Every now and then I see this old guy on my tram and it’s obvious that he works for whatever company runs our public transport system now because he’s all decked out in the uniform and all his buttons are shiny and he wears a very official looking conductors cap and I’m pretty certain he would have had to ask for it because not every tram guy has one. He looks like he has been working with trams for the last fifty years, since back when being a tram driver was a career, when there were conductors, when it was a respectable job that came with a uniform and a hat and brass buttons that you shined and the passengers knew your name, back when shit used to mean something.
And it kind of kills me. And don’t get me wrong, I am not nostalgic about a past that I have never experienced, oh no, I am being entirely selfish in my effected sadness. It kills me because I am thirty years old and all that I know how to do is work a cash register and say ‘Hi, how you going?’ in a way that makes everybody in the room want to kill themselves. I’m thirty, I work in retail, I have a twitter account called Masturbation Blues and I think that pretty much says it all really.
I don’t even know where I was going with this. White persons problems. The usual Will I lose my job and am I competent enough to find another one, what skills do I have, if any, that would allow me to live my life but perhaps of a slightly higher standard, is it even necessary? When you compare my life to say, that of an infant in some malaria stricken village in Africa, sure, I’ve got it pretty good but that doesn’t stop me from wanting nicer things.
Am I what’s wrong with the world? I am the unsatisfied youth that is youth no longer. I am neither satisfied nor dissatisfied. I am unhappy, belligerent and complacent but not outwardly so. I never got what I was promised as a child so I want it all now even though I’ll never have it. It sucks and I blame the media and anything else within reach because that what we do now. I’m like this because that happened, it’s got nothing to do with the fact that I am naturally a total arsehole and indeed excel at being one.
I’m getting off track. I guess what I’m trying to say is that now that I'm thirty I'm beginning to feel like a man repenting on his deathbed, in the sense that if I don’t do something now then later will suck even worse, you know? Only, he’s worried about the after-life and I’m worried about being homeless when I’m fifty and then being recognised by someone whom I was a prick to. I think it’s a fear we all have.
Tuesday, August 23, 2011
Wednesday, June 8, 2011
Anchor point.
My boss is dying. Right now he’s lying in his house and going through the last stages of aggressive brain cancer. Surrounded by his family he is breathing his last breaths and I am heating a burrito.
This is surreal to say the least.
We had a staff meeting at work today and were told that he had only days left, that the company had been sold and that there would be a take over by a larger company whose job it is is to eat other smaller companies. None of this matters.
When I think of my boss dying I think of an old king dying on the throne, only he wasn’t old. He’s only ten years older than me.
It’s so fucking weird and sad and scary. There is nothing that anyone can do. How many words can you say, are awkward gestures and silence a substitute?
I can’t stop thinking about it, its like an avalanche. I have no anchor point, I am buffeted by thoughts and emotions and before I can even deal with them more come. I can’t think straight, I found myself singing ‘who let the dogs out’ for no apparent reason and I keep shaking my head as if to clear it.
I wonder how I will sleep tonight. Probably ok. And the thought of that kills me. Should I be wailing, gnashing my teeth, should I be driven mad by grief and pounding at my breast? I haven’t cried. I probably won't, although it would be nice to.
When I think about going into the store tomorrow I will be all the more aware of everything around me. Everything that is there he designed and built, standing at the counter I will say to myself, ‘He put this here”.
It will seem very empty for a long time.
When I was transferring my burrito from the tray to my plate I was so absent that I grabbed the hot tray with my bare hand. My mind is elsewhere at the moment.
I am going to miss him.
This is surreal to say the least.
We had a staff meeting at work today and were told that he had only days left, that the company had been sold and that there would be a take over by a larger company whose job it is is to eat other smaller companies. None of this matters.
When I think of my boss dying I think of an old king dying on the throne, only he wasn’t old. He’s only ten years older than me.
It’s so fucking weird and sad and scary. There is nothing that anyone can do. How many words can you say, are awkward gestures and silence a substitute?
I can’t stop thinking about it, its like an avalanche. I have no anchor point, I am buffeted by thoughts and emotions and before I can even deal with them more come. I can’t think straight, I found myself singing ‘who let the dogs out’ for no apparent reason and I keep shaking my head as if to clear it.
I wonder how I will sleep tonight. Probably ok. And the thought of that kills me. Should I be wailing, gnashing my teeth, should I be driven mad by grief and pounding at my breast? I haven’t cried. I probably won't, although it would be nice to.
When I think about going into the store tomorrow I will be all the more aware of everything around me. Everything that is there he designed and built, standing at the counter I will say to myself, ‘He put this here”.
It will seem very empty for a long time.
When I was transferring my burrito from the tray to my plate I was so absent that I grabbed the hot tray with my bare hand. My mind is elsewhere at the moment.
I am going to miss him.
Thursday, December 16, 2010
Things that I will miss: A year in review.
My Headaches.
This year I have had about 4 of my cluster headaches and none of them have lasted more than a few hours. No month long cycles, no waking up in agony and throwing up, no ice packs at midnight, no stumbling to work only to collapse in a chair, no shaking, no puffy face and a desperate need for caffeine, no wondering if this is it, if perhaps this is when I finally call time out and make sure that I can never suffer again, no planning my own death and wondering if I will need a will or if a few scribbled lines can suffice.
And god damn it if I don't miss them. Sometimes I think that I can feel them coming and I sort of look forward to it, I think this is it, no doubt, in a few hours I will be sitting up in bed with my legs twitching waiting for that golden moment when the pain eclipses everything else and then starts to fade, that glorious moment where they have peaked and have started to subside, the sweat cooling on my body as relief floods over me like a sunrise, where the three hours sleep that I will get will be sweeter than any sleep that I have ever had.
As much as I hate them they are like some terrible lover that has left me, perhaps never to return, perhaps she will be back next week. Her embrace drains me and leaves me limp and shivering. I have had lovers that have drained me completely and left me exhausted but none have left me with the feeling of relief that I get when she leaves me. She is terrifying and comforting all at the same time, beautiful and vicious, awful and awe inspiring. As much as I wish that I had never met her, I worry that without her I am nothing. I miss her, I love her and I hope to god that I never see her again.
Miss Mary Jane.
She is another lover who has kept me warm and safe and solitary. Hers is an embrace which helps keep me isolated but in an entirely different way. When I am with her I can be alone in a room full of people, I can ostracize myself from my best friends and only regret it until she enters the room again. When I am with her she is the only thing that I will ever need, when I am away from her I know the she is the last thing in the world that I require.
We have been broken up for nearly six months now but I can not deny that I have fallen into the age old trap of sleeping with the ex. Her touch is tender like no others, insidious and addictive. She has been a part of my life for so long that I can't imagine what my life would be like without her. I have this unfortunate feeling that she will always be around, lurking at the edge of my sub-consciousness, she is the booty call that always answers, the lover that never refuses, she takes more than she can ever give and I am prone to weakness and have nothing left to lose.
In reality.
This year the only lovers that I have had have been loss, regret, addiction and despair and not once has any of them told me that they loved me. Not once have we lain in bed whispering sweet nothings to each other, not once have they leaned over and run their fingers through my hair and told me that there is no place that they'd rather be, not once have I looked them in the eye and thought 'I could die happy now'. They fill me only with empty space in the same way that the distances between planets is what makes the solar system the lonely cold and desolate place that it is.
This year I have had about 4 of my cluster headaches and none of them have lasted more than a few hours. No month long cycles, no waking up in agony and throwing up, no ice packs at midnight, no stumbling to work only to collapse in a chair, no shaking, no puffy face and a desperate need for caffeine, no wondering if this is it, if perhaps this is when I finally call time out and make sure that I can never suffer again, no planning my own death and wondering if I will need a will or if a few scribbled lines can suffice.
And god damn it if I don't miss them. Sometimes I think that I can feel them coming and I sort of look forward to it, I think this is it, no doubt, in a few hours I will be sitting up in bed with my legs twitching waiting for that golden moment when the pain eclipses everything else and then starts to fade, that glorious moment where they have peaked and have started to subside, the sweat cooling on my body as relief floods over me like a sunrise, where the three hours sleep that I will get will be sweeter than any sleep that I have ever had.
As much as I hate them they are like some terrible lover that has left me, perhaps never to return, perhaps she will be back next week. Her embrace drains me and leaves me limp and shivering. I have had lovers that have drained me completely and left me exhausted but none have left me with the feeling of relief that I get when she leaves me. She is terrifying and comforting all at the same time, beautiful and vicious, awful and awe inspiring. As much as I wish that I had never met her, I worry that without her I am nothing. I miss her, I love her and I hope to god that I never see her again.
Miss Mary Jane.
She is another lover who has kept me warm and safe and solitary. Hers is an embrace which helps keep me isolated but in an entirely different way. When I am with her I can be alone in a room full of people, I can ostracize myself from my best friends and only regret it until she enters the room again. When I am with her she is the only thing that I will ever need, when I am away from her I know the she is the last thing in the world that I require.
We have been broken up for nearly six months now but I can not deny that I have fallen into the age old trap of sleeping with the ex. Her touch is tender like no others, insidious and addictive. She has been a part of my life for so long that I can't imagine what my life would be like without her. I have this unfortunate feeling that she will always be around, lurking at the edge of my sub-consciousness, she is the booty call that always answers, the lover that never refuses, she takes more than she can ever give and I am prone to weakness and have nothing left to lose.
In reality.
This year the only lovers that I have had have been loss, regret, addiction and despair and not once has any of them told me that they loved me. Not once have we lain in bed whispering sweet nothings to each other, not once have they leaned over and run their fingers through my hair and told me that there is no place that they'd rather be, not once have I looked them in the eye and thought 'I could die happy now'. They fill me only with empty space in the same way that the distances between planets is what makes the solar system the lonely cold and desolate place that it is.
Monday, September 13, 2010
Thy father who art in a hell that he created for himself and in my opinion fucking deserves it.
I ran into my biological father the other day while I was at the supermarket showing my new house mate around. Wow, talk about awkward. I didn't introduce them to each other because I didn't think it would be worth it. What would I say, "House mate, this is my estranged father, estranged father this is my house mate. I hope you never meet again because then it will mean that I will have seen the estranged father again and I'm just not comfortable with that. It is nothing against you, house mate, and trust me when I say that you would be better off not knowing him".
It was awkward man, it was weird. He kept asking me questions, like where I was living and where I worked and I was not inclined to tell him on the off chance that he would just turn up one day. I do not think that he has anywhere to live and as much as it pains me as a person, I could not offer him my couch because I would rather that he slept out in the cold. That way he might get pneumonia and die, and then we would all be rid of him. He is a bitter and angry man and desperately unhappy and to tell you the truth it lightens my soul to know this.
My childhood memories of him include him pacing, walking for hours for whatever reason be it collecting money he'd loaned to people or more likely, collecting money people had loaned to him and me, crying and unable to understand why he was so angry at everything. Him swearing under his breath, telling me to hurry the fuck up.
I regularly give money to one of the many homeless junkies in my area, not because I want to support his habit but because he is nice. He says please and thank you and seems to be almost embarrassed to ask for spare change. When he smiles at me he makes me feel like I have done something right, even if what I'm doing is helping a man kill himself, slowly, day by day. I would not offer my father any money because he's the sort of person that would resent being given anything. But he would take it just the same and utter false promises to pay it back, but never would.
My father is grey and gaunt like a junkie, his teeth are black stumps and his hair is long and greasy. His eyes are cruel and sharp and despise everything that they see, they are jealous of people who worked hard for what they have and people who haven't worked at all. I don't know if he's ever held down a proper job, he is a musician and used to work in the film industry. Apparently he was good at what he did but fell out of favour because of his toxic personality.
Sometimes I meet people who have never met their fathers and sometimes I envy them, I have met mine and what's worse, I know exactly what sort of person he is. I am sometimes ashamed to be of the same blood of him.
Another one of my child hood memories is being told to stay in the lounge room with my sister while my mother and father fought and when the noise got too much I remember rushing in to find her pinned up against a wall, his hand around her throat, one hand cocked back ready to strike her. I remember punching him in the balls to get him off her. Later, one of his friends tried to tell me that you should never hit a man 'there' but they never once mentioned that you should never hit a woman. No one ever mentioned it to my father either, and if they did, it never stopped him.
I have never wanted to kick the shit out of anyone so vehemently as I have my father. I used to think that one day it would end with a show down between the two of us and I would kill him, strangle him with my bare hands or maybe stove his head in with a brick but this is not how it will end. It will end with me at his funeral trying to suppress a smile, the only reason I will be there will be to watch his coffin get lowered into the ground so that I can be certain that he is dead.
In the supermarket he must have sensed how much I did not want to speak to him, it took him a few minutes but he seemed to get it in the end. He kept picking things out of my basket and asking me about them, "Is this the soap you use?" he'd ask and I would reply with one word answers, not giving anything away, not giving an inch. We parted, he arm raised slightly like would try and shake my hand but he must have realised that I would not. I realised this might be the last time I saw him alive but I did not care. A look of hurt flashed briefly in his eyes, hurt and regret. It was not enough and never would be.
He does not realise but he has given me a gift and that gift is hate. Hatred for him, hatred for everything that he stands for, hatred for everything that he ever was and has ever done. This is a gift that will burn with a biblical intensity and last just a bit longer than he will, when he is gone it will burn out and and with it will burn the part of my soul that he inhabited and leave it clean and new like fresh tissue, tender and young, ready to be used again for something else, something new, ready to grow again and cover what was once a wound. It will free up that part of my heart that was once reserved only for anger, free it up to be used for something beautiful, something wonderful, something pure and untainted, like grass grows after a bush fire, new green shoots pushing up through the blackened earth.
It was awkward man, it was weird. He kept asking me questions, like where I was living and where I worked and I was not inclined to tell him on the off chance that he would just turn up one day. I do not think that he has anywhere to live and as much as it pains me as a person, I could not offer him my couch because I would rather that he slept out in the cold. That way he might get pneumonia and die, and then we would all be rid of him. He is a bitter and angry man and desperately unhappy and to tell you the truth it lightens my soul to know this.
My childhood memories of him include him pacing, walking for hours for whatever reason be it collecting money he'd loaned to people or more likely, collecting money people had loaned to him and me, crying and unable to understand why he was so angry at everything. Him swearing under his breath, telling me to hurry the fuck up.
I regularly give money to one of the many homeless junkies in my area, not because I want to support his habit but because he is nice. He says please and thank you and seems to be almost embarrassed to ask for spare change. When he smiles at me he makes me feel like I have done something right, even if what I'm doing is helping a man kill himself, slowly, day by day. I would not offer my father any money because he's the sort of person that would resent being given anything. But he would take it just the same and utter false promises to pay it back, but never would.
My father is grey and gaunt like a junkie, his teeth are black stumps and his hair is long and greasy. His eyes are cruel and sharp and despise everything that they see, they are jealous of people who worked hard for what they have and people who haven't worked at all. I don't know if he's ever held down a proper job, he is a musician and used to work in the film industry. Apparently he was good at what he did but fell out of favour because of his toxic personality.
Sometimes I meet people who have never met their fathers and sometimes I envy them, I have met mine and what's worse, I know exactly what sort of person he is. I am sometimes ashamed to be of the same blood of him.
Another one of my child hood memories is being told to stay in the lounge room with my sister while my mother and father fought and when the noise got too much I remember rushing in to find her pinned up against a wall, his hand around her throat, one hand cocked back ready to strike her. I remember punching him in the balls to get him off her. Later, one of his friends tried to tell me that you should never hit a man 'there' but they never once mentioned that you should never hit a woman. No one ever mentioned it to my father either, and if they did, it never stopped him.
I have never wanted to kick the shit out of anyone so vehemently as I have my father. I used to think that one day it would end with a show down between the two of us and I would kill him, strangle him with my bare hands or maybe stove his head in with a brick but this is not how it will end. It will end with me at his funeral trying to suppress a smile, the only reason I will be there will be to watch his coffin get lowered into the ground so that I can be certain that he is dead.
In the supermarket he must have sensed how much I did not want to speak to him, it took him a few minutes but he seemed to get it in the end. He kept picking things out of my basket and asking me about them, "Is this the soap you use?" he'd ask and I would reply with one word answers, not giving anything away, not giving an inch. We parted, he arm raised slightly like would try and shake my hand but he must have realised that I would not. I realised this might be the last time I saw him alive but I did not care. A look of hurt flashed briefly in his eyes, hurt and regret. It was not enough and never would be.
He does not realise but he has given me a gift and that gift is hate. Hatred for him, hatred for everything that he stands for, hatred for everything that he ever was and has ever done. This is a gift that will burn with a biblical intensity and last just a bit longer than he will, when he is gone it will burn out and and with it will burn the part of my soul that he inhabited and leave it clean and new like fresh tissue, tender and young, ready to be used again for something else, something new, ready to grow again and cover what was once a wound. It will free up that part of my heart that was once reserved only for anger, free it up to be used for something beautiful, something wonderful, something pure and untainted, like grass grows after a bush fire, new green shoots pushing up through the blackened earth.
Tuesday, August 17, 2010
Omaha
Here come
Omaha,
Hot now
I got,
Hot hair hot eyes, high tits hot mouth.
Misheard lyrics from the song Omaha by Tapes n Tapes.
To use a time worn cliché' this girls skin is like milk. Spun silk, a spiders web, a gossamer thread. Her hands are chapped and rough in her eyes is an innocence that only exists for a short time before the fires of life burn it out. I know, because I've seen it before.
She tells me that she hates when people look at her 'like that', which I find strange, because she is so outrageously beautiful that she must get it all the time. I honestly don't see how men would look at her any other way and I don't know how she doesn't see me looking at her like that. I swear, if my eyes had teeth they jump right out of my head and devour her.
Is it the essence of youth that I find so appealing, is it the unblemished skin or that churlish giggle that makes me wonder what her mouth would taste like, is it the way that she holds the hot water bottles I make her, is it because I have not lived with a women for so long that I forgot how the bathroom smells after they have showered, the heady smell of steam and shampoo. Is it all of those things and plus lust as well.
We seem to be playing that game where she says that she is fat and that she used to be perfect and then I take my cue and tell here that she is not fat and that as of now she is as perfect as she could get. She does not understand that some people would kill for those long limber limbs, that her body is the envy of almost every woman on the street, that older men see her and sigh and remember what is used to be like when they were young and that in fact girls like her are the very thing that they miss the most.
She makes me nostalgic for times that I never even had, makes me wish that I had more experiences when I was a teenager, makes me hungry in ways that can not be described but only felt. She makes me feel like I remember my time as a teenager with unblemished psyche and shoulders free of responsibilities.
She tells me that she is cold at night and I can only bite my lip and try not to mention that I could warm her, I long to suggest that she crawl with me into my bed because what if she accepts, what would I do then? Beside then have to spend the night desperately resisting the urge to fuck her. And I don't think that I could hold out that long.
I imagine her biting her lip as her pubic hair rubs against my chin, I wonder what it would be like to have her lay her hand gently on my head and then pull my hair as she climaxes. I wonder if I deserve it or whether she is a young mans game and I would be taking advantage of her trust and naivety. The thought crosses my mind that I may be holding myself back for no reason other than so I can say 'Look at how in control and mature I am', which is exactly the same thing that I'd say if I let myself go.
Let me admit that I want to fuck her more than anything in the world. I did not think it possible and the more that I realize that I probably never will the more it burns. See what I did there, used the word 'probably', I think its probably a form of denial. We were talking earlier and she flinched at the word 'vagina' and said 'ew' when we said anus. I wonder what she'd do if I told her that I wanted to taste both of those parts of her.
I have never met anyone so straight that I have wanted to bend so badly. Bend her morals, bend her will, bend her over.
I am being vulgar and I need not be. I could talk about her skin, how its white and smooth like cream. About how when she blushes the contrast between the pink and the pale makes me think of what she'd look like flushed with excitement, short of breath and pupils dilated, the tip of her index finger resting on her lips, eyes screwed tight and fluttering.
Goddamn it, I'm doing it again. I turn into a wolf when I am around her and see her only as my prey. My teeth grow long and my pelt grows grey. I stalk the ground around her looking for any sign of weakness, an opening in which I can insert my snout, any hole in the fence or gap in the wall in which I can drag her through, leaving behind only feathers and traces of blood.
Everyone says that I should get her drunk but I wonder if that will even work, she's almost straight edge. What if I awaken a beast within her that ravages menfolk for miles around, would I be proud, ashamed or indifferent? Would I be happy knowing that she could use her powers of sex over men, would I cringe in the night worrying that she would be out there somewhere being penetrated by some undeserving hipster, scared that her scary unbalanced sex worker friends might turn her out as it were. I imagine her in a club turning around and some guy asking her to bend over so that he can look at her asshole.
I am crazy and without boundaries and without reason, there is no limit to the depths in which my mind will sink and with it no limit to the discomfort it causes me. I once said that no girl really has a good losing her virginity story and I want to be her terrible story that she tells. The only thing I'll fuck is myself and the only thing I'll ravage is my sanity.
Omaha,
Hot now
I got,
Hot hair hot eyes, high tits hot mouth.
Misheard lyrics from the song Omaha by Tapes n Tapes.
To use a time worn cliché' this girls skin is like milk. Spun silk, a spiders web, a gossamer thread. Her hands are chapped and rough in her eyes is an innocence that only exists for a short time before the fires of life burn it out. I know, because I've seen it before.
She tells me that she hates when people look at her 'like that', which I find strange, because she is so outrageously beautiful that she must get it all the time. I honestly don't see how men would look at her any other way and I don't know how she doesn't see me looking at her like that. I swear, if my eyes had teeth they jump right out of my head and devour her.
Is it the essence of youth that I find so appealing, is it the unblemished skin or that churlish giggle that makes me wonder what her mouth would taste like, is it the way that she holds the hot water bottles I make her, is it because I have not lived with a women for so long that I forgot how the bathroom smells after they have showered, the heady smell of steam and shampoo. Is it all of those things and plus lust as well.
We seem to be playing that game where she says that she is fat and that she used to be perfect and then I take my cue and tell here that she is not fat and that as of now she is as perfect as she could get. She does not understand that some people would kill for those long limber limbs, that her body is the envy of almost every woman on the street, that older men see her and sigh and remember what is used to be like when they were young and that in fact girls like her are the very thing that they miss the most.
She makes me nostalgic for times that I never even had, makes me wish that I had more experiences when I was a teenager, makes me hungry in ways that can not be described but only felt. She makes me feel like I remember my time as a teenager with unblemished psyche and shoulders free of responsibilities.
She tells me that she is cold at night and I can only bite my lip and try not to mention that I could warm her, I long to suggest that she crawl with me into my bed because what if she accepts, what would I do then? Beside then have to spend the night desperately resisting the urge to fuck her. And I don't think that I could hold out that long.
I imagine her biting her lip as her pubic hair rubs against my chin, I wonder what it would be like to have her lay her hand gently on my head and then pull my hair as she climaxes. I wonder if I deserve it or whether she is a young mans game and I would be taking advantage of her trust and naivety. The thought crosses my mind that I may be holding myself back for no reason other than so I can say 'Look at how in control and mature I am', which is exactly the same thing that I'd say if I let myself go.
Let me admit that I want to fuck her more than anything in the world. I did not think it possible and the more that I realize that I probably never will the more it burns. See what I did there, used the word 'probably', I think its probably a form of denial. We were talking earlier and she flinched at the word 'vagina' and said 'ew' when we said anus. I wonder what she'd do if I told her that I wanted to taste both of those parts of her.
I have never met anyone so straight that I have wanted to bend so badly. Bend her morals, bend her will, bend her over.
I am being vulgar and I need not be. I could talk about her skin, how its white and smooth like cream. About how when she blushes the contrast between the pink and the pale makes me think of what she'd look like flushed with excitement, short of breath and pupils dilated, the tip of her index finger resting on her lips, eyes screwed tight and fluttering.
Goddamn it, I'm doing it again. I turn into a wolf when I am around her and see her only as my prey. My teeth grow long and my pelt grows grey. I stalk the ground around her looking for any sign of weakness, an opening in which I can insert my snout, any hole in the fence or gap in the wall in which I can drag her through, leaving behind only feathers and traces of blood.
Everyone says that I should get her drunk but I wonder if that will even work, she's almost straight edge. What if I awaken a beast within her that ravages menfolk for miles around, would I be proud, ashamed or indifferent? Would I be happy knowing that she could use her powers of sex over men, would I cringe in the night worrying that she would be out there somewhere being penetrated by some undeserving hipster, scared that her scary unbalanced sex worker friends might turn her out as it were. I imagine her in a club turning around and some guy asking her to bend over so that he can look at her asshole.
I am crazy and without boundaries and without reason, there is no limit to the depths in which my mind will sink and with it no limit to the discomfort it causes me. I once said that no girl really has a good losing her virginity story and I want to be her terrible story that she tells. The only thing I'll fuck is myself and the only thing I'll ravage is my sanity.
Monday, August 2, 2010
My secret girlfriend.
I'm stuck in a relationship that I've been in, off and on, more on than off, for the last ten years. Its passive aggressive and terribly self destructive and I can't see myself getting out anytime soon. I love her but I hate her at the same time. She has made me complacent with my life where as I need a partner that pushes me to be all that I can be. She has convinced me that what I do is good enough and that there is no point in trying for anything better. We spend the weekends on the couch, we hardly ever go anywhere and when we do, even if its something as normal as a party, it wears us out and we can generally only stay for a few hours at the most. We don't do drugs and we don't drink so it seems that nothing really exciting happens in our lives unless we make it happen, and my baby, Mary-Jane, doesn't seem to want that. We are so wrapped up in each other that our grip on the outside world and our perceptions of reality are tenuous at best.
Tonight though, I am wrapped in her loving embrace so I can hardly think of anything bad to say about her, but tomorrow I know I will curse her presence and wish for a life without her. But I will do nothing about it because I am trapped, a slave to her and everything that comes with her. Such a sense of security, as fragile as it is, so warm and loving when needed, comforting and calming, reliable. She fills the empty places inside me and helps keep the night from braying in. I mean, I think she does. I've spent so long with her that to be honest, I can hardly tell anymore. Perhaps she is the creature in the night, the reason I sleep funny, the reason I get uncomfortable in crowds. She has distracted me so much that I can't even finish this properly.
I wrote this a few months ago, 3 and a half to be exact, and we've been broken up for about two of those months now. I feel great. I saw her on the weekend for the first time and we spent some time together. I don't know how I feel about it. It was nice to see her, I can't deny, but she bought up some old memories that I'm not keen to relive. I think it was a mistake to see her, on reflection, because now that we are apart she calls to me. And it would be the perfect time to see her, you know, there's new episodes of Cops on and later there is new Entourage. If I see her tonight, then I'll definitely want to see her tomorrow, and then the day after that and the day after that and so on and so forth. You know how it is, just a little at first and then a little won't do so a little gets more and more, to quote Guns and Roses. I would like to be strong, but I am unsure how long I can last. "Just a little" she whispers, "one or two tokes won't hurt". Her voice is alluring and her embrace, to be honest, just can't be beat. She comforts me when there is nothing to be comforted about, but the feeling of insulation she provides is better than any bullet proof vest.
On the positive side, I'm feeling a lot more stable mentally without her. I'm not up and down like a roller coaster, I don't wake up feeling like I've been hit in the head with a mallet, I can remember what happened yesterday and where I was last week. Not with the greatest of clarity, I'll admit, but things are a lot clearer. I have this thing now called focus which is very weird for me, I mean, I sort of have a life plan now. There are things that I want that are no longer just vague outlines, I am no longer just reaching for things that I could never reach and then being unjustly disappointed. True, I've hardly written a word since we broke up, but I honestly feel like nothing has happened that's been worth writing about. Every little thing does not seem to make itself into something that its not. Things make sense and don't confuse me as easily. I can remember people names and faces and every trip outside is not some huge adventure. Everyday things are not confronting and I can almost see how everyone else sees the world.
It sucks, but its better than faking everything and being wrapped in uncertainty.
Oh yeah, and did I mention the dreams? I am dreaming more now than I ever have in my life. But that's a whole other story for a whole other time.
Tonight though, I am wrapped in her loving embrace so I can hardly think of anything bad to say about her, but tomorrow I know I will curse her presence and wish for a life without her. But I will do nothing about it because I am trapped, a slave to her and everything that comes with her. Such a sense of security, as fragile as it is, so warm and loving when needed, comforting and calming, reliable. She fills the empty places inside me and helps keep the night from braying in. I mean, I think she does. I've spent so long with her that to be honest, I can hardly tell anymore. Perhaps she is the creature in the night, the reason I sleep funny, the reason I get uncomfortable in crowds. She has distracted me so much that I can't even finish this properly.
I wrote this a few months ago, 3 and a half to be exact, and we've been broken up for about two of those months now. I feel great. I saw her on the weekend for the first time and we spent some time together. I don't know how I feel about it. It was nice to see her, I can't deny, but she bought up some old memories that I'm not keen to relive. I think it was a mistake to see her, on reflection, because now that we are apart she calls to me. And it would be the perfect time to see her, you know, there's new episodes of Cops on and later there is new Entourage. If I see her tonight, then I'll definitely want to see her tomorrow, and then the day after that and the day after that and so on and so forth. You know how it is, just a little at first and then a little won't do so a little gets more and more, to quote Guns and Roses. I would like to be strong, but I am unsure how long I can last. "Just a little" she whispers, "one or two tokes won't hurt". Her voice is alluring and her embrace, to be honest, just can't be beat. She comforts me when there is nothing to be comforted about, but the feeling of insulation she provides is better than any bullet proof vest.
On the positive side, I'm feeling a lot more stable mentally without her. I'm not up and down like a roller coaster, I don't wake up feeling like I've been hit in the head with a mallet, I can remember what happened yesterday and where I was last week. Not with the greatest of clarity, I'll admit, but things are a lot clearer. I have this thing now called focus which is very weird for me, I mean, I sort of have a life plan now. There are things that I want that are no longer just vague outlines, I am no longer just reaching for things that I could never reach and then being unjustly disappointed. True, I've hardly written a word since we broke up, but I honestly feel like nothing has happened that's been worth writing about. Every little thing does not seem to make itself into something that its not. Things make sense and don't confuse me as easily. I can remember people names and faces and every trip outside is not some huge adventure. Everyday things are not confronting and I can almost see how everyone else sees the world.
It sucks, but its better than faking everything and being wrapped in uncertainty.
Oh yeah, and did I mention the dreams? I am dreaming more now than I ever have in my life. But that's a whole other story for a whole other time.
Monday, June 7, 2010
The gentle executioner.
I was recently in the country at my parents house celebrating my step-fathers birthday. I have tried to write about my time in the country before but whenever I do I find that whatever I have to say is boring and stilted and to be honest, it really is because nothing seems to happen in the country when I'm hanging out with my parents. It's a nice time, we do nice things, we might go for a nice drive, we might go for a nice meal, visit a pleasant little country market or a garage sale or two, drink cups of tea and smoke joints as we walk around the garden. It's lovely and I love it, but it is no way exciting and that is exactly what I like about it.
Although it can be very interesting. Things happen, but they seem to blend into everything and do not seem bizarre or out of the ordinary when sometimes, they really are. The 'Easter fair Dancing in the Street' for example, when they block off the main street with a truck and a guy with a sound system gets up and takes everybody through every popular dance routine that has ever existed, ever, and all the kids dance and all the adults drink and the whole town turns out and its really quite a scene come to think of it, you should check it out some time. I'd give you a blow by blow run down of what happens but its far too awesome to ever truly describe. Imagine hay bales and flannelet and 200 people doing Grease lightning, The Nutbush and the Macarena, drunk and badly. Wow, just thinking about it is blowing my mind.
But there's other stuff too, like how on my step-fathers birthday we did out traditional have a cup of tea and then walk around the garden when we found that the sparrow trap had caught some sparrows and then what came after.
Fist off, let me try and describe the weather, I have never been to the moors in Scotland but I imagine that they are like this. It wasn’t quite a drizzle and it wasn’t quite a mist (later I asked my step-father if there was a word to describe and he said it was a “drizzly mist” so, you know, thanks for that). How do I give you the impression of just how beautiful it was. I know, how about this? You know when you go outside and there seems to be moisture in the air but you don’t get wet and then a few minutes later you realize that moisture is collecting at the end of all your hairs and that all the loose fibers on your clothes are now adorned with a shiny new drop. It’s the kind of weather where if you were with someone you loved you would turn to them and notice that all the moisture is collecting at the end of their eye lashes and making them sparkle and you’d say to yourself “I’ll remember this for ever” and you would. It was that kind of weather. Beautiful, poignant and life affirming and all the plants glistened and shone like they were in a commercial photo shoot. The air was almost grey, but it was stunning, the temperature was just above bracing, crisp, but not cold.
Anyway, so we had drunk our tea and were walking around the garden smoking a joint. I had not been smoking any weed for a while so the beauty was flowing in and the pot heightened the experience no end. My parents ducks', Agnes and Madeline, were following us around. Presently we found ourselves down the back of their property where the ducks have their pen and where, at the moment, my folks were keeping their sparrow trap.
They have a sparrow trap because they don't like sparrows because they are over breeding and are threatening some of the local populations of bird life. The trap itself is a big cage with a trap door that they fly into but then can't fly out of. Four had flown in, and as it was meant, they were now trapped.
My step father went to get a plastic bag while I stood around and tried to help my mother scare the sparrows into one end of the trap. Presently my stepfather arrived and began reaching into the cage and grabbing the sparrows and stuffing them into the plastic bag. It sounds horrible and cruel but in fact he was gentle and calm, trying as hard as he could not to hurt them and was cooing at them, trying to calm them. 'Easy little fella', he'd say, 'You exhausted aren't you?' Soon he had all four in the bag so we reset the trap and walked up towards where the cars were parked. My mother suggested that we go and see of the corn in the veggie garden was ready to be picked while my stepfather started one of the cars and held the plastic bag of sparrows over the exhaust pipe. In about two minutes they were dead from carbon-monoxide poisoning. It was quick, clean and efficient.
He emptied the bag of now dead sparrows into the compost and we picked the corn.
The ducks followed us everywhere and they watched us the entire time. I couldn't help but wonder what they thought of it all.
The next morning I woke up to discover that my nephew had survived quite a serious car accident and we spent some time at the police station before we all went out to lunch. I'm not even close to joking.
And here's me saying that nothing ever happens in the country.
Although it can be very interesting. Things happen, but they seem to blend into everything and do not seem bizarre or out of the ordinary when sometimes, they really are. The 'Easter fair Dancing in the Street' for example, when they block off the main street with a truck and a guy with a sound system gets up and takes everybody through every popular dance routine that has ever existed, ever, and all the kids dance and all the adults drink and the whole town turns out and its really quite a scene come to think of it, you should check it out some time. I'd give you a blow by blow run down of what happens but its far too awesome to ever truly describe. Imagine hay bales and flannelet and 200 people doing Grease lightning, The Nutbush and the Macarena, drunk and badly. Wow, just thinking about it is blowing my mind.
But there's other stuff too, like how on my step-fathers birthday we did out traditional have a cup of tea and then walk around the garden when we found that the sparrow trap had caught some sparrows and then what came after.
Fist off, let me try and describe the weather, I have never been to the moors in Scotland but I imagine that they are like this. It wasn’t quite a drizzle and it wasn’t quite a mist (later I asked my step-father if there was a word to describe and he said it was a “drizzly mist” so, you know, thanks for that). How do I give you the impression of just how beautiful it was. I know, how about this? You know when you go outside and there seems to be moisture in the air but you don’t get wet and then a few minutes later you realize that moisture is collecting at the end of all your hairs and that all the loose fibers on your clothes are now adorned with a shiny new drop. It’s the kind of weather where if you were with someone you loved you would turn to them and notice that all the moisture is collecting at the end of their eye lashes and making them sparkle and you’d say to yourself “I’ll remember this for ever” and you would. It was that kind of weather. Beautiful, poignant and life affirming and all the plants glistened and shone like they were in a commercial photo shoot. The air was almost grey, but it was stunning, the temperature was just above bracing, crisp, but not cold.
Anyway, so we had drunk our tea and were walking around the garden smoking a joint. I had not been smoking any weed for a while so the beauty was flowing in and the pot heightened the experience no end. My parents ducks', Agnes and Madeline, were following us around. Presently we found ourselves down the back of their property where the ducks have their pen and where, at the moment, my folks were keeping their sparrow trap.
They have a sparrow trap because they don't like sparrows because they are over breeding and are threatening some of the local populations of bird life. The trap itself is a big cage with a trap door that they fly into but then can't fly out of. Four had flown in, and as it was meant, they were now trapped.
My step father went to get a plastic bag while I stood around and tried to help my mother scare the sparrows into one end of the trap. Presently my stepfather arrived and began reaching into the cage and grabbing the sparrows and stuffing them into the plastic bag. It sounds horrible and cruel but in fact he was gentle and calm, trying as hard as he could not to hurt them and was cooing at them, trying to calm them. 'Easy little fella', he'd say, 'You exhausted aren't you?' Soon he had all four in the bag so we reset the trap and walked up towards where the cars were parked. My mother suggested that we go and see of the corn in the veggie garden was ready to be picked while my stepfather started one of the cars and held the plastic bag of sparrows over the exhaust pipe. In about two minutes they were dead from carbon-monoxide poisoning. It was quick, clean and efficient.
He emptied the bag of now dead sparrows into the compost and we picked the corn.
The ducks followed us everywhere and they watched us the entire time. I couldn't help but wonder what they thought of it all.
The next morning I woke up to discover that my nephew had survived quite a serious car accident and we spent some time at the police station before we all went out to lunch. I'm not even close to joking.
And here's me saying that nothing ever happens in the country.
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