You know how when you watch a horror movie and some bobble-head who was just having slutty sex with her football captain boyfriend decides she's going to investigate the maniacal laughter emanating from the darkened basement without telling anybody where she's going, without a flashlight and or light sabre, and dressed only in bra and panties, and you're thinking, like, oh dear GOD. DON'T GO IN THE BASEMENT. Followed immediately by, I would never do something so stupid...
We've all been there. And by there, I mean yelling at our TV screens as opposed to being on the verge of dismemberment because we foolishly had premarital sex and then decided to check out the basement armed only with our panties.
My point is, we all assume we know what we would do and how we would feel given what should seem like some pretty cut and dry circumstances.
I used to think that, but now I know I'd probably be the idiot having my head chopped off in the basement. I'd definitely be the idiot having slutty sex with the football captain.
In a way, I recently experienced my own horror show. I survived. As per Dr. Q, I did so "kind of by the skin of the teeth," but here I am nonetheless. As one commenter on my blog put it, the universe sent me a bitch-slap of a wake up call and now I need to do something about it.
(To my commenter: I would agree, you may have watched too many Oprah reruns. That's OK, I love you anyway, and agree with you. Actually, I read her magazine every chance I can, which is worse than watching the reruns. Her new show Oprah: Behind the Scenes is fantastic by the way. I've somehow become hooked on Oprah 25 years after the party started and subsequently closed down. At any rate, your comments were exactly what I needed, when I needed them...so thank you.)
The problem wasn't that I had survived something that could have just as easily have left me with a mild case of decomposition, but that I wasn't doing it right. Surviving that is.
I have always believed that when faced with a near-death experience, a normal person would automatically feel blessed, and so much MORE alive for having survived.
A normal person wouldn't take another minute for granted, would realize what mattered most in her life, and would seize every day like it was her last, having had the fact that future days aren't guaranteed bitch-slapped right into her.
In fact, it's not uncommon for people having survived some pretty bat shit circumstances to wake up the next morning and completely change their lives. How often have you read some survivor story profile (probably in O Magazine) that says something like:
"As soon as that airplane toilet was sucked out into the stratosphere with me still on it, I just knew I was in trouble. As I flew through the air, I thought about my family, my children, my friends, and all my dreams and hopes for the future. Right before the toilet swung around and knocked me unconscious, I remember thinking that if God/Buddha/Allah/Sweet Baby Jesus/Grown Jesus/et al. would just spare my life, I would be a totally different person and would never waste time complaining again! Since I landed safely on top of a Bouncy Castle with my pants down at 150 mph, I can honestly say I am so grateful for every day, and am living life to the fullest. I left my kids with their father, and moved to Portugal where the men are hot and the drugs are legal."
Or something like that.
The point is, surviving something is supposed to feel lucky. I wasn't feeling lucky, and I sure as hell wasn't feeling grateful either.
I really wanted to feel both. I desperately wanted to feel grateful and happy to be alive. Not just happy - I was expecting meadow-twirling levels of exhilaration.
Needless to say, what I actually felt was a bit of a letdown in comparison. Admittedly, there have actually been moments where I was pissed. Pissed right off that I lived.
Clearly, I'm a survivor failure. Just continuing to breathe should be simple, and yet I've been fucking it up.
However...I'm done with this too.
Frankly, I will never feel lucky because of what happened. Being raped, horribly injured, left untreated, and then horribly injured even further isn't lucky. It's terrible. Lucky is winning the lottery - not an exploding vagina.
My life circumstances didn't immediately change because I kept on breathing. They're not going to, unless I change them. This may take some effort, but I'm still breathing, which is one less thing to have to work on at the same time. I can't imagine things would be any easier if I were deceased.
I have no idea what my life purpose is, but I can think of at least three people that I annoy greatly. Since I don't like them either, my continued ability to annoy them still counts for something. It may not be much, but I'll take it.
Also on the good news front, the indomitable Dr. Q has declared me, "perfect." He wanted to know if I had had sex yet, and I told him he was crazy, particularly because the last time I asked about sex he had made it sound like I could only ever have the most boring, terrible, passionless sex imaginable and even then the man would have to have a very small penis. Hardly seemed worth it.
Apparently that's not exactly what he said word for word, but nonetheless, he revised his opinion following my very last exam. I am perfect, there is nothing wrong with me, and I can have any kind of sex I want. Not even another doctor looking at me could ever tell what had happened. Only...how important is anal?
To which I replied, what if it's the most important thing ever?
Really..?
No, I've never tried it. But what if I wanted to?
Fiiiine. Go have anal. Just be careful. And with that, Dr. Q shook my hand, said good-bye, and went on to his next patient.
And so to summarize...don't be an idiot by checking out the basement. If you do, put some clothes on. I'm not feeling lucky but I'm feeling better. Also, anal sex.
That is all.
Tuesday, September 27, 2011
Friday, September 2, 2011
The Proposal
My desk is a mess. My colleagues don't know how I can find anything, and I don't either. I'd really rather not bother looking. However, when I found my forehead resting on top of a coffee lid and scissor handles, it became apparent that I should at least clear a space for when I just need to put my head down and cry.
Surprisingly, my forehead becoming attached to the sticky side of a coffee lid had little to do with actual work and slightly more to do with Alex having just told me his girlfriend is pregnant.
I had called him from work to keep the conversation short, and business-like. In contrast to the months of thought I had put into how I would once and for all end our friendship and put a stop to all future communication, I figured the conversation itself would be short and sweet.
(My original plan had always been to have this conversation in person. In my fantasies we would be alone together, I would know exactly what to say, I would look amazing, and there would possibly be a wind-machine somewhere in the vicinity to blow my hair around fetchingly. If I cried, it would be no more than a very pretty tear or two - enough to demonstrate heartbreak, but not enough to generate any snot or swelling.)
(In turn, he would be devastated, and would simply say that he understood completely how and why I felt that way. Depending on my level of delusion on any particular day, I imagined he would then break up with his girlfriend rather than face the thought of not being able to send me text messages any more, and we would all live happily ever after. Except for the girlfriend. Imagining a happy ending for myself can be hard enough, so she was on her own.)
I had even made plans to visit him on my holidays, but as it turns out, my vagina exploded and I spent the first night of what was to have been my holiday in hospital.
Not that it would have mattered all that much, because Alex and his girlfriend had taken a last-minute vacation package to Mexico, so while I was laying there wondering what it meant when the nurse told me my vagina was packed, he was on a beach with her.
So we stood each other up. One more than the other.
Actually, it was this thought that made me angry enough to force the inevitable conversation. While I was experiencing one of the most horrific and terrifying moments of my life, his girlfriend was at an all-inclusive...with him. I realize that life isn't fair, but should I ever make it to an afterlife, I'm going to be demanding an explanation, and somebody or something is getting kicked in the balls.
Once Alex returned from Mexico, he wanted to know if I had been out his way and gone already. I told him I never made it, due to a bit of an accident.
Suddenly, he was very worried about me and wanting to know what happened. I wasn't sure I wanted to tell him, but it made for a great excuse for a phone call.
Which is roughly when things went off the rails - presuming things had ever really been on the rails to begin with.
First off, I hadn't planned on telling him what happened. Alex is actually one of the few people I had told about the original assault, and we spent a good several hours crying together on the phone when I did. He actually cried with me, and I did not need a repeat. Not so much the crying - I couldn't bear Alex being amazing all over again when I needed him to be the guy worth getting rid of.
I told him everything anyway, and he was amazing.
For my part, I wasn't eloquent. I stumbled and stammered and heard my voice breaking, felt my nose getting snotty, and instead of ending with the by now well-rehearsed and sunny sounding proclamation that I'm sure I would be just fine and am getting better every day, I told him how I may as well be a fucking eunuch and I was so sick of hurting all the time and I can't even take a shit properly and how I'm never going to be normal again.
I couldn't believe I told him all of that - particularly the part about going number two, because he and I have had actual arguments over whether girls really do that or not. I had always assured him we did, but for a guy who refuses to buy toilet paper in public, it was a hard sell.
Even more worrisome was how quiet he got after I was done. I had no idea what he could be thinking. First he said that although he knows I don't know who that piece of shit bastard who started this whole thing was, but if I ever did know, he would kill that guy. Straight up kill him. I know that, right?
Then he said this. "You also know, that whatever you can or can't do sexually is like, the least important thing about you right? To me, you are so much more and so much more important than that."
And then he told me Shelley is pregnant. He's so glad I can tell him things like I do, because he tells me things that he doesn't tell anybody else. Not even Shelley. He tells me things he can't tell her. In fact, the only people who knew she was pregnant at that moment was him, her and me.
This is when my forehead hit my coffee lid, and stayed there.
In defense of all that came next, I really did try. I actually used him telling me how he can talk to me in ways he can't talk to her as a jumping off point. Didn't he think that was a bad thing? Didn't he think that it was probably a good thing we never ended up seeing each other, and didn't he think that now that Shelley is pregnant we should stop talking? For good?
As it turns out, he did not think any of those things at all. In fact, he thinks that I'm the most amazing woman he's ever met and can't imagine not having me in his life, in any way possible.
In case I didn't believe him, he spent the next twenty minutes describing all the ways I'm amazing, and if he didn't feel that way, would we even be talking at all still? And even though he knows others would consider the relationship he has with me to be cheating, he knows how he feels about it, and that's enough for him to know it's not wrong at all.
Why couldn't he just say he saw my point and leave it at that? This unplanned for reaction was exactly why I wanted the conversation to happen in person. I still would have had no idea what to say, but at least my hair would have been blowing fetchingly.
And so I back-pedalled. I back-pedalled like the Tour de France on rewind. We would stay friends. We would stay in touch. We do have this connection. I feel it too. We always will. I miss you. I miss you. I miss you too.
I had tried to end things, but I've never been good at writing conclusions. Instead, once we had re-declared our intense, undying like for one another, there was nothing left to do but congratulate him on his impending fatherhood with another woman.
Only...he didn't seem that happy. He sounded scared and sad. It wasn't planned, although from everything he told me I can't help but think there was a little bit of planning on her part. He had trusted her to take care of things. He wanted kids, but maybe not now. He always thought he'd be married.
I told him if everybody waited until everything was perfect and they were totally ready to have children, the world would end due to population decline.
He knew this was true, but still...he just thought he'd be married.
Better buy the ring, I said. She's no doubt waiting for it.
Maybe he said. He's not getting any younger, and neither is she. Maybe it's time to grow up.
Maybe it is. Better go jewellery shopping.
There is indeed a time for everything, apparently up to and including a time to counsel the man you love to buy another woman an engagement ring and marry her.
Somewhere in between a time to reap and a time to sow, I'm sure the authors of the bible considered slipping that one in there, but probably deemed it too fucking depressing.
******
And so, right now, I'm working on a proposal for a book. I'm pitching it to publishing companies as the opportunity to score another bestseller along the lines of "Eat, Pray, Love" by Elizabeth Gilbert. If they could make money paying for that that bitch to travel all over the world because her marriage was going badly and she was experiencing distressing levels of ennui that only eating and praying and banging some guy in Bali could ease, have I got a deal for them.
In fact, they don't even have to send me around the world. I'd be fine with a weekend trip somewhere. I'd be sure to capitalize on the Eat, Pray, Love template, but I can't promise I'll pray. Maybe...Eat, Drink, and I'd Love to Bang You But You Can Only Stick It In Half-Way Unless You Have a Small Penis...? It's a working title - not written in stone.
The point is, I'd very much like to escape my life for a little while, and being paid to travel the world and write about how it perked me up a bit would be a great start.
Maybe they don't pay for me to go to three countries - maybe I propose they just cover gas money for me to go to IKEA. The point is...I feel like I'm done with just about everything. So done, that it's time for something different.
Surprisingly, my forehead becoming attached to the sticky side of a coffee lid had little to do with actual work and slightly more to do with Alex having just told me his girlfriend is pregnant.
I had called him from work to keep the conversation short, and business-like. In contrast to the months of thought I had put into how I would once and for all end our friendship and put a stop to all future communication, I figured the conversation itself would be short and sweet.
(My original plan had always been to have this conversation in person. In my fantasies we would be alone together, I would know exactly what to say, I would look amazing, and there would possibly be a wind-machine somewhere in the vicinity to blow my hair around fetchingly. If I cried, it would be no more than a very pretty tear or two - enough to demonstrate heartbreak, but not enough to generate any snot or swelling.)
(In turn, he would be devastated, and would simply say that he understood completely how and why I felt that way. Depending on my level of delusion on any particular day, I imagined he would then break up with his girlfriend rather than face the thought of not being able to send me text messages any more, and we would all live happily ever after. Except for the girlfriend. Imagining a happy ending for myself can be hard enough, so she was on her own.)
I had even made plans to visit him on my holidays, but as it turns out, my vagina exploded and I spent the first night of what was to have been my holiday in hospital.
Not that it would have mattered all that much, because Alex and his girlfriend had taken a last-minute vacation package to Mexico, so while I was laying there wondering what it meant when the nurse told me my vagina was packed, he was on a beach with her.
So we stood each other up. One more than the other.
Actually, it was this thought that made me angry enough to force the inevitable conversation. While I was experiencing one of the most horrific and terrifying moments of my life, his girlfriend was at an all-inclusive...with him. I realize that life isn't fair, but should I ever make it to an afterlife, I'm going to be demanding an explanation, and somebody or something is getting kicked in the balls.
Once Alex returned from Mexico, he wanted to know if I had been out his way and gone already. I told him I never made it, due to a bit of an accident.
Suddenly, he was very worried about me and wanting to know what happened. I wasn't sure I wanted to tell him, but it made for a great excuse for a phone call.
Which is roughly when things went off the rails - presuming things had ever really been on the rails to begin with.
First off, I hadn't planned on telling him what happened. Alex is actually one of the few people I had told about the original assault, and we spent a good several hours crying together on the phone when I did. He actually cried with me, and I did not need a repeat. Not so much the crying - I couldn't bear Alex being amazing all over again when I needed him to be the guy worth getting rid of.
I told him everything anyway, and he was amazing.
For my part, I wasn't eloquent. I stumbled and stammered and heard my voice breaking, felt my nose getting snotty, and instead of ending with the by now well-rehearsed and sunny sounding proclamation that I'm sure I would be just fine and am getting better every day, I told him how I may as well be a fucking eunuch and I was so sick of hurting all the time and I can't even take a shit properly and how I'm never going to be normal again.
I couldn't believe I told him all of that - particularly the part about going number two, because he and I have had actual arguments over whether girls really do that or not. I had always assured him we did, but for a guy who refuses to buy toilet paper in public, it was a hard sell.
Even more worrisome was how quiet he got after I was done. I had no idea what he could be thinking. First he said that although he knows I don't know who that piece of shit bastard who started this whole thing was, but if I ever did know, he would kill that guy. Straight up kill him. I know that, right?
Then he said this. "You also know, that whatever you can or can't do sexually is like, the least important thing about you right? To me, you are so much more and so much more important than that."
And then he told me Shelley is pregnant. He's so glad I can tell him things like I do, because he tells me things that he doesn't tell anybody else. Not even Shelley. He tells me things he can't tell her. In fact, the only people who knew she was pregnant at that moment was him, her and me.
This is when my forehead hit my coffee lid, and stayed there.
In defense of all that came next, I really did try. I actually used him telling me how he can talk to me in ways he can't talk to her as a jumping off point. Didn't he think that was a bad thing? Didn't he think that it was probably a good thing we never ended up seeing each other, and didn't he think that now that Shelley is pregnant we should stop talking? For good?
As it turns out, he did not think any of those things at all. In fact, he thinks that I'm the most amazing woman he's ever met and can't imagine not having me in his life, in any way possible.
In case I didn't believe him, he spent the next twenty minutes describing all the ways I'm amazing, and if he didn't feel that way, would we even be talking at all still? And even though he knows others would consider the relationship he has with me to be cheating, he knows how he feels about it, and that's enough for him to know it's not wrong at all.
Why couldn't he just say he saw my point and leave it at that? This unplanned for reaction was exactly why I wanted the conversation to happen in person. I still would have had no idea what to say, but at least my hair would have been blowing fetchingly.
And so I back-pedalled. I back-pedalled like the Tour de France on rewind. We would stay friends. We would stay in touch. We do have this connection. I feel it too. We always will. I miss you. I miss you. I miss you too.
I had tried to end things, but I've never been good at writing conclusions. Instead, once we had re-declared our intense, undying like for one another, there was nothing left to do but congratulate him on his impending fatherhood with another woman.
Only...he didn't seem that happy. He sounded scared and sad. It wasn't planned, although from everything he told me I can't help but think there was a little bit of planning on her part. He had trusted her to take care of things. He wanted kids, but maybe not now. He always thought he'd be married.
I told him if everybody waited until everything was perfect and they were totally ready to have children, the world would end due to population decline.
He knew this was true, but still...he just thought he'd be married.
Better buy the ring, I said. She's no doubt waiting for it.
Maybe he said. He's not getting any younger, and neither is she. Maybe it's time to grow up.
Maybe it is. Better go jewellery shopping.
There is indeed a time for everything, apparently up to and including a time to counsel the man you love to buy another woman an engagement ring and marry her.
Somewhere in between a time to reap and a time to sow, I'm sure the authors of the bible considered slipping that one in there, but probably deemed it too fucking depressing.
******
And so, right now, I'm working on a proposal for a book. I'm pitching it to publishing companies as the opportunity to score another bestseller along the lines of "Eat, Pray, Love" by Elizabeth Gilbert. If they could make money paying for that that bitch to travel all over the world because her marriage was going badly and she was experiencing distressing levels of ennui that only eating and praying and banging some guy in Bali could ease, have I got a deal for them.
In fact, they don't even have to send me around the world. I'd be fine with a weekend trip somewhere. I'd be sure to capitalize on the Eat, Pray, Love template, but I can't promise I'll pray. Maybe...Eat, Drink, and I'd Love to Bang You But You Can Only Stick It In Half-Way Unless You Have a Small Penis...? It's a working title - not written in stone.
The point is, I'd very much like to escape my life for a little while, and being paid to travel the world and write about how it perked me up a bit would be a great start.
Maybe they don't pay for me to go to three countries - maybe I propose they just cover gas money for me to go to IKEA. The point is...I feel like I'm done with just about everything. So done, that it's time for something different.
Saturday, August 20, 2011
Is this really "better"?
There's something mildly concerning about being wheeled to the operating room with your purse.
My purse is gigantic, so there was the immediate concern that one stretcher wouldn't be enough for both of us. If it couldn't stay where it was, crammed between me and the stretcher rails, I wondered where they could put it during the procedure. What if it tripped somebody wielding a scalpel?
I had arrived at the hospital barely forty minutes before my giant handbag and I were rolled up to surgery, which felt like a record. Appetizers take longer to roll out at most restaurants.
Two days prior I had been sent home from emergency room number one (ER#1), following what could best be described as my vagina exploding. The doctors and nurses on staff at ER#1 were clearly trained in the not giving a fuck area of emergency medical care, and so for two days I continued bleeding profusely before I was could snag an appointment at a wonderful local sexual health clinic.
Bleeding and pain weren't the only disturbing symptoms I had noticed in those two days, but they were the only ones that made any sense. My pregnancy test administered at ER#1 was negative, as were the STD tests - a huge relief, as I'm sure an epidemic of a previously undiscovered genital-exploding STD strain could have caused some panic within the community.
By the time I was ready for my examination at the clinic, the doctor was already suitably concerned by the bleeding alone. There didn't seem to be a need to share any of the other red flags I had noticed.
In fact, I didn't have to hardly explain anything at all. She examined me for approximately two seconds, and knew what was wrong.
Much like burns, there is a classification system for bodily tears. I wasn't sure if this classification system followed that for burn victims, but apparently I had 2nd degree tearing.
Second degree means too deep to heal without stitches, and I would have to go immediately to emergency room number two, where her staff had already notified the gynecologist on call that I was coming.
At least I knew what was wrong, and would worry about how in the name of sweet nugget of Jesus this could have happened at a later date. For now, all I cared about was whether the gyno on call could sew straight.
He assured me he could, because I actually asked. Dr. Q examined me within minutes of my arrival at ER#2, and told me I'd have to be put under. He did not recommend I have stitches without anaesthetic.
I shared his well-informed medical opinion whole-heartedly, and was greatly relieved to find out it would be a simple procedure, and I'd be heading home that night. So simple, I could even take my purse up to the OR.
****
The first time I opened my eyes in the recovery room, I stared at the clock on the wall. I'd gone to the OR close to 6:00 pm. It was just past 10:00 pm. Clearly, their anaesthesiologist did not fuck around.
The second time I opened my eyes, I saw another patient lay directly across from me, his feet facing mine. His toes were huge. They freaked me out.
The third time I opened my eyes, his toes were still freaking me out. Then I remembered that the bottom of my feet were still orange, due to serious self-tanning miscalculation from a week before. He was going to wake up and see my bright orange feet and be really freaked out too. I felt bad.
The fourth time I opened my eyes, a nurse was asking me whether I needed to throw up. I didn't. Next was what my pain level was on a scale of one to ten, and did I need morphine. I sure did. Finally, I wanted to know what time I'd be getting out - friends would be coming to get me.
I wasn't getting out. Not that night. Maybe not even tomorrow. Did I know the rectal and vaginal wall was perforated, and it took three surgeons working on me to put me back together? Did I know that? The sutures were extensive. The tearing was fourth degree, not second after all. I had a catheter and my vagina was packed. I wouldn't be going anywhere.
First of all...no. I didn't know any of that. She sounded somewhat accusatory, like I had rolled up on the OR, determined to pull one over on the hospital staff. My plan was to present like I just had little bit of second degree tearing, but once they got all up in there...surprise! There was actually no "all up in there" left!
I supposed it had been my fault. I could have mentioned that the one bowel movement I'd had in two days seemed to have...taken the wrong exit. I could have mentioned that I had sneezed once, and fell to the floor screaming in pain. Nobody had asked though, so these details didn't seem that important.
For now though, these details still didn't seem important. All I could think about was that I had a packed vagina. What on earth did that even mean? What was it packed with? I hoped to God it was bubble wrap and not Styrofoam peanuts. That shit gets everywhere.
The night passed very pleasantly in a morphine induced haze, and I was annoyed to be shaken out of it by Dr. Q. He wanted to know if I was ready to tell him what had actually happened yet
Considering I was still struggling with the fact I somehow had a packed vagina, it didn't seem fair to be shaken awake and asked a completely baffling question. I had told him exactly what happened the night two days previous when my vagina exploded.
He said the odds were very good that I wasn't going to heal properly. The holes in the vaginal/rectal wall were unlikely to close. If that happened, I would have permanent fistulas. Did I know what that meant?
I did not, but I assumed it was bad. I had said all I could say though, and I went back to sleep.
In retrospect, I hadn't actually given him the entire story at that time. In my defense, even I didn't fit the pieces together until days after I had been released from the hospital.
I had quite a bit of time to think because I couldn't do anything else. Literally, nothing else. I thought about how it was this had happened. Normal people's vaginas don't just randomly explode like faulty gas tanks. It took a couple of days, but I finally had to admit it had been a long time since my vagina was normal.
Close to five years actually.
Five years ago I went out dancing with a friend for her birthday, sat down next to a good looking blond guy, who slipped something very strong into my drink. I didn't see him do it, but I only have a handful of memories after that, so I'm taking an educated guess. One of those memories is lying on the stairs leading up to my apartment, while he tried hauling me up by my shirt.
I can't say exactly what happened that night, but I woke up the next morning with my covers pulled over my head and my arms folded across my chest. I stepped over a few used condoms on my way to throw up for the first of many, many times that day so I could make a couple of assumptions.
Over the next several weeks saw doctor after doctor. My doctor at the time tried to treat my terribly swollen vagina with Celebrex. My inability to walk without limping was initially thought to be caused by my "stressed out" mental state, but this was later revised to "fractured pelvis."
Another doctor I saw in an attempt to figure out where the searing vaginal pain was coming from examined me and then called me a liar. I had to be lying, because what he was seeing couldn't have been caused by an assault. I had to have been in a car accident, or something like that. Besides -- was my face mangled? No? If I had actually been raped, he would have done damage to my face. Because my face was fine, I was lying and he couldn't help me.
It took six months of steadily looking for answers before a female doctor examined me and took notice that there was vaginal tearing. It was deep enough to be difficult to heal over on its own, but had gone untreated for too long, stitches may not be beneficial.
It would just have to close over eventually. She was also able to diagnose significant nerve damage, and prescribed medication that eased most of the physical pain due to nerve damage within 24 hours. I'm still on that medication, and will happily stay on it for the rest of my life.
I attended weeks of physiotherapy to help with the nerve damage, and to prevent incontinence that could arise from the damage I'd sustained to my pelvic floor muscles. I hated having to be touched there, and stopped going.
Bad things happen to good people, and they happen to me. Life has a way of moving on whether I choose to or not, and I assumed it had moved on far enough for me to be safe.
Life also occasionally has a way of bitch slapping you to let you know when it's time to stop moving and to start talking. Safety is very, very relative.
It only took Dr. Q asking me twice more what really happened during my post-op appointments before I told him what more there was to the story. He seemed greatly relieved to be told something that made sense. Frankly, so was I.
The damage that had gone untreated five years ago was like a crack in a windshield. It might have stayed cracked, or the wrong combination of conditions could cause the whole thing to shatter.
I guess I shattered. The original scarred over injury tore open again, and tore everything else open too when it did. How it didn't happen any sooner is a mystery. Then again...not really. I never had sex with Alex and the firefighter...well...he was always just that good.
Every day I'm figuring out just how extensive the shattering was. It was Dr. Q who persuaded the other two surgeons not to give me a colostomy bag. He told them I was too young, and should have a chance to heal.
Every week that passes it's less likely the stitches will "blow." If the stitches fail to hold, I get a colostomy bag. I'm very grateful to Dr. Q for giving me the chance to maintain free-range pooping status. So far so good.
The blood loss was significant, but the chances of turning septic were far greater than bleeding to death. I don't know how I didn't in the two days I walked around around with my internal organs just blowing in the breeze.
It'll be another few weeks before all the stitches are gone, and a few weeks after that before I can exercise normally again. By the sounds of it, it'll be never before I can have normal sex.
No toys. No vibrators. No well-endowed men. No going in all the way if they are. Nothing outside of the missionary position. No risking "certain angles." No anal. Not ever.
It's funny how no goal is ever so desirable as the ones you're told you can't have. What's also funny is how I prided myself on having not lost my sexual desire.
I was so happy that there was one thing that piece of shit never took from me. He did a lot of damage, but thank God I could still enjoy being passionate and wild and sexy.
It took five years, but I stand corrected. Guess he wins that round too.
My purse is gigantic, so there was the immediate concern that one stretcher wouldn't be enough for both of us. If it couldn't stay where it was, crammed between me and the stretcher rails, I wondered where they could put it during the procedure. What if it tripped somebody wielding a scalpel?
I had arrived at the hospital barely forty minutes before my giant handbag and I were rolled up to surgery, which felt like a record. Appetizers take longer to roll out at most restaurants.
Two days prior I had been sent home from emergency room number one (ER#1), following what could best be described as my vagina exploding. The doctors and nurses on staff at ER#1 were clearly trained in the not giving a fuck area of emergency medical care, and so for two days I continued bleeding profusely before I was could snag an appointment at a wonderful local sexual health clinic.
Bleeding and pain weren't the only disturbing symptoms I had noticed in those two days, but they were the only ones that made any sense. My pregnancy test administered at ER#1 was negative, as were the STD tests - a huge relief, as I'm sure an epidemic of a previously undiscovered genital-exploding STD strain could have caused some panic within the community.
By the time I was ready for my examination at the clinic, the doctor was already suitably concerned by the bleeding alone. There didn't seem to be a need to share any of the other red flags I had noticed.
In fact, I didn't have to hardly explain anything at all. She examined me for approximately two seconds, and knew what was wrong.
Much like burns, there is a classification system for bodily tears. I wasn't sure if this classification system followed that for burn victims, but apparently I had 2nd degree tearing.
Second degree means too deep to heal without stitches, and I would have to go immediately to emergency room number two, where her staff had already notified the gynecologist on call that I was coming.
At least I knew what was wrong, and would worry about how in the name of sweet nugget of Jesus this could have happened at a later date. For now, all I cared about was whether the gyno on call could sew straight.
He assured me he could, because I actually asked. Dr. Q examined me within minutes of my arrival at ER#2, and told me I'd have to be put under. He did not recommend I have stitches without anaesthetic.
I shared his well-informed medical opinion whole-heartedly, and was greatly relieved to find out it would be a simple procedure, and I'd be heading home that night. So simple, I could even take my purse up to the OR.
****
The first time I opened my eyes in the recovery room, I stared at the clock on the wall. I'd gone to the OR close to 6:00 pm. It was just past 10:00 pm. Clearly, their anaesthesiologist did not fuck around.
The second time I opened my eyes, I saw another patient lay directly across from me, his feet facing mine. His toes were huge. They freaked me out.
The third time I opened my eyes, his toes were still freaking me out. Then I remembered that the bottom of my feet were still orange, due to serious self-tanning miscalculation from a week before. He was going to wake up and see my bright orange feet and be really freaked out too. I felt bad.
The fourth time I opened my eyes, a nurse was asking me whether I needed to throw up. I didn't. Next was what my pain level was on a scale of one to ten, and did I need morphine. I sure did. Finally, I wanted to know what time I'd be getting out - friends would be coming to get me.
I wasn't getting out. Not that night. Maybe not even tomorrow. Did I know the rectal and vaginal wall was perforated, and it took three surgeons working on me to put me back together? Did I know that? The sutures were extensive. The tearing was fourth degree, not second after all. I had a catheter and my vagina was packed. I wouldn't be going anywhere.
First of all...no. I didn't know any of that. She sounded somewhat accusatory, like I had rolled up on the OR, determined to pull one over on the hospital staff. My plan was to present like I just had little bit of second degree tearing, but once they got all up in there...surprise! There was actually no "all up in there" left!
I supposed it had been my fault. I could have mentioned that the one bowel movement I'd had in two days seemed to have...taken the wrong exit. I could have mentioned that I had sneezed once, and fell to the floor screaming in pain. Nobody had asked though, so these details didn't seem that important.
For now though, these details still didn't seem important. All I could think about was that I had a packed vagina. What on earth did that even mean? What was it packed with? I hoped to God it was bubble wrap and not Styrofoam peanuts. That shit gets everywhere.
The night passed very pleasantly in a morphine induced haze, and I was annoyed to be shaken out of it by Dr. Q. He wanted to know if I was ready to tell him what had actually happened yet
Considering I was still struggling with the fact I somehow had a packed vagina, it didn't seem fair to be shaken awake and asked a completely baffling question. I had told him exactly what happened the night two days previous when my vagina exploded.
He said the odds were very good that I wasn't going to heal properly. The holes in the vaginal/rectal wall were unlikely to close. If that happened, I would have permanent fistulas. Did I know what that meant?
I did not, but I assumed it was bad. I had said all I could say though, and I went back to sleep.
In retrospect, I hadn't actually given him the entire story at that time. In my defense, even I didn't fit the pieces together until days after I had been released from the hospital.
I had quite a bit of time to think because I couldn't do anything else. Literally, nothing else. I thought about how it was this had happened. Normal people's vaginas don't just randomly explode like faulty gas tanks. It took a couple of days, but I finally had to admit it had been a long time since my vagina was normal.
Close to five years actually.
Five years ago I went out dancing with a friend for her birthday, sat down next to a good looking blond guy, who slipped something very strong into my drink. I didn't see him do it, but I only have a handful of memories after that, so I'm taking an educated guess. One of those memories is lying on the stairs leading up to my apartment, while he tried hauling me up by my shirt.
I can't say exactly what happened that night, but I woke up the next morning with my covers pulled over my head and my arms folded across my chest. I stepped over a few used condoms on my way to throw up for the first of many, many times that day so I could make a couple of assumptions.
Over the next several weeks saw doctor after doctor. My doctor at the time tried to treat my terribly swollen vagina with Celebrex. My inability to walk without limping was initially thought to be caused by my "stressed out" mental state, but this was later revised to "fractured pelvis."
Another doctor I saw in an attempt to figure out where the searing vaginal pain was coming from examined me and then called me a liar. I had to be lying, because what he was seeing couldn't have been caused by an assault. I had to have been in a car accident, or something like that. Besides -- was my face mangled? No? If I had actually been raped, he would have done damage to my face. Because my face was fine, I was lying and he couldn't help me.
It took six months of steadily looking for answers before a female doctor examined me and took notice that there was vaginal tearing. It was deep enough to be difficult to heal over on its own, but had gone untreated for too long, stitches may not be beneficial.
It would just have to close over eventually. She was also able to diagnose significant nerve damage, and prescribed medication that eased most of the physical pain due to nerve damage within 24 hours. I'm still on that medication, and will happily stay on it for the rest of my life.
I attended weeks of physiotherapy to help with the nerve damage, and to prevent incontinence that could arise from the damage I'd sustained to my pelvic floor muscles. I hated having to be touched there, and stopped going.
Bad things happen to good people, and they happen to me. Life has a way of moving on whether I choose to or not, and I assumed it had moved on far enough for me to be safe.
Life also occasionally has a way of bitch slapping you to let you know when it's time to stop moving and to start talking. Safety is very, very relative.
It only took Dr. Q asking me twice more what really happened during my post-op appointments before I told him what more there was to the story. He seemed greatly relieved to be told something that made sense. Frankly, so was I.
The damage that had gone untreated five years ago was like a crack in a windshield. It might have stayed cracked, or the wrong combination of conditions could cause the whole thing to shatter.
I guess I shattered. The original scarred over injury tore open again, and tore everything else open too when it did. How it didn't happen any sooner is a mystery. Then again...not really. I never had sex with Alex and the firefighter...well...he was always just that good.
Every day I'm figuring out just how extensive the shattering was. It was Dr. Q who persuaded the other two surgeons not to give me a colostomy bag. He told them I was too young, and should have a chance to heal.
Every week that passes it's less likely the stitches will "blow." If the stitches fail to hold, I get a colostomy bag. I'm very grateful to Dr. Q for giving me the chance to maintain free-range pooping status. So far so good.
The blood loss was significant, but the chances of turning septic were far greater than bleeding to death. I don't know how I didn't in the two days I walked around around with my internal organs just blowing in the breeze.
It'll be another few weeks before all the stitches are gone, and a few weeks after that before I can exercise normally again. By the sounds of it, it'll be never before I can have normal sex.
No toys. No vibrators. No well-endowed men. No going in all the way if they are. Nothing outside of the missionary position. No risking "certain angles." No anal. Not ever.
It's funny how no goal is ever so desirable as the ones you're told you can't have. What's also funny is how I prided myself on having not lost my sexual desire.
I was so happy that there was one thing that piece of shit never took from me. He did a lot of damage, but thank God I could still enjoy being passionate and wild and sexy.
It took five years, but I stand corrected. Guess he wins that round too.
Monday, August 8, 2011
And then it got worse.
Following a vaginal explosion as detailed in my previous posting, and with blood still gushing, I called a girlfriend for a quick chat. I casually mentioned that the boy had come over, it went well, now I'm bleeding, quite a bit actually, but I'm sure it's no big deal and I'll just go to a clinic in the morning.
Minutes later I was hunched over in my friend's passenger seat, on my way to the emergency room. It's a good thing my good friends have learned to pick and choose what words that come out of my mouth to pay attention to, and which ones to ignore completely.
Once there, it seemed certain we'd be processed quickly. Ahead of me at the triage station, a young guy with a skateboard was telling the nurse that he'd “felt anxious” all evening.
At the registration station and below a sign stating that persons with uncontrollable bleeding should make themselves known immediately to a nurse, an older guy was retching into a bucket, accompanied by his son.
Finally it was my turn with the triage nurse, and she asked what the problem was. I said I was bleeding. Like, a lot. She asked from where, perhaps recognizing I wasn't sporting a traumatic head wound. Suddenly aware that everything I said could be easily overheard, I pointed down at my lap.
Could you be pregnant? No? Are you sure? When did it start? What were you doing when it started? Excuse me? You were having sex when it started? Was it with a male or female partner? How long were you having sex for? I don't mean how long you knew him, I meant how many minutes were you having sex for? What position were you having sex in?
I quickly learned to hate the triage nurse. Just in case there was an ambulance driver somewhere out in the parking lot who happened to miss a word of my intake interview, the triage nurse handed my file over to the registration clerk sitting less than four feet away by saying, “This is Bambi. She was having sex and now she's bleeding.”
She could put in on billboards for all I cared, as long as somebody did something very quickly about the pain I was in. I got my wristbands, and then my friend and I were told to follow the blue dots on the floor to another waiting room, where we sat for two hours.
Clearly, matters of life and death were taking place in the ER. The kid with the skateboard and anxiety was looked after immediately. Then, a woman who followed us in was provided with dramatic resuscitation for her multiple bullet wounds.
Ha, no. Not really. She was given a tensor bandage for a puffy wrist though. The guy with the bucket was still puking. And still, I waited. And bled, finally bleeding through my pad and pants.
Finally, somebody called my name and I followed a nurse to a room 20 feet down a hallway and around a corner. I was told to strip off all my bottoms, and to sit up on a stretcher. A doctor would be with me shortly.
Since taking my pants off and sitting down led immediately to making a big gory mess, I was stuck right where I was. As it turned out, I would be stuck sitting in an ever widening pool of ick for more than an hour and a half, so I had some time to think.
First, I thought about my evening so far. To think my biggest worry had once been that the boy would stay over and I would fart in my sleep. I was sure that would strike me as funny at some point. Perhaps not this year, but maybe if I survive another few decades.
Then I thought about what in the fuck could be possibly be happening to me. The sex with the new boy was downright normal, if perhaps a little overly enthusiastic on his part. Still, his dick wasn't shooting laser beams or bullets, so one would think things should have been fine.
And yet, one would be wrong. Therefore, in my highly esteemed medical opinion...this was something else.
I had to be having a miscarriage.
Yes, I'm on the pill. Yes, the firefighter and I always use condoms, and yes, my womb is listed as one of the top ten places on planet earth most inhospitable to human life, as voted by the United Nations Security Council. Two of those three things are true, but the third is not that far off.
However...I'm still me. By nature, I'm not a lucky person. It's more than possible I might have taken a pill late. It could be possible a condom might have sprung a leak, or broken altogether. If both of these things were to have happened, they very well could have happened the last time he and I were together, more than two months earlier.
On that occasion I sprained my back and helped prove IKEA shelving will not support a grown woman attempting pages 32 – 37 of the Kama Sutra. If I was going to be accidentally knocked up by the firefighter, that would have been the time.
Miscarriage. Holy fucking shit I'm having a miscarriage. It's the only thing that could explain what's happening, and what was running down my legs and dripping on to the floor.
Though God and I have been feuding since 1998 and despite not being a religious person, I wondered if I should say a prayer of sorts.
I don't believe life begins at conception, but I've seen enough video of spermies (technical term – try to keep up) swimming toward an egg to believe that while perhaps not miraculous, conception is at least pretty cool. If not life, I believe the resulting cell cluster contains at least...a spark.
And so I thought about that spark, and what it could mean. I have no idea whether there's a heaven or a hell. I like to think that hell already exists in so many places and within the hearts and minds of so many people on Earth, there's no need for anything comparable in the afterlife.
I am convinced however, that we come from somewhere and go somewhere else.
Therefore, I wondered how my cell-cluster might have passed his time in the universe's waiting room, considering whether to make his arrival official or not.
(I had no doubt my cell-cluster would be male, because there's no way a female would have made such a goddamn mess of things.)
Because my cell-cluster would have half my DNA, it would inevitably have been freaking the fuck out, and would have sought out somebody in Management to discuss contingency planning.
As blood dripped off of my feet onto the floor of a hospital room, I imagined how that conversation might have gone.
Cell-cluster: So my parents are an artsy type and a firefighter...? That sounds pretty cool!
Management: Well...sure. It's cool. It's also a little complicated.
Cell-cluster: Complicated? I knew it! What's the deal?
Management: Well, you know nowadays there are all kinds of relationships and all kinds of families...
Cell-cluster: Don't give me that bullshit.
Management: Fine. The firefighter is married...to somebody else. Happily. Your mother is single. Beyond single, actually. No hope there.
Cell-cluster: Oh. Well...do the firefighter and my Mom at least love each other maybe? Is it like a polygamy thing?
Management: Ha! Hahahahahahahaha...oh Jesus. You're serious. No kid, it's not like a polygamy thing. There is no way in hell those two women...
(Management involuntarily shudders, removes a bottle of vodka from a desk drawer, and takes a giant swig.)
Cell-cluster: So if they don't love each other, what's the deal? How did this happen?
Management: Well, when it comes to love...your Mom admits nothing. Your firefighter Dad however would totally admit he really loves fucking your Mom.
Cell-cluster: HEY. That's my Mom you're talking about.
Management: The point is, it's complicated. Also, your Mom has killed every house plant she's ever owned. Unless you want an aqua globe up your ass you may have to learn to feed yourself. Your call. Stay or catch the next ride kid.
Overall, I think our cell-cluster made the right call by fleeing. If I wasn't stuck sitting half-naked in a hospital room increasingly resembling that scene out of the Shining when the tidal waves of blood sloosh through the halls of the Overlook Hotel, I would have fled too.
Without question, this was a bad situation.
When the 12 year-old looking doctor finally showed up, stuck a q-tip all up in there to check for gonorrhea, syphilis or chlamydia, instead of expressing any concern with...oh I don't know...the stupid amount of blood still coming from some mysterious location and the fact I was in too much pain to sit or move without help, I sensed the situation had grown worse still.
When she told me she was sure this was all normal, I gave up. I gave up even more when I was told I couldn't leave before providing a pee sample, to check for pregnancy.
Ummm...if I had been pregnant when I arrived, I was fairly certain I wasn't going to be leaving that way. Still, after everything else...why not? Why in the fuck should I not be locked into a blood spattered bathroom (blood that wasn't mine by the way), left alone to unpack my pregnancy pee test kit and instructions, which included two tiny moist wipes which weren't about to do me any good, a funnel of all goddamn things, and of course, a plastic cup.
According to the instructions, I was to begin peeing, stop, then start again into the cup, using the funnel if for whatever reason I needed either a fashionable hat while doing so, or better aim.
(I'm sure my handful of readers brave enough to procreate would have an idea why one would need a stop and start pee to test for pregnancy. Is pee not pee? If I were to just let it all go, would it skew the results that badly?)
(After thinking about it, I don't believe it would. I think the medical community is just trying to prepare women. If the test comes out pregnant and you pop out a child, you'll be spending the next few decades unable to pee without interruption, so I suppose it's a case of forewarned is forearmed.)
Sadly, my vagina suddenly going through a violent Quention Tarantino phase meant that I had lost the ability to pee. When I sat or squatted over the bowl, it felt like my internal organs were going to fall right the fuck out. The pain was so bad, I couldn't push, nudge, squeeze or bitch slap my bladder into doing anything but cower.
By the time I was done trying, the bathroom was in an even bigger mess than when I found it. In my completely normal, nothing is wrong with me at all state - I actually tried to clean it all up.
There was a bottle of disinfectant and a roll of paper towels under the sink so I set about spraying and scrubbing down my legs before my pants went back up, then the floor which I scrubbed with some paper towel under my flip-flop, and then the sink and walls, right before I realized I had lost my fucking mind and really needed to go home.
And so I did. The 12-year old doctor declared me free to go, suggested I pick up a couple of ibuprofen on the way out if I wanted and my poor friend drove me home. If I left a mess in her jeep, she was kind enough to not say anything.
Once at home I couldn't stand, couldn't sit and didn't much feel like sleeping. Instead, I lay down in my shower where I stayed until I ran out of hot water.
As far as I believed, I had had and was continuing to have the most spectacularly ill-timed miscarriage in the history of the uterus. I wanted it to stop, I wanted somebody to bring me some tea directly to my new shower bed, I wanted the pain to go away, and then, more than all of those things, I wanted the firefighter there with me.
Out of everything I wanted that night but couldn't quite manage...that was the worst, and the only aspect out of all of the whole ungodly mess that made me cry.
To have gone from a fun, sexy start to the evening with a new boy, new lingerie, new confidence, new hopes to a bafflingly bloody, screamingly painful end to the night naked and alone in my shower, pining for somebody else's husband to be there to hold my hand...well...was just a bit much.
That was the absolute lowest point - even lower than scrubbing somebody else's bloodstains off of a bathroom floor with some paper towel underneath a flip-flop just so custodial couldn't blame it all on me, but I believed that was the worst it was going to get. That was comforting at the time. Wrong...but comforting.
Minutes later I was hunched over in my friend's passenger seat, on my way to the emergency room. It's a good thing my good friends have learned to pick and choose what words that come out of my mouth to pay attention to, and which ones to ignore completely.
Once there, it seemed certain we'd be processed quickly. Ahead of me at the triage station, a young guy with a skateboard was telling the nurse that he'd “felt anxious” all evening.
At the registration station and below a sign stating that persons with uncontrollable bleeding should make themselves known immediately to a nurse, an older guy was retching into a bucket, accompanied by his son.
Finally it was my turn with the triage nurse, and she asked what the problem was. I said I was bleeding. Like, a lot. She asked from where, perhaps recognizing I wasn't sporting a traumatic head wound. Suddenly aware that everything I said could be easily overheard, I pointed down at my lap.
Could you be pregnant? No? Are you sure? When did it start? What were you doing when it started? Excuse me? You were having sex when it started? Was it with a male or female partner? How long were you having sex for? I don't mean how long you knew him, I meant how many minutes were you having sex for? What position were you having sex in?
I quickly learned to hate the triage nurse. Just in case there was an ambulance driver somewhere out in the parking lot who happened to miss a word of my intake interview, the triage nurse handed my file over to the registration clerk sitting less than four feet away by saying, “This is Bambi. She was having sex and now she's bleeding.”
She could put in on billboards for all I cared, as long as somebody did something very quickly about the pain I was in. I got my wristbands, and then my friend and I were told to follow the blue dots on the floor to another waiting room, where we sat for two hours.
Clearly, matters of life and death were taking place in the ER. The kid with the skateboard and anxiety was looked after immediately. Then, a woman who followed us in was provided with dramatic resuscitation for her multiple bullet wounds.
Ha, no. Not really. She was given a tensor bandage for a puffy wrist though. The guy with the bucket was still puking. And still, I waited. And bled, finally bleeding through my pad and pants.
Finally, somebody called my name and I followed a nurse to a room 20 feet down a hallway and around a corner. I was told to strip off all my bottoms, and to sit up on a stretcher. A doctor would be with me shortly.
Since taking my pants off and sitting down led immediately to making a big gory mess, I was stuck right where I was. As it turned out, I would be stuck sitting in an ever widening pool of ick for more than an hour and a half, so I had some time to think.
First, I thought about my evening so far. To think my biggest worry had once been that the boy would stay over and I would fart in my sleep. I was sure that would strike me as funny at some point. Perhaps not this year, but maybe if I survive another few decades.
Then I thought about what in the fuck could be possibly be happening to me. The sex with the new boy was downright normal, if perhaps a little overly enthusiastic on his part. Still, his dick wasn't shooting laser beams or bullets, so one would think things should have been fine.
And yet, one would be wrong. Therefore, in my highly esteemed medical opinion...this was something else.
I had to be having a miscarriage.
Yes, I'm on the pill. Yes, the firefighter and I always use condoms, and yes, my womb is listed as one of the top ten places on planet earth most inhospitable to human life, as voted by the United Nations Security Council. Two of those three things are true, but the third is not that far off.
However...I'm still me. By nature, I'm not a lucky person. It's more than possible I might have taken a pill late. It could be possible a condom might have sprung a leak, or broken altogether. If both of these things were to have happened, they very well could have happened the last time he and I were together, more than two months earlier.
On that occasion I sprained my back and helped prove IKEA shelving will not support a grown woman attempting pages 32 – 37 of the Kama Sutra. If I was going to be accidentally knocked up by the firefighter, that would have been the time.
Miscarriage. Holy fucking shit I'm having a miscarriage. It's the only thing that could explain what's happening, and what was running down my legs and dripping on to the floor.
Though God and I have been feuding since 1998 and despite not being a religious person, I wondered if I should say a prayer of sorts.
I don't believe life begins at conception, but I've seen enough video of spermies (technical term – try to keep up) swimming toward an egg to believe that while perhaps not miraculous, conception is at least pretty cool. If not life, I believe the resulting cell cluster contains at least...a spark.
And so I thought about that spark, and what it could mean. I have no idea whether there's a heaven or a hell. I like to think that hell already exists in so many places and within the hearts and minds of so many people on Earth, there's no need for anything comparable in the afterlife.
I am convinced however, that we come from somewhere and go somewhere else.
Therefore, I wondered how my cell-cluster might have passed his time in the universe's waiting room, considering whether to make his arrival official or not.
(I had no doubt my cell-cluster would be male, because there's no way a female would have made such a goddamn mess of things.)
Because my cell-cluster would have half my DNA, it would inevitably have been freaking the fuck out, and would have sought out somebody in Management to discuss contingency planning.
As blood dripped off of my feet onto the floor of a hospital room, I imagined how that conversation might have gone.
Cell-cluster: So my parents are an artsy type and a firefighter...? That sounds pretty cool!
Management: Well...sure. It's cool. It's also a little complicated.
Cell-cluster: Complicated? I knew it! What's the deal?
Management: Well, you know nowadays there are all kinds of relationships and all kinds of families...
Cell-cluster: Don't give me that bullshit.
Management: Fine. The firefighter is married...to somebody else. Happily. Your mother is single. Beyond single, actually. No hope there.
Cell-cluster: Oh. Well...do the firefighter and my Mom at least love each other maybe? Is it like a polygamy thing?
Management: Ha! Hahahahahahahaha...oh Jesus. You're serious. No kid, it's not like a polygamy thing. There is no way in hell those two women...
(Management involuntarily shudders, removes a bottle of vodka from a desk drawer, and takes a giant swig.)
Cell-cluster: So if they don't love each other, what's the deal? How did this happen?
Management: Well, when it comes to love...your Mom admits nothing. Your firefighter Dad however would totally admit he really loves fucking your Mom.
Cell-cluster: HEY. That's my Mom you're talking about.
Management: The point is, it's complicated. Also, your Mom has killed every house plant she's ever owned. Unless you want an aqua globe up your ass you may have to learn to feed yourself. Your call. Stay or catch the next ride kid.
Overall, I think our cell-cluster made the right call by fleeing. If I wasn't stuck sitting half-naked in a hospital room increasingly resembling that scene out of the Shining when the tidal waves of blood sloosh through the halls of the Overlook Hotel, I would have fled too.
Without question, this was a bad situation.
When the 12 year-old looking doctor finally showed up, stuck a q-tip all up in there to check for gonorrhea, syphilis or chlamydia, instead of expressing any concern with...oh I don't know...the stupid amount of blood still coming from some mysterious location and the fact I was in too much pain to sit or move without help, I sensed the situation had grown worse still.
When she told me she was sure this was all normal, I gave up. I gave up even more when I was told I couldn't leave before providing a pee sample, to check for pregnancy.
Ummm...if I had been pregnant when I arrived, I was fairly certain I wasn't going to be leaving that way. Still, after everything else...why not? Why in the fuck should I not be locked into a blood spattered bathroom (blood that wasn't mine by the way), left alone to unpack my pregnancy pee test kit and instructions, which included two tiny moist wipes which weren't about to do me any good, a funnel of all goddamn things, and of course, a plastic cup.
According to the instructions, I was to begin peeing, stop, then start again into the cup, using the funnel if for whatever reason I needed either a fashionable hat while doing so, or better aim.
(I'm sure my handful of readers brave enough to procreate would have an idea why one would need a stop and start pee to test for pregnancy. Is pee not pee? If I were to just let it all go, would it skew the results that badly?)
(After thinking about it, I don't believe it would. I think the medical community is just trying to prepare women. If the test comes out pregnant and you pop out a child, you'll be spending the next few decades unable to pee without interruption, so I suppose it's a case of forewarned is forearmed.)
Sadly, my vagina suddenly going through a violent Quention Tarantino phase meant that I had lost the ability to pee. When I sat or squatted over the bowl, it felt like my internal organs were going to fall right the fuck out. The pain was so bad, I couldn't push, nudge, squeeze or bitch slap my bladder into doing anything but cower.
By the time I was done trying, the bathroom was in an even bigger mess than when I found it. In my completely normal, nothing is wrong with me at all state - I actually tried to clean it all up.
There was a bottle of disinfectant and a roll of paper towels under the sink so I set about spraying and scrubbing down my legs before my pants went back up, then the floor which I scrubbed with some paper towel under my flip-flop, and then the sink and walls, right before I realized I had lost my fucking mind and really needed to go home.
And so I did. The 12-year old doctor declared me free to go, suggested I pick up a couple of ibuprofen on the way out if I wanted and my poor friend drove me home. If I left a mess in her jeep, she was kind enough to not say anything.
Once at home I couldn't stand, couldn't sit and didn't much feel like sleeping. Instead, I lay down in my shower where I stayed until I ran out of hot water.
As far as I believed, I had had and was continuing to have the most spectacularly ill-timed miscarriage in the history of the uterus. I wanted it to stop, I wanted somebody to bring me some tea directly to my new shower bed, I wanted the pain to go away, and then, more than all of those things, I wanted the firefighter there with me.
Out of everything I wanted that night but couldn't quite manage...that was the worst, and the only aspect out of all of the whole ungodly mess that made me cry.
To have gone from a fun, sexy start to the evening with a new boy, new lingerie, new confidence, new hopes to a bafflingly bloody, screamingly painful end to the night naked and alone in my shower, pining for somebody else's husband to be there to hold my hand...well...was just a bit much.
That was the absolute lowest point - even lower than scrubbing somebody else's bloodstains off of a bathroom floor with some paper towel underneath a flip-flop just so custodial couldn't blame it all on me, but I believed that was the worst it was going to get. That was comforting at the time. Wrong...but comforting.
Sunday, August 7, 2011
That went well.
***Note from Bambi: This posting will probably be part one of an approximate 172-part series in which I attempt to outline how exactly my private life crossed over into urban legend status. Part 2 through 169 will cover how and what in the hell happened, and hopefully by the time that's done...I'll have figured out at least one happy ending. For now. Part one.
This time, the sex was going to be different. Firstly, it wasn't going to be with myself, so there was that. Secondly, this new guy was single. I can't even stress how excited I was by the prospect of being with a guy who didn't have to ask his wife for permission first, as I'm sure is typical in most intimate relationships, provided you are me.
Also...the guy wasn't Alex. Therefore, there was no girlfriend, no heartbreak, and no scary sexual history that read like the white pages. And some blue ones. This guy was a new start – totally different. Totally normal, and therefore totally exciting.
Unmarried, unattached, mildly employed, passably literate, totally hot and young enough to barely pass the most generous of gay math algorithms – I was exceptionally pleased with the catching of this particular cub.
Approximately three months prior to this earth-shaking date night, I had posted an ad in desperation on Craigslist, seeking “entertainment for the summer.” In response, I received 37 different pictures of penises. Peni? Lots of wangs.
It's true that everything I understand about the male species can be written on a grain of rice in bubble letters, but there is one aspect of the male psyche that baffles me more than anything else: a man's belief that women will be driven wild by a poorly lit photo of his disembodied nubbin.
Apropos of seriously nothing else, captured in all of its glory(?) by either a poorly focused webcam, or the ubiquitous bathroom mirror self-portrait, men everywhere seemingly believe that their wieners have the power to...well...I have no idea what.
.
It's not as though I've never met a penis I've fallen for, because I most certainly have. There are some very charming appendages out there, but this strong affection usually comes with some all important context. By the time it's waving in my face, I've usually made the decision to go ahead and get better personally acquainted.
Never before, and never will an email attachment and some sort of clever email introduction such as “Hope U like what U see!!!!!!” drive me to tear my clothes off in steamy anticipation of what could possibly just be an adequately sized sea slug for all I know.
My favorite penis pictures received were the thoughtful comparison photographs. One enterprising fellow was kind enough to forward along a picture of what I can only assume was his dick, photographed alongside of a Coke can for my careful analysis. I remained unimpressed, although strangely thirsty.
The point is, I got a lot of idiot replies, but one response stood out from the crowd. Funny, friendly, and the kid included a head shot – of his actual head.
We texted for long enough to determine he wasn't looking for anything serious, but neither was I. I expected a quick coffee meeting next to determine what could possibly be wrong with him, and then he blew my mind completely by taking me on an actual date.
He dressed up to meet me. Took me to shoot some pool. Did the whole manly man showing girl how to shoot properly so he could look down my shirt. Tried too hard to make me laugh. Paid for everything. Took me for tea just because I said I like tea. Tried to pay for that too. Insisted we go for a walk by the water, and steered himself between me and some drunken pan-handlers, like I might be something worthy of protection. Walked me to my car. Gave me such a swooning good kiss goodnight that the peanut gallery waiting to get into the nightclub where my car was parked started cheering. Texted me before I even got home – when could he see me again?
I don't date. Guys don't want to date me. They want to fuck me or they don't, and my options are limited accordingly. My romantic bar is set so low, a guy spending $22.50 on a few games of pool has now performed the equivalent of building me the Taj Mahal.
It was several weeks before we saw each other next, as he had a few issues to deal with including losing his job, his license, and being 25 years old. But...I mentioned he was hot, right? Like, really hot.
This is how we managed to keep texting through it all, and how he eventually came to be making out with me on my bed, and how I came to be four minutes away from having sex with somebody who wasn't me, wasn't married, wasn't attached and who hadn't yet made me cry.
Four minutes later...sex! I wish I could say amazing sex, or mind-blowing sex, but the words that sprang to mind were...clumsy. And, kind of...ow. And, holy shit kid haven't you ever done this before because the whole foreplay portion kind of feels like you're looking for change down there, and I assure you, that's not where I keep it.
Nonetheless, this was really an accomplishment. Normally so paralysed by fear and anxiety surrounding sex, for once I was just excited about somebody new like a normal person. No fear. No worry. Just happiness and...
“I think you're bleeding.”
...blood. Apparently blood. Happiness and blood.
He had backed off away from me on the bed, and I could his hands, elbows and knees covered in something that looked black in the dark. Underneath me was a pool of black that was getting wider by the second.
A moment went by and I honestly couldn't think of anything. Not just what I should do or say, but anything at all. So I just sat there. My bed was ruined, and I should probably have a shower. That's all that came to mind.
I ordered the guy off the bed, stripped the covers off and ran to the shower, shouting that I'd be back in just a moment. Standing under the shower, still wearing my bra and tank top, I sincerely believed the water would fix whatever was wrong, and the bleeding would stop.
It didn't.
The boy had followed me into the bathroom, apparently unfazed by my exploding vagina. Hurriedly scooping clots off of my legs, I yelled at him to go wait...I would. Be. Just. A. Moment.
I seemed to be panicking a little. Was I panicking a little? There was no need to panic – I was just having my period was all. No big deal. It totally happens. I should just come out of the shower and chill out.
A couple of things were just not happening. For one, I was not having my period. Secondly, I was not coming out of the shower. I was however, panicking.
As nonchalantly as circumstances allowed, I let him know I was not having my period. In no way, was this my period. This may in fact be the result of my vagina being under some sort of heavy security and perhaps he had inadvertently set off the dye pack placed strategically next to my cervix, but this was not my period.
He finally left the bathroom, and I finally left the shower. Pain hadn't hit just yet, so I could run from the bathroom to the bedroom, leaving a biblical mess all over my carpet in search of a towel to cram between my legs. Wrapping a towel around that, I felt I could pass for normal.
Finally sorted, I found the boy in my living room checking text messages. I noticed that he really needed to wash his arms. Also, I had totally ruined his socks.
By this time, pain had hit. Was still hitting. Pain like I couldn't have imagined words for. I apologized for his socks and curled into a ball on the couch, determined to keep the party going.
“Would you like me to leave?”
No, I really didn't. I might need him to drive me to the hospital, but even more importantly, two people having a friendly post-coitus conversation was normal.
All I wanted was a normal encounter, and so far I had not yet managed to achieve normal. If I had to sit there and bleed to death so I could have five minutes of goddamn normal than so be it. I was going to sit, he was going to stay, and at least one of of was going to suck it up and pretend like there was nothing unusual taking place at all.
I sucked it up all the way until the pain got so bad I couldn't talk any more, and then I agreed he should go. Also, it was time to change my towels...and perhaps get to a hospital. Just like a normal person.
This time, the sex was going to be different. Firstly, it wasn't going to be with myself, so there was that. Secondly, this new guy was single. I can't even stress how excited I was by the prospect of being with a guy who didn't have to ask his wife for permission first, as I'm sure is typical in most intimate relationships, provided you are me.
Also...the guy wasn't Alex. Therefore, there was no girlfriend, no heartbreak, and no scary sexual history that read like the white pages. And some blue ones. This guy was a new start – totally different. Totally normal, and therefore totally exciting.
Unmarried, unattached, mildly employed, passably literate, totally hot and young enough to barely pass the most generous of gay math algorithms – I was exceptionally pleased with the catching of this particular cub.
Approximately three months prior to this earth-shaking date night, I had posted an ad in desperation on Craigslist, seeking “entertainment for the summer.” In response, I received 37 different pictures of penises. Peni? Lots of wangs.
It's true that everything I understand about the male species can be written on a grain of rice in bubble letters, but there is one aspect of the male psyche that baffles me more than anything else: a man's belief that women will be driven wild by a poorly lit photo of his disembodied nubbin.
Apropos of seriously nothing else, captured in all of its glory(?) by either a poorly focused webcam, or the ubiquitous bathroom mirror self-portrait, men everywhere seemingly believe that their wieners have the power to...well...I have no idea what.
.
It's not as though I've never met a penis I've fallen for, because I most certainly have. There are some very charming appendages out there, but this strong affection usually comes with some all important context. By the time it's waving in my face, I've usually made the decision to go ahead and get better personally acquainted.
Never before, and never will an email attachment and some sort of clever email introduction such as “Hope U like what U see!!!!!!” drive me to tear my clothes off in steamy anticipation of what could possibly just be an adequately sized sea slug for all I know.
My favorite penis pictures received were the thoughtful comparison photographs. One enterprising fellow was kind enough to forward along a picture of what I can only assume was his dick, photographed alongside of a Coke can for my careful analysis. I remained unimpressed, although strangely thirsty.
The point is, I got a lot of idiot replies, but one response stood out from the crowd. Funny, friendly, and the kid included a head shot – of his actual head.
We texted for long enough to determine he wasn't looking for anything serious, but neither was I. I expected a quick coffee meeting next to determine what could possibly be wrong with him, and then he blew my mind completely by taking me on an actual date.
He dressed up to meet me. Took me to shoot some pool. Did the whole manly man showing girl how to shoot properly so he could look down my shirt. Tried too hard to make me laugh. Paid for everything. Took me for tea just because I said I like tea. Tried to pay for that too. Insisted we go for a walk by the water, and steered himself between me and some drunken pan-handlers, like I might be something worthy of protection. Walked me to my car. Gave me such a swooning good kiss goodnight that the peanut gallery waiting to get into the nightclub where my car was parked started cheering. Texted me before I even got home – when could he see me again?
I don't date. Guys don't want to date me. They want to fuck me or they don't, and my options are limited accordingly. My romantic bar is set so low, a guy spending $22.50 on a few games of pool has now performed the equivalent of building me the Taj Mahal.
It was several weeks before we saw each other next, as he had a few issues to deal with including losing his job, his license, and being 25 years old. But...I mentioned he was hot, right? Like, really hot.
This is how we managed to keep texting through it all, and how he eventually came to be making out with me on my bed, and how I came to be four minutes away from having sex with somebody who wasn't me, wasn't married, wasn't attached and who hadn't yet made me cry.
Four minutes later...sex! I wish I could say amazing sex, or mind-blowing sex, but the words that sprang to mind were...clumsy. And, kind of...ow. And, holy shit kid haven't you ever done this before because the whole foreplay portion kind of feels like you're looking for change down there, and I assure you, that's not where I keep it.
Nonetheless, this was really an accomplishment. Normally so paralysed by fear and anxiety surrounding sex, for once I was just excited about somebody new like a normal person. No fear. No worry. Just happiness and...
“I think you're bleeding.”
...blood. Apparently blood. Happiness and blood.
He had backed off away from me on the bed, and I could his hands, elbows and knees covered in something that looked black in the dark. Underneath me was a pool of black that was getting wider by the second.
A moment went by and I honestly couldn't think of anything. Not just what I should do or say, but anything at all. So I just sat there. My bed was ruined, and I should probably have a shower. That's all that came to mind.
I ordered the guy off the bed, stripped the covers off and ran to the shower, shouting that I'd be back in just a moment. Standing under the shower, still wearing my bra and tank top, I sincerely believed the water would fix whatever was wrong, and the bleeding would stop.
It didn't.
The boy had followed me into the bathroom, apparently unfazed by my exploding vagina. Hurriedly scooping clots off of my legs, I yelled at him to go wait...I would. Be. Just. A. Moment.
I seemed to be panicking a little. Was I panicking a little? There was no need to panic – I was just having my period was all. No big deal. It totally happens. I should just come out of the shower and chill out.
A couple of things were just not happening. For one, I was not having my period. Secondly, I was not coming out of the shower. I was however, panicking.
As nonchalantly as circumstances allowed, I let him know I was not having my period. In no way, was this my period. This may in fact be the result of my vagina being under some sort of heavy security and perhaps he had inadvertently set off the dye pack placed strategically next to my cervix, but this was not my period.
He finally left the bathroom, and I finally left the shower. Pain hadn't hit just yet, so I could run from the bathroom to the bedroom, leaving a biblical mess all over my carpet in search of a towel to cram between my legs. Wrapping a towel around that, I felt I could pass for normal.
Finally sorted, I found the boy in my living room checking text messages. I noticed that he really needed to wash his arms. Also, I had totally ruined his socks.
By this time, pain had hit. Was still hitting. Pain like I couldn't have imagined words for. I apologized for his socks and curled into a ball on the couch, determined to keep the party going.
“Would you like me to leave?”
No, I really didn't. I might need him to drive me to the hospital, but even more importantly, two people having a friendly post-coitus conversation was normal.
All I wanted was a normal encounter, and so far I had not yet managed to achieve normal. If I had to sit there and bleed to death so I could have five minutes of goddamn normal than so be it. I was going to sit, he was going to stay, and at least one of of was going to suck it up and pretend like there was nothing unusual taking place at all.
I sucked it up all the way until the pain got so bad I couldn't talk any more, and then I agreed he should go. Also, it was time to change my towels...and perhaps get to a hospital. Just like a normal person.
Saturday, June 18, 2011
I'm going to hell - reason #1,237.
I am not fond of any number of things. Small children. Screaming small children. Girls who don't wear pants. Girls who wear tights and mistake them for pants. . Olives. Men. Men who marry and or date stupid women. Stupid women. Prematurely auto-flushing toilets. The list does go on.
This may be why people find it so surprising that my second job working with senior citizens hardly annoys me at all. I kind of feel these people have earned the right to be a pain in my ass.
(Case in point... every week I have to do the set up for weekly card tournaments. Little old granny Bridge players by the way do not fuck around. They take their Bridge seriously, and will cut a bitch should a bitch get in their way.
Earlier one Saturday morning, a 90 year old gentleman insisted on helping me move the required tables and set up the chairs. Working with seniors I have finally discovered a demographic with less upper body strength than I have, so I knew this would be a problem.
With his "help," my set-up took a half an hour longer than usual. Admittedly, I was nearly annoyed, and less than receptive when he said he could be there every Saturday to help me if I needed.
There was really no need at all for him to do this, and I made that clear. Then he went on to tell me how he just needs to get out of the house. His wife passed away last month.
They had been married for 65 years - and they always had so much fun together! In 1939, she was a tennis champion. She was a vision in her tennis outfit and shorts, and I better believe he spent all of his time hanging around the tennis courts just hoping she might look his way. It must have worked alright, because they were happy for 65 years.
And then, one day, it's all gone. The only thing left to do is find a way to keep going, and to get out of the damned house.
Going forward, it's now just going to take me a half an hour longer to move around some tables. And I'm fine with this.
Other times, I have significantly less patience. Occasionally the centre is rented by various community groups in the evenings, and I'll be called in to help with these events. The night the Canucks lost the Stanley Cup and Vancouver collectively lost its shit, I was working.
Adding insult to injury, the group renting the centre were of the wing-nutted variety. Their meeting that night was to discuss how cell phones and radio waves are silently devastating us all, and are at the root of all health problems ranging from insomnia to acne to suddenly not being alive.
(A few months prior, this same group held another evening meeting to discuss the American government's involvement in 9/11. Unfortunately I decided to sit in on the movie they were showing when invited to do so, largely because they had cookies. Following the movie I was introduced to the small crowd of people as their "newest true believer." I didn't know how to tell them I was only in the audience because a) I work here and b) I can not resist a chocolate covered digestive cookie.)
By the time 10:00 p.m. and my 14th hour of straight work rolled around, I was ready to go home. Unfortunately, I wouldn't be doing so without dealing a major blow to my already long-suffering karma.
The very last wing-nut to leave...well...refused to leave. He discovered a rummage sale table that hadn't yet been taken down from a recent fundraiser for the centre, and under that table was a vacuum.
Was it for sale? Yes. How much? As the sign in front of you says, it's by donation. Does it work? I don't know. Who donated it? I don't know. Where's the on button? I don't know. Can I call a friend? I don't kn...wait. What?
A friend of his might want a new vacuum, and he wanted to call her to confirm. Following a ten minute phone conversation on the centre's phone with said friend in which they discussed, I shit you not, whether the vacuum could suck up ferret hair , he wanted to try it out. I wanted to stab him in the eye.
I invited him to come back any time during regular business hours, and he could take all the time he needed to decide. The centre was now closed, and I had to lock up. He commenced vacuuming the foyer carpet.
No really, it's past closing time. If he lived nearby, the centre would be re-opening the next day, and he was more than welcome to vacuum the living shit out of anything he wanted at that time - the rummage sale table would still be there, I swear to God.
He began taking apart the vacuum to see how the bag worked, a full half hour past the time I had stopped being paid for my time, and 40 minutes after everybody else had left.
I began to wonder if this would be my fate. Is this how I finally snap - doomed to spend the rest of my life rotting in prison for beating somebody to death with a vacuum hose? If self-control failed, at least I knew I could base my self-defense on the radio waves emanating from my smart phone.
Admittedly, I was desperate. Also, tired, hungry, disappointed and anxious. The firefighter had just texted me to let me know parts of Vancouver were on fire - I should check the news.
(Given my rather unnatural attraction to first-responders and suddenly being made to picture firefighters in uniform, I could also add horny to the list of completely inappropriate emotions I was forced to deal with while watching an annoying little man vacuum a foyer.)
More importantly however, I knew my sister was downtown Vancouver, and I was getting no response from her to my text messages. I needed to be home. Right. Now.
Clearly, the guy in danger of being beaten to death with a vacuum cleaner was gullible, or else he wouldn't have been there irritating every single molecule in my body to begin with. I began engaging him in conversation.
Yes...late nights are sure tough as a single mother. So many times I don't get to see my children before they go to bed. The babysitter is usually alright with staying a little longer but...
I let my voice trail off. Surely a single mother wanting to be home with her children could prevent this gentleman from taking another run at the carpet, especially having satisfied himself that the vacuum bag was exactly where a vacuum bag could normally be found, as opposed to in my purse or behind his ear.
Oh - you have kids? That's nice. Was there an outlet farther away he could plug the cord into? He wanted to see how far it stretched.
Clearly, this motherfucker had got tired of breathing. If I couldn't get him to leave on his own in 30 seconds, very bad things were going to happen.
I sure do have children. Two of them. Precious angels, both. They normally try to stay up and wait for me to read them a story, but ever since little Kelli started chemo, the poor little thing has just been so tired. Story time is just the highlight of her day, since she can't be outside much anymore. Not since starting treatment. Chemo. Treatment.
Oh yes...I sure did. Everybody who has ever met me knows my ovaries are frozen in opposition. And yet, I made up an imaginary child with cancer waiting for me at home. An imaginary child with cancer that just happened to share the same name as Alex's girlfriend, by what I'm sure is the sheerest of coincidences.
He handed me a twenty, and no I didn't have change. And no, I also didn't have a bag large enough to carry a godforsaken vacuum but I would help him drag it out the front door so I could lock it behind him, hope he has a wonderful night, and stay away from all those radio waves!
As for me, I'm going to be staying away from the outdoors for the next little while. When I'm inevitably struck down by a lightening bolt from the clear blue sky, I want to at least have made it challenging to find me.
This may be why people find it so surprising that my second job working with senior citizens hardly annoys me at all. I kind of feel these people have earned the right to be a pain in my ass.
(Case in point... every week I have to do the set up for weekly card tournaments. Little old granny Bridge players by the way do not fuck around. They take their Bridge seriously, and will cut a bitch should a bitch get in their way.
Earlier one Saturday morning, a 90 year old gentleman insisted on helping me move the required tables and set up the chairs. Working with seniors I have finally discovered a demographic with less upper body strength than I have, so I knew this would be a problem.
With his "help," my set-up took a half an hour longer than usual. Admittedly, I was nearly annoyed, and less than receptive when he said he could be there every Saturday to help me if I needed.
There was really no need at all for him to do this, and I made that clear. Then he went on to tell me how he just needs to get out of the house. His wife passed away last month.
They had been married for 65 years - and they always had so much fun together! In 1939, she was a tennis champion. She was a vision in her tennis outfit and shorts, and I better believe he spent all of his time hanging around the tennis courts just hoping she might look his way. It must have worked alright, because they were happy for 65 years.
And then, one day, it's all gone. The only thing left to do is find a way to keep going, and to get out of the damned house.
Going forward, it's now just going to take me a half an hour longer to move around some tables. And I'm fine with this.
Other times, I have significantly less patience. Occasionally the centre is rented by various community groups in the evenings, and I'll be called in to help with these events. The night the Canucks lost the Stanley Cup and Vancouver collectively lost its shit, I was working.
Adding insult to injury, the group renting the centre were of the wing-nutted variety. Their meeting that night was to discuss how cell phones and radio waves are silently devastating us all, and are at the root of all health problems ranging from insomnia to acne to suddenly not being alive.
(A few months prior, this same group held another evening meeting to discuss the American government's involvement in 9/11. Unfortunately I decided to sit in on the movie they were showing when invited to do so, largely because they had cookies. Following the movie I was introduced to the small crowd of people as their "newest true believer." I didn't know how to tell them I was only in the audience because a) I work here and b) I can not resist a chocolate covered digestive cookie.)
By the time 10:00 p.m. and my 14th hour of straight work rolled around, I was ready to go home. Unfortunately, I wouldn't be doing so without dealing a major blow to my already long-suffering karma.
The very last wing-nut to leave...well...refused to leave. He discovered a rummage sale table that hadn't yet been taken down from a recent fundraiser for the centre, and under that table was a vacuum.
Was it for sale? Yes. How much? As the sign in front of you says, it's by donation. Does it work? I don't know. Who donated it? I don't know. Where's the on button? I don't know. Can I call a friend? I don't kn...wait. What?
A friend of his might want a new vacuum, and he wanted to call her to confirm. Following a ten minute phone conversation on the centre's phone with said friend in which they discussed, I shit you not, whether the vacuum could suck up ferret hair , he wanted to try it out. I wanted to stab him in the eye.
I invited him to come back any time during regular business hours, and he could take all the time he needed to decide. The centre was now closed, and I had to lock up. He commenced vacuuming the foyer carpet.
No really, it's past closing time. If he lived nearby, the centre would be re-opening the next day, and he was more than welcome to vacuum the living shit out of anything he wanted at that time - the rummage sale table would still be there, I swear to God.
He began taking apart the vacuum to see how the bag worked, a full half hour past the time I had stopped being paid for my time, and 40 minutes after everybody else had left.
I began to wonder if this would be my fate. Is this how I finally snap - doomed to spend the rest of my life rotting in prison for beating somebody to death with a vacuum hose? If self-control failed, at least I knew I could base my self-defense on the radio waves emanating from my smart phone.
Admittedly, I was desperate. Also, tired, hungry, disappointed and anxious. The firefighter had just texted me to let me know parts of Vancouver were on fire - I should check the news.
(Given my rather unnatural attraction to first-responders and suddenly being made to picture firefighters in uniform, I could also add horny to the list of completely inappropriate emotions I was forced to deal with while watching an annoying little man vacuum a foyer.)
More importantly however, I knew my sister was downtown Vancouver, and I was getting no response from her to my text messages. I needed to be home. Right. Now.
Clearly, the guy in danger of being beaten to death with a vacuum cleaner was gullible, or else he wouldn't have been there irritating every single molecule in my body to begin with. I began engaging him in conversation.
Yes...late nights are sure tough as a single mother. So many times I don't get to see my children before they go to bed. The babysitter is usually alright with staying a little longer but...
I let my voice trail off. Surely a single mother wanting to be home with her children could prevent this gentleman from taking another run at the carpet, especially having satisfied himself that the vacuum bag was exactly where a vacuum bag could normally be found, as opposed to in my purse or behind his ear.
Oh - you have kids? That's nice. Was there an outlet farther away he could plug the cord into? He wanted to see how far it stretched.
Clearly, this motherfucker had got tired of breathing. If I couldn't get him to leave on his own in 30 seconds, very bad things were going to happen.
I sure do have children. Two of them. Precious angels, both. They normally try to stay up and wait for me to read them a story, but ever since little Kelli started chemo, the poor little thing has just been so tired. Story time is just the highlight of her day, since she can't be outside much anymore. Not since starting treatment. Chemo. Treatment.
Oh yes...I sure did. Everybody who has ever met me knows my ovaries are frozen in opposition. And yet, I made up an imaginary child with cancer waiting for me at home. An imaginary child with cancer that just happened to share the same name as Alex's girlfriend, by what I'm sure is the sheerest of coincidences.
He handed me a twenty, and no I didn't have change. And no, I also didn't have a bag large enough to carry a godforsaken vacuum but I would help him drag it out the front door so I could lock it behind him, hope he has a wonderful night, and stay away from all those radio waves!
As for me, I'm going to be staying away from the outdoors for the next little while. When I'm inevitably struck down by a lightening bolt from the clear blue sky, I want to at least have made it challenging to find me.
Monday, June 13, 2011
What nobody is surprised by but me, and how I might be a terrible person.
The other night, a good friend took me out for my birthday. My actual birthday took place last week in Las Vegas, but as I get older I believe in extending birthday celebrations indefinitely. By the time I'm 75, I'll still be celebrating that milestone when I turn 100.
We were by no means the oldest women in the club, but certainly old enough to stand out. Largely because we wore pants, and not skirts so short our vaginas could be stamped more readily for re-entry than our wrists.
What followed was the most depressing 25 minutes of my life - which is approximately how long we lasted before deciding we had had quite enough and fleeing in terror.
We were hit on, which you'd think might be flattering. First up was a really old guy with a grey beard and pit stains down to his belt loops. I could just about smell the Viagra oozing out of his pores. He asked if he could buy me a cocktail or beverage of my choice.
First of all, who in the hell says can I buy you a cocktail? Secondly, the only way I'd ever be interested in meeting this man would be if I was dating his youngest son. As all ten of my readers know, I like my men young. Once they're old enough to rent a vehicle on their own, I've pretty much lost interest.
Greybeard was just the first in a long line of very old men. There was a guy with a combover, a guy with hair in his ears and a guy with three missing teeth that I could see.
Next came a very short bald man who came to just below my nipples. I didn't realize that bald people can have dandruff, but you really do learn something new every day. Never before in my life have I been hit on by so many men, and never has it made me feel so awful.
During a break in the action, my one remaining single friend who was also fending off a few admirers, asked me if this was really all there is to choose from, and I said yes. Yes it is.
We are so fucked, she said.
Fucked indeed.
(My friend is six years younger than me, single, and Portuguese. Her parents are completely beside themselves that she's single and so far past her prime. They want grand-babies, and how will that ever happen when she is insert Portuguese expression for last can on the shelf that nobody wants here. Then her mother usually crosses herself. Her mother has also been known to seek answers and resolutions for her daughter's spinsterhood through more spiritual means. At one point she was convinced my friend was under the influence of some sort of evil eye spell, and was therefore cursed in the marriage department. If a simple blessing could clear up my friends issues, I'd hate to see what her mother feels would help me get closer to the alter at this point. It probably involves silver bullets and an exorcist.)
I offer this whole story as a roundabout justification for my currently awful behaviour, and also as a warning. The next friend of mine who tells me I should settle for personality over any sort of physical attraction, and that at this point in my life, physical attraction shouldn't matter at all, will no longer be my friend. I've seen who's out there to settle for, and the beard was grey. There was dandruff, but no hair. Not. Possible.
Naturally, I can't talk about bad behaviour without talking about Alex. Last week he told me his girlfriend, Kelli, found out he cheated on her and left him. My heart soared. They're trying to work it out though, but she is pissed.Heart sank.
Would you believe I was actually surprised by this? Actually I was surprised by a couple of things. Here, in bullet form, are a few things that surprise me still, and nobody else.
We were by no means the oldest women in the club, but certainly old enough to stand out. Largely because we wore pants, and not skirts so short our vaginas could be stamped more readily for re-entry than our wrists.
What followed was the most depressing 25 minutes of my life - which is approximately how long we lasted before deciding we had had quite enough and fleeing in terror.
We were hit on, which you'd think might be flattering. First up was a really old guy with a grey beard and pit stains down to his belt loops. I could just about smell the Viagra oozing out of his pores. He asked if he could buy me a cocktail or beverage of my choice.
First of all, who in the hell says can I buy you a cocktail? Secondly, the only way I'd ever be interested in meeting this man would be if I was dating his youngest son. As all ten of my readers know, I like my men young. Once they're old enough to rent a vehicle on their own, I've pretty much lost interest.
Greybeard was just the first in a long line of very old men. There was a guy with a combover, a guy with hair in his ears and a guy with three missing teeth that I could see.
Next came a very short bald man who came to just below my nipples. I didn't realize that bald people can have dandruff, but you really do learn something new every day. Never before in my life have I been hit on by so many men, and never has it made me feel so awful.
During a break in the action, my one remaining single friend who was also fending off a few admirers, asked me if this was really all there is to choose from, and I said yes. Yes it is.
We are so fucked, she said.
Fucked indeed.
(My friend is six years younger than me, single, and Portuguese. Her parents are completely beside themselves that she's single and so far past her prime. They want grand-babies, and how will that ever happen when she is insert Portuguese expression for last can on the shelf that nobody wants here. Then her mother usually crosses herself. Her mother has also been known to seek answers and resolutions for her daughter's spinsterhood through more spiritual means. At one point she was convinced my friend was under the influence of some sort of evil eye spell, and was therefore cursed in the marriage department. If a simple blessing could clear up my friends issues, I'd hate to see what her mother feels would help me get closer to the alter at this point. It probably involves silver bullets and an exorcist.)
I offer this whole story as a roundabout justification for my currently awful behaviour, and also as a warning. The next friend of mine who tells me I should settle for personality over any sort of physical attraction, and that at this point in my life, physical attraction shouldn't matter at all, will no longer be my friend. I've seen who's out there to settle for, and the beard was grey. There was dandruff, but no hair. Not. Possible.
Naturally, I can't talk about bad behaviour without talking about Alex. Last week he told me his girlfriend, Kelli, found out he cheated on her and left him. My heart soared. They're trying to work it out though, but she is pissed.Heart sank.
Would you believe I was actually surprised by this? Actually I was surprised by a couple of things. Here, in bullet form, are a few things that surprise me still, and nobody else.
- I'm not the only girl he's kept on the side, even though he told me I was...four different times. He couldn't have been lying, because he said we're special.
- He and Kelli are living together. I'm not sure why this is so surprising, but for me it's shocking enough to make me do math. How long were they actually together before he told me? Fingers might not be enough. I may have to carry the one.
- I believed him when he told me I was the only and special. I have a career, a mortgage, a university degree, a license to drive and I generally don't need to wear a helmet in public most days and yet...I wholeheartedly believed him.
I expressed my regret that he had been caught out, and offered to leave him alone. I have a trip booked to Kelowna, but if he's trying to work things out then there's no reason for him to hear from me.
He said it's no problem, but when I text him the dates I'm coming I should address the message to both of them, and be sure to say how much I'm looking forward to meeting her. Also, I'll need to get in touch with him, because he took all of his numbers out of his phone.
Clearly, I didn't need to ask how it was he got caught. After contemplating whether just typing those words might me heart failure, it occurred to me... I may want to clarify something first.
What if he thought I might actually want to meet her? Sweet Christ in a sidecar.
I would say the complete and utter bullshit he needed me to in order to cover his ass, but just to be clear...I don't want to meet her. I want to see you, not your girlfriend.
He said he understood, but she'll be done school by then so that might be hard. Awesome. I want to believe he was referring to college/university and not high school, but either way Kelli is obviously younger than me, and probably has never contemplated whether the skin around her mouth is starting to sag, and whether she should give up a paying a mortgage in exchange for regular Botox.
For the first time ever I said something snarky to Alex. Nothing earth-shattering - but for once I had a bit of a tone. Furious. Frustrated. Fed-up - for the first time in five years. I shouldn't have to remind any of my readers that I can be a sharp-tongued bitch. And by can be, I mean I am. All of the time. Just never to him.
And he must have noticed, because the next evening he was texting me. Strange, because he had told me he deleted all of his numbers. Turns out he had, but had dug up his old phone and charger just to talk to me. He loved me. There's nobody else like me. When he's with me it's like no other girl ever. He can't even explain it. Can't even describe it. He misses me so much. Wishes he was there. Wishes I was there. He can be so open with me, not like anybody else.
Would we fool around if I came to see him? He doesn't know. But there's so many reasons why he loves me. When I got off work, could he see me? (On webcam.) Please?
The smart thing to do might have been to ignore him. Even better, to tell him to fuck off. Call him a dog, a liar, a cheater, a womanizing asshole and a redneck fucking car salesman, because he is all of those things.
The less intelligent way to go would have been to rush home to my webcam so we could see each other, and I could hear his voice when he says how much he loves me.
Guess which option I went with. Go ahead, take your time. I'll wait.
*****
*****
Well that didn't take you bitches long.
He looked so good to me that I nearly cried. It had been a long time since we'd last had one of our webcam "dates." Just long enough to convince myself that maybe I'm moving past him, but not nearly long enough for that to be true.
(As much pain as it caused me, I have to say it was quite nearly worth it when I stood up and he said, "Holy fucking shit how skinny are you??" Actually, scratch that...it was TOTALLY worth it. The last time he saw me was 55 pounds ago...heh.)
In between the schmaltz and the xxx-rated conversation that followed, I helped him figure out how to change his email password...just in case Kelli knew it and went snooping.
Maybe this alone doesn't make me a terrible person, but the fact that I can't find a single fuck to give about her and her feelings might. I'm not the keeper of their relationship. I'm not her friend, and this isn't about her.
It begs the question though - what exactly is this about? Why am I holding on so hard to a guy who can barely hold his own dick without letting it accidentally fall into some random vagina?
Why am I clinging to a relationship that never existed in the way I wanted it to?
Why am I so willing to home wreck?
Why am I insisting on dragging this out, putting myself through more pain every time I talk to him, just so I can talk to him one last time in person. Only so I can end it.
While we're on the subject - why in the hell is he holding on to me? The one girl he's never actually slept with?
That's really the only mystery in left in this story, because I know exactly why I'm doing all of these things.
I've seen the alternative.
The alternative is the old guy with the grey beard and the pit stains who'd just love to buy me a cocktail. It's not that there isn't anything else right now, it's that there isn't anything else. What is there horrifies me.
To top it off, I'm sick to death of losing friendships. I have friends who actually think I should be grateful for the alternative, and who are dumb enough to say it. As soon as I hear it, I think to myself that they must not like me very much, or think much of me at all.
I'd sooner drag out an ending with Alex then face the alternative. An ending with Alex is better than the kind of new beginnings waiting for me. Finally, I've found something that doesn't suprise me.
Saturday, June 11, 2011
I couldn't even get married there either.
Last week today, I was in Las Vegas, sucking back an industrial strength strawberry margarita by the hotel pool and applying enough sunscreen to douse the flames should any part of my pasty body begin to smolder.
Now I'm back home and back at work. On the bright side, I'm somewhat less likely to catch on fire, although the odds I'll want to set myself purposefully on fire have risen significantly.
Let me just say, Las Vegas is a beautifully ill-advised sparkling shitshow of a train wreck. In other words, it is awesome.
Much has been written about the city, by people more entertaining and informed than me. The city is just decadent enough to warrant an entire show dedicated to people being murdered there, so there's not much more I can say about it.
However, I noticed a few things about the Vegas experience that nobody seems to ever talk about - and that seems worth sharing. Without further hoo-ha and in no particular order...
Sometimes Vegas smells really bad.
Seriously. You're walking along without a care in the world, except for how on earth you're ever going to pay off the Visa bill you wracked up and why they couldn't just put the strawberry and lime margaritas you ordered at the same time together in one big cup so you don't have to double-fist and have everybody thinking you're a raging drunk when all of a sudden...it hits you.
The stench.
An invisible and nauseating mixture of open sewer, rotting garbage, more sewer, the desperate sweat of gambling addicts and underwear not changed for days. There's no explanation or visible source, apart from the potentially hundreds of decomposing bodies left in the desert by the Mafia, and so far undiscovered by the non-fictional Las Vegas CSI team.
No matter how hot you look, you look comparatively terrible.
Anna Wintour and Karl Lagerfield made sweet love, and then gave birth to your dress. The joyful tears of angels fill your breast implants and your face just triggered the Trojan War, one more time. At best, you're maybe a 3 in Vegas. There are women in Las Vegas so staggeringly beautiful, you will question exactly how many steps below the evolutionary ladder you managed to land, and how many times you somehow smacked your face on the way down. Best to keep drinking.
It will take you 45 minutes to cross a street.
The city planning genius who designed the Vegas Strip deserves some kind of major award. The hotel/casino/buffet/strip joint/shopping mecca you want to go to might be directly across the street from your own hotel. It's like, right there. As the crow flies, or as any normal damned person might function, it should take you 30 seconds to walk across the street to your destination.
Crossing a street however, is impossible. There are giant man-made barriers or sudden drops involved in getting to the street, on which there are no crosswalks. To make it to the other side of the street and to your destination, you have to go sideways first. Up an escalator. Across a promenade. Past the bar selling margaritas for $1. Stop at the bar selling margaritas for $1. Down an escalator. Onto a moving sidewalk. Through a casino. Pose for a picture with Elvis. Pay $10. Up an escalator. Over an overpass. Down an escalator. Photo bomb three separate Japanese family pictures by cutting in front of a fountain. Climb a flight of stairs, and 45 minutes later you are now directly in front of the place you came from, and have spent $100 along the way. Genius.
Now I'm back home and back at work. On the bright side, I'm somewhat less likely to catch on fire, although the odds I'll want to set myself purposefully on fire have risen significantly.
Let me just say, Las Vegas is a beautifully ill-advised sparkling shitshow of a train wreck. In other words, it is awesome.
Much has been written about the city, by people more entertaining and informed than me. The city is just decadent enough to warrant an entire show dedicated to people being murdered there, so there's not much more I can say about it.
However, I noticed a few things about the Vegas experience that nobody seems to ever talk about - and that seems worth sharing. Without further hoo-ha and in no particular order...
Sometimes Vegas smells really bad.
Seriously. You're walking along without a care in the world, except for how on earth you're ever going to pay off the Visa bill you wracked up and why they couldn't just put the strawberry and lime margaritas you ordered at the same time together in one big cup so you don't have to double-fist and have everybody thinking you're a raging drunk when all of a sudden...it hits you.
The stench.
An invisible and nauseating mixture of open sewer, rotting garbage, more sewer, the desperate sweat of gambling addicts and underwear not changed for days. There's no explanation or visible source, apart from the potentially hundreds of decomposing bodies left in the desert by the Mafia, and so far undiscovered by the non-fictional Las Vegas CSI team.
No matter how hot you look, you look comparatively terrible.
Anna Wintour and Karl Lagerfield made sweet love, and then gave birth to your dress. The joyful tears of angels fill your breast implants and your face just triggered the Trojan War, one more time. At best, you're maybe a 3 in Vegas. There are women in Las Vegas so staggeringly beautiful, you will question exactly how many steps below the evolutionary ladder you managed to land, and how many times you somehow smacked your face on the way down. Best to keep drinking.
It will take you 45 minutes to cross a street.
The city planning genius who designed the Vegas Strip deserves some kind of major award. The hotel/casino/buffet/strip joint/shopping mecca you want to go to might be directly across the street from your own hotel. It's like, right there. As the crow flies, or as any normal damned person might function, it should take you 30 seconds to walk across the street to your destination.
Crossing a street however, is impossible. There are giant man-made barriers or sudden drops involved in getting to the street, on which there are no crosswalks. To make it to the other side of the street and to your destination, you have to go sideways first. Up an escalator. Across a promenade. Past the bar selling margaritas for $1. Stop at the bar selling margaritas for $1. Down an escalator. Onto a moving sidewalk. Through a casino. Pose for a picture with Elvis. Pay $10. Up an escalator. Over an overpass. Down an escalator. Photo bomb three separate Japanese family pictures by cutting in front of a fountain. Climb a flight of stairs, and 45 minutes later you are now directly in front of the place you came from, and have spent $100 along the way. Genius.
At some point during your holiday, you will fist pump.
You may not be the type of person who fist pumps for anything. You may not even have hands. It doesn't matter, because at some point you will be so excited by something that you'll inexplicably channel the entire cast of Jersey Shore and be fist pumping with wild abandon. It happened to me in the middle of the dance floor at Tao, a spectacle of a night club that can only exist in Vegas. It will happen to you too.
Armpits burn in 30 seconds.
Should you raise your arms above your head one single time in order to shield your eyes while checking out the handsome young members of a stag party newly arriving poolside, your armpits will flash fry. You'll spend the remaining days of your holiday walking around with your arms held away from your body like a gunslinger ready for showdown at the OK Corral, and annoying everybody within earshot by complaining how nobody has invented deodorant that doubles as sunscreen.
The lack of pants crisis is global.
Girls from all over the world now feel it's acceptable to be in public wearing what constitutes a shirt to most people, hooker heels and nothing else. I had prayed it was only in my town, but the problem is now clearly international. I used to dream of world peace, but now I have another message on behalf of our planet.
Women of planet Earth. For the love of God and everything that has or will ever be holy. A Brazilian wax - not pants. Thong underwear - not pants. Spray tanned ass - not pants. Dress so short your Brazilian wax, thong underwear and spray tanned ass are clearly visible - also not pants. Choose another skirt, or wear some goddamned pants.
That is all.
Tuesday, May 17, 2011
Happiness.
Not one, but two of my closest working friends are in the midst of losing their minds. Both of them have met The One.
You know the one.
The guy that is different from any guy before. The guy that has them actually giggling at the mere mention of his name, the guy they just know was meant to be, the guy whose lovemaking skills have led them to discovering their own vaginas for what seems like the very first time ever, and the guy they never, ever thought would ever happen to them.
Ten thousand Care Bear stares can not begin to compete with the joy emanating from these once neurologically typical women. They are so fucking happy right now, they're pooping glitter and sunbeams.
The best any of us can do is to avoid eye contact for fear of facing another conversation about whether he's just so wonderful, or simply awesome.
Don't get me wrong - I'm happy for them both. Really, I am. I know there are those of you who think of me as a petty, jealous and cynical bitch and you would be correct. However, these girls deserve all the happiness in the world and I'm glad that they've found it.
No, really. I am!
I'm only a petty, jealous and cynical bitch when I'm...well...jealous. Could I be the bigger person and accept that Alex's girlfriend might in fact be a great girl and I should be happy that he found somebody?
No.
Could I be the only person who walks out alive from a cage match to the death with that slut?
Yes. Yes, I could.
That feeling probably isn't unusual, but the idea that happiness is deserved or that I should have any say in who and who doesn't deserve a story book life consumes me more than normal people.
All of my friends deserve happiness, and when they're happy I'm happy for them. When I feel somebody has good fortune they don't deserve, I'm angry with the universe.
Luckily for those people, I have barely any say in when I have to pee let alone who in my highly esteemed opinion deserves a good karmic ass-kicking. Life isn't fair. It's about the one thing I know for certain, other than buttered bread will always fall to the floor face down.
Which brings me back to my two girls, who are just so entertaining. I make it a point to stop by one woman's office a couple of times a day, just to stick my head in the door, say his name, and watch her light up and giggle. This woman is a grandmother, albeit a young hot grandmother, but a grandmother who's still a giggling hot mess.
I'm too lazy to walk to my other friend's office, so I phone her instead. I have no other purpose in calling besides knowing that if she doesn't get to gush about him every 15 minutes her head and heart will simultaneously explode.
Like all deliriously happy people, they want everybody around them to be just as happy. Although the two have never actually met as far as I know, they have both breathlessly told me the exact same thing at different times.
"Oh Bambi...I just want you to experience what I'm feeling!"
I know it could be worse. It's not like they're saying this while their faces are on fire or they're cramping with diarrhea. They want me to be just as deranged with joy over having finally met a really great guy I fall ass over ears for, who in turn, and I believe this to be the key difference, falls head over heels for me.
The truth is, I know exactly what they're feeling. It's not as though I've never been consumed with a guy to the point I can't think of anything or anybody else. I know how strange it is to be smiling all the time for no reason, and to squee with happiness every time somebody says his name.
That feeling of...this is who I'm supposed to be with. This is what it's supposed to feel like. This is what everybody is talking about. This is who I've dreamed about long before I even knew I wanted him is very, very familiar.
I know what they're feeling. In fact, there are actually two guys in my life who have let me glimpse beyond the velvet ropes separating those of us who go about our daily lives only worried about our jobs and our bills and whether the yogurt in the back of the fridge is safe to eat versus those whose only concern is whether it's actually possible to die of happiness.
As it turns out, both of those guys just happened to find other women. Before meeting me, while meeting me, after meeting me - the results are the same, and they're all deliriously happy.
In those situations, it's a little harder to be quite as happy for them as I am for others.
You know the one.
The guy that is different from any guy before. The guy that has them actually giggling at the mere mention of his name, the guy they just know was meant to be, the guy whose lovemaking skills have led them to discovering their own vaginas for what seems like the very first time ever, and the guy they never, ever thought would ever happen to them.
Ten thousand Care Bear stares can not begin to compete with the joy emanating from these once neurologically typical women. They are so fucking happy right now, they're pooping glitter and sunbeams.
The best any of us can do is to avoid eye contact for fear of facing another conversation about whether he's just so wonderful, or simply awesome.
Don't get me wrong - I'm happy for them both. Really, I am. I know there are those of you who think of me as a petty, jealous and cynical bitch and you would be correct. However, these girls deserve all the happiness in the world and I'm glad that they've found it.
No, really. I am!
I'm only a petty, jealous and cynical bitch when I'm...well...jealous. Could I be the bigger person and accept that Alex's girlfriend might in fact be a great girl and I should be happy that he found somebody?
No.
Could I be the only person who walks out alive from a cage match to the death with that slut?
Yes. Yes, I could.
That feeling probably isn't unusual, but the idea that happiness is deserved or that I should have any say in who and who doesn't deserve a story book life consumes me more than normal people.
All of my friends deserve happiness, and when they're happy I'm happy for them. When I feel somebody has good fortune they don't deserve, I'm angry with the universe.
Luckily for those people, I have barely any say in when I have to pee let alone who in my highly esteemed opinion deserves a good karmic ass-kicking. Life isn't fair. It's about the one thing I know for certain, other than buttered bread will always fall to the floor face down.
Which brings me back to my two girls, who are just so entertaining. I make it a point to stop by one woman's office a couple of times a day, just to stick my head in the door, say his name, and watch her light up and giggle. This woman is a grandmother, albeit a young hot grandmother, but a grandmother who's still a giggling hot mess.
I'm too lazy to walk to my other friend's office, so I phone her instead. I have no other purpose in calling besides knowing that if she doesn't get to gush about him every 15 minutes her head and heart will simultaneously explode.
Like all deliriously happy people, they want everybody around them to be just as happy. Although the two have never actually met as far as I know, they have both breathlessly told me the exact same thing at different times.
"Oh Bambi...I just want you to experience what I'm feeling!"
I know it could be worse. It's not like they're saying this while their faces are on fire or they're cramping with diarrhea. They want me to be just as deranged with joy over having finally met a really great guy I fall ass over ears for, who in turn, and I believe this to be the key difference, falls head over heels for me.
The truth is, I know exactly what they're feeling. It's not as though I've never been consumed with a guy to the point I can't think of anything or anybody else. I know how strange it is to be smiling all the time for no reason, and to squee with happiness every time somebody says his name.
That feeling of...this is who I'm supposed to be with. This is what it's supposed to feel like. This is what everybody is talking about. This is who I've dreamed about long before I even knew I wanted him is very, very familiar.
I know what they're feeling. In fact, there are actually two guys in my life who have let me glimpse beyond the velvet ropes separating those of us who go about our daily lives only worried about our jobs and our bills and whether the yogurt in the back of the fridge is safe to eat versus those whose only concern is whether it's actually possible to die of happiness.
As it turns out, both of those guys just happened to find other women. Before meeting me, while meeting me, after meeting me - the results are the same, and they're all deliriously happy.
In those situations, it's a little harder to be quite as happy for them as I am for others.
Tuesday, April 19, 2011
Bambi: Patron Saint of the Ridiculous
When I don't feel like working, which is pretty much 90% of my working day, I drop by a friend's office for an update on her dating life. I have to live vicariously through her, as I have no dating life of my own.
She's one of those terribly annoying women in their late forties who look about five years younger than I do in my mid thirties. She does very well with online dating, given that her demographic is men who are also in their late forties, coming off of their first or second divorces.
It also helps that she doesn't mind if they're fat or bald, citing something about personality and spirit over appearances. Admittedly, this is not an equation I'm familiar with.
The fact is, she's got so many men lined up to date her, she hasn't had to pay for a coffee, lunch or dinner in two weeks.
She was telling me about a lovely dinner date she had with a 49 year old high school teacher that she said even I might like, largely because he has a very dry sense of humour.
She knows perfectly well I'm much more likely to be pursuing one of his students, but she can't help trying to steer me in the direction of men who need to trim their ear hair more frequently than I shave my legs.
It amuses her.
She and the high school teacher agreed to share a plate of calamari, and all was going well until a piece of deep-fried squid became lodged in her throat. Aware that she was choking, she attempted to drink some water.
To her horror, her throat was so completely blocked the water just washed up again, spilling out down her shirt and over the table. By now she was panicking, flapping her arms, getting out of her seat, all the while trying desperately to cough or vomit.
Her date had rushed to her side, and was preparing to go full Heimlich when the deadly appetizer dislodged itself and plopped to the floor.
I was suitably horrified on her behalf, right up until she told me the only thought going through her head as she was being slowly murdered by a mollusk.
Instead of her life flashing before her eyes, all my friend could think of was that she was having a "Bambi Date."
My name is now so synonymous with dating mortification, that a woman can't simply come close to death, vomit on a dinner table and regurgitate seafood while her date attempts to save her life without thinking about me.
If I leave no greater legacy, I can be happy with that.
She's one of those terribly annoying women in their late forties who look about five years younger than I do in my mid thirties. She does very well with online dating, given that her demographic is men who are also in their late forties, coming off of their first or second divorces.
It also helps that she doesn't mind if they're fat or bald, citing something about personality and spirit over appearances. Admittedly, this is not an equation I'm familiar with.
The fact is, she's got so many men lined up to date her, she hasn't had to pay for a coffee, lunch or dinner in two weeks.
She was telling me about a lovely dinner date she had with a 49 year old high school teacher that she said even I might like, largely because he has a very dry sense of humour.
She knows perfectly well I'm much more likely to be pursuing one of his students, but she can't help trying to steer me in the direction of men who need to trim their ear hair more frequently than I shave my legs.
It amuses her.
She and the high school teacher agreed to share a plate of calamari, and all was going well until a piece of deep-fried squid became lodged in her throat. Aware that she was choking, she attempted to drink some water.
To her horror, her throat was so completely blocked the water just washed up again, spilling out down her shirt and over the table. By now she was panicking, flapping her arms, getting out of her seat, all the while trying desperately to cough or vomit.
Her date had rushed to her side, and was preparing to go full Heimlich when the deadly appetizer dislodged itself and plopped to the floor.
I was suitably horrified on her behalf, right up until she told me the only thought going through her head as she was being slowly murdered by a mollusk.
Instead of her life flashing before her eyes, all my friend could think of was that she was having a "Bambi Date."
My name is now so synonymous with dating mortification, that a woman can't simply come close to death, vomit on a dinner table and regurgitate seafood while her date attempts to save her life without thinking about me.
If I leave no greater legacy, I can be happy with that.
Thursday, April 7, 2011
Would this be dill or gherkin?
I had lunch with a friend the other day who described my situation as being, "a real pickle."
Frankly, I've never understood why this phrase would ever be used to denote something negative. Pickles are phallic shaped, crunchy salty goodness. If I had more pickle in my life I might actually be getting somewhere.
Crunchy salty goodness was not what she was referring to though. I have a job I can't stand, and to be fair, the job hates me back hard, so we're even. The best course of action would be to find another job, which wouldn't be a problem if there were other jobs available.
It's true it wouldn't be impossible to land a job at the lower-end of the pay scale, but I have a mortgage to pay, shoes to buy, and an inability to walk by Sephora without spending my grocery money on eyeliner.
Mostly it's the mortgage that's the problem, and I truly can't afford to make any less than I already do, even if I went back to the cheap eyeliner that smudges.
Surprisingly enough, my salary would be considered by most to be decent, and yet I need to work a second job anyway.
I live in a city filled with old people who bought their houses for $1500 two years before the discovery of fire, and now that their homes are worth 1.5 million they can't understand what's wrong with all the young people these days who won't stop whining about the crazy cost of living in our chosen city.
My cost of living would be less if I had a partner who also made a decent salary, but according to at least one friend of mine, I can't ever hope to "get" a guy who makes anywhere close to decent money.
Even though I may want to start reconsidering my friendships on top of everything else, that friend is probably correct. So far, the last six months have demonstrated I can't land a redneck used car salesman, a low-rent security guard with a penchant for inappropriate masturbation or a 20 year old virgin. I wouldn't describe my track record as hopeful either.
Making more money where I am is impossible. I will never be promoted, there's no chance to move anywhere else within the organization, and my most recent request to slightly shift my role and responsibilities in another direction was denied.
I've hit the wall.
Athletes talk about hitting the wall all the time, and having always had the good sense to stop participating in athletic activity when I'm tired, I never knew what they were talking about.
Now I do.
I just don't want to work anymore. This doesn't make me unique - most people would retire this afternoon if they could. I'm no different, but I realize my current financial and personal situation won't allow me to stop working until I'm at least 97. Particularly if my love life doesn't change, I'll need any extra income I can find to cover the cost of cat food and kitty litter.
Thankfully, I've started planning for retirement. I'm a grown-up with RRSPs and a Retirement Savings Account. According to the banks calculations based on my contributions, by the time I'm 97 I should have just enough money put away for a week long all-inclusive vacation - providing there's a seat sale.
After my holiday, I'll be ready for the career that will keep me comfortable well into my nursing home years. Porn. I read recently that there's a growing niche market for porn starring really freaking old people. By the time I'm that age, I'm not going to care whether the treatment for chlamydia interacts badly with my arthritis medication.
When I say I don't want to work anymore, I still recognize that I need to. It's more that lately I don't want to work the way I've always worked. My career doesn't matter or mean as much to me as it once did.
For years now, my only goals have been a better position, a better title and a better salary. I wanted respect, I wanted glowing performance appraisals and a job that I could base my entire identity and self-worth upon.
I worked so hard for all of those things, and now that I've come as far as I can go and I still find myself here - I don't care any more.
Basing my happiness in life on an activity so easily derailed by your average CEO believing he's a warlock, or a president and CEO who once described women's equality in the workforce as an "interesting concept," was never going to bode well.
So.
If I no longer care about the only goals I've ever cared about, if my current work situation is unsustainable and may actually be making me ill, if I can't afford to back away from my current work situation until I find a better opportunity, if there are no better opportunities, if my focus is shifting away from my career and onto the gaping holes in my personal life, if I don't want to go but can't stay here, if I cried during an episode of Say Yes to the Dress for no apparent reason, if what has always worked no longer works and if I have absolutely no idea what to do next...what then?
It's a real pickle.
Frankly, I've never understood why this phrase would ever be used to denote something negative. Pickles are phallic shaped, crunchy salty goodness. If I had more pickle in my life I might actually be getting somewhere.
Crunchy salty goodness was not what she was referring to though. I have a job I can't stand, and to be fair, the job hates me back hard, so we're even. The best course of action would be to find another job, which wouldn't be a problem if there were other jobs available.
It's true it wouldn't be impossible to land a job at the lower-end of the pay scale, but I have a mortgage to pay, shoes to buy, and an inability to walk by Sephora without spending my grocery money on eyeliner.
Mostly it's the mortgage that's the problem, and I truly can't afford to make any less than I already do, even if I went back to the cheap eyeliner that smudges.
Surprisingly enough, my salary would be considered by most to be decent, and yet I need to work a second job anyway.
I live in a city filled with old people who bought their houses for $1500 two years before the discovery of fire, and now that their homes are worth 1.5 million they can't understand what's wrong with all the young people these days who won't stop whining about the crazy cost of living in our chosen city.
My cost of living would be less if I had a partner who also made a decent salary, but according to at least one friend of mine, I can't ever hope to "get" a guy who makes anywhere close to decent money.
Even though I may want to start reconsidering my friendships on top of everything else, that friend is probably correct. So far, the last six months have demonstrated I can't land a redneck used car salesman, a low-rent security guard with a penchant for inappropriate masturbation or a 20 year old virgin. I wouldn't describe my track record as hopeful either.
Making more money where I am is impossible. I will never be promoted, there's no chance to move anywhere else within the organization, and my most recent request to slightly shift my role and responsibilities in another direction was denied.
I've hit the wall.
Athletes talk about hitting the wall all the time, and having always had the good sense to stop participating in athletic activity when I'm tired, I never knew what they were talking about.
Now I do.
I just don't want to work anymore. This doesn't make me unique - most people would retire this afternoon if they could. I'm no different, but I realize my current financial and personal situation won't allow me to stop working until I'm at least 97. Particularly if my love life doesn't change, I'll need any extra income I can find to cover the cost of cat food and kitty litter.
Thankfully, I've started planning for retirement. I'm a grown-up with RRSPs and a Retirement Savings Account. According to the banks calculations based on my contributions, by the time I'm 97 I should have just enough money put away for a week long all-inclusive vacation - providing there's a seat sale.
After my holiday, I'll be ready for the career that will keep me comfortable well into my nursing home years. Porn. I read recently that there's a growing niche market for porn starring really freaking old people. By the time I'm that age, I'm not going to care whether the treatment for chlamydia interacts badly with my arthritis medication.
When I say I don't want to work anymore, I still recognize that I need to. It's more that lately I don't want to work the way I've always worked. My career doesn't matter or mean as much to me as it once did.
For years now, my only goals have been a better position, a better title and a better salary. I wanted respect, I wanted glowing performance appraisals and a job that I could base my entire identity and self-worth upon.
I worked so hard for all of those things, and now that I've come as far as I can go and I still find myself here - I don't care any more.
Basing my happiness in life on an activity so easily derailed by your average CEO believing he's a warlock, or a president and CEO who once described women's equality in the workforce as an "interesting concept," was never going to bode well.
So.
If I no longer care about the only goals I've ever cared about, if my current work situation is unsustainable and may actually be making me ill, if I can't afford to back away from my current work situation until I find a better opportunity, if there are no better opportunities, if my focus is shifting away from my career and onto the gaping holes in my personal life, if I don't want to go but can't stay here, if I cried during an episode of Say Yes to the Dress for no apparent reason, if what has always worked no longer works and if I have absolutely no idea what to do next...what then?
It's a real pickle.
Monday, April 4, 2011
Further consultation required.
Ah consultants. Where would my organization be without them? Besides in the black that is.
Over the years, I've met with a virtual parade of people, all of them boasting entire alphabets after their names and possessing a driving passion for leveraging synergy, making sure we're all on the same page, drilling down, and suggesting that certain nouns and verbs can and should be "unpacked."
As in, "That's an interesting observation Bambi - let's unpack that."
In other words, I've met with a large contingent of people who make me want to chew my own ear.
My favorite new thing to do when sitting across the table from any new consultant is to tell the absolute truth, just to see what happens. This may be the clearest sign that I have simply run out of fucks to give.
I recently shared during an interview with a consultant how the five year strategy for my current department first went off the rails. The issue was staffing, and the question was why I had none.
A brief time ago there had been a plan in place to remedy this situation, and the consultant wanted to know what had happened to the plan to hire for position X. I told the absolute truth.
"There was definitely a plan in place to hire for position X. An interview panel was convened, interviews took place and a preferred candidate was chosen. The offer was to have been made over the weekend, but CEO #1 intervened before the offer could be made, and the position was awarded to somebody else. That person accepted the position, but resigned less than three months later."
Naturally, the consultant wanted to drill down and unpack.
"CEO #1 had a dream or what he considered a vision regarding another candidate, and he intervened to hire the candidate who appeared in his dream. When I expressed concern regarding this course of action to the managing director, I was told that although this may seem unusual, CEO #1 considered himself a warlock, had reached a heightened state of enlightenment, and was very, very intuitive as a result."
(This happened by the way. Seriously.)
So far, no consultant has had the Texas sized balls necessary to include the continued employment of a CEO who considers himself a warlock as a possible reason the $50 million project said warlock was responsible for never got off the ground.
To do so would be to question how in the hell that was allowed to happen, and to ask such a question would mean pissing off the asshole who signs off on their contracts. Coincidentally, the same asshole who signed off on the warlock.
(Some may say I have no pride in my company, but that's not true. We had a pants-shittingly crazy bastard wasting millions and calling himself a warlock on our payroll, long before Charlie Sheen ever lost his mind. Suck it Charlie. We're the real innovators.)
Consultants bring a unique, outside perspective. This outsider perspective allows them to spot roadblocks and potential issues so much more quickly than those of us working within the system.
After all, we were all hired because our organization is an Equal Opportunity employer, with a soft spot for the deaf and the blind.
The semi-annual re-organization of all company departments can cause a considerable amount of anxiety. It's true that not knowing who you report to or where your desk might be located from day to day can be stressful, which is why an army of new consultants are brought on board every year.
(Sadly, the consultants are all hired at different times throughout the year. I think it would be amazing if they could all gather in the same place at the same time, on one special day.)
(Instead of the Running of the Bulls in Pamplona, we could have the Running of the Contracted Consultants. It would be glorious, and really, really crowded. Anybody too slow to jump over fences and out of their way gets to meet with them first.)
If employees haven't learned to embrace change after their 8th re-organization in a year, then clearly they need some one-on-one time with a consultant who can produce an org-chart with clearly defined arrows.
A really good consultant offers so much more than arrows however. This type of consultant really gets on the same page with people, and drills down to the heart of the matter so that synergy can occur.
In fact, I was fully synergized just this morning.
It seems, and let's keep in mind that this is from an outsider perspective, that the external communications my department is responsible for are important. I needed a moment to take that in, as I'd never before considered communicating to have any real purpose until the outsider consultant said it out loud.
Once I was on the same page, it became time to work together to create a new org-chart with new arrows, because as it turns out, my writing is unprofessional and inappropriate for use in any external communications.
Let it be known, this was not a criticism. Writing is a skill that very few can master, and it does not come easily to everybody.
Just so we're on the same page, let's reference the latest article I uploaded to the online corporate newsletter, as I've done monthly for the last four years. The posting appeared to have a more casual tone. Yes, casual.
It's true that nobody has complained, and it may very well be true that some people say they enjoy reading that column particularly for the more casual tone, but I need to embrace change.
If there was to be an approval process in place of no less than three people for anything I write that may be published anywhere, and or read outside of the organization, and if my writing showed improvement, there might be a chance that I could apply for some professional development funding to take a non-credit course at a local college in basic writing.
Wouldn't that be nice?
It sure would be nice. The xeroxed certificate of participation I might earn from taking a non-credit basic writing course sure would look great next to my BFA and Degree in Writing I've got hanging on my wall from the University of Victoria. The UVic program only accepts 10 people a year, so clearly it can't be that sustainable.
But because I've run out of fucks to give, I didn't tell a consultant she could unpack my ass or synergize my fist through her face this morning. That would have been a clear sign I wasn't embracing change, and if we were to drill down any further I might have murdered something.
Instead of murder, maybe I'll just publish a book already. Casual, inappropriate and unprofessional would make a pretty awesome tag line.
Over the years, I've met with a virtual parade of people, all of them boasting entire alphabets after their names and possessing a driving passion for leveraging synergy, making sure we're all on the same page, drilling down, and suggesting that certain nouns and verbs can and should be "unpacked."
As in, "That's an interesting observation Bambi - let's unpack that."
In other words, I've met with a large contingent of people who make me want to chew my own ear.
My favorite new thing to do when sitting across the table from any new consultant is to tell the absolute truth, just to see what happens. This may be the clearest sign that I have simply run out of fucks to give.
I recently shared during an interview with a consultant how the five year strategy for my current department first went off the rails. The issue was staffing, and the question was why I had none.
A brief time ago there had been a plan in place to remedy this situation, and the consultant wanted to know what had happened to the plan to hire for position X. I told the absolute truth.
"There was definitely a plan in place to hire for position X. An interview panel was convened, interviews took place and a preferred candidate was chosen. The offer was to have been made over the weekend, but CEO #1 intervened before the offer could be made, and the position was awarded to somebody else. That person accepted the position, but resigned less than three months later."
Naturally, the consultant wanted to drill down and unpack.
"CEO #1 had a dream or what he considered a vision regarding another candidate, and he intervened to hire the candidate who appeared in his dream. When I expressed concern regarding this course of action to the managing director, I was told that although this may seem unusual, CEO #1 considered himself a warlock, had reached a heightened state of enlightenment, and was very, very intuitive as a result."
(This happened by the way. Seriously.)
So far, no consultant has had the Texas sized balls necessary to include the continued employment of a CEO who considers himself a warlock as a possible reason the $50 million project said warlock was responsible for never got off the ground.
To do so would be to question how in the hell that was allowed to happen, and to ask such a question would mean pissing off the asshole who signs off on their contracts. Coincidentally, the same asshole who signed off on the warlock.
(Some may say I have no pride in my company, but that's not true. We had a pants-shittingly crazy bastard wasting millions and calling himself a warlock on our payroll, long before Charlie Sheen ever lost his mind. Suck it Charlie. We're the real innovators.)
Consultants bring a unique, outside perspective. This outsider perspective allows them to spot roadblocks and potential issues so much more quickly than those of us working within the system.
After all, we were all hired because our organization is an Equal Opportunity employer, with a soft spot for the deaf and the blind.
The semi-annual re-organization of all company departments can cause a considerable amount of anxiety. It's true that not knowing who you report to or where your desk might be located from day to day can be stressful, which is why an army of new consultants are brought on board every year.
(Sadly, the consultants are all hired at different times throughout the year. I think it would be amazing if they could all gather in the same place at the same time, on one special day.)
(Instead of the Running of the Bulls in Pamplona, we could have the Running of the Contracted Consultants. It would be glorious, and really, really crowded. Anybody too slow to jump over fences and out of their way gets to meet with them first.)
If employees haven't learned to embrace change after their 8th re-organization in a year, then clearly they need some one-on-one time with a consultant who can produce an org-chart with clearly defined arrows.
A really good consultant offers so much more than arrows however. This type of consultant really gets on the same page with people, and drills down to the heart of the matter so that synergy can occur.
In fact, I was fully synergized just this morning.
It seems, and let's keep in mind that this is from an outsider perspective, that the external communications my department is responsible for are important. I needed a moment to take that in, as I'd never before considered communicating to have any real purpose until the outsider consultant said it out loud.
Once I was on the same page, it became time to work together to create a new org-chart with new arrows, because as it turns out, my writing is unprofessional and inappropriate for use in any external communications.
Let it be known, this was not a criticism. Writing is a skill that very few can master, and it does not come easily to everybody.
Just so we're on the same page, let's reference the latest article I uploaded to the online corporate newsletter, as I've done monthly for the last four years. The posting appeared to have a more casual tone. Yes, casual.
It's true that nobody has complained, and it may very well be true that some people say they enjoy reading that column particularly for the more casual tone, but I need to embrace change.
If there was to be an approval process in place of no less than three people for anything I write that may be published anywhere, and or read outside of the organization, and if my writing showed improvement, there might be a chance that I could apply for some professional development funding to take a non-credit course at a local college in basic writing.
Wouldn't that be nice?
It sure would be nice. The xeroxed certificate of participation I might earn from taking a non-credit basic writing course sure would look great next to my BFA and Degree in Writing I've got hanging on my wall from the University of Victoria. The UVic program only accepts 10 people a year, so clearly it can't be that sustainable.
But because I've run out of fucks to give, I didn't tell a consultant she could unpack my ass or synergize my fist through her face this morning. That would have been a clear sign I wasn't embracing change, and if we were to drill down any further I might have murdered something.
Instead of murder, maybe I'll just publish a book already. Casual, inappropriate and unprofessional would make a pretty awesome tag line.
Friday, April 1, 2011
If it's finally puberty, I'm hoping I'll grow boobs.
I'm going through a weird phase right now, and I'm not sure what to chalk it up to. I'm just not myself. For example, I had lunch with a very good friend recently, who I don't get to see very often but who is one of my ten faithful readers.
She seemed hopeful that I hadn't done anything ridiculous in quite a while, primarily because I hadn't updated my blog. I wish I could say my lack of posting is a sign of unquestionably good behaviour on my part, but that wouldn't be true. Not writing is part of my weird phase.
Describing how I literally fell out of my stupidly high heels while exiting a night club at closing time where 200+ people were milling about and can now testify as to whether I bounced at all after hitting the payment could have made for a good story for my blog.
Even though I hadn't been drinking enough to fall over, stepping off the curb onto uneven pavement was all I needed to gain an entirely new appreciation for how fast gravity can work.
As I lay sprawled and suddenly barefoot in the street, I had time to think to myself that 34 years old is entirely too old to be laying in the street in front of a night club at closing time, and yet here we are.
The gathered crowd was kind enough to find my shoes for me, seeing as my shoes had got even better air time than I did. I'm grateful for these drunken good Samaritans. At least being able to walk away wearing my shoes again afforded some kind of dignity to the situation.
Then there was the twenty year old virgin I picked up while out dancing last weekend. Oh calm yourselves - he's still a virgin as far as I know.
I didn't start talking to him because I had any idea that doing so could violate both gay math and whatever passes for Madonna's moral code, so I was as shocked as anybody.
There was just something about him that was so shy and sweet, he appeared a completely different species than the guys that would normally attract me. For this reason we ended up talking and dancing, and then we went for coffee after the club where we talked for another two hours.
It was somewhere in this conversation he let slip that despite being twenty and in the military, he's still a virgin. Do you have any idea how hard it is to have scalding hot Tim Horton's tea go down the wrong pipe all of a sudden, and then try to recover gracefully while reacting like everything is completely normal? Do you??
It's really hard.
You'd think being ever so slightly older, wiser and more experienced than this guy would have given me an edge, but I was still SO crazy nervous about calling him afterward.
Telling myself he was so young I could have given birth to him (providing I was a raging whore in middle school) just made it exponentially worse.
Cougars are supposed to be confident, but I must be more of a hybrid jungle cat - about as dangerous as a Build-a-Bear grizzly.
This could have made a good story for the blog, although a bit anti-climactic. After breathing into a paper bag for a while I finally phoned him two days later, and we had a pretty good conversation - mostly about how he was leaving the next day for three weeks at sea.
I suppose I'll be happy for our Canadian Navy's rigorous training schedule should I ever need rescue from Somali pirates, but right then it really pissed me off. He said he'll call me when he's back on dry land, but I'm not holding my breath it'll cross his mind again. Kids have such short attention spans these days.
Overall, it's not as though there's nothing in my life that wouldn't make my readers feel so much better about their own. I'm still ridiculous. I could be writing. I probably should be writing. Instead, I'm going through a weird phase.
Although we can safely rule out mood altering conditions such as pregnancy or vegetarianism, I'll be sure to let you know if I figure out what the hell it is and what it all means.
Until then, I'll try to stay in my shoes and share more stories. Good advice for anybody.
She seemed hopeful that I hadn't done anything ridiculous in quite a while, primarily because I hadn't updated my blog. I wish I could say my lack of posting is a sign of unquestionably good behaviour on my part, but that wouldn't be true. Not writing is part of my weird phase.
Describing how I literally fell out of my stupidly high heels while exiting a night club at closing time where 200+ people were milling about and can now testify as to whether I bounced at all after hitting the payment could have made for a good story for my blog.
Even though I hadn't been drinking enough to fall over, stepping off the curb onto uneven pavement was all I needed to gain an entirely new appreciation for how fast gravity can work.
As I lay sprawled and suddenly barefoot in the street, I had time to think to myself that 34 years old is entirely too old to be laying in the street in front of a night club at closing time, and yet here we are.
The gathered crowd was kind enough to find my shoes for me, seeing as my shoes had got even better air time than I did. I'm grateful for these drunken good Samaritans. At least being able to walk away wearing my shoes again afforded some kind of dignity to the situation.
Then there was the twenty year old virgin I picked up while out dancing last weekend. Oh calm yourselves - he's still a virgin as far as I know.
I didn't start talking to him because I had any idea that doing so could violate both gay math and whatever passes for Madonna's moral code, so I was as shocked as anybody.
There was just something about him that was so shy and sweet, he appeared a completely different species than the guys that would normally attract me. For this reason we ended up talking and dancing, and then we went for coffee after the club where we talked for another two hours.
It was somewhere in this conversation he let slip that despite being twenty and in the military, he's still a virgin. Do you have any idea how hard it is to have scalding hot Tim Horton's tea go down the wrong pipe all of a sudden, and then try to recover gracefully while reacting like everything is completely normal? Do you??
It's really hard.
You'd think being ever so slightly older, wiser and more experienced than this guy would have given me an edge, but I was still SO crazy nervous about calling him afterward.
Telling myself he was so young I could have given birth to him (providing I was a raging whore in middle school) just made it exponentially worse.
Cougars are supposed to be confident, but I must be more of a hybrid jungle cat - about as dangerous as a Build-a-Bear grizzly.
This could have made a good story for the blog, although a bit anti-climactic. After breathing into a paper bag for a while I finally phoned him two days later, and we had a pretty good conversation - mostly about how he was leaving the next day for three weeks at sea.
I suppose I'll be happy for our Canadian Navy's rigorous training schedule should I ever need rescue from Somali pirates, but right then it really pissed me off. He said he'll call me when he's back on dry land, but I'm not holding my breath it'll cross his mind again. Kids have such short attention spans these days.
Overall, it's not as though there's nothing in my life that wouldn't make my readers feel so much better about their own. I'm still ridiculous. I could be writing. I probably should be writing. Instead, I'm going through a weird phase.
Although we can safely rule out mood altering conditions such as pregnancy or vegetarianism, I'll be sure to let you know if I figure out what the hell it is and what it all means.
Until then, I'll try to stay in my shoes and share more stories. Good advice for anybody.
Friday, February 25, 2011
Actually, this is cruelty-free spandex.
Are you blogging this? My work-out buddy asks me this question every Tuesday night, usually in the empty high school parking lot where our running group meets for the warm-up.
We are both back in training to successfully complete an inexplicably popular 10k race in April. Success to us means not dying, peeing, puking our shitting our pants during the effort.
We're at risk of doing all four of these things, although perhaps not in that order. Her and I are not natural athletes. I can barely be referred to as natural anything. Proof that our bodies are not built for long or short bursts of running lies in our stomachs.
The aching shins and hips are to be expected, but complaining that a hip hurts or a knee feels out of whack actually helps us feel athletic. We have sports injuries! From actual sports! No, really!
We know that to remedy these aches and pains we need to focus on strengthening something in our bodies called "a core." Apparently this would be the middle section of my body that has always given me problems. The top half of this section I'm always wishing to grow bigger, but it's the lower half that keeps expanding.
There are classes just for core training, and exercises we could do at home. We know this because we've discussed doing both, and these conversations are exhausting enough.
Besides, core training won't do much to help our stomach situations. If I say the word 'running' to my friend she has to poo. Just like that. Prior to actually going for a run, she's been known to poo up to four separate times in anticipation. I've proposed that she doesn't need running to lose weight. We just have to talk about it and the pounds will fall right off of her.
My problem is of the more liquid variety. My bladder shrinks accordingly with every running step forward. Should I ever run a marathon, that organ might just shrivel and vanish from my body completely.
The problem isn't actually shrinkage, it's bouncing. In some runners, the colon and bladder can "jostle." I would have thought internal organs would be somehow better anchored, but it seems there's a lot more free floating going on in there than I would have believed.
Nevertheless, my friend and I joined a running group, and that group may already be sorry.
Every Tuesday we're divided into three smaller groups. One group is a handful of crazy people who head out for a casual 15k every Tuesday night, and a second group are runners who are considerably more advanced in their training for the big race. My friend and I belong to the third group, who are baby stepping our way through a beginners run/walk interval program.
We're supposed to do our warm-up exercises segmented within the larger group, and every Tuesday evening my friend and I confuse where we're supposed to be, and in the process confuse at least a dozen other people. One would think we'd recognize other members of our beginners group by now, but my excuse is that it's dark out by the time we get there.
Every Tuesday the warm-up is halted at some point so that the confusion caused by my friend and I can be sorted out. It happens when we argue over what section of the parking lot we're supposed to be in, causing dozens of eavesdroppers to doubt themselves.
I'll instinctively join a group because they're doing arm circles which I like, but another group is doing leg lunges, which I really don't. My friend likes walking on her toes, so she'll go over with that group. By the time everything is halted because we're still publicly arguing whether we're supposed to be here or over there, half the members in every group changed places.
We've both been very sick for the past few weeks, but I'm proud of ourselves because we've kept up our running schedule. It's not so much perseverance, but the knowledge that there's no way in hell we'll persevere if we stop now.
This has made for some really awful runs recently. I have a cold that has lingered so long, I can honestly say that as of today it's outlasted the majority of my relationships.
Although I seem to be on the mend (this isn't a scientific determination, but I no longer sound like James Earl Jones so that should count for something), I've been barking like a seal when I try to breathe deeply. My friend has had the stomach flu, and has been in serious danger of something spectacular happening out of one or both ends the last few times we've been out.
Neither of us have ever been in danger of landing in a Gatorade commercial at the best of times. Rather, we've considered producing our own line of at at home work-out DVDs that stick a little closer to reality.
Instead of hard-bodied women who've never known the pleasures of carbohydrates smiling like beauty queens the entire way through an hour long work-out, there would be us; four steps behind the routine, substituting the eff word for every happy cheer raised by the cardio-bots and tripping over our coffee tables. It will retail for $9.99.
We're upfront about our suffering. During our Tuesday practice runs, the official "run leaders" will occasionally take a moment to stop and yell encouragement to us beginner runners who are slogging by. There are actually people who respond to all of the, "Good jobs!" and "You're doing greats!" with happy cheering noises.
We are not those people. This past Tuesday, a run leader made the mistake of hollering out a hearty, "How are ya doing?" as we passed. My friend yelled back that she was going to puke and wanted to die.
She lived, and I'm so glad. Without her I might quit, and it's incredible how much worse a sense of failure can feel than a feeling of actually wanting to die due to lactic acid build-up.
She helps see me through, and so this Tuesday, I'm happy my answer will finally be,"Yes. I am blogging this."
We are both back in training to successfully complete an inexplicably popular 10k race in April. Success to us means not dying, peeing, puking our shitting our pants during the effort.
We're at risk of doing all four of these things, although perhaps not in that order. Her and I are not natural athletes. I can barely be referred to as natural anything. Proof that our bodies are not built for long or short bursts of running lies in our stomachs.
The aching shins and hips are to be expected, but complaining that a hip hurts or a knee feels out of whack actually helps us feel athletic. We have sports injuries! From actual sports! No, really!
We know that to remedy these aches and pains we need to focus on strengthening something in our bodies called "a core." Apparently this would be the middle section of my body that has always given me problems. The top half of this section I'm always wishing to grow bigger, but it's the lower half that keeps expanding.
There are classes just for core training, and exercises we could do at home. We know this because we've discussed doing both, and these conversations are exhausting enough.
Besides, core training won't do much to help our stomach situations. If I say the word 'running' to my friend she has to poo. Just like that. Prior to actually going for a run, she's been known to poo up to four separate times in anticipation. I've proposed that she doesn't need running to lose weight. We just have to talk about it and the pounds will fall right off of her.
My problem is of the more liquid variety. My bladder shrinks accordingly with every running step forward. Should I ever run a marathon, that organ might just shrivel and vanish from my body completely.
The problem isn't actually shrinkage, it's bouncing. In some runners, the colon and bladder can "jostle." I would have thought internal organs would be somehow better anchored, but it seems there's a lot more free floating going on in there than I would have believed.
Nevertheless, my friend and I joined a running group, and that group may already be sorry.
Every Tuesday we're divided into three smaller groups. One group is a handful of crazy people who head out for a casual 15k every Tuesday night, and a second group are runners who are considerably more advanced in their training for the big race. My friend and I belong to the third group, who are baby stepping our way through a beginners run/walk interval program.
We're supposed to do our warm-up exercises segmented within the larger group, and every Tuesday evening my friend and I confuse where we're supposed to be, and in the process confuse at least a dozen other people. One would think we'd recognize other members of our beginners group by now, but my excuse is that it's dark out by the time we get there.
Every Tuesday the warm-up is halted at some point so that the confusion caused by my friend and I can be sorted out. It happens when we argue over what section of the parking lot we're supposed to be in, causing dozens of eavesdroppers to doubt themselves.
I'll instinctively join a group because they're doing arm circles which I like, but another group is doing leg lunges, which I really don't. My friend likes walking on her toes, so she'll go over with that group. By the time everything is halted because we're still publicly arguing whether we're supposed to be here or over there, half the members in every group changed places.
We've both been very sick for the past few weeks, but I'm proud of ourselves because we've kept up our running schedule. It's not so much perseverance, but the knowledge that there's no way in hell we'll persevere if we stop now.
This has made for some really awful runs recently. I have a cold that has lingered so long, I can honestly say that as of today it's outlasted the majority of my relationships.
Although I seem to be on the mend (this isn't a scientific determination, but I no longer sound like James Earl Jones so that should count for something), I've been barking like a seal when I try to breathe deeply. My friend has had the stomach flu, and has been in serious danger of something spectacular happening out of one or both ends the last few times we've been out.
Neither of us have ever been in danger of landing in a Gatorade commercial at the best of times. Rather, we've considered producing our own line of at at home work-out DVDs that stick a little closer to reality.
Instead of hard-bodied women who've never known the pleasures of carbohydrates smiling like beauty queens the entire way through an hour long work-out, there would be us; four steps behind the routine, substituting the eff word for every happy cheer raised by the cardio-bots and tripping over our coffee tables. It will retail for $9.99.
We're upfront about our suffering. During our Tuesday practice runs, the official "run leaders" will occasionally take a moment to stop and yell encouragement to us beginner runners who are slogging by. There are actually people who respond to all of the, "Good jobs!" and "You're doing greats!" with happy cheering noises.
We are not those people. This past Tuesday, a run leader made the mistake of hollering out a hearty, "How are ya doing?" as we passed. My friend yelled back that she was going to puke and wanted to die.
She lived, and I'm so glad. Without her I might quit, and it's incredible how much worse a sense of failure can feel than a feeling of actually wanting to die due to lactic acid build-up.
She helps see me through, and so this Tuesday, I'm happy my answer will finally be,"Yes. I am blogging this."
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