Holiday Rants - Volume Five

Well kids, it's that time again. But you know what? I'm just not feelin' it.
I know; it's shocking! The acerbic wit is taking a break.
Don't worry, I still loathe that crap people put on cars, Christmas music bleating well before its time and the fake niceness.

But this year there has been some change that has been like a burden has been lifted (yes, despite the feelings uttered in the last post) and well, that creates lightness in all areas of life.
In other words, the Bad Season has turned itself around a little bit. I know! I can hardly believe it myself.
I can still indulge in a little bit of ranting though so here goes!


1. Helicopter Parents - You don't need seven cameras recording the exact same performance of your kid at the holiday light show especially if you are both standing in the same place and all the cameras have the same shot. Zoom in already. There's a big pile of regret waiting when you get home.

2. The Costco Basket of Stuff No One Wants to Eat - This is disguised as a gift. It's not. It's an experiment or rather a dare; like a Letterman sketch. "Will you eat it?" (Also, no, it probably won't float. Those are going to be sinkers.)

3. Obligatory Gifting - see #2. Just bring a bottle of wine or a poinsettia if you feel you must bring something. Flammable liquids in the form of libations are always a good way to go. Unless your friends are alcoholics. Then you have bigger problems.

4. The Disappearance of Actual Christmas Cards - A mass text to your contact list is not a heartfelt wish. Save those characters for your Facebook status and annoy those people instead.

Have a happy holiday season everyone and be sure to make a very special wish on 1-1-11!





-Citygirl

Clouds Over My Heart

It probably started earlier than 2005 but that's the timestamp I can remember.
That's when the first events of the Bad Season began.

I know I wrote about it then. This blog proves it here (although you'll have to scroll). What I didn't know is that every autumn from there forward would have terrible things happen.

Fall 2005: That's when the clouds over my heart started to really roll in and well, the storm continues to build one Bad Season at a time.

I'm obviously writing about this because it's happening again.

I thought, foolishly of course, that this year would be different. The Bad Season would not yield any new events in 2010 and it would just be a memorial year of all the other Bad Seasons gone by. Wrong. Dead wrong.



This year the Bad Season doesn't disappoint. It is full of loss and 'bad' change. Change that I don't want. Mostly because again I didn't choose it.
This is where a philosophy class comes in handy because it's a waste of time arguing about the positive versus negative aspects of change, forced or otherwise. It isn't either. It just is. If change is anything, it is completely balanced with both of those qualities.
Go ahead and take a second here to consider that point for yourself.

No, really, we have plenty of time. I'll wait.


When I first heard the news about this life altering event, I felt like I'd been punched squarely in the jaw. My face was hot and felt like it would melt but I didn't cry (for once!). I chalked it up to the Bad Season rearing its ugly head and well, I'd better kick things in to high gear to get out in front of the storm.
A storm I'd already started preparing for, by the way, just like when people used to stock bomb shelters in the 50's.

And even with all the canned peaches and jugs of water in the cellar, there is no emotional preparation that works for these storms; when your loved ones are ripped away from you, up into the funnel cloud. There aren't umbrellas big enough to shield you from the rainfall, as you watch them float away.
The bonds are broken and nothing is ever the same. Nothing.



I've had very few tears until today. (Prompting this post) I am watching the twister take all the things that have been keeping me from wandering off into the darkness never to be found again Bad Season after Bad Season. Over-dramatic? Yes, probably, but that's what it feels like. Of course it's survivable, just like all the other Bad Seasons that have come before it. This doesn't change the fact that I have too many tallies in the 'lose' column. Too many storms weathered with the clean-up still in progress. Where is Brad Pitt to rebuild that house??!

Do not derail my pity party. I am logical and sane and I 'get' it. I have been engaged in the futile efforts of working toward 'just being Happy!' and "Cheering UP!" for 36 years and several thousand dollars safely in the hands of incompetent therapists. Trust me when I say I know how this goes.

So, like it or not (and I don't), the storm is rolling in. The only thing constant is the balanced winds, no, tornadoes of change.
I better get back to gathering more supplies and make my way down to the cellar.

Human Movement Through Water

It's hard to stay focused when you're swimming. You can't read a magazine or listen to music or watch television. There is nothing to distract your brain from the fact that you are exercising, that your lungs are burning, that you still don't know how to do a successful flip turn in the shallow end.

I have been utterly satisfied by this, however. I have found my stride and some consistency with my lap swimming. Surprisingly enough I've made improvements.

It was not without it's trials. There is a constant battle between me and everyone else. Which I don't doubt will continue. It seems to be a trend in the world. Inconsiderate people are multiplying faster than they can update their Facebook status.

These kerfuffles in the pool aren't even funny stories to re-tell although I know that usually that's what we're looking for; the funny in the end.
But I'm here to attest that following the rules of lap swimming has only gotten me hit in the face, the leg and the butt by grown men who have no clue about how to split a lane or remember the old ways of simple respect for the fairer sex.

And while I turn my head to breathe I come to these conclusions about my life. Following the rules has gotten me nothing. I should have risked more and more often. I am the way I am (acerbic, intolerant of foolishness, efficient, alone) because I know how to grin and bear it extremely well.

'They' are often fond of saying "It's never too late." I disagree.
Sometimes this is all there is. No better, no worse.

Stroking through life one lap at a time, getting hit in the ass by a loser who backstrokes; then moving faster than the stupid lady who is exercising in the lap swim lane when she knows she's not supposed to and then the rare moments when you get a swimmer who keeps the rhythm or when you have the lane to yourself for all the flip turn practice you can stand. Then you do it all over again.

Up and down the pool until your body is done.

The Devil Won

"There is nothing for me now. Not one thing that is good. Not one thing I can hope for."

Insomnia has returned with a vengeance. It's not the mild version I've grown used to. This is the up-all-freakin'-night kind. The kind that kills you completely.

I think it's because I am at a very significant fork in the road. You see, I was again not given the promotion or the raise and also no goals because I am already exceeding expectations. There is no direction for which I am to go. So, what am I to do now?

There is this feeling deep in my being that I cannot shake and that is why I cannot sleep. I KNOW that I must DO something about this.
I am fighting the part of me that knows better; the part that has already been down this road too many times to count. The part that is exhausted from starting over and over and over and over again. And the part that refuses to be a traffic spinster, doing more than my share and them some, I might add.

I am so unhappy. I am so very, very lost. And so utterly and completely alone. But what difference does that make to anyone but me? We can only save ourselves.

I don't have much else to say other than that. I wish my friend hadn't died. I wish you still talked to me. I wish I would have gone to ASU like I wanted to. But then if I had I wouldn't have known you. And that would be the bigger tragedy I think. So, I suppose we are somehow always choosing the right path, wherever it takes us.

I think I'm tired now.

Fester Further Flaxey

I've been batting around some thoughts for awhile now. They are best left unpublished. They'll be misinterpreted for sure. So, I'm going to keep them in my head to fester further for now.
Instead I'll share this song lyric because it says some of it better than I can right now. Thank you Annie Stela for writing it and KCRW for playing it that day.
I strongly suggest you give it a listen too.







Heart

Hallelujah, the spring is bringing bombs of purple on the street
I walk the dog and I crush them with my feet
Oh, the morning
The sun too bright and the moon not bright enough
I got nothing new to say except I think I’ve had enough

I don’t believe you when you tell me I’m a good girl

There must be a heart that keeps me here
Away from the panic and the fear
There must be a heart that keeps me here

Did I break you?
I really did not think it could be done
And suddenly the cards had all been played and I had won
So where is the good feeling?
Where is the lighting up?
Where are the thousand voices screaming, telling me this is enough?

I don’t believe you when you tell me I’m a good girl

There must be a heart that keeps me here
Away from the panic and the fear
There must be a heart that keeps me here

Oh, everyday and ordinary, does it make me happy?
Does it curl beneath the surface of my skin
Will I let it in?

There must be a heart that keeps me here
Away from the panic and the fear
There must be a heart that keeps me here

Holiday Rants - Volume Four

It's time again. Although I missed it last year. Here they are, just under the wire.

1. The bad economy has almost eliminated the vehicle adornments from cars. I guess even stupid people are more interested in their shrinking bank balances enough to stop frivolous spending on decorations for their cars. Bad Economy - One, Stupidity - Zero. (although I'm sure that will change)

2. Holiday songs are not that great. Musicians aren't that fond of them. So don't act so surprised when we don't want to hear Celine Dion scream O Holy Night or Jingle Bells for the 30th time. Let's get some Lady Gaga on that playlist and call it a day, alright?

3. It is not okay for neighborhood light viewing to cause a traffic problem. I want to get home and your gawking is preventing me from entering my driveway. Move out of the way. I live here, you don't and go put lights up on your own house already.

4. Enough with the countdown lists. This really applies to the whole year, especially on E!, (I suspect it's because they have nothing better do) but these are especially prevalent at the end of every year and now we must bear the decade countdowns this year as well. People love lists I suppose. It gives them something to talk about at cocktail parties.

And so another rant closes. Good luck navigating 2010. I'm sure there's a list for that.

My Sympathy Tank Has Been Removed

I'm waiting for a cake to bake. I knew I needed to bake it but ended up not coming home right away to do this chore before 11pm tonight.

That of course is not the point but it could be I guess. I feel like I am always putting off moving toward a real goal or moving the needle toward something worthwhile.

My definition of that is only two-fold. It's always been these two seemingly simple items but knowing this is clearly not enough as I've veered so far off the course that I don't think I can find my way back.

I think I can sum it up in one sentence; I do not want to be a traffic spinster. I see them all around me and last summer, the shining, glaring really, example set before me gave me great pause. I knew that if I kept on this trajectory that I may as well throw it all in now. And yet, here I am a summer later and I am losing my will to resist. And frankly, I am better than that, I am smarter than that and I am more talented than that. My glass has not yet found it's level.




You see, I didn't think I'd ever recover from last years calamity. I was heavily medicated, in pain and hateful to many people who cared about me. Now here I am, I made it through; a chance to change, a chance to take real steps to those goals and to hopefully mend relationships and be forgiven by those who suffered my wrath. But all I feel is lost and exhausted. I struggle to find the point and time keeps moving more swiftly each day and people keep drifting further and further away from true connection (one that doesn't include a status update).

And I'll tell you, THAT, is all I truly want. That is all anyone wants, which is why it baffles me that 'we' keep moving further and further away from it. It's like the movie WALL-E has predicted our future; where humans are blobs that hover around, eyes glued to a screen, remote in hand and a liquid concoction at their lips.

The cake is done, my eyes are closing and so must these thoughts.

It's the Birthday Beagle, Charlie Brown!

I have nothing to say about my impending 35th birthday. Instead, I offer this pictorial.

Spelling Counts

That's it. That's the whole post. Spell check isn't a fail-safe. Sometimes words that are similar but aren't the word that is meant will fall the through the cracks of spell check because they are spelled correctly, but it's not going to be the right word.

So re-read those letters, posts, comments and papers before they go public.

I Have Learned Nothing

Here are my thoughts - they aren't particularly clever or well put but here they are.

I want out. I want the secret of the universe to NOT be the law of attraction because it doesn't work for me even though I understand it completely and know that it works.

I want my air conditioning to WORK. I'm sick of being told that it does when it has been on all day, costing me a small fortune and it's still 100 degrees in my apartment.

I want stupid people to get off the streets and highways.

I want my neighbor to stop doing the dishes at midnight because I can hear it even though he pretends it isn't him. It is YOU.

I want to stop being so nice. I want to not get the shaft all the freaking time.

The law of the universe blows.

Blank

I cannot think of anything to say. It's 4AM Pacific Standard Time and I have yet to sleep. I'm not sure which is worse the cause or the cure. So, far the cure stinks because I am awake at 4AM Pacific Standard Time.

Here is a picture. I hear they are worth a thousand words. You decide. That's it. Goodnight, I hope.

Bug Me Once

There is a serious issue in my bathtub. That's right more bugs. A spider this morning and Tuesday another centipede or millipede.

What is that about? It's not a weather change because they were here in the heat and now it's cooling off. So that theory is null.

Whatever it is I am no longer amused.

Dear Insect and Arachnid Kingdom Leaders,

Please move on to someone else's bathtub or drain. I don't have time, especially in the mornings to enforce policies that you have been well aware of for so long.

Thanks in advance.

Insect City

So, yesterday morning my bathtub had yet another resident make its way to the surface streets. A very large brown spider was at the very popular non-drain end just hanging out. His furlough didn't last long. That's right; the shoe. There is no photo this time (see artist's rendering left), but trust me he was big.

This is a short post that will end with the following music recommendations; Pink's latest Funhouse is a good record. Snow Patrol also released a new one yesterday as well, but it's marginal at best. I am totally digging Matt Nathanson. He's my new John Mayer.

Hope Springs Eternal

I was challenged to pen a blog on hope and I am struggling to complete the task.

So, let's start with the definition of hope. Our friends at Wikipedia say this...
Hope is a belief in a positive outcome related to events and circumstances in one's life. Hope is the feeling that what is wanted can be had or that events will turn out for the best. To hope is to wish for something with the expectation of the wish being fulfilled, a key condition in unrequited love. Hopefulness is somewhat different from optimism in that hope is an emotional state, whereas optimism is a conclusion reached through a deliberate thought pattern that leads to a positive attitude.

People are hoping all the time. They hope for political change, emotional change, physical change (outward and inward); they are really hoping for difference. And yet, different things cause fear and loathing. Change also is fear inducing and full of anxiety. No one likes it and yet these are the things we HOPE for. So, really we are looking for FEAR. I think that is irony. Whose definition I'm much more clear on than I used to be.

I don't know what to say about hope. I know that I have hoped for hopeless things. I know that I have felt hopeless. I know that I have hoped for others more than for myself. I know that if I type or read the word hope one more time I'll...

It's a funny little word and it really gets us into trouble most of the time.

It's really not a real thing. It's like 'try' and we know what Yoda said about that.

I think it causes inaction. It traps us into non-movement. It keeps us stuck and immobilized. And let me assure you, inaction is still a choice and rarely the best one. I guess that is the coma of hope; inaction. After all, that's what a coma is, immobilization and non-movement and those around your bedside are hoping for movement, action, mobilization and their hope keeps them from those very things.

Getting out of a coma is no easy task, as coma patients will surely tell you. But we are all in our own little comas daily. We are trapped and immobilized by the things we refuse to take action on for as many reasons as there are therapists.

I don't like to be trapped and that takes work. That takes unlocking the cages we've put ourselves in. Sometimes they're really gilded and it's harder to leave but I believe it's worth it.

I think that if your heart is truly open and you are willing to be vulnerable, foolish even, you are already in possession of the key to that cage. It may hurt more if your wings are damaged and you don't have a safe place to land when you start to fly out. But every minute of freedom will heal those broken feathers faster.

So there it is, hope; a definition, an analysis and my off-the-cuff theory. Take from it what you will. I am hopeful that you find some truth and resonate on some level and maybe make a phone call that you had hoped the other person would have made first.
You get the idea. Just remember that nothing really changes with hope, it changes with activity in one direction or another.

"The Haunted Blue Tub" or "The Bugs"

I think the crickets read my last post and are planning a revolt with all of their insect friends.

This morning I awoke and wandered into the bathroom later than I'd have liked. So, there was no time to waste whatsoever. I did not have time for insect policy enforcement.

At the same end of the tub as cricket was a centipede. This is much scarier than a cricket or two. These can be poisonous.

I can absolutely, positively NOT have these in my house.

And Why I ask, do these critters keep shimmying out of my bathtub drain? I am disturbed.

I brought out the shoe for round number two and the corpse still sits in my tub for removal by the coroner.

Unless of course it gets carried off by his friends before I return home tonight. Grrrr.

The Cricket in Valley Glen Square

I am not a fan of repetitive noises. The incessant drone of an air conditioner under my window or a siren or a clicking of any kind sends me over the edge. So, you can imagine that the sound of cricket chirping wouldn't last long in my house.

I don't have anything against crickets at all. In fact one of my all-time favorite books is George Selden's lovely little story about a boy and his cricket in Times Square. Everyone should read it. It's wonderful.









However, when I came home the other night to a very loud, non-outdoor chirping I had to investigate its whereabouts as I have a strict no-insect-in-MY-natural-habitat policy.

I found it. In my bathtub. In the drain. I couldn't see the little guy but I could certainly hear him. I ran the water but the song returned a few minutes later. I let it be but knew that that cricket would eventually want to come out of the drain and into my house. The policy is very strict and as the sole enforcer, I cannot rest until the menace is eradicated.

So, right before I went to bed, I decided that scalding HOT water would surely make the cricket meet its demise. I ran a lot of hot water and it stopped for the night.

It was not to be. Apparently, crickets are hot water resistant as the sound returned in full force tonight. Stronger methods would need to be employed.

I took out the bleach and started to pour and the sound stopped. I returned to my living room for a few minutes and continued my telephone conversation. I decided to go back in and check on things and to my shock and dismay the cricket (seen in the picture below post mortem) and his other tiny cricket son had scurried up the drain and into the other end of my tub to make their escape.

Serious violators they had now become and I retrieved the proper equipment for insect-in-the-home removal; a shoe. I got the big one on the first whack but the little guy was a lot more resilient than I expected.

The moral of this story is that crickets won't be killed with bleach but they can be chased with it.

Now all is well again in the Square and the policy is upheld.

Celebrate the COW!

Welcome to Cow Appreciation Day 2008!

We missed it last year but all is not lost! Sing a song, dance a dance, write a sonnet, but celebrate the cow!

Here are some links to help you along....

(Just click on the pictures)

Happy Cow Appreciation DAY!!!

3-2-1....Contact!

I had to search for some documents recently and I ended up uncovering a few extra things.

I didn't find the thing that I needed, having put it in a place for safe keeping. It's safe alright. Safe from me and everyone else.

But there were other items I found during this gumshoe activity that made me smile, laugh and remember old friends.

I found notes from my mother. They were mostly utilitarian; "I'm sending you this clipping that I thought was interesting" or 'here's some stickers I thought you'd like'. A few years ago I went through a similar search mission and found a lot of these notes. I decided at that time that I would keep them all, because when my mother passes on, I will still get to have her with me.

I will have all the things she wrote to me at my fingertips and that will bring me comfort when I miss her and she is no longer writing me notes about the clipping from the local newspaper. Some of them may end up being out of context, removed from whatever they were attached to but that will make me laugh. And laughter always brings healing.

I came across a card from a co-worker and friend from many years ago. She sent me flowers because I was inconsolable in my broken heart and her note told me that she was my true friend when things were seemingly bleak. It made me smile and I wrote to her and told her so.

I found old letters from high school friends and college friends. That was before email and cell phones and text messaging and online blogging*.

We had to write to each other, putting pens to paper, to recount what had been happening since the last letter. The ones with multiple pages on college rule were the ones you cherished. Because that took time and that was special! Even boys wrote letters and sent them!!

As I was uncovering this treasure trove of memories of my little life, I thought how hurried and un-special our lives and relationships can become. We no longer have time to write letters; we're too busy with our blackberries to even spell properly. We lose interest so quickly and there is no more sentiment. I won’t discount the efficiency of email but for some of the really important stuff I wish we still cared enough to send our very best instead of coping out with text messaging.

Aren't we always gasping in awe about how, could we have possibly let so much time go by without spending time or communicating with those that we have connected deeply with?

Those are the times, the notes, and the moments when we feel belonging and alive.

Facebook, Friendster, MySpace all have claimed to be tools to connect with people. But it's not a real connection. It's a substitute. Connection is listening to a guy play a song he wrote and having it move you to tears. Connection is feeling like you've known someone your whole life and telling them so. Connection is reveling in the excitement of a shared idea and a meeting of the minds. These things have to be done in person or at the very least, over the telephone.

Connection is not an email of carefully crafted words. Connection is not a text message or a web page or a voicemail. This is what we've devised and created so we can avoid true connection. Why are we so scared? Why are we so scarred?

We all want the same things. We want our lives, our existence, to matter to someone else.

We don't want to feel alone or lonely. We don't want to feel empty or cold on the inside. We don't want to be left behind or left out. We want magic and love and we want love to be magic. We don't want to be discarded or forgotten. And we don't want to be hurt for believing and giving love.

I think about these things a lot because it is usually my undoing when a connection fades or ceases to be. As a little girl, a teenager even, I would cry to see visitors leave or when I left someone I adored.

I want to hang on, I want to cling and it’s because my heart wants so much to give out its love and devotion. It feels unnatural to have to stop that flow from one heart to another.

It’s quite a conundrum really. We crave understanding and union with other souls. We long to be intimately known and yet we tend to run away when someone comes too close. This, I believe, is what is known as the human condition. I just don’t really understand it.

I only know that I want more of those moments that are authentic. The moments when I hear a song lyric and am found in it even though I didn’t write the words. The moments when I am singing to a crowd of people and smile at the person in the front row and they smile back. The moments when I am sitting in peaceful silence watching a butterfly with my sister. I want more of those.

So, my search for that document led me here. Where instead of finding a piece of paper, I uncovered parts of the past that helped me find another piece of my soul to share.

*(Yes, I realize that I am posting this in an online blog. Isn't irony fun?)

Flag Day Fun

It's here! June 14th.

The BEST holiday of all time, well except for Cow Appreciation day. So, it's the 2nd best holiday of all time.

Wave it loud and wave it proud people, today is Flag Day.

I know everyone says Christmas or Halloween but really Flag Day is better. You know it is.

Who cares if you're patriotic or not? You don't have to send cards or get gifts and there aren't large department store displays urging you to depart with your disposable income.

So, embrace it. Live it. Love it.

Get the new Weezer album to celebrate. It's awesome. But not the New Kids on the Block. It is not awesome. It's ridiculous.

On Approach...Birthday

So, in three days I'll be another year older. I have always liked my birthday; I like everyone's birthday. I relish celebrating the people I love. But I don't have much to say about it this year. I feel a bit 'blah' about it this year.

I don't have much to say about anything really. I don't have any ranting to do or news to tell or adventures to report.

Time seems to go more quickly as the age climbs higher. I guess that's why it becomes increasingly more important to live fully and completely and to love deeply and courageously.

I hope to do that more this year.