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Miss Atticus' journal
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If I know you, am related to you, been catty to you or made out with you, I reserve the right to write about it here in my own uncensored voice. If you do not like what you read here, there is a procedure in place for your utilization:
1. Take it all with a grain of salt. I mean, really, how often do I really know dinkie-doo?
2. If #1 does not assuage your anger, call or e-mail me so we can talk about it. Don't leave a nasty anonymous comment. It may make you feel better in the moment, but I have the power to just delete them so that does nobody any good. And it's pansy-ass, besides.
3. Understand that if you choose not to talk to me directly about it, that is on you.
4. Or, you could simply not read it.
Consider yourself disclaimed.
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Monday, June 20th, 2005
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9:42 am - TypePad
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I just got a membership to TypePad, so I'm (again) reformatting the blog. Blurty's been okay, but I've wanted a few more features and a more reliable service (blurty tends to go down periodically and so it is sometimes hard to get to the blog).
I'll keep a link to these blogs in the archive section of my site, though. It'll take me a while to download three years worth of entries.
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| Thursday, June 16th, 2005
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8:05 pm - Help me name this cat:
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So, here's the story (because there is always a story). . . .
Several weeks back, in the wake of the death of my 19 year old Calebina, some DBO friends of my mothers bestowed upon us a kitten from one of the two semi-feral litters they had in their back yard. Without asking us, I might add. (These people are big, loud and pushy. . . you know, the type who won't hear you when you yell NO at them.)
Anyway. . .that was a little orange striped kitten we named Trixie. Trixie and my cat, Samaritan, do NOT get along. But that is beside the point.
Today, a neighbor asked if we had tossed a cat into the clean up dumpster we're renting. Looking at him in that horrified way that says, "Why would you think we'd do something like that? WE are responsible pet owners," I said no, of course not. He then explained that he's heard a cat crying in there the last day or two.
Well, then I hear the crying. So I climb into the dumpster and begin to try to figure out where this cat is. After a while, I figure out that the meowing is coming from underneath three recliners that those same DBO friends had thrown into our dumpster (on MONDAY) to get them out of their yard.
I immediately begin swearing. Because the recliners are lodged in under a mound of clean out stuff from the last four days. My mother calls the DBOs and finds out that they had found a kitten in one of the recliners before they brought them, but they had fished it out. Oh, great. So now I know the thing is probably trapped in one of the recliners. I just don't know which one. SINCE MONDAY.
At this point, I'm panicked. The thing IS ABOUT TO DIE! So I spent the better part of an hour swearing the DBOs ill treatment of animals and lack of responsibility while simultaneously swearing about BEING IN A DUMPSTER PULLING SHIT APART! I find that swearing gives me added strength that allows me to move large furnishings filled with various spiders and creepy crawlies over mounds of boxes and filler with added brute strength.
Under each recliner, as I get it turned over, I start RIPPING the batting off of the bottom so I can see inside. Under the LAST recliner, I see a little fluff of grey fur and hear a long meow.
The poor thing had been trapped in the footrest mechanism of the recliner for FOUR DAYS. The DBOs didn't even notice he was gone. When my mother called them to tell them that we got it out, they then swore that they didn't have any grey and white kittens in their litter and that that cat must have CRAWLED INTO THE FOOTREST MECHANISM.
Never mind that the cat is the same age, hair type and facial structure as Trixie-- ITS SISTER!!! No. The DBOs will take no responsibility for it at all.
So now I have a new cat. This makes three cats. Something I've never known in my lifetime. Three dogs, yes. Three cats? All of whom hate each other? Yeah, that's some good times right there.
So, anyway. .. now I have to name the grey and white male cat found in a dumpster-- who hasn't shut up since he got out.
Any suggestions?
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1:13 am - A good hard look at yourself
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Picked up the proofs from my sitting with Melanie Nelson of Black Dahlia Photography.
Pics 'N Images Page
Since I only needed a headshot for the occasional regional audition (ie. I don't have to have hundreds printed up and sent to casting agencies and deal with "industry norms and standards" and all that nonsense), I chose to go with a photographer who specialized in black and white portraiture rather than industry headshots. She does a decent range of portraits but specializes in the vintage-style look (think old Hollywood).
That being said, I wasn't prepared for my reaction to the proofs. I didn't have a lot of pictures taken of myself for much of my 20's because of my weight. I pretty much had to be drunk or guilted into having a photo taken. And as a teenager, I never felt pretty enough for my two best friends who were stunners. I don't really recognize the person in most recent photos of myself, so these were a surprise. It's always a shock to me-- that person in the photo. I think that's why I take and post photos of myself now. To try and get used to being the girl in the photo. Am I trying to convince myself of something? I don't know.
And what's more. . . the look in my eyes in many of these portraits really took me aback. I've always been described as having an intense stare, so when I did have a pic taken my eyes were always a bit camera shy. Now, I'm just stunned by the intensity in them. The range of emotion was there-- even to an intense nothingness (a shot I'll send when I next audition for the part of a blonde zombie, ha ha!)-- but the look in my eyes that gets caught on camera sometimes frightens the shit outta me.
Freaks me out more than the possum!
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| Tuesday, June 14th, 2005
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10:55 pm - I DON'T LIVE IN THE COUNTRY, DAMMIT!
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| Sunday, June 12th, 2005
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10:38 pm - The problem with home improvement. . . .
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. . . putting the rooms back together after they've been 'improved'.
We've been in an almost constant state of home repair/improvement/accessibility since February of 04. Ramps put in. Doors widened. Carpet taken out. Flooring put in. Rooms painted. Furniture changes. Cabinets modified. Counters lowered. Tile put in. Electricals rerouted. It goes on and on.
We have no fewer than three regular handimen: a carpenter, an electrician, and a "general jobs" guy. Different guys come in to do flooring. We've had contractors in to completely modify the bathroom and kitchent. Now, with the exception of one last ramp to be built in the back, we are finally down to the more cosmetic stuff. Painting, tiles in the bathroom, curtains and stuff like that.
But it always seems to come in waves of scheduling. Of course, we couldn't take it one room at a time. Ohhhh, no. Mom always wants it done NOW! So tonight we have three rooms in complete disarray (although, thankfully, NOT in disrepair) because of boxes, scraps, stuff pulled out that now needs to be put away, etc.
I hate that part. I really, really hate that part.
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| Wednesday, June 8th, 2005
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10:39 pm - "Are you one of the fortunate kind?/ Alone but not lonely..."
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Tonight's been one of those double edged sword nights for me. I got a few hours of much needed alone time at home because mom went to my sister-in-law's for the evening. I honestly can't remember the last time I was alone in the house for more than an hour. Anyway, I had a meeting early this evening and then got to head home to an empty house.
These days, being alone in the house is a decompression thing. It usually means I'm perfectly free to open up and let loose some emotions that have been building up for a while. Being alone, at home, now means the rare opportunity to not have someone else's needs to anticipate, and not having to perform for the needs of my family, friends, and my mother's friends. (Not that I have to really "perform" per se, but just that there's a certain level of maintainence that they're comfortable with and I feel like I have to keep that together; that, and there's always the reaching outward rather than inward when other people are around. It drains my batteries.)
Anyway. . . tonight was one of those nights. Started out blissfully eating pizza and deciding which I wanted to do: watch a DVD or watch TV. Choices, ya know? They're tough.
Then I caught the season premiere of Six Feet Under. I didn't lose it immediately, although I was very conscious of how hugely it resonant it was. Freak out sessions about being a sole caregiver; the meaning and horror that simultaneously comes from committing your life to the care of another; the feeling like you're not really worthy of anything really good that could come along. All there. In friggin' Six Feet Under. I can't watch that show.
Well, it is a good thing that I now keep a box of Kleenex in every room in the house, because about a half an hour after it was over, I got an e-mail from one of the board members from my earlier meeting. Now, this was NOT a good meeting. While trying to hammer out various issues regarding board personnel and creative staff for next season, I was repeatedly cut off, ignored and fully dismissed several times during the meeting.
I can handle a lot of things, but being DISMISSED is not one of them. So, this e-mail was a REPEATED dismissal of an earlier dismissal and I just started crying. {Oh, box of Kleenex, how I adore thee!). So, there's the first edge of the sword. My tendency to just start weeping when I'm alone with myself.
But, one thing about me. . . I know that my tendency towards crying like this is A) Genetically predisposed. Both Grandmothers had the same trait and B) actually just my body's way of releasing frustration and tension. It is the most effective way of calming myself down so that I don't take things so personally.
But the second edge of the sword comes immediately following that release of tears: It is ALWAYS during that time that I wish I wasn't alone. At no other time in this cycle of emotions called my life do I wish more that I had a relationship, a lover, a fucking boyfriend, who could just wrap his arms around me and stroke my hair, because aside from the release of the tears, that is the next best way to calm me down. Treat her like a thoroughbred mare, my dad used to say. Whisper to her.
That craving for intimacy.. . .it never really goes away. But it's never stronger than on nights like tonight. Would I still be crying if I were watching Six Feet Under with a loving man? Probably. But the crying would feel a lot different.
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And the sex afterward wouldn't be so bad, either.
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1:15 pm - Trixie
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For the last two weeks or so, we've had a new kitten in the house called Trixie. My mom thinks I named her after her trick of climbing the bedspread to get up on the beds (which she figured out the first day-- when she was just 5 weeks old), but in fact, I named her after my favorite whore on Deadwood.
She's a little terror, really. Eats constantly, plays herself out and then sleeps. Then repeats the cycle. She's teething still so she wants to bite everything and has taken to climbing up on my lap via the "claws in pants" method of scaling my legs. She has also taken a liking to taking 4 points off of beds, chairs and desktops. She looks like a strange orange vampire, leaping from the edge with all four legs splayed wide, mouth open revealing her fangs and eyes wide open. She also likes to ride on the under-seat tray of my mom's wheelchair. We now have a kitty bed under there where she takes her naps while my mother wheels around the house.
Luckily, she is easily distracted with kitten toys strategically placed around the house. The constant sound of bells and squeeks from her attacking them has become part of the fabric of my day to day existence.
Holly, our rottweiler, likes Trixie immensely. They play and kiss and curl up together. They also have found common cause against Samaritan (now known as Vadarette because of the constant breathy hissing that issues forth from her in the presence of Trixie), our black cat who is decidedly UNTHRILLED by the kitty competition. Holly and Samaritan have never gotten a long, and I think Holly is excited by the prospect of ganging up on her a bit. Use the force, and all of that jazz.
Right now, Trixie is watching my fingers on the keyboard and trying to figure the best way to attack them. I dread the day she decides that the keyboard should be her domain as well.
I expect that day to come next Tuesday.
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| Tuesday, June 7th, 2005
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11:47 pm - Cream puffs
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First off, thanks to my two commenters -- dear, dear Alyson and Anonymous- (Oh, how I wish I knew who you are!) Sometimes it helps to be told that I'm not really devolving back into the primordial ooze, as I oftentimes feel I am.
Today was mildly exhausting, due in major part to the occurance of one of those pressure-releasing fights my mother and I have once every four or five months. It usually starts with an unspoken struggle of wills between her need for more control in her life and my need for more space. Then, when I've danced around doing what she wants me to do and she's wheeled around trying to get me to do what she wants me to do. . . she just snaps and starts yelling, "I can't stand it! I can't STAND IT!!!".
Then I get all, "What the fuck did *I* do?" and she goes, "Nothing. . NOTHING!" And that usually spirals into a lot of 120 decibal talk about needs and anger and fear and expecting more of ourselves and getting shit together. Then add the frustrated tears and you've got a grand old spat! The poor, unsuspecting FedEx guy knocked on our door in the middle of it and was treated to my turning around and shouting, "Go the FUCK away!" at the door. He did.
Nothing more fun, I tell ya!
But really, when it comes down to it we usually feel a shitload better after one of these. Both of us know that it is just a pressure-release and a more compelling form of communication between us. It doesn't happen very often and never involves insults or guilt trips, so that helps.
Afterward, we kissed made cream puffs.
God love the cream puff.
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| Monday, June 6th, 2005
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10:52 pm - surreal life
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I just read a blog where the author describes hearing the sounds of women perpetually screaming from the DVD of Spiderman 2-- playing at ridiculously high volumes by his roommate from the next room. . . . simultaneously to my reading this blog entry, I'm hearing the sounds of women perpetually screaming from the DVD of Spiderman 2-- playing at ridiculously high volumes by my mother from the next room. . .
God, I hope that you, dear reader, are not currently hearing the sounds of women perpetually screaming from a DVD of Spiderman 2 playing at ridiculously high volumes from the next room. . . .
Because that. .. THAT would be weird.
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4:33 pm - A recent development I don't like about myself
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Two years ago or so I was a person who was eager to be compassionate, understanding and to offer the benefit of the doubt to almost anyone. Recently, I've found that to be diminished in my character. And I can't explain why. I'm usually one to jump to a rash conclusion-- often about someone I don't know well or at all-- and then get talked down by someone who exhibits an infinitely greater source of the sense of insight and understanding that I wish I had.
What's that about, I wonder?
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| Saturday, June 4th, 2005
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11:54 pm - song in my head
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She played. . . tambourine/
With a . . . silver jingle/
And she must have know the words/
to at least a million tunes.
But the one most requested/
By the man she knew as 'Cowboy'/
Was the Late Night Benediction/
At Y'all Come Back Saloon"
Yup, the Statler Bros., baby. A blast from the past on AM 1270 Classic Country. I knew every word of the song because my mother played their albums all the time. My mother was in the car with me when it came on. We sang it as we drove home tonight. We do that from time to time. We randomly break into the "Bonanza" theme song from time to time, too.
Good times. Good memories.
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| Friday, June 3rd, 2005
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5:19 pm - Convoluted thoughts on blogging
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So, I was trying to explain blogs to an acquaintance who e-mailed me after "stumbling" across my site. She had only heard the word in the context of the political blogs that CNN and Time Magazine are always talking about. She wondered what the point was of a personal blog. "Why not just keep a journal? Why publish it for others to read?"
A legitimate question. And one I don’t really have the answer to. There’s a guy out there that I know of who just started a blog, but who seems a tad uncomfortable with it. There’s always the self-deprecating joke laced into his commentary about having a personal site, blog and forum. It’s true, blogging. . . putting your inane thoughts out there for the world . . .can feel like a supremely self-obsessed, arrogant, and vainglorious act. I mean, what makes us so special?
Nothing really. . . And that’s perhaps the point.
First, I’ve found that blogging is often a humbling experience as well as a self-aggrandizing one. I get the occasional e-mail from people who have read my blog. These people are mostly very supportive, letting me know that I am not alone in the thoughts and feelings I’ve expressed here. Some people bring up a point I had not thought of, and open up a dialogue that can change my perspective-- or solidify it, as the case may be.
And secondly, while I think that most serious personal bloggers wouldn’t mind being a professional writer or columnist, there’s something about the fact that these people-- even the most talented of them-- are NOT necessarily professional writers. I admire and continue to read the professional writer for the depth of research they exhibit, the focus they can maintain, and the reach with which they can canvass a subject.
But bloggers. . . Bloggers are the journeymen of the Internet. They are people with jobs in cubicles, kids at home, spare time projects, family therapy sessions, and weekend partying to do. They have random thoughts and things to say as they interact with their world, and they want to share them in some form-- because they are real people, too. It seems to be a way of asserting yourself in an increasingly random and anonymous world. A world where, when anyone can be a celebrity, we have to find other ways to discover what's interesting about ourselves.
And yes, the vast majority of bloggers write crap. But many, many of the good journeymen bloggers find new and incredible ways of exhibiting their world. The good stuff tends to find an audience. The bad stuff stays in the confines of their xanga friends, thank god.
But why publish it? I don’t know. An intense exhibitionist drive? A feeling of conceit that what you have to say actually matters? A way of convincing yourself that it actually matters? I suppose the reasons for that could be as varied as the number of bloggers out there.
It does beg the question, though. . . In this world of reality tv, paparazzi, and Inside Edition, why do we feel like nothing is suppose to go unexpressed? Unrecorded? Like nothing is really real until it has been launched out there for the world to see-- even if they don’t want to see it?
This is the question I oftentimes struggle with. I’ve been spending a lot of time recently examining how I can get an even more authentic voice in my blogging, find a better focus, get even deeper and more compelling-- for myself, not for my readers. Much of my life is an open book. Ask me a question and you’ll get as honest an answer as I can give you. (I’ve never really believed in the ‘right answer’ just the honest one).
If you look back to my entries about 2-3 years ago, you’ll find a lot of very vague discussion about the relationship I was in at the time. That’s because I found that when I said what was really on my mind, in full and open prose, I had people in my life reading the blog and having an opinion about my relationship. Opinions they have a right to, sure, but opinions I nonetheless didn’t ask for. After it was all over and past, I came to the conclusion that I have to evaluate, situation by situation, which intimate things should stay intimate with no one else able to give their two cents. That was certainly one of them.
Probably the one thing I crave more than self-expression in my life is intimacy. I tend to guard it fiercely when I get it-- which is rare. So, I guess the ultimate challenge for a blogger is figuring out which things are most real when they are shared with the world, and which things are most real when shared with only a few rare people.
But that’s a whole ‘nuther post.
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9:57 am - I wonder. . .
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| Wednesday, May 25th, 2005
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3:29 am - And so it begins. . .
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. . .my annual insomniac attack commencing with the rise in temperatures. My summer sleep patterns always get all screwed up because I can't sleep in the heat. And I do so love to sleep. I've already done all of my tricks to pass the time: read, tv, wander the house, masturbate (my libido also tends to soar with the temperatures-- an unfortunate situation when one is single). . . I would have done some eating, too, but I'm trying to break the night eating habit. So now, when I feel the urge to eat at night, I have to blog. I'm trying to replace one habit with a new one.
So. . . expect several 3:29 a.m. blog entries over the next several months. Joy.
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| Tuesday, May 24th, 2005
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9:58 pm - The positives and negatives of a day
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So, yeah. . .I officially turned down a job offer today. But not for the reasons I'm often lamenting here in this whine-wallowing blog.
The job was teaching part-time drama at Mt. Whitney High School. It's a job I've done before and certainly have the skills and wherewithall to do now. However, despite my latent sense of guilt for not having a very steady paycheck, I couldn't bring myself to take it. Not only for the very practical reasons that my mother's needs next fall are unknown, I'm slated to direct two shows at the Ice House and upon taking the job would then have to teach AND direct FOUR shows which would kill me.
I also turned it down because, when it comes down to it, I'm not ready to go back into the classroom. Not like this.
Mom and I had a round of discussions about both of us setting some goals, making some changes, getting things going again. We've decided that she'll take a watercolor class next fall and I'll get my ass into a creative writing class with the MFA program at Fresno State. At least get started on it, feel like I'm moving forward with what was the original plan.
When trying on the idea of taking the Mt. Whitney job, it felt so . . . . hopeless. Emotionally nihilistic, really. Like I was going backwards, again. Settling for teaching because it is there and readily available-- an easy, yet stagnant paycheck. I've decided that if I take another high school teaching position, it will be in a different community, a different city, a different region. If I'm going back to the safety of that, I'd better be moving to something different in my personal life. It wouldn't be that way here. I'd wind up teaching it for another five years, never moving, feeling stuck and as though nothing will ever change.
I feel that often enough as it is. I don't need to reinforce it.
No, this summer I'll get together my portfolio for the MFA program and start there. Which is an inherently hopeful thought to me.
In the meantime, my mother wants to reopen discussions about putting her in a home so that I can move, go wherever I want to go and start over. The moving and starting over is obviously appealing to me. But I cannot yet fathom a world where I would be okay with putting her in a skilled nursing facility so I can do it. I asked her today, "Do you know what kind of person that would make me if I did that?" Not the kind of person I can handle being right now.
What really frightens me, though, is that I can fathom a world-- near or far as it may be-- where the NEED for that to happen could override my feelings of guilt and make it happen. Six months ago, I thought that time could never, ever come. Today, I know that that time is not here and I don't want that time to come, but I can see that someday I may be in such a state that I need it to happen and my mother would have to sacrifice what's left of her life so that I can have mine.
That just doesn't seem right.
My positive discovery for the day is this (and I'll leave this entry on this note): I feel like an incredibly powerful force when I'm out for a walk. During no other time of the day do I feel so completely alive in my skin, full of life and skill and ability and personality as I do when I'm out for a walk. I need to do it more.
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| Saturday, May 21st, 2005
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7:16 pm - pins and needles
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As I wrote in The Mom Blog, we finally finished her 6 week round of anti-biotic infusions and treatments. They've really been hard on her physically and on us emotionally. They threw everything around here out of whack. It was impossible to stick to a schedule and since she began getting sick on the IV at around week two, we've had four weeks of her increasing weakness and dependency and four weeks of my playing waitress and nurse. It's been pretty hard. It wasn't has hard as when she first came home, but it was pretty close.
I sort of feel pricked all over by pins and needles now. Like I just want three or four days where I'm not asked to do anything for anyone. Where I can turn off the phone and the tv and, yes. . .the computer and just sit and listen to the silence, uninterrupted, for a while and not be jolted out of my thoughts by a half completed sentence-- in a voice a cross between a whine and a whimper-- beginning, "Heather, I. . . ." and then trails off without any indication of what I'm to do until I come in and assess the situation. That's how weak she got.
And while, thank god, she's still better than she was, the cure in this case was slightly worse than the disease. And this time last year, my brother was relieving me for a full day a week and my aunt and uncle came in more often. These days, aside from rehearsal, I take a patchwork of "time off" that is usually piggybacked on top of errands to drug stores and for medical supplies. These times last for a few hours and rarely involve me sitting still and silent for more than a few minutes at a time. I want to see and talk to my friends, after all.
The pressure isn't bad, certainly. Just slow and steady.
And, I've had two job offers recently that I haven't been able to take because they'd just be too involved and have too much stress and awkward hours that wouldn't work with my mother's needs.
Yesterday, I began thinking about it (due to a convergence of different conversations), and I actually made myself nauseated-- thinking about how long this could go on and how many things I'll watch pass my way and keep going. I've never made myself nauseated by thinking about something before. I think my anxiety may be building up about this and I need to learn something to do with it. Some days I'm very at peace with everything. Other days. . . I feel like I'll never have my own life again. There's rarely an in-between.
And then I think about how I wasted the life of my own I had. . . tossed it aside out of fear and pressure and security. . . oh. . this road of thinking could go on and on and its not a road I should travel tonight.
Anyway. . . I don't mean for this to sound as bleak as it is coming across. I don't think I feel that downtrodden. I know what my blessings are, too. I guess right now I feel very alone in caring for mom. And I can't really see an end to this in sight. Something has to be figured out. I have to figure out something. Soon.
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| Monday, May 16th, 2005
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10:12 pm - Bush sighting
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This is how engrained in my DNA being on call for my mother is:
Just a few moments ago, I was sitting on the "seat" and doing my nightly business. Halfway through the steady urine stream making its way out of my body, I hear my mother FA-REAKING out in the other room, but not articulating much.
Stopping mid-stream, I pull up my Victoria's Secrets and jeans as far as I can while rushing into her room, wondering over the 1.4. seconds it takes me to get there what on earth could be wrong with the IV infusion I just set up.
Standing at her bed with my drawers half around my butt, I see her frantically patting her covers. She then turns to me and shouts, "I CAN'T FIND THE REMOTE AND I'M MISSING CSI: MIAMI!!!"
*blink*
*sigh*
I walk blankly to the TV and turn the satellite channel to 384. "Thank you, sweetheart," she says calmly.
I stand in front of the tv and say, "If anyone ever says I wasn't fully dedicated to you as a daughter, I want you to tell them about the time I rushed into your room with my bush half exposed just to make sure you got your David Caruso fix."
Then I went back and finished my pee.
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| Friday, May 13th, 2005
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9:24 pm - Not a whole hell of a lot. . .
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. . . going on.
I mean, there is a lot going on. It's been a rather busy and trying week, really. But I figured out, and expressed to mom, that the trials of everything lately seem to have more to do with the fact that we don't seem to have a rhythm to our days lately.
Since she got out of the hospital last time and on her latest treatments, we've just been OFF. No sense of time, no sense of self, no real presence. There's no rhythm to her day nor mine. We both seem irked by the inturruptions and regular demands of the day. She's sick and sick of being sick. I feel like things just stretch interminably.
So, yesterday we committed to getting the rhythm back. Her getting up at a certain time, me maintianing organization and function around here. Both of us asking just a little bit more of ourselves so that our lives feel back in the balance, productive and forward moving.
A lot of that has everything to do with taking back some control over our lives and decisions we've yielded to others. We are so acutely aware of everything that we can't control in this life and world, that we've forgotten for the last few weeks to tend to the things we can control. Ourselves.
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| Sunday, May 8th, 2005
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11:47 pm - Underappreciated Susan
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Yesterday, while lunching downtown, I spied a familiar form walking down Main Street in my direction. After making a mental note of her beautiful hair, I recognized her as Susan, a friend from high school.
Now, at this point, most of you dear readers may have visions of my delight at such a realizations and the subsequent squeal and hug fest that should follow.
But no. My initial reaction when seeing ANYONE from high school in this town is one of complete and utter avoidance. Thankfully, most people from high school don't recognize me at all. And I don't know why I avoid them. It's not like my life is utter failure. It is just different. And I have many things I've accomplished and continue to pursue. And, mostly, I like the person I am today. So there's really no reason to avoid it. I think I just avoid anything reminding me of high school, really.
However, as soon as Susan had passed me by a block or so, I thought to myself, "Awww man. .. I really liked Susan. She was cool. I would actually like to know what she's up to these days." And then disappointment ensued.
You see, Susan was really a rare and underappreciated friend in high school. I really know very little of what her life was like during that time. I know it was different from mine. But I always remember her as being positive and insightful and even wise in her own way. She was very authentic, even then. I think I sort of envied her that. She was fun to talk to, always. And good at listening. Accepting. Talented, although I really can't remember at what.
Looking back, it is amazing how she really did influence me. I was very often in between various worlds as a high schooler. My friends like Susan were alternative leaning, liberal, as Berkeley as you could be in Visalia at that time. Smart. Funny. Thoughtful. Stirred the shit in the school newspaper types. Then I had friends who were choir presidents and head cheerleaders. I never completely fit with any of those groups, but could mold myself to "pass" in each one.
But Susan challenged me. Talked about things without bitterness and anger. I always felt better after having lunch with Susan (although not so much with our mutual friend, Jennifer). And I loved having classes with her. She really was a bright spot for me during those years full of illness and insecurity.
So, I was glad that I did catch up with her a shop a few blocks down. I'm glad she's doing well. And even if she doesn't feel it, she still has that same warmth and authenticity about her. That was lovely to see and feel.
*waves to Susan* if she comes in and reads this. E-mail me. Check in from time to time. :-)
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| Thursday, May 5th, 2005
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11:25 pm - Seen today. . .
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Apparently "cheaper than dirt" doesn't have much meaning here.
They may be 'cutier', honey, but they sure aren't smarter, are they?
(and yes, this car was ahead of me at the light and I actually had the wherewithall to whip out the camera).
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