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High de ho.

Holy shit, yet another long minute since I have been here.

I miss this. I do. I feel like I am doing myself a disservice, how am I supposed to remember if I don’t write things down?

The trek up the hill after a massive blizzard, 200 feet of 2 foot drifts to crash on a couch in a deserted empty house in the woods. Worth it though. Mostly.
The cock blocking staff party well after I had given up.
The continuation of giving up. Letting go and letting God. Not despair, just a shrugging of shoulders. It is what it is.
The worst idea I have ever had, which is what this is going to end up being about.

It took me forever to log into my account. 5 reset passwords and a forgotten username.

I miss my laptop, prior to the shittiest Windows update ever, the great crash of October 2018. She now has dementia. Takes forever to do things, has forgotten and forsaken me. In an added note of hilarity, I decided, while waiting to log in yet again, to put pen to paper. Threw out 5 pens. I don’t love the one that worked, heavy and clunky with no smoothness to it. But it worked. Everything is a metaphor. And god might be trying to tell me something.

I am, at my best, a bad listener. I ask for signs, the misinterpret them on purpose to suit myself. And look where that got me. 3000 km from home on some drunken promises that were forgotten by morning. But not by me.

So here I am.

I do what I can with what I have where I is.

A year ago today I announced my intention to move here after sitting on the idea for 6 weeks.

I rarely keep quiet that long, but if I check the dates, probably been that long since I wrote something here. Still, not like me at all. I think I am changing again. I would like to keep the writing, and the page. These are good things. My optimism can return any time now. Libido too.
My patience is waning. My innate desire and compulsion to contribute to the happiness of others can fuck right off.

I have to leave for work in 2 hours, totally forgot about that as I was attempting to get in here. I fell asleep in my clothes, it’s hair washing day. Had 2 girls cancel and Brian is sick. I have no choice at this point. Better to save my days off, I think something good is coming.

I have hit this level somewhere past hand shy though. It scares me a bit.

Let down after let down after let down.

I took to covering his mouth when he’d promise tomorrow, or anything at all really. Didn’t change anything. But my superstitions are hard to let go of. They are bred in my bones.

I heard and old Russian proverb. Pray to God, but row to shore.

Praying isn’t enough, heaven knows I tried.

When I went back to Ontario I decided to appease the gods. No use praying for sex and turning it down when it presents itself, I shall not squander the gifts I have been given. I saw the Giant. And it was good, amen.

I thought it had started a trend. I had an amazing date/week with a wonderful man, who sadly lives 19 hours away. I miss him. Funny story. When we finally got around to having sex (half a dozen times) every time he would leave the room, I could hear my pussy whispering “come back now please”. She’s still doing it, just more of a shout now.

I waited for another to come back from away, but it didn’t go well. Too bad, he was lovely too.

And then…

Oh and then…

I was talking to Biker Body Pillow last night (we both had Christmas booty calls that didn’t follow through and were both irritated at best)
I wrote a brief point form list of all the reasons my bc was a bad idea,
He’s rude
Inconsistent
We bicker when we’re fucking
Probably slept with half the strippers on the island
and a whole lot more I cannot go into
Blah blah blah
then stated, “but, vagina likes him”.

BBP in his glorious wisdom and blessing/curse of always telling the truth said

“Dude you sure it’s your vag that likes him and not your constant need for self destruction?”

To which I replied “No, I am not even remotely sure, in fact I think that’s it.”

Last night was the 4th attempt at said booty call. 1 outta 4 is not great odds. 25%. If I only did 25% of my work, or only showed up for one shift in 4, I’d be fired.

So that’s it then.

Time to realize some people ain’t worth my time at all.

And maybe quash that need for self destruction.

Jesus, it feels like years since we’ve been here.*
In true Newfoundland fashion, the sun did come out for a minute today. And I say, “it’s alright”.

I have a notebook full of chicken scratchy blog post ideas and a few posts. It’s my Newfie Notebook.
No, not like that. Although I did kinda show up with luggage, shrug my shoulders and hope for a happy ending. Who knows.

Onto bigger and better things. Well, not big…it is always the little things after all.

I managed to have coffee at my day job. Today. Last week not so much.
I had no customers and forgot my charger…
But
The Lord said, “Let there be coffee”
And there was,
And it was good
Amen

The little things remember.

I am constantly striving for balance, and consistently failing.

Love life is good = I am broke
Money is good = I have zero free time and I am scrambling to jerk off before work so I don’t accidentally eat anyone alive.
Night off = plans fall through or I sleep all day and or I forget what I was supposed to be doing or I can’t afford to do what I want.

My plate is full and something keeps falling off the edge.

I haven’t posted anything to my page in about a month. Haven’t written anything in about that long either.
I am always dealing with this or that, or dead dog tired.

Just the aforementioned chicken scratches in the aforementioned Newfie Notebook. Which I am transcribing here and now. Not gonna lie, I found an old fountain pen and there is something satisfying about the flow of ink to paper. But the keyboard is my one true, grownup love.

It contains a ledger of all of my earnings from the first two trips. Plus brief notes of comings or goings of this one or that one. Blackout nights and accidents in black and white, reminding me yes, I did live through all the things. Yay me and my tenacity. It now contains security codes and employee numbers too. Things have really changed. Everything diligently recorded for posterity. Except that one thing at the bottom of the page that I cannot read.

And the very first page…
My flight info from my first time here. As if I would ever have the luxury of forgetting. 365 days as I type this. Give an hour or two. I mean, IF we’re counting, I am always counting. 16/200. I count most things. An adorable yet horrible habit. This writing down of all the things.

I do it on purpose so I can see. Like now, I know I have come a really long way from that sad girl that got off the plane the first time. Maybe not the second time, but 3rd time seems to be charmed. Semi-charmed. Shit still happens.

My phone died today, because I seized the deadness of the day and did a bunch of paperwork, follow up messages and emails, started the schedule for next week for my other other job. The friendships and alliances I have made these last few months, along with my leadership skills will be tested this week on Sirens St. John’s Survivor (stripper edition). Zero girls in the house for a few days…no guaranteed girls working. Just gotta hope for the best and bring chocolate.

Lees girls = Mo money + No free time this week coming. Magic 8-ball sees doubles in my future. I might just pray for rain.

Too bad, just went back on Tinder.

Ya, you heard that right, on the island of misfit toys, ghosts and fuckbois. It’s pretty comical.

We’re just gonna go ahead and blame that on Vagina.

She just keeps moaning, “It’s been 84 years.”

Except I had a Tinder date last night and she actually yawned.

The food was really good.

But I coulda tagged along with Suzie Q and B to the Keg and been home in my comfy sweats by 9. Instead of nice supper, followed by a nice walk along the harbor and the Longest Drive Home Ever.

His ex that he is nowhere near over, is an addict and I know way more about her than I should.

It was nice he was honest, and like I said, supper was great. But he isn’t over her, and my free therapy is reserved for those I know and love.

To be fair, I am not over mine either. I have applied logic to it and there is no way I am scratching that scab and oozing all the grossness all over a stranger. Just gonna leave it and let it heal best I can.

Some days are easier than others. I suffer in silence mostly.

(they mostly come out at night; mostly.)**

I got drunk and cried about that last week. Day 56 of sobriety of anyone was counting, I was. I had to add 10 days to my 90 day goal. And people who never met “the Sarah that came before” got a crash course. There was some angry drunk texts that I didn’t regret surprisingly. I did regret breaking my 56 day streak.

But, as Mark so eloquently pointed out, he used to be proud if I got through one day without weeping.

5 days in 9 weeks.

I am doing fucking fabulous.

Mostly.

I miss parts of who I was. I miss writing and my page. They are still there, like neglected toys in the sandbox, I should go brush them off and start again.

I miss my stable full of boys back home.

No strings, just suppers and snugglefucks.

It was the best of times.

I’m a chef and a nympho. One would think it would be easier than this, but it hasn’t been.

I suppose I could use all the time spent not fucking to write and post. I have shit of my own that I ought to be doing. Carve out an hour or two every morning that is mine and mine alone. Start the coffee, let the dogs out, drink the coffee and write. Like the good old days.

Would help exponentially if my laptop was fixed. But we’ll get there. That is the way this island is, big voids of nothing punctuated by rushes of everything.

Wind is always changing and bringing changes galore.

Over the last week a few things that were lost to me have resurfaced, including a relic of my first time here, something I left behind came back***.

Good omens.

It was warm out today and I danced in the rain.

And I know next week, with it’s empty girl’s house, will work out. It always does.

I think life is just like that.

My job is to have a bit of blind faith.
Prepare for the worst and hope for the best.

*Beatles
**Aliens
***a pillowcase Stalker Sarah, just a nice soft pillowcase, jesus sis.

Love, it will not betray you dismay or enslave you
It will set you free
Be more like the man you were made to be.

Oh Marcus Mumford, ain’t that the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the fucking truth.

So… help me God.

Posted this meme to Instagram, got an insta message in my inbox from the Last One.

You should have kissed me longer.

Seriously Sparky? Fuck you, I tried and you bailed.

Lord I am tired.

And another one.

“I came back for you”, I said finally, out loud and everything, like a big girl, using my words and shit.

“That makes me feel good”, he replied

And at some point, the morning after, as I was applying poultices to my busted heart and walking home tired, sore and not terribly sated, I finally saw everything clearly.
A marquee lit up in the darkness saying simply, “what about me?”
When do I get to feel good?
What have you done other than promise tomorrow and show up weeks later just to repeat the same pattern?

“I’ve been trying to get you home for a week now.”

2 tings there buddy, what about all the weeks that came before, and see also do or do not, there is no try*.

It is what it is, and it’s not enough.

Speaking of…

The Nope was in the bar last night, I was not.

He messaged to let me know. Because no one would bother to tell me, he is not like the others.

I replied ‘I have no interest in watching you drink beer and yammer on about all your sexual conquests since I saw you last’.
I am good on my couch, watching the Good Place, in my good place.

The opposite of love is indifference. I never loved him, but I am definitely indifferent.

I don’t want to be passed over for addictions, hillbilly heroin, money, sex, coke, whatever. I am better than all of that and I know it.

Back to the Last One. He is making furniture now. Says he wants to build me something. Not sure if that is textbook irony, or just annoying.
Something small that can be shipped if it has to be, he said.

“It has to be, I am really far away” I said.

“You’ll be back”.

Oh Sparky…

Magic 8 ball says, not fucking likely. And even if I did go back, I would go further west or anywhere but there. That version of my future burned to the ground and there was nothing to put out the flames.

There is no warmth in that burning. There is no pattern with his come here, gone away, except when I post a good selfie to Instagram. Then he remembers and interupts my forgetting.

It has been a year to the day that the Last One ghosted worse than any ghost has ever ghosted. For almost week I thought he had really died. Took months to sort everything out.
He disappearing catapulted me to where I am now. I see this clearly.
Panda made me come here to get me out of my head after weeks of weeping.
He still checks in from time to time, they all do.
I got an explanation for Christmas, and a call to come back to him in February as I crossed the border from Quebec to New Brunswick on my way here. I didn’t turn around and go back.
He was on his way over to the house with flowers, to take me out proper and start over. But I don’t live there anymore.
It’s easy to see the why now, but back then I was inconsolable.
It’s like those pictures where you have to relax your eyes to see what is underneath.
And as I sit in Brian’s kitchen with good company and good coffee, I can see the sailboat.
And it’s good.

I am finally sleeping in my own bed. After 7 and a half months of twins punctuated with a few hotel room kings.
I am sleeping so much better these days. I had a dream last week. In my dream I knew the moon was new and hidden from view, but I could see it, low and huge on the horizon. I have no idea what it means, but I woke up feeling peaceful.

I drifted back off and fell into that lucid dream state wherein I had some control over my subconscious and man oh man I cussed out Mister within an inch of his life. There are parasites in the bar and I do not want them around. Hard enough holding everything together without the extra energy suckers.

Silence, legion, save your poison
Silence, legion, stay out of my way

Tool, Jambi

I thought he said leech…like this whole time, about a decade or so. Tomato, toe mah toe I suppose. Whoops.
I confuse ‘home’ and ‘hope’ too, depending on where my head is and how busted my heart is in any given moment.

And there is legion, for they are many.

My heart is a marionette with tangled red strings pulling her this way and that. Takes a lot for me to cut one. I know the damage it can do.

I am Lady Luck for all those around me. Especially the ones in the inner sanctum. The door is always open, some simply chose not to walk through it, hovering around just outside instead. And I won’t make them. I don’t force anyone. This is the land of free will. Show me what you can do.

I know what I am and what I am capable of, and on a long enough timeline they figure it out.

Usually it’s too little too late. Like the drunken finale on the Friday before the Sunday I left, 197/200. Like a promised knick-knack shelf in the mail that still hasn’t arrived. Like asking if I am back and doing nothing about it, except staying away, good boy.

Doesn’t matter now. I came back for me this time, and I am happy.

Full moon has come and gone. The Harvest Moon at that. Time to be reaping what was sown, and I am.

And it’s not so terrible this time around.

I can only surmise that I wasn’t as bad as I thought I was when I was here last. I was pretty fucking bad.

“We needed someone like you for a long time. I am glad you are here.”

“I am glad you came back, I would have lost a really good friend if you had stayed gone.”

“Don’t let that bitch bother you, you are the queen of this place, straighten your crown already and own it, we all love you and you’re killing it.”

That last one came when I needed it. I got some nasty messages a week or so after I got here. So did the bartender.

She just called the bar. Asked who was working. Asked for Mark. Then asked for you. When I said you weren’t in tonight she said “that’s fine I’ll deal with that little slut myself”

Sigh

Sigh is right. Let it go sis.

You weren’t happy or capable.

Running strippers when she had never been one, nor worked a day in her life. Treating girls like numbers, and shit.

I am a little slut, but not in the way she meant it. And if by “dealing with me” she meant drinking a few bottles of wine and burning any and all bridges she had to me, ya, I’m totally dealt with.
I spent the better part of 3 hours a day for over 4 months on the phone with the woman basically doing her job for her, but we bonded, somewhat. And she tore all that down with a wrecking ball of misspelled insults.

She was making mountains out of a molehill then getting pissy when I just stepped around it. Attempted sabotage and blackmail that I also stepped around. I understand leverage and I don’t need it to do my job.

She showed up at the bar throwing sloppy drunk shade…why? I don’t know. This isn’t your house anymore, never really was. It’s not my house either, but I keep it clean and functioning.
I am literally just doing a job, which I am rather fond of, even if it means cleaning up mess after mess. And it does. It is my wheelhouse, I got this.

I was given permission to drink one night, and a regular bought me a double whiskey. I looked at it, literally drooling and wanting. But I couldn’t go back to zero, so I walked into the changeroom, shaking and gave it away. It wouldn’t have tasted as good as the words ‘I am 9 days sober’ did coming out of my mouth. And Mark’s haunting request “please don’t be like S_____.” I won’t. I love Mark more than I love whisky and that’s saying something.

I was 23 days sober last night. Everything still hurts, but it is getting marginally easier. I danced sober the first 3 years. I have no muscle memory left from those days, the car wreck erased everything and took 60% of my flexibility, but it’s just practice, like anything. I can do this. It’s on the list.

People are still trying to buy me shots. Old habits die harder in others. Like showing up for work.

I don’t get to pick my shifts anymore, I just get to pick them up as I am needed, whether it be behind the bar in a dress or on the floor in my underwear. It is nice to be necessary.

I think I always was, or I wouldn’t have this job. There was a me shaped void.

Seems like everyone wanted it, but they don’t want to do the actual work. The cleaning up puke of a table in Denny’s at 4am. The locker checks when something goes missing. The working of the shit shifts. Bribing the girls with food, finding what is needed, handing out smokes and tampons like Halloween candy. Sending my man out for actual candy as we all synced up our periods to the moon. Buying shots out of pocket on the dead nights when I know it’s going to get better soon, just wait.

It’s NOT being Mermaid and waltzing in like I own the place and hate everyone. I ask permission to come late, the girls have to agree. I love my fellow strippers, always have always will, even when they make it hard. We are all equal, just taking our clothes off for money. There is no status here.

Mermaid made it hardest of all, took every little thing I had for comfort out of spite, over a boy I wouldn’t touch with my worst enemy’s dead dick. She falsified emails from ‘customers’ and got rid of the cards on dead nights, my blanket on the cold ones. But she quit in a stompy blaze of glory, tried to walk into the only other strip club on this tiny rock and was turned away after 80% of the staff threatened to quit if she was allowed back.

I was welcomed back in Hamilton with open arms and listened to my old boss go off about her for about an hour, so if anyone is winning here…it might be me, the one that was asked to come back. I am welcome everywhere I have ever worked.

Because I work.

I had to reiterate last night, “no I do not pad the schedule in my favor, I am sick as a dog and I am here because I knew one of the girls wanted to leave early.” Mark chimed in and said she is only here because she has to be here. And it’s true. 3 girls bailed and 2 needed the night off, so I came. These girls I have asking me not to over hire like the one that came before me, then blowing shifts like it’s nothing.
It isn’t nothing, it’s my night off, and it’s one more night in heels sober.
It’s hard.
But it’s my job.

Had another one lose her mind because I get a filler shift at another bar that belongs to my boss. You wanna work til 3am and be at another job to open for noon and stand around for 7 hours? Take a good look at what you are so jealous of sis. She guaranteed never working again by blowing up at my boss over it.

On a long enough timeline the trash takes itself out.

There are women here who do not want me to succeed. They don’t want me here at all. But they don’t want to put in the work either. And all three torched their own bridges.

I make way less money now. Carrying trays watching all my girls book VIPs. Staying sober and shy as fuck on the weekends while they drink and dance. I missed it so bad on several occasions I was ready to quit my current position and rejoin them. But I won’t.

There have been miracles here and there wherein I thought I wouldn’t be able to make it, where I thought I wasn’t going to pull something off, then my phone rings and a girl comes just in time. I see them and I say thank you.

It’s easier this time around. My dog is here, my living room is coming together, my bed is made and my closet is overflowing with the things I missed. I stopped by the girl’s house at 5am to put out a proverbial fire the other night. Popped my head into room one and was struck by memories of misery. I have no fondness for that chunk of my life. It got a little better when I moved up to the third floor, but better than absolute shit is still shit.

I didn’t think I was gone long enough to be missed, but I was. This time I am supported and loved, and I am sober enough to see it. I have a good man by my side, I picked the right friend this time. I have respect because I have earned it. I have my tiny dog and my things. I have a home instead of a room in a house. And everything is coming together, slowly but surely.

That’s how it always goes, a big void of nothing, then everything all at once.

I have never been one to squander second chances, and life is a lot smoother now than it once was.

“I don’t understand how she can do that. She overdosed, almost died and she still does blow?”

Addiction is a powerful thing. Makes you cheat, steal and lie.

Logic dictates cheating death once should be enough to make someone stop the thing that caused it, but obviously (from her runny nose and vacant eyes) she didn’t quit.

I’m no better. Broke my tailbone, broke my own heart and I kept drinking and loving. Blacked out more on this rock than I ever have in my life and still ordered another shot.

Last night was night 2 fully sober. Stage is slowly becoming less terrifying. My hands still itch to be holding my (long broken) sippy cup, my throat wants the burn and water isn’t cutting it, but I am ultra-super mega hydrated so I supposed that’s good.

I still won’t say I quit. I didn’t. I was told not to drink, at all, and I am listening. The only thing I am proud of is not having that shot on my way in yesterday nor shots when I got home to fall asleep. That I have some control over. Mark said fully sober and I will abide. I love Mark more than whiskey.

I prayed for this. Some kind of intervention. Someone telling me that I was more important than bar sales.

It’s a different kind of wonderful to be awake and aware at the end of the night and to make sure the ones I care about are alright. I know they got home okay because I watched them. Falling asleep with effort, yet peacefully instead of blacking the fuck out.

I have been lead into temptation.

Past has passed, but the ghosts still appear. Two times since I have been back I felt sucker punched to the heart chakra by news of the old ones, and twice I have not cried nor drank even though my eyes and mouth watered and I wanted to.

I had 5 drinks in the 18 days I was home. Plus the 3 shots to get on the ferry away from here. I didn’t want to go.
Rode horses, went in the water, spent time with random friends in serendipitous ways. Not how I planned anything, but it was lovely.
Universe take the wheel.

I might be evolving again.

I don’t think it was enough time for a factory reset, but Do what you can with what you have where you are. Theodore Roosevelt

I am trying Teddy, I really am this time.

It would be real fucking easy to get overwhelmed right now.
Stuff is in limbo.
Bank account looking worse for the wear due to the move.
Laptop down.
Whole new routine to settle into.
The added oddness of sobriety and remembering how to function/dance whiskey-free.
The splendor that could be this new house if I could get rolling and get money and get my stuff.
Then I remembered moving to farmy all those years ago.
5 years of 2 bachelors, knotty pine walls and country dirt.
And I made it shine.
I’m on my 4th laptop and it always works out somehow.
I work in a place where money comes easily and frequently, I just have to ask for it.
My stuff will get here.
I’ll sleep in my bed for the first time since February 17th 2018. My fall clothes will come. Hats and socks and things I need.
And I remember the hangovers and the blank nights I don’t want. So this is better.
I hear people say ‘we missed you’ and ‘ it wasn’t the same without you.’ ‘She’s a good girl, be good to her.’
And I believe them.

I feel like I’m home.
I feel loved.

I also remember how to eat the elephant.
One bite at a time.

Laptop slipped into a coma a week into me being here. Sketchy YouTube to mp3 site, little virus and down she went.

It was looking bleak and then a miracle occurred.

Isn’t that always the way?

6 years ago (when this happened the last time) I panicked and shrieked loud enough to make the banshees in the woods take notice and count me as one of their own. I had set aside my Lorazepam and regretted it. Poured some whiskey on my anxiety instead. Eventually a solution was found and I ended up with this one I am using now, my darling hp Envy. The old memory ripped from the other and transferred into here. I lost a few things, it’s inevitable. Machines are still as fallible as the men who made them.

This time was no different, except for my reaction.

When letting go of the past you must be willing to let go of all of it, even the good. Come forward, be present, it’s never going to be like that again, good or bad. Nothing will come of lingering except hurt.
(I wrote that years ago)

Yes, there were twinges and pangs. I tried not to think of what I might lose, and I won.

Memories. Photos upon photos. 6 years of writing, finished and unfinished symphonies. Books started and forgotten until I couldn’t look at them anymore. Isn’t that just the way things are? Taking for granted the things right in front of us until they are taken away or just wander off because they can’t fucking take it anymore, or they get a virus and won’t load.

I left a note on the kitchen counter last night saying “what is in here is more important than the machine itself, please don’t factory reset.” And I fell asleep to my iTunes sleepy playlist via my laptop.

Douglas Adams wrote “Don’t panic.”

No point in it…all the time you spend trying to get back what they took from you, more is going out the door. No Country for Old Men, Cormac McCarthy

Brother Matt said ‘the rewrites are always better anyways’.

Hmph, three wise men, all in alignment.

I believe this to be absolute truth. That is what this is, one big cosmic do-over rewrite.

No panic, only gratitude and lessons to learn.

I suppose it’s all out now.

I came back.

To the fucky island full of fuckbois.

“I thought you hated it there”, she said.

I did, sometimes. But also, I don’t.

Nowhere is perfect, perfection doesn’t exist.

The men here are maddening, but I didn’t come back for them. I came back for me, and a bar I love and a job I really wanted that was custom made for me. I came back with my eyes wide open this time. I know exactly what I am getting into and I know I cannot predict the future, I won’t even try.

A lot of my current friends came along at a point in my life where I really only aired clean laundry on Facebook, once in a blue moon if I was falling apart, I would say so. I figured if I forced myself to seem positive, positivity would follow.

And for the most part, it worked. Then I came here and Stompy happened, that started the avalanche of suck and I had no idea what I was getting into and I couldn’t get my feet under me for more than five minutes.

Each snowflake in an avalanche pleads not guilty. Stanislaw J. Lec

But I am okay now.

I didn’t know what I was getting into and I truly believed it was going to be a cake walk with boy snuggles and it wasn’t.

No idea why I thought that. Roses have thorns and honey comes with a sting.

Like I said, I was doing everything wrong. So I got a do-over and I am doing it right now. Or at least better.

No more girl’s house. I have a pretty dove grey room upstairs to sleep in and a giant room downstairs to live in. No more hiding out in bed all damned day. I live in a real house like a real girl. I still have all the keys and responsibility of the other house. I popped by yesterday to ascertain how things were going there. Smoothish. First management meeting on Tuesday. I have all the passwords and a lot of responsibility.

I did a lot this week all things considered. I have a long way to go. At least I have coffee now. The first few hours of the first day were a bit rough. 7 days in the car during my 18 days away. I did not want to drive, but drive I did. Groceries, gas, and my last stop at Tim Hortons for a long while.

I made it to St. Apollonaire Quebec on the second day driving away from here. Picked my stopping point by sheer luck that there was an exit with coffee, food, gas and lodging all in a little roundabout 2 seconds off the highway.

I had a colossal melt down as I got in line for the ferry the night prior. A big black pickup truck pulled in behind me and I realized in that moment I was stuck leaving and I couldn’t turn around. A nice Newfie in the SUV ahead of me had a mini bar in the back (of course he did) and poured me a triple Jack Daniels so I could pull it together enough to change into my pajamas and I managed to sleep sitting half up in a chair.

I felt better the next day and the thought that kept me from melting down again was ‘I can always go back’. I walked around with matches and gasoline it seemed but I burned no bridges. So the same way I left in Novemeber, sad but determined to get back, was the way I left in August. No firm plan, but the firm plan I had hadn’t exactly worked out. I had places to land on the mainland and all the time in the world to figure it out. Had planned a trip to BC, had places to go and people to see. I got this.

Day 2. On the road for 12 hours on 6 hours sleep.

8:30 rolled around and I realized I need off the highway, I was dazed totally lost in my thoughts. 800 km on the same stretch of road. I really thought there would be more rest stops, but once I get driving I have a hard time pulling off the road. Highway hypnosis is real kids.

So I pulled off at my magical everything in one place exit and walked into a McDonalds. Phone in hand. 9 missed calls, what the fuck? Mark and Tina 3 Chains, text messages galore. “Call Mark right now” she said. “Call me right now” he said. Trying to order a burger in French, that didn’t go well, balancing my tray trying to get ketchup thinking, “I was only gone a day, did the bar burn down?”

I called Mark, he asked how soon I could get back, and that the job I wanted was mine.

I emailed my boss with terms, he agreed and added a few bonuses.

So ya, here I am.

I have bartending shifts. I am officially in charge of all things strippery. I am a literal Madame. Always wanted to do that, and now I am.

I have no idea what is going to happen. I moved into Dirty Uncle Brian’s house sight unseen and I like it here. Alice my darling puppers is with me. Mark got happy and exclaimed “she brought her dog, she’s never leaving!” I never say never, but I am here for a good long while.

All my stuff will be on a truck in a few days and before it gets here I have a lot of work to do. It feels good to say that. No more agony in atrophy. I have 3 winter coats and all my clothes coming. And yes, it’s cold here but I love dressing for fall and spring, and have landed on the island of fucky weather. My furniture and all of my things that make me happy and home.

I don’t know what the future holds, but in this moment I am happy and optimistic.

He had just braided his fingers into my hair and said he was happy I didn’t have extensions.

I smiled, “What kind of girls are you fucking honey?” He didn’t answer.

“You have never seen me shiny or strippery.”

“Nah, I like you like this.”

“I just got out of the water, I look like a sea witch.”

“Nah, this is you. Beautiful.”

Every once in a long while I am handed a sincere compliment with no agenda. I hold onto them like diamonds.
I’m the first to admit I am insecure. He sugar coated it and called me humble, but we will get back to that in a minute.

“She’s just margarine. Fake, plain, toxic in large doses, only so much eyeshadow and Snapchat a girl can take really. And I know he was engaged. So that’s that then.”

We both chuckled and he took me upstairs. I kept waiting for the guilt to kick in but it didn’t. He came out of the shower and laid down next to me. Kept telling me how strong my hands are as I kneaded this muscle or that one.

It didn’t start out that way, I don’t usually double dip with ex’s friends, and I haven’t slept with someone one of my girlfriends liked since I was in my 20’s. Except Moonface but I saw him first. PIC wanted him and instead of taking one for the team, I took one for me. She got over it.

And I took one again for me, this man, with his honey coated tongue and fingers made of molten steel pulling me apart and putting me back together. Saying all the sweet things first with his mouth, then his hands, then all in.

Right before he remarked that he loved we could just lay together mostly naked, and there was no pressure for sex.

“About that” I said. “I was waiting on you.”

He grinned a Cheshire cat grin and

Flip

Switch.

I do love that flip.

Switch. From tender to intense. From gentle to bestial.  From reverent to wanting.

I was not disappointed.

“Do you trust me?”

In that moment I realized I did.

FUUUUUUUUCK, there is nothing sexier than a tanned, buff, naked man standing beside the bed while my legs quake, asking that question. Except what happened after.

…

I started writing this, scrapped it and started again. I was on a self-imposed gag order about where I was going and what I was doing but I realized by the time I got to sit at my laptop everyone would know. So here I am. Committing memories to the archives. The thing about driving for days is you have a lot of time to think/remember. I have driven 10,000 kilometers over 7 days in the last 18 days. Not including city trips and the quarry.

I wouldn’t have it any other way. My shoulders hurt, I never want to eat at Tim Horton’s again, and I already need another oil change, my 3^rd this August. But I am calm and I am Zen and I am happy.

They say living well is the best revenge. I say no revenge is the best revenge.

The opposite of love is indifference (so pay attention now, I’m standing on your porch screaming out, and I won’t leave until you come downstairs) The Lumineers, Stubborn Love.

Ignore that last part in parenthesis, I refuse to stalk. Maybe I shoulda, but I won’t. Not my thing. Clear invitation or I ain’t coming. Preferably 2 or 3, see above. I am insecure.

I just really like that song and for once I would like someone to stand on my porch and scream my name. It’s been a long hot minute since anyone threw pebbles at my window. It was romantic though if memory serves.

Almost threw pebbles at the aforementioned ‘his’ roommate’s window during a heatwave a couple years back. I said so, jokingly once and he replied, “You could just call you know, you never call or text.” I didn’t. See above where I am insecure and need 1-3 invites to go anywhere.

Where was I going with this?
…
Oh ya. It was weird that I messaged him at all. Hadn’t seen or heard from either of them in a while.

“Are you at home? I feel like swimming.”

“I am, let’s go.”

(later)

“Do you trust me?”

I nodded.

“Put your arms around my neck.”

I can’t remember if I had done this before or if I just watch way too much porn, but DAMN.

He hooked his arms under my knees and lifted me up like I was light as a feather; he was stiff as a board.

OH
MY
GOD

GOODGODDAMN

So where does the revenge come in?

It really doesn’t.

To fully understand we must cross reference with events that occurred in June 2018. A friend, that I am no longer friends with, let’s call her Becel, and I wandered down to the beach for a swim and a tan and came back with an invite to dinner by 2 beautiful men.

The one I liked, liked me and became my summer fling. The other two, not so much.

Mine, I found out later, was engaged to a girl back home, far far away. So I left it and him alone.

My friend in question? That friendship has dissolved in a vat of sulfuric acid, ripped dresses and unpaid bills.

Now usually I carry a lot of gilt for a non-Catholic.

I get more sad than angry. Carry the hurt instead of lashing out and hurting others. And in the grand scheme of things I didn’t hurt anyone. Just got a porn sex, multiple orgasms with a back rub and some good pillow talk karmic reward.

It takes a lot for me to be done with someone, and the two in question…done.

They don’t exist. For a second I felt bad. Like ghosts haunting a perfectly good moment.

And I don’t feel bad about it
It’s exactly what you get
Stop interrupting my grinding*

He didn’t feel bad either.

“I wasn’t really that into her. I always had a bit of a crush on you to be honest.”

I like honest.

“She had way too much attitude for someone so average you know?”

Oh I know.

“I prefer my women beautiful and humble.”

(forehead kiss)

Thanks baby.

“She said if I didn’t message her back I was dead to her.” he laughed.

“You don’t feel dead, nice and warm actually.” He pulled me closer.

I can see clearly looking back that I have a habit of picking the wrong friend when it comes to dating, and life in general.

Flip

Switch.

(*Beyonce)

Once upon a time farm hubby decided we were gonna wait 3 months before we had sex. Like date proper, really get to know each other and see if we actually liked each other.

Okay.

We did, or close, like maybe 2 months and 3 weeks. Good call, by the time we got around to it I was pretty smitten. I mean I stayed for 7 years, mostly, through quite a bit of heinous fuckery most foul. Longest relationship I’ve ever had to date. I would draw a correlation and I still might, but…

We all know what happened there. And truth be told that was a 7 year itchy dry spell. Sex was not a huge part of the relationship, and for me it needs to be. It’s one of my love languages, touch, and it’s a biggun’. It wasn’t one of his, so 3 months of waiting was torture for me and a cakewalk for him.

I’m not generally a waiter. I see someone shiny and vibey and this guttural voice sounds in my head “I want that one.” I think the grunting voice belongs to my vagina and head and heart know better than to argue so they follow along.

Also I have been a practising cougar for a while now. I know better than to try and “date” anyone in their 20’s.
And that 28-32 year old window is a dangerzone where they want kids and wives and no thanks. So ya. Logic and circumstance and my choices dictated everything be casual. And it was, and it was pretty good, amen.

Cruz and I banged on the first date and I woulda put money on never seeing him again, but he kept showing up with flowers and food. He was 25. It didn’t make sense, but it was good for a bit. So there goes that theory.

I kinda fucked up with Young Un the First and wanted a title 4 months in. That was 5 years ago and I had no idea what I was doing. Lesson learned and not to be repeated. He treated me more like a proper girlfriend than most of them, might’ve continued if I hadn’t gotten greedy. I get it now.

I have also been pretty allergic to the idea of being in a traditional relationship. I still have wars in my head about it. There were a couple that seemed viable.

3 in the last 5 years.

One I jumped into bed with pretty quick, like 3 weeks and a handful of dates and it was over pretty quick. No fault on either of our parts, circumstances dictated he had to go away. But maybe…nah, I know what went wrong there.

(Biker Body Pillow reminded me it took me almost a year to get over that one and I almost went back.)

One courted and wooed me for over 2 months intermittently, and in retrospect I shoulda held my ground a bit longer but, he was delicious. King of the Fuckboys come to find out, but delicious. Fuckboys usually are the yummiest of all the snacks. He was my 3^rd round of lightning sex. It’s rare but it happens. It isn’t mystic, I’ve had mystic/cosmic….but he was definitley electric.

And the Last One. I mentioned that he messaged the minute I sat my road weary, traumatized ass on the couch after the 3 day drive back from Newfoundland. I swear he knows things, slightly psychic and the thread is still there. I feel the pull every now and again. He pursued me for a year, like a full calendar year before I agreed to meet him. I flat out refused to fuck him on our first date even though he drove a 10 hour round trip to hang out with me for 6 hours.

Two weeks later he did the drive again and after much discussion about waiting longer, we both had some vodka and caved. Lightning sex round 2. He likes to remind me it was September 22^nd, he remembers everything and yet… He likes to remind me of the fact that he remembers everything too. He was gone by October 6^th, I haven’t forgotten that part.

I don’t think he bailed because we slept together. But maybe… it’s a thing that happens.

But there is proof to the contrary in Giant, who I fucked on the second date, and he was still in my life 2 and a half years later.

Big Spoon also politely and insistently asked me out for a full year. I refused because
1. I’d briefly dated a co-worker of his and
2. because I ended up getting a job where he worked
3. he was really young and
4. a myriad of reasons.
We waited awhile and he is still good to me to this day.

And he was the only one from home who remembered when I was coming back and checked on me. He asked me out proper when I got home. I’m not going, I don’t have time, but it was nice to be asked. It is the one year anniversary of our first date. Facebook memories showed me. But again, young and not viable. He likes to remind me I have spoiled him forever with how I do things. Nah babe, just set the bar higher, I was never his girl.

I am wondering if I will ever be anyone’s girl. I’m wondering if I care.

I am tired of waiting for them to smarten up and realize what they have lost. Time to earn it instead, harder to drop something you had to work for I suppose.

They all love me after I leave and for that I have to be gone and it seems rather counterproductive and really unfair to me.

I have made some decisions and a new rule.

60 days. Be consistent, hang out with me, text and check in and then maybe we will see about the sex part.

I am busy, I have shit to do and I am tired of one night stands.

Next time my princess parts yell out that they ‘want that one’, Ima remind her, good things come to those who wait.

“I knew you weren’t coming back. That boy coulda drop dead at your feet and you woulda have curled up next to his corpse.”

Mark said that. Mark knows pretty much everything ever. And I have to admit this to be the absolute truth.

I am gone.

I’m also not supposed to mention Him, but I have once, in passing, when I was listing off all the things I had to go through, get through, and live through out there. Whoops. His ex did stalk the fuck outta me. These things happened, no point in denying them. Kinda proud of surviving really.

And ya, a fucking lot of it sucked, hard, bad and overwhelmingly. I felt like I was in a boxing match, just hit after hit, but I wasn’t punch drunk…I was actually drunk.

A lot of good happened too.

I saw whales and dolphins.

Funny story actually. My second time whale watching we came back to harbor and there were 4 boys out on seadoos, I felt a little twinge of “I wanna be doing that.” Instead of having to rush home to get to work after having this amazing day. I dismissed the thought as quickly as it came. I didn’t think much of it really, until later that night, when I found out by fluke (give me one pun) that the boy was on one of said seadoos, and it became a metaphor for how things were. I’m over here doing one thing, he’s over there doing another… close but never quite right.

So be it.

I am gone.

I went to the quarry with Mandy today. Had the sunroof open. Coffee, smokes, open road and the music cranked. I haven’t been swimming this year. No wonder I was mega-super-ultra-depressed, surround by water and I never went in past my knees. I fucking live to swim, I was at the quarry 3 days a week last year. Closest I came was walking into Middle Cove with my dress pulled up as far as I could, I wasn’t wearing panties or I woulda tore my clothes off and dived right in. Again, so close.

Speaking of…

As we were driving, I started telling Mandy the story of Mister, and it started a little something like this.

I had a broken car. Mister found me a mechanic, picked me up, took me to get a birthday cake for Lucifer Luu (a girl I worked with) and got me home. Pretty knight in ‘shining’ armor if you ask me.

He then fetched me the next day with coffee and we went for a drive to get the part I needed. He drove this big fuck off diesel pick up that made that amazing rumbling noise that gets me a lil wet, not gonna lie. It was one of the first nice days we had on the rock, I was in a t-shirt and jeans, sipping coffee (he remembered how I take mine, bless him) smoking a Marlboro, country music playing, driving with the windows down and I laughed.

He asked what was funny and I replied “Nothing at all, I am just perfectly happy in this moment.”

And I really was.

“Cute man/boy, big pick up, back roads and country music, good company, good coffee and in this exact moment everything is just fine.”

He smiled so big his eyes crinkled up at the corners.

He thought that was really cool. He thought every fucking thing I did was so fucking cool. Not only did he tell me with sparkles in his eyes and sheer reverence in his voice, he took photos. Wrangling his big dogs and getting them to heel and listen. Walking barefoot everywhere. The way I fuck, the way I look, the way I touch and talk.

I do love when I can be IN those moments.

She said “it’s so cool you can do that.” So we spent the rest of the day doing exactly that, enjoying the moment. Floating, jumping, sunbathing, chatting, making fun of the white kids down the way trying to rap and getting serenaded by so many cicadas.

She asked me to finish the story of Mister on the drive home and I sucked my teeth and chuckled in a cynical way that made her go “Uh oh.”

Ya, uh oh.

I don’t want to go through it yet one more time. I already said it once today. And ya Brandon, I cried.
Every time I scroll through my phone looking for this or that I am reminded of what he said and did…and worse, how I felt. I thought…ha, how many times have I ‘thought’ something that turned out to be bullshit. I thought that maybe, just maybe, I had to go back to that island because there was a man/boy there who thought I was made out of magic. I remember sighing this deep sigh of fucking relief and thinking, “okay, there it is.”

There it wasn’t.

The kicker is, I am made out of magic. I forgot and he reminded me, and I haven’t forgotten since.

So he did serve a purpose, all of it did. All the things I ought not to do. Waiting is on the list, I think it is the list.

Giant said he was sooooooo looking forward to me coming home and stopped messaging me 6 weeks before I got here.
I messaged him a happy birthday and he invited me over.
I am not going over there.
The Last One must have some kind of homing beacon, he messaged my first night home. At least he has some sense of self awareness and said “I know I wasn’t very good to you and you deserved so much more.” No apology, but that’ll do Donkey, that’ll do.
And no we aren’t having lunch.
Hulk wanted me to fly to BC and see him, but something came up, something important to me and I have to see it through.

Not a boy this time, a job. Something I really want.

I had a lot of isolated joyful moments out on that island. Sometimes alone or with the girls. Sometimes at work, the night Smiley and friends came by and treated me like a princess. The night I found the biker with anxiety and we hid in the corner until it was time to leave. The other time I babysat one of the seadoo boys because we were both overwhelmed with the masses out on George Street for the festival. Midnight drive with the Nope. Stolen kisses here and there. Miracle Mondays where me and Tina 2 (now 3) Chains made over a grand. Girls chilling in my clean bedroom, finding time to write, feeding my coworkers and listening to the silence because they loved what I fed them too much to talk.

There IS magic in the little things, and me.

Thanks Mister.

I started today like I start most days. Hit the ‘memories’ option upon ye olde Facebook and go meme hunting for stuff to post on my page. I tend to stop rolling back around 2010 or so, there are no memes beyond that point, and a lot of me blowing sunshine or bitching about farm life.
Fuck I tried to make that look so much prettier than it was, until I didn’t. I was a vicious little cunt at certain points and all of it makes me cringe.

I hate to admit, but I have backslid to some semblance of that girl in the last 6 months. I saw it and I couldn’t necessarily stop it.

But now I have people bashing the place I used to live and I see what I did there.

It was exactly like the moment when I went back to farm hubby one more time and my friend Anna threw up her hands and disowned me forever.
I had never told her one good thing about him. She didn’t understand, how could she?

Scrolling through my memories this very morning, I was given the information that in about a week it will be the 7th anniversary of when I was forcibly liberated from the farm…for the last time.
There was beard ripping and camera smashing and I never went back inside the house after my things were out.
I did end up at the end of the driveway once, holding ex hubby while he sobbed realizing what (he thought) he lost.
I will always be that girl who forgives and kinda basks in the moment they realize what I am, even if it is beyond too late.
I think I did the same thing with Nfld as I did at the farm. Only posted the bad things.
There was a lot of Good.
I had the money to leave that island months ago, and I stayed because I wanted to.
I didn’t get what I wanted exactly. But I wanted the wrong things.
There was honey.

My horoscope a few weeks ago said “Make do with bread and butter until god gives you honey.”

I can’t shake the idea that I was starving myself, waiting for honey. And it did come. But my whole mindset out there was wrong,

I wasn’t there for me you see.

This is going to come out messy. I am rusty. Probably wrote what, like 6 articles in 6 months? Not like me at all. And now my hands are aching to type and I have no time because I have to put my life back together out of boxes and memories.

I have a whole hour because I couldn’t read the time properly on my phone with my blurry morning eyes and thought it was 8. It was 6.

Maybe I am still on that other time zone. My computer is, haven’t changed it. Tiny time warps in my tiny room.

I have an hour.

What do I write about?

I Can’t Believe it’s Not Butter?

198 days

The Long Drive Home

The Last One for the Last Time

Fuck, I don’t even know. So much has happened in a relatively short period of time. I scroll back through my photos and it is the most bizarre thing. So many definitive chapters. This is when he was here, or that one, or those girls were visiting, or Sexy Giraffe was around. There were whales.

I did have an epiphany yesterday sitting in a parking lot in the Hammer, waiting for a song to finish so I could go get my girls a “big bottle of something red and cab savvy” at the lick bo. I was at my worst in Newfoundland, and they all loved me anyways. I have never been so forgiven for all my shortcomings in my life.

My buddy Andrew, who is part of the reason I ended up on that rock in the first place, said

“That’s what I miss the most about St. John’s. Absolutely zero next-day drinker’s remorse, because no matter how bad I got I was NEVER even close to the most fucked up person in the room.
Well, that and how everyone gets bored and fucks everyone else”

I was the worst one in the room a few times, not gonna lie. But I was still forgiven. For sleeping in a pile of blankets when I ought to have been working. When rivers of tears ran down my face like a dam just broke and there was no way to stop them. “How bad do I look right now?” Tina 3 Chains would always tell me the truth. “You came downstairs without a stitch of make up on.”

Its things like that, the evolution of Tina from one chain to 3. The fact that she trusted me with her mother’s ring even though I was a hot mess often.

The evolution of me from hiding in room 1 from Stompy nursing a bruised tailbone and a broken heart. Moving up to 4, having responsibilities and all the keys, and still a busted heart. The comings and goings of girls I just met and loved, girl I knew and didn’t care for, this one leaving that one coming back. It was like summer camp, I just stayed.

There was the realization that my son was grown and didn’t need me anymore do for the first time in over half my life I only had me to look after and I had NO idea how to do that.

There was the Creep chapter. Followed by the Nope…then a good break and Mister showed up. Then the Viking for a minute. With the exception of Nope whose dog I never met, I realized I was more enamoured with the puppers than the men themselves. Almost true.

The realization that I am a horrible hustler and all I did was sit at the bar and wait for something to happen and poured whisky on everything.

There was the moment when I had driven 9 hours to the west side of the island and gotten queued up for the ferry and a big black pick up pulled in behind me and I couldn’t help but keen and wail and the nice Newfie in the SUV ahead of me gave me a Tim Hortons cup with a healthy swig of Jack Daniels so I could calm down enough to go get my pajamas on and wait for the boat to take me away.

There was 2 more days of driving where I saw clearly everything I did wrong and realized, I burned no bridges out there, they are fireproof, almost. That I was loved unconditionally and yes, there was honey.