calling me crazy

Hello, my lovelies. How are you this January day? I'm sitting cozily, wishing it would snow and finally finding a time to write.

I've had this post brewing in my head for almost a week now. Several posts actually, but I've been a busy chiquita. In good ways mostly and new things are also brewing and frothing but which I can't talk about yet. I hate keeping secrets from the Internet, but what else is a girl to do?

Insert brilliant segue here. 

Before I get into the meat of this post, a little prologue:

I know I keep writing about my last relationship. First, this does not mean I spend all of my daily life obsessing about it. But it is something I'm analyzing and so the receptacle of that analysis is going to be my writing and therefor you have the luck of digesting that endless bile that is my love life. Sorry about that, but I promised myself that I'd be as honest as possible in my writing and so here we are.

Also, I'm feeling pretty good. I'm in the home stretch of this relationship recovery and I feel pretty damn happy most days. Any residual anger I have is no longer about the breakup itself (mostly. it still chaps my hide that I put up with all his shit and he had the nerve to dump me. but whatevs.), but now I have to work through some anger at losing six months of my life to that fucktard. I know you shouldn't regret any experience because it makes you who you are blah blah blah. But that doesn't erase this resentment I have toward him for the train wreck we were (which I'll get more into in a sec). It won't last forever, but for now I'm resentful. Just how it is. And I'm a big believer in allowing yourself to feel whatever you're feeling. So there.

How to the every loving ever, I feel at this point like I can begin to look at the relationship less emotionally and learn from it, which I think is important if I want to date seriously again.

Which brings me to this article I found on Stumble the other night. I was just stumbling around the Internet, which I'm wont to do, putting off slumber, and this hit me square in the face, slapped me with its truth my life. Go read it. I'll wait.

Now a little backstory:

When I was 25, I was in a relationship with a boy we'll call J. It was the most toxic relationship and he was the most manipulative male I'd ever and have ever known. Long story short, he found me at one of the lowest points in my life (loss of a career, loss of a best friend, then the death of a boyfriend), he moved into my life, and he took it over. And before I knew what had hit me, we were living together and engaged and felt like a trapped animal. He manipulated me, convinced me I was crazy and cruel and controlling (all things I now know he was) and it worked. I believed him for a long time.

I eventually found my wits and broke up with J. And I've always said since I wouldn't let that happen again. After lots of therapy and working through a whole carousel of baggage, I really thought I wouldn't.

Ahhhh if life were so easy. Cut to 6 years later.

HP was not the same as J. He was actually nicer (J once told me he hated me, for example) and not really controlling (though we did always do what he wanted to do). He never rushed me into an engagement or anything, though looking back, we were in a serious relationship awfully fast. And the first 2 months were pretty blissful. You could call it honeymoon period, blah blah blah, but it ended awfully abruptly (instead of a slow cooling off that usually happens in relationships) and I think I know a big reason why but I'm still too decent a person to expose why on here.

He was manipulative, especially when it came to arguing. Plus I think he was sensitive too. He couldn't hear any kind of discussion and not turn it into an argument. He had to win and I often wondered if he even cared about what he was arguing or if he just wanted to win. He could deflect any comment back on me and convince me he was right. He would call me crazy, illogical, overemotional. His way was always the right way and he'd talk to me like I was a stupid child. This last part hurt more than the crazy, I think, because I value my intelligence so highly. It's one area I always fought back on even if I never really won.

It got so frustrating to argue in circles, especially because I'm not a fighter. I prefer to walk away when I'm angry or upset, cool off, think about what I'm feeling, and then discuss it later. In the moment? I freeze up. I don't have quick responses or witty retorts. So if I felt backed into a corner, often my only response was just to cry, which was just visceral emotion. You know that feeling where your throat gets tight and you just can't say a word without crying it out? That. It's not like I wanted to. But the dude made me feel like a child and so I acted like a child.

It finally got to the point where I got so tired of this act that I'd just stop talking at all. Wouldn't share how I was feeling, wouldn't fight back, wouldn't discuss anything that might be taken wrong and thrown back at me. So I'd keep my mouth shut, shut down completely. But then he'd just accuse me of being passive aggressive. I honestly couldn't ever win. I was screwed just for existing.

Why did I let it happen? Fuck if I know. Maybe it's because that's how my mom always talked to me. Maybe it's because I have a need to be liked and will be a goddamn doormat. Maybe it's because I'm susceptible to manipulation. Maybe because it's fucking confusing to be told you're loved and you're beautiful, etc, while being told you're crazy and passive aggressive and talked down to constantly.

Sigh.

It's no wonder I got so depressed. It's no wonder I lost so much of who I am. No wonder I stopped writing, stopped making art, stopped finding time to love myself.

How the fuck does that happen? More importantly, how do I not let it happen again?

I'm confident I can do this. I am a quality person and I won't let someone take that from me again. I just need to find the right tools.

drunken Christmas eve blogging

I'm writing from gorgeous rarely, but it was today, sunny Seattle. Though it's not sunny right now. Right now it's nighttime and I just got back to my hotel after eating my body's weight in sushi and green tea ice cream and wine.

I'm in my happy place finally. Also: a little sloshed. Which was the point of this trip.

Why am I in Seattle? Well why the fuck not? All my friends and fam are in California and I had no absolutely no place to go because I have all of one friend in Portland anymore (more on that in a bit) and what else was I going to do? Sit at home and feel shitty? Nope. So I jumped in the car and drive the three hours to Seattle.

And, as it turns out, the drive was important. I cried almost the whole way. Not in a pathetic way, really, more of a I really needed to fucking cry kind of way. I've cried since the breakup, for sure, but not in a just letting go purging and crying it all out. I've been crying in furtive spurts, trying to keep it in so as not to scare my friends or make them feel uncomfortable. Crying like I did, all alone in the car, freely and without reserve, felt fucking great. I needed a good cry.

Then I was feeling much better for a while.

Buuuut then the holidays crept up and I got homesick and I realized that all but one of HP's friends had dumped me too and, god love her, but she of course has her own life and I understand that she's going to spend time with the group before me. And that leaves the one of my two besties, the one who lives in Portland. She's been so damned supportive and I so really appreciate that I get to be in the same city with her because what the hell would I do without her? She's my only friend here (well, there, in Portland). But more than that, there's a reason she's my best friend, because she's just so awesome.

But, like I said, she's really my only friend right now. Not that I need hoards of friends necessarily, and I do get that I have tons of friends down in California and I miss them all so immensely much right now. But it's the holidays, a time of year which does its damn best to make the alone feel more alone. And I am making some cool, new friends lately, but they're new and I feel pathetic insinuating myself into their lives just yet.

Can't you just see it?

"After a most tumultuous relationship, my tool of a boyfriend dumped my ass and took all his friends with him. Please be my friend and love me!"

Ugg.

When I graduated college, all my friends moved away. They went to grad school or went to their hometowns or got jobs and internships elsewhere. But for a while, because I stayed and worked, I found myself completely friendless. Of course, I made new friends in time, but it was odd to suddenly be left behind. That's sort of how I feel right now. Only it's slightly more depressing to have to start all over because one guy decided he didn't want me.

Not that I would change things or want him back, because I really really really don't. It's just awfully bad timing.

So I just needed an adventure, to choose aloneness for a bit, to explore and discover and think. Sometimes a girl just needs to get away.

So here I am, in Seattle, in a cushy hotel room (have I mentioned how much I love hotel rooms?) after having a great first day of vacation. I plan to stay up watching movies and drinking wine and tomorrow I can't wait to explore the city. While everyone is home eating and exchanging presents and arguing and stressing, I'll be tromping around the city and taking photos. Doesn't that sound lovely? Yeah, I think so too.

the saga of the broken bed

So, before we broke up, the ex and I broke my bed. Yup. That happened. You can guess how.

You can also do the math and given that the last time we had sex was over a week before he dumped me, you'll see how effing long this saga truly, truly is. It's an epic, folks. I'm like Odysseus. Minus Medusa.

But the break wasn't actually that bad. It was just the plastic foot that goes in the corner of the metal frame. So my bed was missing one foot which meant that it was teetering like an old man with a walker with one leg shorter than the other (on the walker; not the man). Not exactly awesome. Still, I stuck a book under there and called it a day.

So I was living on this rickety ass bed, feeling a little seasick from it all actually. And then HP dumped me and it's not like he cared that his ass broke my bed or anything. But it's not like I was getting any so the rickety bed was not exactly the end of the world. And Goldie doesn't care if she's used in the bed or the bath or what.

Nevertheless, I needed to fix my bed. It wasn't exactly...how you say...classy. Plus it was just a reminder of the last time HP and I had sex and it's not like that time would be memorable on its own if not for one broken bed, nor did I want to remember it at all in any way.

So. This problem needed to go.

So for several Saturdays in a row, I hoofed it around Portland. I made phone calls. I visited mattress stores which sent me to hardware stores which said I'd have to try mattress stores. Nobody carried these plastic feet. Nobody. "They only come with the bed frames," said they. I'd have to buy a whole new frame.

"Bullshit!" exclaimed the pissed off woman. No fucking way was I paying for a whole new bed frame because one plastic piece broke. Surely this was a common occurrence. Surely this is a big racket. Surely this was turning into a bigger headache than I'd planned or needed and I was about to pull out a katana Kill Bill style and get myself a new fucking bed set for free I tell you what.

What's a little blood spatter? Sheets will cover that right up.

Yesterday morning, as I got out of bed, the mattress tilting beneath me, like a 800 pound person getting out of a mini-cooper, I'd had enough. "I've had enough!" I yelled to no one. Though Hobbes gave me an annoyed meow and rubbed up against his food dish. Because he has his priorities straight.

I drove my ass to the Target, battled holiday parking and holiday shoppers and holiday checkout lines, and I bought a tool to fix my bed.

I came home and I fixed that damn plastic foot MacGuyver style.

Duct tape fixes everything. By the way, Internet, it's DUCT tape, not duck tape. THAT is something else entirely.

Anyway, so far so good! It took a little while to get my land legs back, but it feels good to have a sturdy bed again. I don't know how it will hold up with rigorous bedtime activities ifyouknowwhatImean, but there's only one way to find out. Wink wink.

The line starts here.

Game Changer

I barely know where to begin.

This week was big. Do you ever have one day that changes your whole perspective? Yeah, that. That.

I had a scare last week. I doubt I have to come right out and say it. You know the scare. The holy-mother-fucking shit-what-the-hell kind of scare. There's this moment, when you're moaning and complaining about how you feel and all of a sudden it dawn on you that OH SHIT! and then your friends encourage it and pretty soon you believe it. And then you hate your damn body for being a damn petri dish that's absolutely beyond your control.

Are you following? I thought I was knocked up. The timing was right. And yet so so wrong. And for about a day I was scared shitless. My first thought was, If it's true, what the fuck would I tell him? Yeah. Never mind that singlemomhood would suck balls and where the hell would I put a baby and I can barely afford myself and it's not like I have any family here to help or whatever so it would be ALL ME. Never mind all that because it would be all wrong.

So so wrong.

This is coming from a woman who wants a baby so badly she'd consider stealing one and stuffing it in her uterus. Yeah. I want a baby. But not like this. Not like this.

And then the haunting prevailing thought was that if it were true, if I was preggers, I'd be tied to that man for life...and I felt deep down in my core that, no, I don't want to be tied to him for life. No way.

Which I needed to feel. I knew that of course, consciously, I knew he was wrong for me. I knew that. But I hadn't truly FELT it. I needed to really feel that, to be punched in the gut by it. I needed to feel that certainty in my whole body. Sometimes a scary ass situation can be the best thing for you.

Needless to say, I'm not pregnant. I took a test, for peace of mind mostly, and I wish I could frame the damn thing it made me so happy.

And it's not like I don't still care for him or have love for him. Of course I do. With the exception of a couple uber douches, I still have love for several exes. I care about them. Of course I do. Maybe I shouldn't, but that's just not in my nature.  It's not like I want to be with them again; it's more that once I give someone love, I don't take it all back. I spread the love around, people. Maybe one of my issues is that I have too much heart, but that's just too damn bad. Because I yam what I yam.

In fact, I probably have better relationships with these guys as friends than when we were in relationships. But that's a whole 'nother issue entire.

Anywayyy, back to my point. Ever since that insane day, I've felt free, happy. I also realized a few things.

We all know how unhappy I'd been the last few months. I think I'd been losing myself (well, I know I had), but also, I think I was unhappy in the relationship and unwilling to see that. I'm nothing if not tenacious but blind tenacity isn't always healthy.

So yeah, I'd been unhappy and not my usual self and once I started to find myself again, the fun, funny me started coming back. I missed her as I know everyone else did too. We all get caught down from time to time and I'm giving myself patience to get back again. While I don't regret this breakup anymore (and regret isn't the right word since it implies culpability of some kind, but I lack a better word.), I do wish he could have been more patient, at least realized that's what I was going through. I could have used the support. Of course, that's one more reason this was for the best.

More than that, despite the misery of going through a breakup, feeling unloved and rejected and wounded while I grieve this relationship I'd put all of myself into (and lost so much of myself into), I've been happier than I'd been in months.

Go figure.

I'll stop there before this becomes a dissertation. I have much to share still, like changing my hair (!) and all the great stuff I'm doing for myself. I'll hopefully find a minute to write again soon.

Also, The Blogger Body Calendar is up for sale now (wee!). Go and buy yo. PS? I'm July. Eeek!

one week later and I'm alright

On the upside, if there's anything I'm pro at, it's breaking up. I've done this A LOT. A lot a lot a lot. There are rarely any surprises anymore when it comes to how I'll deal. I know just how to get through. I've got my playlist, my books, my breakup buddies. I know just what happens at each stage (though duration varies, naturally).

Unlike my last hard breakup, where I didn't eat much for two weeks and threw up most of what I did (which was scary because I didn't really have the weight to lose), I only did the starvy-barfy thing for like 2 days this time. But add to that,  as I was leaving to go see a friend Monday night, I slammed my thumb in the car door and decided to get cozy with an ice pack for two days (I think the ice pack and I are now legally married in at least 3 states.). The horrid pain and fear of losing my thumb nail was both sufficiently distracting and sort of a when-it-rains-it-fucking-pours deal.

Yet by Wednesday, at a record breaking pace, I was already leaving behind the shocked, rejected, pathetically sad phase and entering the oh so delicious angry phase. This is my favorite phase because it's where you can first start seeing the light at the end of the tunnel. Getting that what the holy mother fuck feeling is the first taste of perspective. And what the fuck indeed.

Once that starts, my appetite returns and thus begins the shopping, the getting done of the nails, the joining of the gym, the considering of the cutting of the bangs (should I?), and the feeling sparkly and attractive again. Not that I wasn't sparkly and attractive pre-break-up, but there's something about a little pampering to remember that.

By Thursday, all my friends and coworkers were conspiring to hook me up with as many guys as can make up a pro football team and by Friday, I was feeling alright.

I have to say, I'm okay. The hardest part has been missing his damn presence in my life. Little things, like a text or talking. And then Saturday morning, I was half awake and went to curl up to someone who just wasn't in my bed. That was hard.

We spent 6 months in a relationship and how does a friendship not come out of that? Fact is..he was a friend, one of my best friends, and I've never been one to understand why I should lose a friendship because a relationship dies. Some of my great friends are exes and they have perspectives about me no one else does and I like that.

So we'll see.

I saw him for the first time last night at our bar (which neither of us will give up. which is just fine.) and it was okay. Weird and slightly sad, but okay.

My friends have been incredible and I couldn't ask for more support and love. It can be exhausting, growing older in relationship after relationship. And when you find yourself at the end of yet another, it's invaluable to have an army of people reminding you of your value and worth.

I am still a little sad. I am. I'll be okay. I am okay. But like any wound, it will take some time for the bruising to subside. My heart is bruised, but it will recover.

A hearty chuckle

As is usually the case, after Hot Pants goes out drinking, he passes out in my bed. Dead to the world. Doesn't matter how much he drank either. That man makes sleeping an Olympic sport. Good luck waking him up.

So, the other night, he'd done just that. Then I awake at some point in the middle of the night and can just make out his dark shadow standing in the corner of my room on my side of the bed. And he's walking into this chair I have in that corner like a bug in a windowsill. I can see outside, just can't figure out how to get there! Over and over, he's bumping into this chair.

So I go, "What are you doing?" And he goes, "LKJGJHTRDJG JYFG OINEFIYRBFWHFI NUIYB NUY." That's a direct quote.

I respond with incredulity, "What?" Which I felt was an appropriate response.

He says, exasperatedly, "The Xerox! I gotta move all the Xerox!"

So I calmly inform him, "You're not at work."

To which he replies, "THEN I HAVE TO PEE."

So I very forcefully point out that the bathroom is in the opposite direction and don't pee on my furniture or he may have to die tonight as well.

He did, eventually, make it to the bathroom and, I am happy to report, did not pee on my furniture or my carpet and still retains his life, but not before getting stuck at my desk chair (picture the bug again) thus necessitating the turning on of the light.

I have now told this story five thousand times to my friends and then all of his friends, but I can't help it. It made my whole week.


My man is nothing if not entertaining.

Photo of the Day: Fire!

Another 4th of July shot. I love this so hard. I shot a TON of shots that night, but I love how the focus and light of this one are both manic and clear depending on where you look. It's just so super freaking cool. And you know it.

Getting into Hot Pants

Bet you're all wondering what's up with Mr. Hot Pants.

In short? He's incredible. I don't think he possibly knows how much. But this dude makes me so effervescently happy, I can't even describe. Totally happy.

AND? You know how I'm a lifelong insomniac? I sleep better with him in my bed than I do alone. How awesome slash crazy is that? He's like my own just slightly addictive sleep aid. Can't beat that.

He upset me for the first time a few weeks ago, and it's not even important why, but I share this for two reasons. One, because it was a bit of a relief to know he can do that. Like, you know that tension when someone is too good to be true? It feels good to let a little of the tension out. Second, he felt so badly about it that it was too freaking adorable. His face just made me melt. How was I to resist? The minute I saw his puppy-sad face, I lost any bit of upset I had left.

On the other hand, he handles my insanity quite well. Twice now I know I've acted like a complete banshee to him and he's just taken it in stride.

Once, when he took me (aka made me) play disc golf for the first time (first time for me, I mean) and from the depths of my soul came this terrified little kid who got made fun of for sucking at kickball (or any other playground sport) and I started crying. Like a crazy person. And the more I tried to stop, the worse it got. But he was kind and patient and I didn't die or humiliate myself (sort of).

Then this last weekend, I had a low blood sugar moment, which I don't think he'd experienced yet because I'm usually pretty good at keeping my feedings regular. But I could feel the cranky washing over me and there was nothing I could do to stop it until I got sugar, sweet sweet sugar, pumping through my veins again. And you know? He didn't freak out at all. I think he must have wondered where this insane woman came from and would she please go soon? One assumes.

What's also awesome is that though we do have a lot in common, we also have differences and I think it makes a nice balance.

As I told my 13 year old friend just the other day, the important thing I've learned when it comes to dating is to both be picky and realistic. You can't have an amalgam of the perfect dream guy. You can't pick and choose all the best things you want and wait and wait for some Frankenstein monster of a lover to come along. So you figure out the most important things you want and wait for those and you sort of let all the other shit go. Everybody's gonna have their own things and it's okay if you don't like all of it or enjoy all of it. You appreciate the best parts and then those best parts maybe even make you like the little things too. I truly believe that.

Anyway.

It's all official and shit, even on the facebook, which was quite the hit with all my friends. I don't know if it's because it's been years since I've put a relationship on the facecrack or because all my friends were waiting with baited breath for me to be in a relationship. Either way, it's all awesomeness.

Did I mention I'm happy?

Mr. Blue Eyes Hot Pants

I think it's about time I told ya'll about my new gentleman caller (snicker). Whom I'm still undecided on a nickname for. Right now it's between Mr. Blue Eyes and Hot Pants. Kinda leaning toward the latter, even though the former is just perfect.

I'm hopeful that by thus point I'm past the stage of jinxing it by talking about it. I hope. I'm not even that superstitious, but I've let several friends get me all nervous. So nervous I am. Also: Yoda apparently.

And YET! My afterglowy bliss trumps nerves right now. I can't even express the extent of bliss. It seems folly to be this happy this soon, but there it is anyway. It's unreal. It's a dream. It's too good to be true.

Neverthefuckingless, there's this attentive, smart, funny, sexy, great guy who thinks I'm awesome and it all seems to just fit. He keeps saying he's so lucky. "A lucky guy." I think his luck has nothing to do with it. It's my good karma finally kicking in. I've dated enough douchecanoes and guys who just didn't appreciate me, my karmic bank must be rich indeed. And I'm cashing in.

But dude. Dude. He appreciates me. I've told him it's not why I like him, but it's so fucking wonderful to be appreciated just as I am. It's so nice, so intoxicating to be with someone who is so effusive, who expresses his admiration so freely. I really can't get enough.

But, like I said, Mr. Blue Eyes Hot Pants is pretty fucking awesome and I know I'm the lucky girl here. I don't think he knows it. Knows how fucking awesome he is. All those things I said above? All true. I wouldn't lie. And I don't hand out praise undeservedly. So there you go. And I know he's reading this (Hi, Hot Pants.) so maybe he'll believe it.

We have such a fun time together, people. So much fun. And would you believe it? I never get sick of him. I said I'd tell him if I get claustrophobic and need space, but the ebb and flow of time we spend together has felt just right.

People? We so kick ass at the blissful moments. You think you've got the blissful moments? Well guess what? We beat you. Nobody does the blissful moments better than we do. Also? Spooning like no one else. 

And The Sex? Well I'll let you imagine. Hah! I'm such a tease.

There is one thing wrong with him, though. He hates the twenties. You heard me right. The twenties. How can anyone hate the twenties? Speakeasies, jazz, fashion? Gah! I love it all. If I could, I'd bob my hair and dance to old timey jazz forever.

I guess I can let it go. If he doesn't tease me for loving the twenties so.

Right?

I think I'll let him stay.