way, like suicidal. Like when I was a kid and I couldn’t wait to grow up, to get to the next thing.

I have never been overly eager to end my life. Not even in the depths of depression. Don’t get me wrong, I wanted to, and did hurt myself so I could feel something. I needed pain on the outside to match my insides.

I have also always carried that child-like wonder and hope. Another reason I never considered shuffling myself loose the mortal coil. That fascination with what comes next.

There is that post that goes around asking what two words we would tell our younger selves if we could. Mine have staunchly been BE BRAVE.

Drugs scare me a bit, especially the ones that make me lose control.

I like my life and being aware of what is happening in it.

I had thought about asking Drogo to be with me when I tried DMT.
You see dear reader once upon a date with Drogo, we drove for a few hours to a spot we like, our little getaway from the city and chaos, and landed in more chaos.

We had a wee adventure wherein I ate half a pot cookie and fell into a 3 hour coma of sorts and astral projected/tripped God’s balls/solved the energy crisis and figured out world peace/visited a parallel John Carter-esque universe. Sufficed to say, he kept me safe and I thought him a good choice for my DMT awakening/death.

I haven’t smoked pot professionally or recreationally in 20 years, gave it up when I got pregnant with my son, tried to pick it back up a few times and never enjoyed it the same. I am wondering if I ever did.

The time before this when I smoked yielded had similar results. Not sure why I ate the damned cookie.

I get in these amnesia states wherein I forget I hate that feeling. The second I start to trip I wanna go home and back to normal. Instead, I have committed myself to a 6 hour flight with turbulence.

The time before? I am afraid I was having a typical stripper moment. Tried a new club with my favorite girl. Got a little too drunk a little too fast in an attempt to calm my nerves and ended up doing a few lines to try and straighten out.

Which made my nerves worse, thereby negating any attempts at anything ever.

Forced us into taking a cab 4 towns away home and of course my jaw was feverishly chewing that gum that didn’t exist. My head hurt my body was done and I just wanted to sleep.

My girl smokes pot. I had her gimme some in an attempt to knock me out. Amnesia rears her forgetful head again, and I forgot that has never worked in the history of ever.

She smokes all day every day and let me tell you something. Marijuana has become this many splendored sophisticated complex thing in the 20 years since I did it.

Fuck me.

So potent.

I experienced lucid dreaming via sleep paralysis and a sketchy drug induced back door to some other realm. Left my body for a while.

I talked to a dear friend who does this often (without chemicals) and he comforted me by saying ‘it doesn’t matter how you get there as long as you get there.’

I still feel like my body was too dirty to properly experience what happened.

But in the land of lucid dreaming and astral projection who is to say what is proper.

DMT seems cleaner somehow.

Drogo, because of the pot cookie experience and the whole thing where he kept me safe and on the mortal coil seemed like a logical choice for a traveling partner. Add to that the quantum physics and philosophical conversations we have…ya him.

But we rarely see each other anymore. And Hot Neighbor has done it before.

But I rarely see him now either.

I used to smoke pot every day and do acid on occasion. 7 times in my teenage years. Every other trip sucked and I chose to stop after a good one.

I just choked on my coffee a bit, I called it a good trip, but I almost died. It was one of those freakishly warm days in February and a bunch of us were down at the beach. The ice was covered in mist, someone left their car running for music and the headlights made these rainbow tunnels, that I thought at the time led to heaven. Theoretically I was right. I may well have gone to the pearly gates shortly after plunging 30 feet to a frozen watery death. Me and Leo coulda chilled in Davey Jones’ locker.

I am always afraid when doing mind altering drugs that I can’t come back to being the same after. Like I will get stuck in my high, and sometimes, like the pot cookie, that was a terrifying thing.

I used to enjoy a good warm cozy opiate check out from time to time because I still felt like myself. My brain was intact and my body just turned to liquid or clouds.

Now it makes me puke.

I have heard DMT is like talking to god. It has been used to cure the most desperate of addicts because they come out on the other side of the trip with a glimpse at some meaning to life, something bigger than us.

I already know it’s there, I just want to see it.

We listened to Sirius satellite radio on the drive down south.

We always do.

Been a big fan since its inception. Like radio but better. Musical journey’s for days.

It’s an 18 hour straight drive usually done over two 12 hour days when you take breaks, meals and gas station stops into consideration.

For the first 15 hours in the car we had on Lithium.

So the same musical journey on the same actual journey.

All 90’s alt rock all the time. Way too heavy on the Chili’s.

Unpopular opinion…I do not like the Red Hot Chili Peppers. Never really have.

One song I like Breaking the Girl. Go figure.

They have DJs on Lithium now. So instead of a six hour loop with a few gems thrown in, the rotation is spaced out a little better.

3^rd time on this trip and it always starts the same. 12-15 hours of 90’s alt rock.

1997 was 20 years ago.

I was 22.

Don’t get me wrong. It was a good time for me.

I was like Skynet and sometime in the 90’s I became self-aware, came online yada yada.

Do I enjoy little jaunts down memory lane?

Y’all know I do.

Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaand Postcards from 1952 just came on. I am listening to iTunes due to lack of internet just now…this is what shuffle does.

I didn’t cry so that’s progress.

This time last year I think I was just about to head out on my first date with him. 52 weeks ago. Huh.

Happy breakfastaversary Giant.

Never mind him, we are going way further back than that.

I have this unfortunate agreement with my muse. She doesn’t come when I call. Rarely when I am sitting at my laptop ready. Usually she hits me 2 drags into a cigarette that I put off too long and want to finish.

Or…

Her favorite place to visit? The car.

Usually when I am driving. I have come home many a night with chicken scratches on the back of my hand in an attempt to remember some of what she whispered in my ear. I am about 80/20 with ‘what the fuck does that even say’ versus ‘I can kinda decipher this’.

I have even had kiddo take notes while the vehicle is in motion and fond these point form ramblings at a way later date and thought huh? One says razor, Jon Stewart and cotton candy or some other such nonsense.

So back to the drive down.

The first year in the car and I was so stoked to hear all these old songs that transported me back to the 90’s. I had just moved to Toronto, I had a bunch of new friends. New places to hang out. Future Bakery Patio, the Green Room, the Dance Cave all of my old haunts and there live all of my old ghosts.

I wrote down all the songs and made myself a playlist.

Pepper by Butthole Surfers made me think of Jesus. Bittersweet Symphony made me think of my old best friend Squishy. Dave Matthews Band brought about recollections of a fight with the Waiter wherein I really just wanted to hear one song all the way through and he wouldn’t shut up (Crash by the way). Closing Time by Semi Sonic made me think of him too. Him being a waiter and all. Walking After You by those who fight Foo made me remember bawling in the back of a taxi while I was en route to see ‘he whom I stalked for a year’.

See the progression here?

Some of those memories aren’t worth having, reliving, rehashing etc.

Jesus is. I have spoken of him and too him recently. He came with me into the present.

I had a pretty grand revelation on my way down here. And everything that has happened whilst on vacation is just one big punctuation mark after another on that very thought.

I remember looking in my grandmother’s closets and jewelry boxes. No idea why exactly. I think the smell of their clean clothes, permeated with years of the same perfume was comfort to me. Also, magpie tendencies. I don’t think I ever wore their jewelry but I loved seeing it sparkle.

I am currently in Florida and there are a lot of old people here.

I noticed something, both then and now.

At some point in some people’s lives they hit a full stop.

This is who I am, this is how I dress and how I like my hair.
The radio gets dialed in permanently to an oldies station, the TV is all reruns and the movies from back ‘then’ (whenever that was) and that’s that.

They don’t deviate from this or make room for anything new. New becomes bothersome. As is, is just fine.

But is it?

I am guessing, by recollection of my grandmother’s closets and current observations this point is right around retirement for most.

But I am starting to see it in friends my age and it scares me.

Tell you why…

“You can’t live the same year 75 times and call it a life.”

And I know beyond all doubt the best times in my life haven’t happened yet.

I still get excited when I find a new song or band I like. I will go a season or two and not see any new clothes on display that do anything for me sure. I have always been a hippy gypsy with a little goth thrown in but I am also in a constant state of redefining this, fine-tuning, evolving when I find something wonderful. I am on my third round of ponchos being cool in this lifetime.

I get the same spark of fear in my belly when I see someone announce that they have met or lost the love of their life.

Is your life over?

How do you know?

For some, I get this is true. There are people for whom the idea of ever loving someone new with that depth of connection is not possible. They can love again sure…every person is different so every love must be, by default, different too. I completely understand however the desire to hold that sacred and not sully it. I am totally never going to do that, but I understand it.

I think when we stop trying new things a huge chunk of our enjoyment of life goes with it.

I tried to build a house on memory lane but the postman only brings old news and the radio keeps playing the same songs over and over.

For some the scariest word in the world is alone.

For me it is atrophy.

Never let me stop changing, evolving, learning and living.

Tell the wolves I am home.

One of those phrases that can be taken two ways. Love those.

When I realized this I howled.

It all comes back to Wendy and the lost boys.

They find me when it’s time and not a second sooner.

Tell them I came home to them.

Tell them I am home for them.

I realize fully when dealing with fuckbois, lost boys and young un’s that, in a sense, for all intents and purposes, I am being used.

Humans use other humans for warmth, sex, companionship, understanding etc.

Problems arise when it is one-sided. One always taking and never giving. Gets draining after a while.

Fuckbois are notorious for this.

Someone said “calling a boy a fuckboi is like slut shaming a girl”.

No, it isn’t.

Someone else replied “Fuckbois are not called fuckbois for fucking. They are fuckbois because of how they treat the girls they fuck, which is usually badly.”

However, if you just want to get laid…by all means. Go for it.

Speaking of…

That Cassadaga psychic said a few things, one of which foretold the return of an ex. 2 days later Wolfling showed up in my inbox with a ‘what are you up to tonight?’ I howled again.

I am that Panic at the Disco song, and as such have never heard of closing a god damn door.

I am 1400 miles away. I am safe here.

I am safe regardless, I know him, his patterns, and the way he does things. The way he treats me outside of the bedroom is pretty fucking horrendous, but the sex is pretty fucking good and his pillow talk game is on point.

He said I should call him when I get home.

“At this point? With you? I’m bulletproof.” AHS

We shall see.

Sometimes bruising my cervix helps distract from the bruises on my heart.
And I left a movie at his house.

“I can’t just leave Karen, it’s not simple, my cd’s are in his truck. I have like 30 or 40 cd’s in his truck I have to put up with his shit for at least another 6 months.” Dane Cook

Yep.

Moving on, or maybe sideways…

Once upon a time a girl I knew got herself knocked up by an advanced level fuckboi.

He bailed. She struggled. I helped her out to the tune of about 6 grand. Between buying her groceries, taking her out for lunch, smokes, helping with rent and taking emergency cab trips over so she could pass the baby to me and shower etc. 6 grand in 6 months.

I don’t regret it. I’ve justified the whole situation by realizing I was helping the baby, not her. Baby is alive and well, mission accomplished. I’ve made peace with it. It was never about the money, it was about how she treated me like shit after.

While in Florida this time around, a man approached us in a grocery store parking lot crying saying his van had been stolen. Asked for 50 cents and I gave him a handful of change. We went about our shopping and saw him again an hour later singing the same sad song to another group of people.

Once on a family vacation we pulled off at a scenic outlook. A man approached my dad and said the same sad story, went so far as to get our mailing address to ‘send back the money’. My dad said to us after “never loan out what you can’t afford to lose.” and it stuck with me.

Didn’t stop me from handing out change to panhandlers when I moved to Toronto, if I had it and they needed it why not? I was picky about who I gave change to, women and punk kids mostly. My change, my choice.

When I was 15 I was broke and I panhandled. My friends made me do it because I seemed to get more sympathy/money somehow.
So I get it.
I get lots of things. Being down and out. Being pimped out.

I have been a stripper for almost half my life and had many a ‘financially abusive boyfriend’ which is just another way of saying pimp.

The entirety of this convoluted post has been me avoiding the actual issue. Did a good job.

But here it is…

A boy asked me for money.

My philosophy on money is that it comes and goes. If I have it and someone needs it I give it.
When I need it, it comes, sometimes when I don’t need it money comes, I am blessed like that.

So I gave it to him.

It was a bad idea.

I felt a little ill.

I felt the annoyance that I felt in the parking lot when the guy cried crocodile tears for 50 cents.

I felt the betrayal of that girl with the baby.

The anger when a girl who owed me 500 bucks refused to give my hungry child 20 bucks for lunch.

When you give money to friends and they don’t give it back you are basically paying them to stay out of your life.

I’d have rathered he stayed.

I’m still too young and too cute to be a sugar mama, maybe when I’m 50 or 60. Probably not even then. I’m way too concerned with freewill and people staying in my life because they want to not because I’m manipulating them.

This is where my line is.
I don’t mind being home for the wolves/cubs/fuckbois.
I know what they do and why they do it.
Their comfort and joy is mine too and I do so love getting laid.

It’s a barter system.

Sylvia Plath said

“GIRLS ARE NOT MACHINES THAT YOU PUT KINDNESS COINS INTO UNTIL SEX FALLS OUT.”

I’m a different kind of girl-machine wherein they put sex in to get coins and kindness out, but…

When you attempt to use me for money what you’re doing is spitting in a wishing well.

The best things in life are given freely, I am those things.

Fool me once. Okay baby.

Second time? Fuck boy. Transaction denied, funds unavailable.

The only concrete reason I have not to trust him is because of what the others did.
The ones who came before him.

Well that doesn’t seem much like concrete does it?

Those houses were built out of straw and bullshit.

Cheated and lied, broken so bad, you made a vow never get mad, you play the game though it’s unfair, they’re all the same, who can compare

The worst thing I ever did was allow other people into my relationship.

That isn’t really the worst thing,

Fuck…that just took my brain on an ugly journey.

I don’t know the worst thing I ever did. There is a cage match happening right now in my head.

But allowing people outside of my relationships to weigh in on them was bad mmmm’kay?

I went for brunch and then coffee with my girl.
She said she wanted to get all CSI on my mister, she’s afraid I am going to get hurt.
She is a realist and I am not, especially with men.

So…it’s possible.

First you lose trust, then you get worried.

I have a bad habit of being color blind to red flags.

I have been blindsided many a time. Because I am blind.

First you get hurt, then you feel sorry.

My personally philosophy has always been to trust someone until I have a reason not to.

I feel like that might not be the best way to go.

There comes a time, in a short line, turn it around, get a rewrite

I thought last night of making a catfish Tinder account. Catch him doing what I think he might be doing.

Which is spending a substantial portion of his limited free time going on random dates with other random girls.

Ew.

Both of us. Him for hypothetically doing this and me for hypothetically regressing.

Scumbags, both of us.

As if I would be able to hold it together long enough to a) make a date with him under someone else’s name and b) walk out of said ‘date’ with any semblance of dignity or grace.

I would be a wreck, in public.

Not that girl anymore.

I am too lazy to stalk anyone. Lying makes me choke, literally.

I played out the scenario in my head, sadly it felt pretty real and it hurt a lot.

Why in god’s name would I kick the hornets’ nest?

If I go back on Tinder it will be to go on a real date with a new boy or a half dozen of them.

The flags are admittedly varying shades of pink.

In my head he has already been downgraded from boo to bootycall.

I already know he’s married. No, not like that. I’m an asshole but not that big of an asshole.

He’s married to his job.

I keep rationalizing everything. I agreed to this, well not exactly this but I knew he worked a lot. I’ve waited longer for less, but that is wearing thin as the time gets longer I am getting next to nothing.

Flying like a cannonball falling to the earth, heavy as a feather when you hit the dirt.
How am I the lucky one, I did not deserve to wait around forever when you were there first.

Feathers float and so will I.

(Italics = Cold War Kids, First)

It is 5:16am. Panda left 16 minutes ago and I chose to stay awake.

Yesterday’s post was absolute dog shit.

Read like a travel journal without any food reviews.

Apparently I needed a whole transitional post to get here instead of our regularly scheduled paragraph.

Cliff notes in case you missed it? Vacation didn’t go my way but it was warm, the end.

Sorry everybody. They can’t all be diamonds.

There are 3 other shit articles that spring to mind that I avoid reposting  because I really don’t like how I wrote what I wrote.

Why do I leave them up?

Because technically I birthed them and I may need them at some point, or more likely someone else will.

I have a slight addiction to chronology.

Awfully funny intro for a post about change.

Insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results. Einstein

Oh this was a mantra and a half when I lived on the farm. I said it so fucking often (almost daily) and yet somehow didn’t absorb what it truly meant.

Probably because, at that point in my life I was actually insane.

I have no problem admitting this. Who the fuck moves their husband’s mistress into the house and expects anything other than a disaster?

Let’s add batshit to the insane and times it by infinity.

I needed her there to launch me out. Somehow them teaming up on me to treat me like (bat) shit was the catalyst I required.

Please Lord never let me get that obstinate over anyone ever again.

I know this now. At the time? I think I knew it then too but I was stubborn as fuck.

That is not what this is about.

I am in Florida, again, back at Disney, again, we are about 5.5 hours from checking out and returning to the condo.

Something was different this time.

Magic Kingdom was less than magical. And we left the other park yesterday after only a few hours, choosing instead to return to the resort and hit the hot tub and lounge.

Disney the first year was beyond blissful, with kiddo. Universal Studios was more my thing but even then, I can’t believe I am saying this but…

I had a chance to hit the Hulk a 3^rd time the last day and I passed.

Walked right by.

Who am I?

Hulk is bae.

I love rides.

Don’t I?

I do/did.

Amendment to Albert’s rule.

Insanity is riding the same rides over and over, having the same vacation over and over and expecting the original awe and exhilaration you had the first time.

I mentioned once, my friend Andrew and I were on a rollercoaster at Canada’s Wonderland, like literally strapped in, and we were talking, it was taking a little extra time to get going and in that 90 seconds or so I quite literally forgot I was on a rollercoaster.

Originally I thought I had goldfish brain, oh look a plastic castle.

Now I am rethinking this whole thing.

Last year’s theme park adventure was sucky too. The Hulk wasn’t running, the parks were crowded and my kid wasn’t with me.

Don’t get me wrong. I love chilling at the condo, Disney resorts are cool too. But I feel like the time spent in line and on rides and navigating the colorful chaos could have been better used. I have shit to do. Escaping winter is amazeballs. I love that there is 61 days until spring as of the day I return. That seems like a manageable amount of time. I just don’t think I can do the same parks year after year. Not even sure if I want to go to parks at all.

Andrew is my certified rollercoaster partner in crime. He has invited me to LA and wants to take me on the rides there. We shall see I guess. He is now my litmus test.

I rode the Hulk 4 times on this trip. I teared up a bit the first time around, half out of happiness and half disappointment. I didn’t get the rush I was expecting. 6 days later we managed to get front row and I sat outside left, best seat in the house and that was good. But still. The thrill is gone. Or lessened substantially.

I think I have developed some sort of muscle memory for these things. My body doesn’t get that good fear anymore.

I found a good way to spin this. My Pollyanna tendencies are intact.

I am not afraid to lose pieces of what I once was.

I used to be the girl who loved rollercoasters a ridiculous amount.

I used to be a lot of different girls, with lots of different loves and dislikes.

Christ, when I was a kid I didn’t like the food touching on my plate, now I love Korean bibimbop and Vietnamese noodle bowls because every bite is unique.

I am not afraid to lose the girl I was.

This year I asked for change.

The first year I did this trip was the jumping off point for the woman I have become.

But even she knows I can do better.

I know I became complacent in the massive amount of improvement achieved in such a short period of time, but that was 3 years ago.

I can’t keep riding on that.

And I can’t keep riding the same rollercoasters over and over again either.

This is a metaphor for everything, really but mostly relationships.

I loved the ups and downs, the fears, the free falls the twists and turns. I didn’t even mind when it hurt my head and spine or the long agonizing line ups and the waiting. But now…

I think I could have been happier lounging by the pool, getting my good work done. Yoga on the beach and walks on the sand and playing in the ocean.

I think that is the new me and my new ideal.

Relaxed productive escape. Adventure without the thrill seeking.

Cuddling in a cabana in Cuba or something like that.