A fallen squirrel.

[Bambooki]

Dum Da Dum Dum DUM!

All quiet on the Fer front. He's made his peace with his boss. There were mutual apologies and a day of talking things out. I'm glad he's back to the job he enjoys, but...

...don't you just hate it when someone comes to you seeking approval for their actions and you give it to them, only to be slapped in the face later on with your own words? What I mean is that when The Fer sought confirmation that his boss was a jerk and unfair, I gave it to him. Because I think FerBoss is just that. (There's no love lost between us, on a very subtle level. I don't think he likes me any more than I like him.) I wouldn't say I bad-mouthed FerBoss, but I did agree and even went so far as to speculate on the nature of FerBoss's bad attitude. I.e. I told The Fer that I didn't trust FerBoss and that The Fer deserved better. All the while, an inner voice was telling me to shut up and just smile and nod. I should have listened because now The Fer and FerBoss are "back together" again, and I look like an ass for having said anything. I wouldn't say that The Fer will ever trust FerBoss 100% again, or that he'll ever forget this incident, but he's back in the office, back on cordial terms with the man. And now The Fer knows how I really feel about this guy, and that's not something I would have normally revealed to him. It only complicates his relationship with FerBoss, and forces him into the middle. I've opened my big mouth and now it's kicking me in the ass. I'm not the only one who doesn't trust FerBoss; a number of us who know him feel the man is on shaky ground at best, for a variety of reasons.

This is exactly why I don't tell MidWest Girl what I think of her situation. Or my friend JJ (who's dating the married man who won't leave his wife even though he's miserable) what I think. (There's an entry...) These are bitter pills for me to swallow, and I'm not so good at keeping tight-lipped. In fact, I'm lousy. I love to talk. I love to butt in. It's a flaw. I'm trying to work on it, big time. It's either work on it, or lose friends. And I always have to remind myself that I spent two years with an alcoholic, and agreed to marry him before I had the cojones to break off something I knew was awful and hurtful and destructive. I have no room to talk, and I hate hypocrisy within myself. It's ugly and I'm better than that. Which is why I'm reeeeeeeally trying here.

BTW: just in case anyone is wondering why I call him The Fer, it's an abbreviated version of a nickname given to him by his best friend and his best friend's wife. Think of a guy's name turned into "Jennifer". Like "Bennifer". Well, they always said that The Fer was so sensitive that he was feminine, so they started calling him _____ifer, and it became shortened to "The Fer".

 

[Bambooki]

Too Tired Not to Ramble A Bit

I'm completely exhausted this morning. It's my own damn fault - I stayed up finishing my book, Anne Rice's Blood and Gold, and then the damn ending made no sense to me! Has anyone read it and can anyone explain those last five pages? I fucking hate it when you enjoy the hell out of a book and then get confused or disappointed by the ending. My whole night was shot. I adored the book but didn't get closure.

Gotta have that closure.

And hey! Since when did all of these commercials for herbal sex enhancers become koshur? It's embarassing. It's also 7:45am and I'm tired of hearing them. What if my parents were in the car? What if your children are in the car? "Are you and your love ready for hot, spine-tingling sex?" "My wife is raving about my performance." "I can outlast anybody and my stamina is incredible. I'm wearing her out!" EW! Maybe I'm too modest but shouldn't they save that stuff for later in the evening? Why don't they just share the measurments of their friction burns?

I'm tired of this entry already. I'm tired of myself.

And since I'm in such a foul mood....
=====================================
Dear Richard, aka Louis Vuitton,

Let me tell you why you're despicable.

I extended the olive branch. I tried to be your friend. Why? Because that's what good people do. It's what Christian people do, and I like to think that I am both. So I accepted your friendship and was supportive of you and listened to your problems. I was always nice.

Yet every time you call, you insult me. "Hey ho." "Hey slut." "How'd you hurt that knee? Giving your boyfriend a rim job in the shower? You slut." Well guess what? That won't continue. You call me to tease and annoy and insult me. You aren't a friend. You're a miserable ex-boyfriend who has nobody else in the world and I'm the only one who treats you like a human being. You don't deserve that treatment and you won't be getting it from me any longer. There was never any concern for me. You never asked how I was doing. You never expressed any remorse about my accident. You just care about yourself and want to make sure that I'm following the details of your sad life with baited breath.

Do you know why you have no friends? You do it to yourself. You're nasty. You're haughty. You and your daddy think you're better than everybody else. You think you're rich, powerful doctors who can crush anybody and anything tht gets in the way of your fun. You think you have class. Well you're dead wrong. You are trash. You have nothing good to say about anybody and that's finally come back to kick you in the ass. You brag about the fact that you've never had a job. You brag about the fact that DADDY pays your bills. Ever wonder what girls think of that? They think it's pathetic and they think you're pathetic. They think you're a loser who can't even take care of himself at 24 years old. I wouldn't want to go out with you either. I wouldn't even want to be in the same room with you. In fact, I never do again.

I wash my hands of you. You did the absolute worst possible thing to me a few years ago, and I forgave you for it. You showed how trashy you are in that act, and I gave you another chance at friendship because I felt sorry for you and knew nobody else would. I have no more time for you and could care less about your miserable life. Go. Be miserable. You deserve it. You're not my friend. You're a 15-year-old little boy who's just realized that everybody hates him. You're pathetic.

Why do I answer when PGMF calls? Why do I go to visit him? Because he is my friend. He treats me like a friend. He treats me like a goddess. We had problems, we worked through them, we're happy again. PGMF made an effort to change who he was; you have never done that. You have not changed. PGMF is so far beyond the person that you will ever be that I don't know how you can even compare yourself to him. I certainly don't. I love and adore him beyond words. I think you are a waste of space and I want nothing more to do with you. If you call my home again I'll put The Fer on the phone; I have nothing more to ever say to you.

Consider this my giving you the boot. AGAIN.

 

[Bambooki]

Feeling Guilty

Two years ago I was recovering from a head injury. If I've already related the details of the story, forgive me, for I'm turning into my mother. I know I've mentioned it before. I'd taken too many cold pills and gotten into a hot shower. The doctor later told me that this caused the blood to rush out of my head and I woke up on the floor of the shower with half of my front tooth gone and quite a concussion. So I was in bed two days later at 9am and saw the whole thing unfold live. I lived with The Ex, at the time.

So is it absolutely horrible that I can't get him out of my head today, of all days? I'm overwhelmed with vivid memories of him sitting next to me in our bed, with our Dobergirl, in our home. And then last year, being here at work and spending the day with The Fer, before he knew or The Ex knew that I had Fer feelings growing. Today should be about respect, forgiveness, and thanks for loved ones. So it hurts me that I've been thinking of him, because there aren't a whole lot of good memories from that period in my life. I was a prisoner (of my own will, I know), and then this horrible tragedy struck and put everything into perspective. But still, when I think of that morning, I think of him, and the way he smelled after a night of drinking, and the way the furniture was arranged in our bedroom, and the habit Dobergirl had of bringing rotten oranges and grapefruit from the trees into the house.

I feel like a bad American, entwining my own petty misery with such a monumental horror. And the more I think about it the more the anger inside of me grows. It's become a dull ache in my stomach since beginning this post alone, and I don't know how to control it and I don't know when it will leave me. Never before have I truly felt hatred. I didn't hate Louis Vuitton when he cheated on me - it was anger but it came from hurt. This is different. This is a volatile rage. Sometimes I think if The Ex were in front of me I'd physically strike him, in the eye or the throat or the knee. I think I want to see him suffer, and that's so unlike me. On a day when I should be reverent, my heart betrays me and my conscience screams about it. I am a selfish person and I haven't the ability to shut out that which makes me such. I almost didn't post here today, because of my feelings, but I think I owe you all honesty and a true picture of my emotions today, and not to pretend that my patriotism overshadows my all-too-human nature.

 

[Bambooki]

Shhh

Did you ever keep something about yourself a secret because you knew that when people found out, they'd look at you differently? Maybe your real friends wouldn't, and maybe some people wouldn't care. But so many people would see you differently, even if their attitudes and friendship didn't change. And some friendships would end altogether.

Obviously I'm leading up to the fact that I have something about myself that I keep quiet because I've gotten into some quasi-trouble in the past regarding this little-known Bambooki fact. It was a huge factor in how The Ex treated me, and it definitely affected the way Louis Vuitton did, too. One friend in college never felt the same way about me after he learned, while my good friends like PGMF and MidWest Girl, and of course my wonderful Fer couldn't care less.

It's like having a tail, or something. Real friends won't care if I have a tail, but some of lesser quality might be interested in seeing the tail or making a buck or two off it. Some people will always be looking at my butt trying to make out the outline of the tail, and some people will be too wigged out to go to the beach with me. And some won't want to hang out at all with "that chick with the tail".

Of course, I don't have a tail. A tail is a simple thing, really. It is what it is. What I've got going on is more akin to being the daugther of a celebrity or something. I'm certainly not. But that's what it can be like. Sometimes people like you for your famous relative. Sometimes people hate you for you famous relative. And your truest companions loved you before you had a famous relative and will still love you once the fame has subsided. But there will always be that famous relative and you'll always be related. So if you spill the beans, you'll never know how people really feel about you.

I'm trying to dance around this because I don't want the same thing to happen here, amidst my friends here. It's something I have to write about from time to time because it's a difficulty in my life, and I need a shoulder once in a while. Very few people truly understand, though, unless they're in the same situation. So for now I'll keep tight-lipped about it. My dad always warned me never to speak of it, because people cease to judge you and love you for you, and see you as an embodiment of whatever connection or gift or thing you've got. Tail or otherwise.

Sorry for the tease. I'm actually fishing around to see if anybody else knows this feeling. This if-I-don't-tell-them-I-won't-be-totally-honest-about-myself-but-if-I-do-tell-them-then-I'll-be-drawing-a-line-in-the-sand-and-they-may-not-like-me-anymore feeling.

You might know what I'm talking about if you:
a) are a prostitute (and at least one IRC'er knows what that feels like)
b) have a tail
c) are Tom Hanks' kid
d) have secretly won the lottery and are hiding it from family
e) have a tatoo of another woman's name on your body
f) posed for Playboy or starred in a low-budget (or any budget) porn flick
g) killed someone
h) hold some kind of masturbation world record
i) regularly hear from Jesus

Of course, these are just examples to illustrate my point.

Having a tail might be cool, though...

EDIT:
Sorry folks, it's not as interesting as I've accidentally led you to believe. It's boring and not unusual and I've not killed anybody or been in any pornography and some of you probably have a similar thing in your life. Didn't mean to get you all hyped up there!

Also, you have to know that I'm really not going to just vomit it all up - I've already lost enough friends. Considering deleting this post, actually...maybe a partial catharsis like the above isn't healthy.

 

[Bambooki]

A Rainy Monday

What a piece of shit day. This morning when my alarm went off at 6:30am it was dark and rainy outside. I don't usually mind morning rain because I enjoy a good soggy day. However, I enjoy them far more when I can spend the day at home in bed rather than sitting at this giant desk. At least, I think there's a desk under all of this paper....

Saturday The Fer and I took Mama Fer to the Columbus Zoo for her birthday. She had a ball, and I got my manatee fix at the new exhibit. Absolutely wonderful creatures. I enjoyed myself immensely, and even all of the rowdy, happy Ohio State fans at a local restaurant didn't dampen my spirits. (Mother f**kin' Ohio State...)

Dobergirl got to go swimming at the lake on Sunday, and my brother came home from WVU for the weekend. Weird to see him in college. It makes me feel old.

I think I need something hot and frothy...[insert raunchy joke here].

 

[Bambooki]

Argle Bargle

Not only am I already furious, but this is the second post I've had to type because I lost the first one, which I must say was a stroke of angry genius.

Does anyone else have a mother who calls them at work just to chat and has no comprehension of the fact that a) you're trying to get things done and b) you're not really supposed to be taking personal calls? Well, mine doesn't. At least two or three times a week she calls me, sometimes with a question and sometimes not, and bends my ear for 20 minutes. About her horses, and her dogs, and what errands she ran that morning. And should I say, "Mom, I really don't have time to chat with you like this," she'd lose it. She'd fly off the handle and give me the silent treatment. For three days.

All this annoyance is compounded by the fact that I'm all hyped up on caffeine and it really makes me jittery and just downright mean. I have all this work to do, and it's all mundane and I keep spelling "Potential" with two capital letters and having to correct myself. "POtential." It's making me furious. On top of everything else, a coworker has been bugging me about getting married: when, where, when, when, and most importantly, when. I don't fucking know! That's his God damned job! I'm helpless in this matter. Yet she warns me how impossible it is to plan a wedding in under a year. Weddings are very sore spots for me. Probably because I had to explain to my family, not once but twice, why my wedding to The Ex was first postponed and then cancelled. I don't know if I can handle another wedding, quite frankly. Besides, I don't like to bring it up to The Fer. He says he's not scared, but he's a man...

Well anyway this rant made me feel no better. And my hands are still shaking. And someone keeps calling and hanging up. And every time I have to pick it up and say, "This is Bambooki..." instead of what I really want to say, which is "Knock it off mother fucker!"

God, I'm angry. No more frozen mochas for me.

And don't think I don't see the hypocrisy in my second paragraph. I'm bitching about Mom taking up my time and yet here I am playing around with my journal. I annoy myself immensely sometimes.

============
Edit: And my fucking eyelid has been jumping all day.

 

[Bambooki]

Some of this and then some of that.

I’ve not made much mention of it lately, but my knee is doing pretty well. I can straighten it out, though it hurts to do so if I put any weight on it. I’m also keenly aware that when the leg is straight, the kneecap is out of the protective groove that holds it in place. So when the leg is straight the knee is vulnerable, especially to those with hyper mobile patellas. As for bending, I can now get it to bend to 140 degrees, which is pretty damn good consider that it only went to 90 degrees a month ago. My heel still doesn’t touch my butt, but my physical therapist told me that’s not normal anyway. I can do it with my right leg, no problem. I think women can do it and men have a harder time.

I’m still having electrical stimulation every other day, and I hate it with a passion. It feels terrible and causes intense spasms in my thigh, producing far more than the intended results. I know it’s supposed to cause contractions. These are bad ones though. Normally, e-stim isn’t prescribed for such an injury, and my therapist is a little puzzled as to why the doctor called for it. It’s miserable. Meanwhile, I’m lifting almost 100lbs on the leg press, and 30lbs on the leg extension machine. My left thigh is still visibly smaller than the right.

Updates aside, I’m still having a very hard time with the memory of that day. Is this abnormal? I don’t know. I think about it a dozen times or more a day. I think about where I will be when it happens again, and if The Fer will be there to put it back into place. I think about screaming in that bathtub – I’ve not showered in a bathtub-shower since. My shower at home is a stall, and I prefer that, for some dumb, gun-shy reason. The memory of everything that happened on July 6 hasn’t left and hasn’t dulled even a little bit. I have to get back to normal life – eventually I have to take this brace off and be a regular person with regular mobile habits again. I’m terrified, though. I’m afraid I’ll live in fear of the next injury, and I’m almost positive that it will happen again. The odds are good that it will. I think about hiking on a mountain or being on a raft in the middle of the Grand Canyon and having no help. I can’t get over this and I don’t understand why. My mind is far more crippled than my body. My knee is healing and my psyche is still lying in that tub in Fremont, Ohio. I relive it over and over and over until I force myself to think of something else, only to have the thoughts return in quiet moments. My morning shower is always horrific – I move like a turtle and every morning think about wearing my dive booties for traction. I have no idea how to break this fear cycle. I consider seeing my old counselor once in a while, and then change my mind and hope that time will heal the emotional wound, too.

Okay. Time’s up on the pity party. I’ve purged for today.

Speaking of dive booties, The Fer is taking SCUBA lessons. I’m thrilled. We’re already planning a dive trip to the Caribbean next spring. I’m overjoyed that finally a man wants to do the things I love to do, and for himself, not for me. His certification dive will be in the same lake where I took mine – Mount Storm Lake, in the mountains of West Virginia. In November. God, it was cold. The lake is a good place for a cert dive because it is heated year-round by a power plant and remains in the mid-seventies even in the winter, but that doesn’t mean you don’t have to put on a 6mm with hoodie and gloves. Getting out of the water between dives is hellacious. I think I’ll go along for the trip but pass on the lake dive. The Fer gets to be a mud puppy, which is the nickname my instructor gives all newbies. Before you have good control of your buoyancy – and it’s far more difficult in fresh water than in salt – you tend to sink to the bottom. And in a mountain lake with 18 inches of silt on the floor, that’s one helluva cloud to stir up. I remember falling right into the mud, and it ballooned up around me, and the visibility was perhaps 6 feet to begin with. I was enveloped in the blackest night I’ve ever experienced. If the instructor hadn’t been holding my hand, this mud puppy would have been toast. Nowadays I have excellent buoyancy control; you have to if you’re diving around coral. It dies if you touch it so divers have to be extra cautious. Unfortunately, many don’t appreciate the delicacy of coral and the importance it plays in the marine ecosystem. I saw a Japanese couple once in the Florida Keys standing on the reef looking at their map. I about shit. They were given a stern lecture by the boat operator upon returning, but I don’t think they cared.

But I’m about to go off on the environmental importance of the reef ecosystem, and that’s not appropriate here, so I’ll spare you. I keep my environmental soapbox in the trunk of my car so it’s always ready to come out and be stood upon. I just wish the US government understood the importance of public education. It’s everything. Without it, nobody cares, nobody gives a rat’s ass, and nothing is preserved. And we’re all screwed. Why bother pouring money into restoration programs if nobody is going to have a personal investment in the result? Some days I wonder if I can wake up every morning for the rest of my life and go into a job in which I’ll be fighting tooth an nail to take one step forward and be pushed three steps backward. But then I remember that it is what's in my heart. Why fight it?

Talk about a 180-degree turn in a post, huh?
========================================
Edit: Last night as we sat in my living room in front of the big bay window, I noticed a Lincoln-type sedan out on the sidewalk. Half an hour later as we cleaned the turtle tank upstairs the sedan was still there. Twenty minutes later I peeked out through the blinds and saw that there was a person in that car. We both peeked. Not real subtle, so we turned off the lights and peeked. The individual appeared to be just sitting, possibly talking on a phone. I couldn't tell whether they were looking at my house or my folks' house. So I called my dad to ask if he'd taken notice (naturally he hadn't), and as soon as the call connected the car abruptly started up and drove off. The Fer went out to scout and it had disappeared. I locked all three doors, turned on all three porch lights, and left Dobergirl to the run of the house. All was quiet, but I was sufficiently freaked out. I'm still sufficiently freaked out.

 

[Bambooki]

Badgers badgers badgers badgers....mushroom mushroom!

I’m always on the bandwagon. Ladies and Gentlement, I give you Googlism.

the fer is required to meet the system specification
the fer is simply applying the same practices to mutual funds that institutional investors like pension plans use on their investment managers
the fer is similar to the erd
the fer is working in a number of areas to support members
the fer is submitted to congress for a 90
the fer is always nearly a factor of 2
the fer is 0
the fer is perhaps not robust enough for four long nights on the road
the fer is studied
the fer is fixed at 1%
the fer is relatively insensitive to the doppler frequency
the fer is now thought to be a clone of this variety
the fer is my fav car
the fer is no longer operating

Laura is a racist and a total phony
Laura is full of it
Laura is a big skinny idiot
Laura is no Hillary
Laura is hardly a sympathetic martyr
Laura is a sadistic witch
Laura is like playing with fire
Laura is a lesbian and fucks chickens
Laura is such a bitch it is unnatural
Laura is licking the last drop of Ben's sperm from his cock (uh-oh...don't tell Aimee)
Laura is a single Mexican woman from Hermosillo (my secret is out!)
Laura is good in bed
Laura is an incredibly ticklish girl under any circumstances (that's very true)
Laura is currently undergoing simultaneous seed multiplication in south Australia
Laura is a mysterious young girl that seems to have a connection to your late wife

==============

In other news, I’m suffering from an extraordinary bout of menstrual cramps and I’m eating a caramel apple. The grocery store has started carrying them – probably in preparation for Halloween; they’ve also got popcorn balls, of which The Fer bought four. I went for a bike ride around the neighborhood last night. I figured since they put me on a bike in physical therapy, how different can the real thing be? The answer is not much, though I did feel something pop when the pedaling got difficult. Maybe the difference is hills. It felt great, though. Later I started to get really cranky with The Fer. We bickered, and I know I was irritating the hell out of him. He so rarely shows it, though. Rather than pick a fight, he just shut up, and I sent him to the store for sour cream and salsa so we could both have a little break and I could have some wine in his absence and cool down.

It annoys me that he’s a bigger person than I am. I’m not good at letting things go. If something bugs me or I think I’m right, I’ve got to make it known. He doesn’t do that. He’d rather lose an argument than have a fight or even bicker. Why can’t I do that? Why do I have to get the last word in and why is he so much more patient than I am? Is it the life experience he’s got or is it just his personality? If I bite my tongue sometimes I get even angrier than if I’d say something. He’s my role model in that way, and yet when I’m irritated I just want him to put up his proverbial dukes and have at it. I hate it when I’m petty and dammit, this whole making-myself-a-better-person thing isn’t as easy as I thought it would be.

 

[Bambooki]

Ouch, Mom

Well I'm in the grips of hormonal imbalance. I'm a mess. Apparently when I'm menstruating I get "motherly" with The Fer. He says it doesn't bother him, but that's a joke. Last night I made spaghetti and the sauce was blurping all over the white stovetop, and at the same time the water was boiling over and the lid didn't fit the pot and the dog was underfoot and the cat was up on the counter next to the garlic bread and I just about stood there and cried. I didn't though. Points for Cpt. Hormone.

However, I am having a hormone-related dilemna, and almost didn't post about it because you all with think I'm such an idiot. But I'm going to dye my hair back to its original color, which is deep brown. Right now it's very light brown with blonde highlights and everybody just loves it. I love it too, but my hair grows so quickly and after 6 weeks I look like a skunk in reverse. So I've taken polls and announced my intention to go back to brown, because I just can't afford to pay $85 or more that often. I'm trying to be mature and nix the things I don't need and save money, hoard it like a squirrel, for the upcoming Christmas months and a dive vacation The Fer and I want to take in February. Isn't that smart and mature of me? But when I mentioned it to Mom a few minutes ago in our weekly can't-get-her-off-the-phone conversation, she geeked. She loves the blonde. She actually offered to give me money every month to pay for my hair appointments.

... :nervous:

I'm 24 years old. I have a job. I have my own home and I make my own dinner. For a millisecond only I thought about accepting her offer. How could I look myself in the eye every morning if I was taking money from my mom to dye my hair, of all things? (It's not like I can't afford lunch or need help buying Prozac or something.) Does the whole thing seem even remotely unsettling to anyone else? I spend too much money so I'm cutting out the frivolous things. I don't need light hair, so it's going. Should there be any debate?

Aside from the weird money issue, how upsetting is it to hear your mom say that she'll actually pay you to keep you from going back to the hair that you were born with? Geez. Maybe it's because I'm menstruating and am sensitive, but that fucking hurt, man. The Fer said he likes the blonde but I know he doesn't really care one way or another. And JJ and MidWest Girl told me my natural color was beautiful and to go back. So I'm listening to my contemporary females.

Really. Ouch, Mom. She put a damper on my day, big time.

Meanwhile, one year after I had it "fixed", my shower is pouring water down onto my kitchen floor. Shouldn't the plumber who was supposed to have taken care of that problem stand by his work? Since when is the life-expectancy of a patch one year? It pisses me off, but more because my uncle and dad are too cheap to keep their rental home in good condition. The whole place needs re-wired; when I turn on the hair dryer I have to turn off the bathroom light or I trip the circuit breaker and have to go down to the basement and flip it again. And the back steps were falling apart for a year an half. Only when I fell down them with my crutches in August did they send my cousin over to build me new stairs. God forbid they rent this place to actual tenants. It's an absolutely beautiful house, 100 years old next year, with incredible woodwork in the old Victorian style. But my God, put a little money into it.

And so ends the shallowist, most frivolous post, ever.

 

[Bambooki]

Logged back on to tell you all that I chickened out on the brown thing, but now I may be chickening back in. I think I'll just sit my ass down in that chair and wait for whatever words come out of my mouth. Feel free to voice your opinions via pm, since I've already gone this far....

======
Edit:
IRC Votes for Brown: 3
IRC Votes for non-brown: 0
IRC Votes for mooching off Mom: 1
Fer and Minou Vote: RED

 

[Bambooki]

Damn Folks....

I look fabulous!!!

PS: Rain, anyone?

 

[Bambooki]

Scoop

Okay folks. I grabbed my proverbial cojones and went in there last night. I was wanting a red, but the lady told me that such a dark color would be a shock after a year of a very light color. She talked me into a dark brown which is still two shades lighter than my natural color, and put in some red highlights. Apparently the whole reason my hair was so light all over was because the very first lady who did my highlights didn't bother to do my whole head and so she threw in some color all over to cover up some mistakes and her laziness, and there was patches of dark and mis-matched blonde/caramel colors all over. My stylist was actually embarassed that my color job had come from her salon. As she painted over the last bit of blonde, I about cried, but I was resolved to do this. I'd just spend half an hour in a Chinese restaurant with mirrors staring at myself and hoping I wasn't nuts. But I wasn't. It's now a dark color - I can't believe my natural hair is two shades darker than this - and apparently she threw some gold in there. And the red highlights are very subtle but the whole thing has a reddish cast to it. Anyway, The Fer has announced he likes it better, and I am a huge fan. My stylist was so proud that she grabbed some guy waiting for his wife and displayed my head to him. He pretended to be suitably impressed. If nothing else, the dark hair makes my dark eyes look enormous. I look like E.T.

So I ended up spending another $85, but it won't cost that much from now on. I can probably still afford some all-over color and keep it around $40, which is do-able.

So ends the frivolity and shallow-ness of that exercise.

I stayed home today - throat hurts, nose clogged, headache, ear ache, chest ache, cramps, and my knee, I've discovered, is an incredible barometer. Yesterday as the hurricane was coming it felt like hell. Nobody important is up at the office today, it's pouring, and I don't have a problem with staying in bed. I probably could have/should have dragged my butt up there, but I don't want to get sicker. Maybe I can still fight this off.

I think I'm going to go shower. A little steam may help things. And what better to do on a lousy day than play with your new hair?

 

[Bambooki]

:-(

It was a good weekend, and I feel so lousy. I don't even want to waste energy typing about my fun weekend, but I will. It was a gorgeous weekend, Dobergirl got to go for a swim, I got to visit with my favorite cousin for the first time since Christmas, and I went with The Fer to his first scuba lesson. He and the other 10 people in the pool all looked so confused and uncertain and clumsy. But I was pleased - he had no problems equalizing and made it down to the bottom of the pool without a problem. They were funny - like little tadpoles all buzzing around at the bottom, having no buoyancy control whatsoever. Every few minutes one would pop up to the top and not even realize that their hair was sticking up out of the water. I enjoyed watching him learn and go through the same things I did.

We went to some friends' party before scuba. It was one of those social situations in which you know absolutely nobody at the event. Everybody else knew everybody else, including The Fer, but I knew nobody but our hosts. In addition, I was the only non-wife/non-mother there. Everybody was either already a mommy or five months pregnant. When the inevitable gender split happened - men to the Steelers game and women to the kitchen with the toddlers - I was left feeling very strange. I was totally left out when they all started talking about pregnancy and labor and it felt like I wasn't a member of their stupid estrogen club. It was uncomfortable and I only went to be polite and because I love our friends, the hosts (the wife is five months along and so it was good for her to have other moms to relate to). I'm certainly not mad at anybody; I just don't know what any of them were talking about because I'm not there yet. It's hard not to feel like a failure because I've not yet reproduced. As much as we women work for equality, I still find that there's an undercurrent of "you're not a woman until you've produced a child" floating about in these kinds of situations. It's very archaic but I felt it nonetheless.

Lastly, at 10pm last night, after scuba, Mom called with the update on my grandfather: the hospice people give him two weeks at most. Now, he has surprised us in the past. He's very, very strong. He was expected to die in June, and has hung on for three more months. The man is a rock. But it's ending. He's in the final stages of dying. His heartbeats are slow and infrequent, and his ankle have a rash on them where the fluid in his body is literally seeping out through his skin when he sits up in his chair. We've all known this was coming, and my parents are ready and handling it well. The one thing that's been so miraculous about all of this, though, is that he has claimed on several mornings to have seen my grandma the night before. He doesn't sleep at night anymore, and he's seen my grandma several times, and Saturday night he saw his mother. He told his nurses about it, and said, "I have to go with [my wife]." The nurses said, "Where do you have to go?" And he said, "Heaven."

I about bawled when I heard this, but it's so miraculous and beautiful, isn't it? They say that a dying person's mind will bring about images of lost loved ones, but isn't it far more likely that my grandmother really was there with him? I believe she was, 100%. I'm thankful to have been given a clue about death, to know that when it's our time to go, our already-departed loved ones are there waiting for us, to help us make the transition. For the rest of my life I'll believe that we don't die alone. And that's one of the only comforting things about this. We want him released from his pain, but it's hard not to be selfish. (What? Only 94 years and four grandchildren? You call that justice?

I've been debating about whether or not to go up and tell him goodbye. The last time I saw him he was sitting up playing with a puppy. A big part of me wants to remember that. But I think I'll go up anyway. Hopefully I can visit when they've got him in a chair and he doesn't look so death-like. I've had a lump in my throat all morning and that awful headache you get when you're holding back tears. It's collected above my eyeballs. For him, for the family, and for me, I want this to be over.

 

[Bambooki]

Yesterday was crap.

I hate to post negatively. I really do. But lately I've been down, and if I don't get these things out, the dark cloud of my depression can move in, and I can not and will not let that cloud overtake me without a fight. Besides, the impending death of a family member is depressing, for anybody.

Yesterday was garbage. It poured buckets all day out of a flat, gray sky. It was a little taste of November, without the low temps and pneumoniatic cough. I had no umbrella. I waited for the rain to stop, and at 4pm it was still going strong. I went into the bathroom to change into my physical therapy clothing, and found that I was covered in blood and my new pants looked the victims of some serial killing. My cycle is all messed up and has been ever since my surgery and D&C in June. My period never lasted more than five days...now it's creeping up to seven and it worries me. My mom had terrible trouble in that department for years, and a horrible menopause. *Sigh*

So anyway, I changed out of my awful work clothing and cleaned up and then realized that not only did I not have an umbrella, but I'd brought my leather jacket to work. And I know cows are waterproof but I hate to get the stuff wet. So I walked out in the pouring rain - still can't run because of the knee - and got soaking. Physical therapy was horrendous - I about collapsed and they really pushed me. Good, I know. It's their job and it's healing me. But I was so tired and so weak and so sad.

Despite my fatigue I lifted when I got home and worked my chest and abs. The Fer made me dinner, and then my dad called me next door to have the "death talk" with me, as though I were still 12. He wanted to know if I was okay with everything, and if I could handle it. I almost laughed, because a) I'm 24 years old, not 12, and b) even if I wasn't okay with it, what difference would it make? Death waits for no one to be ready. Dad seems to be dealing with it very well and is very grateful for the 94 years Pop has had. The nurses said that it's going to be a peaceful death, the way most people would like to go out. I know I would, given the choice. I'd like to be old and in my bed in my home surrounded by my family.

The Fer pissed me off royally. He was rather glib last night, saying that no matter how prepared my family seemed, it was going to knock us on our butts. I disagreed, saying that we were prepared and we want him to stop suffering and that a peaceful death is how it will end, and we accept that. But The Fer said something obnoxious like, "Only time will tell," or, "You might be surprised at how poorly your dad handles it." I was angrier than hell but bit my tongue so as not to incite an argument. I hate that know-it-all attitude. He's very sympathetic and supportive overall; at this moment he just really rubbed me the wrong way and said something incredibly abrasive.

My brother is scheduled to come home for a few hours on Thursday so he can visit my grandfather, but my dad wants him to come home sooner, because it could be any time. I think I'll stop by after work today, since his house is on the way, and do what I have to do. This is very difficult, obviously, and I don't really know what to say to him. They say that hearing is the very last function to leave a human body and that the patient can still hear when every other sense is gone.

Enough. I'm depressing myself. In other news, I talked to an old friend from college yesterday. We've not spoken in almost a year due to busy lives and living far apart and the usual blah blah. Turns out she's jumped ship. Switched teams. Made the shift. All hail the new lesbian! I'm very happy for her. I don't know if she'll stick with women or go back to men or both, but she's learning about herself and I'm glad to hear her so happy and excited about life again. She's bi-polar, and so many things are a struggle for her. I'm glad this struggle is becoming clearer.

As an aside: I wish she would spay her cat. The thing has had three litters because she lets it outside. It's had no shots or anything, and keeps coming home knocked up. We have enough homeless animals in this world. The more litters her cat has, the more cats will die in animal shelters or out in the feral world. It's morally reprehensible and irresponsible and I bite the hell out of my tongue, because she won't listen to me anyway.

SPAY AND NEUTER YOUR PETS OR DON'T HAVE PETS AT ALL!

 

[Bambooki]

Hooch

Re-reading Minx’s journal made me think of spring break. I lived in Minx’s town; well, actually I lived south, in St. Petersburg, but it’s all Pinellas County and it’s all one giant, gorgeous beach. Tell me again why I don’t live there anymore? I miss it desperately. I’m very glad that Fate led me back home, so that I could get away from The Ex and find The Fer, but if I could have The Fer all the same, I would have stayed in St. Petersburg. Home.

I digress.

I went on one spring break adventure. Understand, I’m not the spring break type. I don’t drink, I don’t smoke, I don’t do drugs, and I certainly don’t party, save for the occasional night at Ybor City (Tampa club district). Well, didn’t. Past tense. Now I don’t party at all and I’m very content with that. I enjoy sleep far too much to be a night owl. My body’s not built for nighttime functioning. Doesn’t happen. Anyway, in the spring of 2000 I ended my relationship with Louis Vuitton. I’d been in New Mexico for three weeks on a winter term. I was at a place called Ghost Ranch, in the northern part of the state. It was the home of Georgia O’Keefe for most of her adult life. It was beautiful, and spiritual, and it was the desert. There’s something so amazing and healing about the desert. I was taking a poetry class with kids from all over the country. There were 10 of us. We spent three weeks together and grew to know each other’s demons and really healed each other in a way. I was hurting from a long fall semester with Louis; breaking up, getting back together, and then hitting rock bottom. Sitting on the kitchen floor with a knife getting ready to cut my wrists because a monster had taken over my brain and I didn’t know how to stop it. The depression had come over me, and the counseling center at my college actually turned me away.

I digress again. I always do that. Sorry.

So I was in New Mexico, healing. Learning to be myself again. Loving the desert and finding faith again. Louis was at home in bed with a girl who’d been saving herself for marriage and whom he’d always referred to as “horseteeth”. So upon returning, my life changed immensely. I kicked him to the curb. And what do women do when they’ve been rejected? Go to Jamaica!

I went to Jamaica with a friend who at the time had just become a lesbian. But she didn’t tell me, and her actions on spring break certainly spoke to the contrary. She was a friend of Louis’ (I never know how to do apostrophes with names that end in “s”.) and it was fortuitous because I got to rub it in his face. At this point my heart was completely shattered and I longed for any respite from the pain. Having never experienced the pain of a broken heart, I grasped at straws.

Those straws happened to be four guys from Philadelphia. I can only remember two of their names. How sad. Now let me say, front and center, first and foremost, that I did not give it up in Jamaica. I wasn’t about to do something stupid and risky. But I did generally make a trash heap of myself in every other way imaginable. Sex was off limits, but nothing else was. I’m ashamed to admit it, but I let myself be passed around from guy to guy like a Bud Light. I was a thing to them, but I didn’t realize it at the time and probably wouldn’t have cared anyway. I remember they were all sitting naked in the hot tub, and I was in a bathing suit. One by one they picked me up and put me on each of their laps, and then passed me to the next guy. I knew it was all very dirty, but all I could think of was how this was going to hurt Louis Vuitton when he heard the tale. And even more importantly, I knew that this mean that I was still attractive to men. Someone would want me.

Of course, it was disgusting and I didn’t realize that those guys saw me as a spring break slut. I would have died had I realized that. I prided myself on my integrity and morals. Somehow, though, they flew out the window of that Air Jamaica plane somewhere over Cuba. Looking back, I shudder at what they must have thought of me. I’m horrified that I wasn’t a person to them, and even more horrified that they didn’t know me. I’m a writer, and an animal-lover, and a friend and a daughter and a sister, and they only knew me as a bimbo. A party girl. Nameless, faceless, just a pair of boobs walking around.

For my part, I did skank it up. I really did. My judgment was severely impaired, and to this day there is a roll of film and a video of me on that trip that belong to those guys, and I often wonder if someone will spot me in one of those “Girls Gone Wild” videos or some such smut. I’d die, because that’s not me. I’m a real person, not an anonymous co-ed to be remembered only for the filthy things she did on one stupid trip.

But I can’t take it back. I made those decisions. And you already know, of course, that it did nothing to ease the pain and heartache I was feeling. Nothing at all. It would be another year and a half before I let Louis Vuitton go, truly. Anyway, it was a week of debauchery, and then they left a few days before I did. And I realized how unlike me I’d been, and was ashamed. It had been so much fun, and yet they had treated me like the trash I’d been, which only compounded my sense of self-doubt and low self-esteem. I was good enough for these guys to fool around with but not to sit and talk to.

Then again, they were man whores to the extreme. One told me he’d been with over 150 women. So it’s a damn good thing I didn’t do anything stupid with these men. They were genuine trash; I was a good girl disguised as trash for a week. I certainly did a good job of pretending.

Anyway, it makes me wonder about spring breakers. They’re all real people, and they all have mothers at home, and maybe some are there to party and maybe some are there for other reasons.

The following year I think I relaxed by my swimming pool for spring break, and visited my grandparents, and it was a good one. It was a Bambooki vacation. All-too-boring.

=======================

I visited Pop last night on the way home from work. He was sleeping, and when he had a coughing fit and woke up, I went over to his bed and held his hand and asked him how he was feeling. Ever the optimist, he said, “Oh, pretty good today.” But he always says that. Never a negative comment from that man. And his eyes didn’t focus on me for long, and he drifted off to some place I couldn’t see, and just stared for a while. I don’t know what he was seeing. Then he fell to sleep again, and I told him I loved him and went home. I expect I’ll see him again, but then again perhaps I won’t. He was very peaceful last night and that may be the best goodbye I can ask for. I expect I’ll go up again, though, with my little brother. It’s tough – I tried very hard not to cry when I was there, all alone with him. I didn’t want him to know I was crying. I’m sure he knows these are his last days, but I couldn’t let any emotion slip. I tried very hard to be brave.

 

[Bambooki]

Dreariness, again.

God I hate this climate. Nothing but rain in the non-summer months. Yesterday was a piece of Heaven - clear blue sky, low seventies, not an ounce of humidity. Today, meanwhile, is miserable. I miss Florida and St. Petersburg the way Minou misses Portland. Achingly.

I had a horrendous night. I skipped physical therapy because all day my head pounded, to the point of nausea. I slept in my closet, of all places, during my lunch hour. I've still got a pillow in there from my knee-propping days, and I just passed out. Fortunately no one was afoot and the closet locks from the inside. It's walk-in, and very spacious, so when BossMan (with whom I share a doorway between our offices) is out of town, I snooze at lunch when necessary. Anyway, I was too sick to go pump any iron or get e-stim, or maybe I was just too depressed. At 3:59pm my dad called to give me the hospice update: 72 hours, they think. But again, Pop will just fall to sleep and drift away. I sniffled most of the way home. The new Shania Twain song, Forever and For Always, came on the radio and it struck a nerve. Totally made me cry.

When I arrived, a package had come from PGMF with the cutest blue warm up suit and tank top from The Gap. He also sent me four boxes of Halloween lights and a card to tell me he loves me. I swear, there's nothing like having a Possibly Gay Male Friend who doesn't want in your pants but who loves you and treats you like an absolute goddess. I must receive two cards a month from him. I let the man dress me, and I'm a better woman for it. And I have to say, I am adorable in this outfit.

Sleep evaded me last night at 2am. I woke up starving, and yet was very frightened to get out of bed. I'm past the age where I believe in monsters under the bed, but sometimes my overactive imagination intimidates me. After an hour of tossing and stomach growling, I crept downstairs for a cookie. Or two. And then ran up the stairs like a little kid in a dark basement. (Okay, hobbled up the stairs.) But sleep didn't come until 4:30am, and The Fer snored, and New Kitty was howling downstairs, so I slept in and was late to work this morning by half an hour. Nobody pays any attention to me around here though, and I just crept in quietly and came up to my office.

Oh, and I totally forgot to take my BC pill on time - I was an hour late. I wonder if that makes a lot of difference. Not that I've been in any sort of playful mood of late. I also had a talk with The Fer about my knee and my inability to deal with the accident. He thinks I should go see my counselor. I cried the minute we started talking about it. It worried him, and it worries me. Should I really be getting so upset every time I think about that morning? And should I be thinking so obsessively about that morning? And shouldn't I stop carrying around the cordless phone when I'm home alone, just in case I fall and it pops out again? How am I ever going to get on with my life? The thought of being out of this knee brace terrifies me. It's interfering with daily life. And that's not good.

I need some fucking toast. I'm starving. Again. On top of everything else, I've gained 8 pounds since this injury. All my life I was "The Twig". Now, seeing that scale creep up to a number I've never seen before really upsets me. I continue to lift and do my cardio, though. I think it's the carbs I've got to lose. Mother fucking carbs...

 

[Bambooki]

In the spirit of Govt Man, and since I'm so blue....

I love my giant king sized pillow-topped mattress because it's the warmest, snuggliest place on earth.
I love my Dobergirl, and the fact that when she falls asleep she loses bladder control is the most awful thing, and yet when she smiles at me with her butt in a puddle on my giant king sized pillow-topped mattress, I can't help be melt inside, for this is a creature who loves me unconditionally and would give her life for me without thinking.
I love the way the pear tree off my back porch is partially red and partially yellow, but still mostly green.
I love inchworms. I love 'em.
I love the way my dad gives his life to others and asks nothing in return. I love the way my brother tells inappropriate stories at the dinner table, about pooing in the woods and such.
I love the state of West Virginia, because it is my home and because the mountains are older than humanity and soft and green and rumply.
I love the smell of the mud within the caves of the Allegheny Mountains, Appalachia. I love the way it gets under my fingers and I love the way I smell and look to other people when I stop at McDonalds on the way home from being 12 stories underground.
I love the way my uncle sneaks out of his office on summer days at 5:15pm with a fly pole in one hand and a beer in the other and walks down to the creek.
I love the way the ladies who work the drive-thru window at the bank send dog biscuits through the vaccu-tubes when they see our dogs in the car.
I love the Wendy's along I-16 in South Carolina that gave my my lhasa apso a biscuit, too.
I love the way The Fer says, "Sorry honey" in his sleep when I poke him because he's snoring and always rolls over without complaint.
I love ducks.
I love the fact that my mom is the Queen of Vocabulary, and my dad is the King of Grammar, and that nobody in my household gets away with using mundane or improper language.
I love my little curly bamboo plant on my desk.
I love the word "vestibule".
I love Publix subs.
I love the taste of sweet envelope glue.
I love plums.

 

[Bambooki]

Young, Dumb, and Spastic

When I was in college, I had a friend named Ellis. He was what they call an "experienced learner", meaning an adult returning for his bachelor's degree. Ellis smoked cigars and had a wrinkled face, and was a combination of high school nerd and construction worker. He always smelled like cigar smoke and always wore ratty jeans, ratty tennis shoes, and ratty t-/flannel shirts, depending on the time of year. Ellis was married, seeking a divorce, and like to tell a small group of us the stories of his failing marriage. We were all Environmental Studies majors, and so we were a tight group. Ellis, of course, was on the fringes of this group.

Sophomore year as part of Environmental Biology, four of us paired up to do what was called the “Exotics Lab”. The Exotics Lab was a four-week study of exotic species on campus, including Solenopsis invicta, the Red Imported Fire Ant (readers in the deep south know exactly what I’m talking about), and the three terrible exotic tree species in Florida, the Malaleuca Tree, the Australian Pine, and the Brazilian Pepper tree. Our job was to go out to the pond on the back side of campus and take measurements on the distance between fire ant mounds and pepper trees and so forth. Due to scheduling, Ellis and I paired up, and the other two guys took a different shift, since we had to do it every day.

Back in the bushes with the alligators and such would have been a perfect place to rape me, I used to think. Ellis was so chatty with me and always a tad bit too nosey. He liked to know what was going on in my life. And back in those bushes I started to feel weird. After all, the first thing they did for the women as freshmen was tp gather us together in an auditorium and bring in a convicted rapist and scare the hell out of us. So I was trained to assume the worst. But it was Ellis, and he was married, and yaddi yaddi yaddi. Nothing happened in the bushes. We finished our lab and all moved on to our junior years. Of course, he was in more of my classes – the people with the same major always end up together in latter years of college. He was one of the environmental studies guys. Albeit, a weird one whom everybody generally mocked behind his back, but a fellow student nonetheless.

So another semester began and of course we were in another class together. At the time I was on a downhill slide with Louis Vuitton and my depression was worsening quickly. I wasn’t thinking so clearly and didn’t notice things I normally would have. I did, however, think it a tad unusual that Ellis had begun to send me emails. The only one I can really remember contained something along the lines of, “I wish I could just put you in my pocket and take you away from here with me.” First of all, that’s a weird thing to say, and second of all, it was a red light. But there wasn’t much I could do – I certainly couldn’t skip class just because an old friend had started to act strangely. He was divorcing his wife, who had drug problems, he said.

One day class let out early. So nobody was in the quad. I lingered in the classroom talking to my professor for a while, and then headed out to my car. (On a side note, I’ve never gotten used to the fact that college buildings have classes that open into hallways. At my school, all classrooms opened to the outside. Every door led out into the Florida sun. Hallways only existed in admin buildings. I never noticed it until started working here, at this northern school.) So the class had dispersed to their cars and were gone, and I was walking alone to the parking lot.

Just before I reached the corner of the math and sciences building, he leapt out at me. Literally. He’d been hiding behind the building and jumped out like a monkey or a cat in an attempt at physical comedy, landing like a samurai and grinning with those gross brown teeth. He told me he’d been waiting for me.

I had jumped about four feet into the air, and as I walked with him to my car, desperately wished that one of my friends was still lurking about, or that classes would let out and students would start streaming into the lot. We talked on the way to the cars; he asked me to go with him to a work-related picnic, or perhaps it was a picnic being held by one of his professors. Either way, I have problems saying no, so I waffled like an idiot, which probably only led him on. I had my keys in my hand and by this time we were at my car. He’d followed me right up to the driver’s side door. I stuck in the key and unlocked it, and when I turned around, he was right in front of me. He took a step forward, and I had nowhere to go, so I was pressed up against the car. I was trapped by this man and while I wasn’t terrified, I sure as hell was nervous.

Ugh, then came the lean-in. Those yellow-brown teeth and that horrible cigar breath. And that wrinkly face. This man was in his forties. I was twenty. I could see his tongue coming up into his mouth. He was going to use it on me.

I think I put my hands on his chest and pushed him back, but he wouldn’t budge. I threw my head back so his tongue couldn’t get me, and my eyes must have been huge because he stopped and said, “I’m just trying to make you feel better.” He backed up. I don’t know what we said to each other but I must have said something and bolted. I was careful not to offend him in whatever I said, though.

I drove speedily over to Louis Vuitton’s dorm. I told my friends what had happened. Not surprisingly, Louis Vuitton couldn’t have cared less. He was interested, but the story didn’t elicit the “I’m going to fucking kill him” reaction I’d expected. Naturally. Why this surprised me at the time I don’t know. My other friends were creeped out and urged me to tell someone. Louis just made jokes. Now that I think about it, what a prick!

I got the desired reaction from my father. The man lost it. My dad is a pacifist to the extreme. I doubt he’s ever raised his hand to another human being, at least not since his all-American boyhood days. But my mother told me it was all she could do to keep him off a plane. Had she not stopped him, he wouldn’t have come to my rescue with a howling lynch mob and pummeled poor Ellis to death. Being a lawyer and all, he used terms like "assault and battery". Apparently the minute Ellis touched me it was considered battery. I guess it's a father-daughter thing. No matter how old I am, he'll always want to protect me. When I'm a parent I'm sure I'll better understand the desire to kill anyone who messes with my children.

Poor Ellis. It’s true. I don’t think he would have harmed me. For a long time I was scared to death of him. I’d never been put in a situation like that. I was raised in a safe little bubble by my over-protective dad. Nobody ever tried to harm me; he didn’t let the real world get to me. Hell, I’d never even met a Hispanic person until I moved south. Anyway, now that it’s all over I think I overreacted.

My dad certainly overreacted. He called the dean, and campus safety was involved, and all of the emails Ellis had sent to me were confiscated, and I had to meet with a number of higher-ups and recall the story and fill out forms and generally help to crucify this man, who was ordered to stay away from me. A month later my dad was still hounding the dean about what he was going to do with the beast who’d attacked his daughter. The dean and I quietly laughed about it one day in his office, and he reminded me that my dad wasn’t in charge. I was.

The following semester began in February. Ellis and I had another class together. I saw him and almost vomited. I was nervous. And he approached me at the end of class and asked, “Is this okay? I don’t want to scare you.” I told him that it was, even though I was still badly shaken. I felt badly for him. Of course my dad threw another shit fit. The poor dean.

To this day I feel badly. But I know my reaction was immediate fear, and that was a gut thing. Women are supposed to trust their instincts. I did. Ellis graduated and I never heard from him again. When I told my classmates they all agreed that it was weird and creepy and that he’d been a tad cuckoo to begin with. Nobody was surprised.

I often wonder what happened to Ellis. And I wonder if I was the jerk, or if he just had a minor lapse in judgment. I like to believe the latter, that he really was a good guy, and just needed someone to tell him not to come on to young girls.

=======================
Meanwhile, Pop is still kickin'. The man has an iron will, I tell ya.

 

[Bambooki]

I just found the most wonderful story online. It was written in the winter of 99-00, I think, by a woman who was feeding a stray dog in the lot next to her apartment on the Lower East Side of Manhattan. I promise it's well worth the 25 minutes it takes to go through the entries, and I promise there's a very happy ending that will make you feel warm for the rest of the day.

Dog lovers, click here for Straydog.

I, meanwhile, am only emotionally warm, since it's 50 degrees outside and the frappin' heat has not been turned on in this building yet. I have my jacket on and a heating pad on my lap for warmth. I'm like an old woman. Also, I've had a headache for three weeks now and I'm concerned that there may be a problem. I don't have allergies, so unless the headache is the only symptom, I can't explain it. Maybe it's allergies, maybe it's hormonal, I don't know. It's getting out of control, though. Today it's bad. The Fer tells me to go to my doctor - which one should I contact? The general family doc or the gyn? I think the family doc is the way to start but I can't even think straight today. I have nausea, too. Especially in the mornings. And no, there's no reason for that nausea. I'm not pregnant. But the nausea leads me to believe that it's hormonal. Maybe my pills aren't working right.

My grandfather hangs stubbornly onto life. He's amazing. The hospice folk are blown away. Blown away. They can't believe he's lived a week after his expected death. I can. The man is a machine. He just lives on. I've never in my life seen such a will to live. The report is that he's stable and pain-free.

 

[Bambooki]

Still Pissed Off

On Friday I was on the stair-stepper in physical therapy. Working hard, hurting like hell, but doing it. My therapist and I were talking, and he went over to write a few things in his chart. Two other therapists were hanging around with their patients, talking and goofing off.

Ever notice that physical therapy centers are like a boys' club? It's mostly men, jocks, and they're real cliquey. (Clickey?) The patients feel left out and uncomfortable because they're not in on the inside jokes being tossed around right in front of them. I've been in pt three times and every time was like that and I've always been self-conscious about it.

So anyway I'm on my stair stepper, and suddenly in front of at least half a dozen people - therapists including my own and other patients - one of the therapists - not my own - stops short and snaps at me, "Why don't you quit hip-hiking on that machine and do your exercises like you're s'posed to?" Everybody stopped what they were doing and looked at me, and he told me in curt terms what I was doing wrong. My therapist said nothing. He'd not mentioned my poor form to me, and I had no idea I was doing it. Isn't that their job? I was humiliated. Here I was, sweating, sad because my grandpa is dying, and tired on a Friday evening. I was in a hurry because I had to go to Morgantown to fetch my brother and my mood has generally been very low lately. I turned bright red and asked him what I was doing wrong and apologized.

But later I realized what a little fucker he'd been and I wanted to call him up and take it back. Naturally I've thought of all the things I should have said, but I suppose it's best not to cause animosity in that place, since I'll be there for a while. Sometimes the fucker works on me and I would have looked like more of a jerk than he did to his jock buddies. But I didn't stand up for myself, and that sucks. There really wasn't much to say that would have subtly conveyed to him how he offended me.

I'm mad as hell, though, and still so embarassed. I felt like a fool, with everyone watching. I hate public criticism. Why did he have to do that?