The caged bird is being a drama queen

Being happy in your present circumstance I firmly believe is an act of will. I do not believe it to be a trait innate to man. We would have never created the things we have were we innately content. Since walking Baloo this morning, wispy clouds of panic, dread, sadness, and despair have started to form around my thoughts. I will drop Ashley off and then I will be alone. Yesterday it was 'yay!' Today I will miss her. I'm sure I will be fine but I wish my Soul Twin were in town so I could go visit her for the New Year or at least talk to her. If I were in Tennessee right now, I am sure I would be craving space, craving my friends, wishing I were somewhere I wouldn't have to make empty promises to visit more often, feeling bad for knowing I don't even make it to the places I actually want to go, and wondering how will I ever be content when I never set a bar I can reach. I am berating myself for the plans I didn't make for this time off and sad because I don't even know what those plans would be.

The caged bird sings because it has boundaries. Because it already knows everything it ever needs to know about life. No one will move their cheese or send them off to make their own way in the world. They can be at peace in their circumstance because they have no capacity to change it. There is a certain freedom in that. There is no 'out there', no opportunity or disappointment over the hill. There is no feeling, 'if only I left the cage every now and again.' It's why they swaddle infants, why the latest craze in curbing dog anxiety is a compression jacket (true story-it's called a thunder jacket). If my boss had been at work today, I would have gone there and until I succumbed to a late afternoon nap, there was a chance I might go anyway just because I really didn't otherwise know what to do with myself. I've let work become a cage. Not unlike a crate for dogs or cage for birds, it's become a refuge. An unsatisfying refuge but a refuge. Something I can be sure of, even if I'm sure it's going to suck. Though it would perhaps have better connotation if I referred to it as swaddling instead of a cage, I think we all seek something, marriage, career, hobbies to provide us a sense of stability in an otherwise forward marching always changing existence.

The poem that inspired the title of this post and the Maya Angelou autobiography bearing the same name evokes images of slavery, being bound and oppressed.

I know why the caged bird sings, ah me,
When his wing is bruised and his bosom sore,
When he beats his bars and would be free;
It is not a carol of joy or glee,
But a prayer that he sends from his heart's deep core,
But a plea, that upward to Heaven he flings –
I know why the caged bird sings.

Paul Laurence Dunbar

What can I say of a time I didn't live? What I do know, unbound with nothing but opportunity before me is that I'm shopping for cages.

WWBD

It seems to be a law in my universe that I must have an object of fixation, something or someone to place at the center of my world to be my point of reference and emotional ground. Needing or seeking this is probably worthy of it's own exploratory post but I am convinced most people have someone or something like this in their lives. Parent, spouse, celebrity, friend, artist, deity, we want to identify with something beyond ourselves.

For the last 6 months or so, that point of reference, that object of fixation has been my boss. I want his mindset. I want his focus. I want his zest for living. I want to emulate what I understand to be his life. I don't understand how he does it. I don't even really understand who he is. It matters to me what he thinks of me. If I know he is going to be in the office, I want to be there. I enjoy his company and watching his frenetic caffeine fueled dispatching of his to do list. I am surprised by the things that get to him. I am amused and obsessed with how he never heats his leftovers, how he recycles and doesn't like to unnecessarily print out things, how he will spend 2 hours riding back and forth on the train to come to work for 3 hours, how undisciplined he is about some things and how disciplined he is about others, how smart he is. He's a walking contradiction with such a fascinating decision flow chart that I could set up shop in his life and simply watch it unfold. I find myself wishing I had a cool spouse that he liked so we could be a part of the fold outside of work. To me right now, he is the world's most interesting man.

I tend to become fixated with people I don't understand. I want to understand what fuels his life because he seems to have something I don't. Even from afar his life seems chaotic and at times, tragic. He's the kind of person who goes on vacation for a week during a month when he has so much work travel planned, he won't be in the office more than 3 days. My head would literally cave in and I'm not even married with kids like he is. There is an animal-like mystery to him. I know Baloo will come to me and will solicit belly rubs and expects me to attend to her needs but I really don't know how she feels about me. I don't even know her capacity to feel or how it does or does not motivate her decision making. It's something I infer. I feel exactly the same way about my boss. When he says 'good job' I'm over the moon for days. That's what fuels my engine and a part of me feels weak because I can't self-generate that feeling, it has to come from someone else. Makes my life harder than it needs to be I think because I outsource a part of my self esteem/worth which puts me at the mercy of things I can't control.

Ironically I go to great lengths to project the opposite. I'll be damned if I let you know you matter to me at all when I care that much about what you think. Don't get me wrong, there are countless people who I truly and honestly do not care two shits how they feel about anything at all and especially not how they feel about me. Countless. But my boss is not one of them. I do care and I do build my work world around him and I do invoke him as a reference point in my personal life as I try to be a more interesting person by doing more and thinking less. In a phrase I think he personifies the adage, 'perfect is the enemy of the good.' I am never going to be him and I value myself enough that I don't want to be him but like all the important people in my life, I will try from time to time to channel him; WWBD (What Would Boss Do). I am glad we had the opportunity to work together, to know one another, and for what I gained personally and professionally from knowing him.

Sister

Oh my God, I am so stressed! Why did I agree to this? My sister, who despite everything that makes her a hard roommate is the coolest girl I know said this to me tonight as she prepared for her trip to Memphis. She's been snapping at me all evening and it's cracking me up. She's going on this trip for me, instead of me and that is a great gift. We cut up her shitty 15% interest credit card tonight and she texted me on the way home from work to tell me she was picking up sushi to ask if I wanted anything. If she were neater and less destructive, she would be a perfect roommate. Those are big ifs but when it comes right down to it, she makes me laugh, introduces me to things I would never seek on my own, and somewhere deep down in her chameleon soul, she even likes me. I like her too though she insisted recently it wasn't important that she likes me since she has to love me. Whatever dude.

Some alibis and some groundwork

Going back to yesterday's post I have a few postscripts to apply. I am a little like God in that I am always the same; whenever someone I haven't seen in a while asks what I've been up to, the answer is always the same. I've been working, every few years or so, I've been moving, and I still have Baloo. There are no significant others or milestones like anniversaries, first days of school, pregnancy, promotions. I just am. On any given day I may have had a strange encounter with an out and about homeless person or old man on the prowl but it's always 65 and partly sunny in Ava land otherwise. Many of my friends are moving forward, they have started families or had them when we met, and they are absorbed in that life and frame of reference for everything they do. A frame of reference I can empathize but ultimately can not relate with. Their closest friends are now people they can share their current life experiences with. Someone who probably has extra diaper wipes, who can relate to the trials and tribulations of marriage and parenthood. I know I'm not that friend for you and you aren't the friend for me who is available to talk every day about nothing at all or who even routinely picks up when I call. That's just not where life is at for you right now. Best we can do is keep our contact warm, see if we weather the transition, and wish eachother the company kindred spirits for where we are at right now.

Also, I'm crabby and I know I'm crabby. I feel I am under siege. Hopefully I will find a way to reset and recharge because I fear I will make decisions, big decisions that are more of a reflection of my need to take a break than they are sound career choices.

I was reading my old blog which because Apple sucks, I can not archive here. I was far more honest there. Perhaps because only Teresa was reading so I felt l was writing letters to an old friend. I don't know if it's nostalgia, narcissm..I just kind of missed those days. 2011 assessment/plans coming soon. It's been real Philly but the countdown begins.

Home Alone

It's going to be great. I will have the house to myself, I will clean things and they will remain that way until I render them dirty. I will control the remote.

I won't know what to do with myself.

But I'd like to try.

I am sending my sister to Memphis in lieu of yours truly. We talked about it on the drive down for Christmas. I really don't want to go. I really don't want to go anywhere. I am feeling very spoiled and very single. I am starting to value the single friend over other friends because we have more time to be a part of eachother's lives. Available to one another. We aren't just footnotes appended to husbands and kids who take precedence. And they should take precedence, but I shouldn't feel bad if I don't want to figure out a way to shoehorn into that. If I don't want to start a conversation because you never really have to the time to finish one. That's what life is for 90 percent of the people I know and I just realized there is a flip side to my gratitude for their efforts to include a relationship with me into an already full dance card of relationships. I want to stop feeling bad because as the single one, I don't visit as often as my relationship status implies I should be able to. I haven't taken a vacation since 2001 and as lovely as it always is to see the people I love and as deeply as I am truly touched to be considered a part of the family, I came for you and you are not available to me. Worse, I am yet another person vying for your attention and time and it's hard to be in the middle of a story or discussion that is interrupted with a phone call, a cry, a tug on the sleeve, a sidebar with the spouse. It's hard not to just drop it. Drop it until the kids start school or the husband is out of town, just push pause on the participation grade in our friendship until you need me again. Better to acknowledge and live that I think maybe than try to make something fit where there is no room right now.

Wasn't thinking this post was going to turn into the Spinster manifesto but I guess that's where I'm coming from tonight.

Sleeping with the light on

When things in my life start to pick up downhill momentum, I start falling asleep with the light on. I'm so overwhelmed I can't fully commit to rest by turning the light off. So I lie to myself as I yield for 'just a few minutes' to my heavy eyes, the light my insurance and assurance I have not given up for the night. I rose this morning cotton mouthed with a headache for the 3rd night in a row, annoyed at the money I waste leaving the light on all night, mind racing and no more prepared to deal.

The printer, the sink, dad's gift, all that is left undone at work, laundry, rebate forms, virus protection for the computer, cleaning house, donating clothing, Baloo's medication, Baloo's new lumps, mom, should I return to Tennessee with her in 5 days for the first time in 8 years, why it's so hard and stressful to 'go home', what it means that I would almost rather not deal with the complication of their lives intersecting with mine, creating another set of obligations to add to the ones I already biff on a regular basis, why it makes me so sad that my boss is leaving, how disappointed I am that I've not left the east coast or visited anyone who doesn't live in New York or D.C., how bummed I am that I didn't meet a great guy here or even a great girlfriend (though I honestly have the girlfriend piece covered in spades--I've got the best out there, they just don't live here). *breath*

It's just been a month or so of losing traction and unfortunate events; personal and professional hiccups that I let snowball into the regressive sleeping with the light on phase I'm currently wading in. I hope after having this cup of weak coffee in my Winnie-the-Pooh cup life will be just a little less daunting, my headache's sharper edges will be blunted through the miracle of caffeine and Sudafed Sinus headache, and something will give way in that list above to make it easier to turn off the light at night and rest easy in the accomplishments of the day.

Well you just picked right up where we never left off

I had a completely different post in mind when I fired up this computer two Tylenol and several hours ago. A post about a guy I could see myself with in a parallel universe. It would either be the most amazing thing that ever happened for both of us or a profound disappointment. But it's not a universe I have to consider, I can just soak up how much he celebrates Ava being Ava and indulge in the occasional daydream when I feel otherwise unwanted.

But instead I'm replaying a reel from bad decision theater of a conversation I just had with a guy I haven't spoken to in 6 years, who was never a friend or a romantic interest, who I in fact found insufferable. That guy, I invited to sleep over at my house for Christmas eve. Jamie Foxx can blame it on the alcohol, I blame it on the terrible headache and the Tylenol. This is the kind of guy who reminds you of his PhD--no he's the guy who actually did mention his PhD during our conversation. He asked if I ever visited New York and when I said I did, asked why I never called when I was there. I told him I didn't have his number nor would I have thought to ask for it, so unless I was supposed to just stand in the street and scream his name, that's why he wasn't aware I was in town. He laughed. He asked about my relationship status but I don't think that's where he's going with this weirdness even though he commented that it was good news I wasn't married, engaged or otherwise attached. (By the way, who says it's good news that you are all alone?) I think he's just trying to visit Philly on the cheap and remembered I was here.

Today I will try to undo last night's mistakes and withdraw the invite. Not because I don't want him to stay. I'm very interested in the story he will bring. He is an interesting and unexpected twist in the sitcom that is my life and I want to see that story play through. It's just too much for this particular week. My house is chaos, my work is chaos, and I am tired.

This is a weird week. I just saw a man in the park wearing yellow socks and black middle aged lady pumps, sitting on the bench sipping his mountain dew. It's possible he is homeless though most have gone to ground during this cold holiday season but he looked otherwise normal until you got to his feet. This has definitely been a weird week.

Ward

Sometimes I make such bad basic decisions, I feel I should be a ward of the state or a ward of someone. Someone to tell me when to go to bed, when to get up. These basic things are sometimes so very hard. I'll be doing okay and one little thing sends me into a tail spin, like the handle falling off the bathroom sink. I can't get around it. I don't know how to fix it. I don't know how long it will take me to fix it or figure out it is beyond me. It's been that way for over a week now. I wait until 1 am to brush my teeth because I don't want to have to go in there and see the handle on the sink. It's a very stupid way of dealing with this or anything in life and it's my go to coping mechanism. At least I realize it's jacked up, right? Right?

Something new

Baloo just walked past my sister who was sitting on the floor in the hallway and into my sister's bedroom. I've never seen her walk into an empty room so we both stopped what we were doing and waited. Then we heard the unmistakable sounds of scratching bedding and went to investigate. Yep, Baloo was in Ashley's bed. We have no idea why. Ashley's bed is on the ground and has been for months since she destroyed the second air mattress but Baloo has never attempted to sleep in it. We have no idea what this means but we were amused enough to turn off the light and just see what happened. She is now softly snoring with her butt hole inches from Ashley's pillow. All we could say was "that's new."

I can do ugly all by myself

I'm not single because I have no options, I'm single because I exercise my options. It's not about settling because we all do settle, striking a balance between what we put up with to have the things we don't want to live without. It's about not feeling that I have to give a guy my number just because he asked. The things I don't have, especially THE thing, because I'm not in a relationship are wants, not needs and it passes like food cravings. Kissy face man is irritating me. Why can't that adorable guy at work just ask me out? I am so over the internet.

Moving on...

If I'm ever to write consistently again, I'm going to have to invest in some earplugs. There is no privacy in this house because of the loft style which means every activity is a group activity. If someone is watching TV, we're all at least hearing the TV. It's not an ideal situation for writing. I have something in my head and then I hear the real sad women of New Jersey, Atlanta, wherever and I'm sucked in, not because I want anything to do with the shows but because they are on and they are living breathing train wrecks. You can't not look. I have epiphanies while watching these shows because I know vapid people like those women in real life and it makes me grateful my closest friends are normal.

The door just clicked closed and I am SO grateful to be alone. Being with my sister these last six months (so much for 6 weeks) has been more good than bad. But I really miss my alone time, my deep thoughts time, my couch, my sometimes neat second bedroom. I've been thinking about my 40th birthday-I think it's close enough to begin considering. I think even the people who think I'm as awesome as they come don't really see me married. I don't see me married either. I don't see me with a significant other. I've never been that person and I don't think people really change all that much. But I do want a party that everyone feels obligated to try to come to, I want to feel loved and celebrated, and I want to dance and be merry. So this weekend I entertained the notion of throwing myself a wedding-themed birthday party for my 40th. Not a sad affair, not an event where everyone wonders aloud why I'm single. On any given day, how many of them are happy? Sometimes I wonder if couples don't look so good in public because they feel so good they aren't alone.

Anyway, I know myself well enough to know the 40th birthday bash will never happen. I will probably try to go to work if it falls on a workday or not go to work if I suspect an obligatory office acknowledgement of the day to avoid the despair of 'celebrating' my 40th with people who barely know me. It will all be too much to try to really send it up because nothing is ever enough really when you have an imagination like mine that dreams big and lives small simply to avoid mediocre.

I'm a little all over the map tonight. I feel furtive in my writing because any moment the key will turn in the lock, Baloo and Ashley will burst back on scene, and this gift is done. Already my head is heavy with fatigue but I type on because later it will be even harder. I really miss my space even though I know I will eventually miss her. I'll have to get used to living alone again and I know I will come to this space with a heavy lonely heart. Sometimes there's just no pleasing me.

Open letter vs Actual letter

Dear Kissy face man,

The camera loves you baby. Almost as much as you love yourself. What I'm wondering is why you think it interests me in the least that you are traveling to Philly and staying at the Marriott. That's why I replied with '6' when you asked me to send you a number. I'm glad you thought it was 'lol' funny but I'm for reals not giving you my number. Why you are still trying to talk to me after I made fun of your pictures is a mystery to me. A disconcerting mystery. A 'I-might-go-missing-if-I-meet-you mystery.' A 'I'm-not-sure-that's-really-you mystery.'

------
Actual letters:

To his initial 'hi' a few days ago:

Dude! What is the DEAL with that kissy face you are making? So, so un-ninja. One of the first things they teach you in ninja school.

To his 'send a number' followed by 'lol' when I sent him the number 6:

Also don't give out my number right away. Don't get me wrong, I don't like to drag things out forever online but I at least want to chat a little here. So tell you what, you really want a number, I'll give you a digit for every e-mail-two if you make me laugh or make me think. You're a great looking man so I have no doubt you don't "need" to be on here to have company. I'm pretty amazing myself so I don't need to give out my number to every guy who asks for it. But I do want to know more so...over to you my kissy face friend. (NOTE: He REALLY has to overcome that kissy face picture. It's ridiculous.)
---

Then he told me he was staying at the Marriott. What am I missing here?

Levees and Dikes

Whenever I go out of town something happens in my house, or more accurately something happens with my sister and then something happens to my house. She reflexively rebels against some rule I have with specifically her in mind (like no eating in the living room) and I return from my business trip to a red stain on my rug. She insists it was a splatter instead of a spill (like I care about the mechanics when the result is a big red juice stain) but the physics I know can't explain a large stain like that forming from a mere splatter. Telling me it was a splatter does nothing to mitigate the BIG RED STAIN on my carpet. She also broke open my ice cream-I haven't even had any of it and she violated it with her greedy manic consumptive spoon. So yes, I'm annoyed. But I'm also a little pensive. When I'm here, I'm like a levee, holding her back. Enforcing the rules through presence. She has already spilled juice on this rug before which is why we made the rule. If I let it, this can bubble up into several days of not talking to her because she possibly ruined my rug, and if I don't count all the rent she doesn't pay, I'm still down several hundred dollars in destroyed property in just under 6 months. Don't get me started on the bathroom sink handle that fell off in my hand. I have to figure out how to repair it. 2 years of living here without catastrophic failures, 6 months of Ashley and air beds perforate, shoes I've had for years are reduced to husks, faucet handles fall off, new wool rug is stained. Clothes she's had for mere months are already sporting tears. I don't know if she is in a fight club or something but I do know I can't take another broken or stained thing.

Emotional about edamame

Maybe it's been a rougher week than I think, maybe I'm starting my period soon. All I know is I ordered edamame and he didn't put the order in so all my food got cold while I waited for them and my frustration was WAY out of proportion to edamame's importance in my life. This might have been the third time I've had it ever. But I still muttered expletives as I walked home with the rest of my carry out about f-ing edamame and inept servers named Brett.

It's been a long week.

A quick postscript: I'm also thinking of defriending someone on Facebook. Actually a couple of people because they irritate me so much as people and I so despise their point of view that I find their posts angst provoking. Both are on fire for Jesus types who have taken to proselytizing and social consciousness with the same vigor and zeal they took to the clubs when that was their scene. Irritating. as. hell. Almost daily they post annoying links or comments; one to faith based websites or Fox News (really), the other posts critical social activism quotations or links which seek to make people feel like douchebags for having anything at all or Bible verses. I don't often take the bait but today I did when he expressed outrage that people came out in the 10's of thousands in Australia to see Oprah and only hundreds gathered to protest whatever the fuck is happening with that creepy Wikileaks guy.

The Wikileaks thing incenses me on a couple of levels. First is that it happened at all. That someone violated the trust placed in them and compromised confidential discussions, positions, assessments. That creepy guy can only publish what someone gives him and some ass wipe did. Anyone defending that is just not a friend of mine. I hold some of Facebook guy's secrets, should I just post them on Facebook because all of our mutual friends deserve transparency into the confidences we've shared with one another? Does your new wife need to know what you've told me about her and the girls before? I think she would say yes. I think you would say hell no. Only a profound idiot takes to the streets and tries to twist the fundamental betrayal of telling secrets and breaking trust on such a scale into something grandiose about transparency in government. Bull shit. This isn't Watergate.

So I'm torn. Do I defriend them? The part of me that wants always to be a better person tomorrow than I was today says I should ignore them but appreciate the diversity and divergence of thought they bring because it reminds me not everyone is as smart as I am. And also so I can be aware there are people who may actually think President Palin has a nice ring to it. But I find the way they use their platform so arrogant and annoying, I just don't want to see it anymore. And for those who might be inclined to suggest I just delete my account, I would be done with Facebook entirely if it weren't the best way to know what in the world my brother is up to.

Probably not fair aka this is why I'm single

I haven't joined "The Network" yet, saving that for an in-case-of-emergency-break-glass kind of day when I need a really big boost AND I'm willing to pay for a month worth of 'hey shorty, hit me up.' I did join another free site just to mix it up a little. I have less than zero expectations from this site but it's generating more traffic than the other so the entertainment factor is better for me. PG adult entertainment.

From: Dude
To: Ava
Subject: Hi

Hey,

My name is XX and I’m 28 years old. I am very to the site, and it is my goal to find some new, fascinating, fun people. I came across your profile and it seems to me that we can at least share a conversation based on some of our interests. I am a college graduate that works in (city) as a Manager; I also live in that area. I like women of all ages, races, types…so I don’t pre-judge people. I would love to hear from you soon as my interest is sparked from your profile/pics!

From: Ava
To: Dude

Hi XX,

Thanks for writing. I'm curious what interests we have in common. Are you a manager
of ninjas? That would be really cool if you were.

I am lovin the capital M manager title. I suspect he is a fake user because he refers to his college degree in his profile as the thing that helped him get his capital M manager job. Who says that?

Or this guy. 'Separated' which is a way of saying 'married' so already not really at the top of most women's list. His one picture is unclear and he's doing a crossed arms rapper pose so yet another tick in the hells no column yet he has the nerve to write this:

I cant say or not say Im atracted to you, but I enjoyed reading your profile. even that big toe story...

You sound like a bigger geek than me...oh every female I ever encountered, nicknamed me a geek as if yhey know something I dont...lol

So appreciate a response to my rapier wit and honesty is great but really not appreciated in this case. So...

Lovin' that honesty. Right back at you on the is she/isn't she attracted to me question.
I like that you made the effort to say hi anyway and at least tell me that you enjoyed
the profile. I prefer the term nerd over geek. Semantics maybe but I think nerds don't
usually get beat up in high school and geeks often do. :-)

Old

I was making one of my rare visits to Facebook to accept a friend request from a guy I haven't spoken to in years. A lifetime ago, I wondered if something would ever happen between us but we were not a good match. He's one of the people who made Steven Covey rich and would describe Amway as his business (which it isn't). Not only am I not that person but I kind of reflexively dislike people who are so I would not have been the woman who supported his dreams. I would have been the woman who made fun of them. Still there was a moment in college when if I had been anyone else, we would have at least made out. Can't tell you how many times I've spent hours in a car with a guy and nothing happens. I must give out some seriously conflicting vibes. ANYWAY, while I was on there I saw a high school reunion page. I was clicking through the photos and wow, we're those people. All the women have filled out and though they all look like themselves, we're old now. We would easily invite eye rolling and mockery from people in their 20's with our Dress Barn fashions (why oh why won't they change their name), and EasySpirit wedges. Most of the women are tagged with hyphenated names so we can remember them, the men for the most part are more lined and ever so slightly bloated versions of their yearbook pictures.

We are lucky I think that these things happen over time a bit at a time. Only if we look back can we get a sense of how long ago high school was, how much time is etched on our face and in our bodies. When Baloo was younger and we played fetch, she would run low to the ground at lightning speed, twisting her body, going all out like a catcher jumping the wall. She is still just as excited about fetch but she just doesn't run the same anymore. She sleeps more. I'm sure she still feels like herself; hates squirrels, other dogs, loves street food and affection, wiggles like a puppy, but she'll yelp if you rub her hips too hard. I think the mid 30's are the first time you start to feel and recognize age. I spent a good part of my 20's just keeping up with the other people in the room who I didn't realize at the time weren't any smarter than me, they had just been there longer. Now I'm that person. It's actually a great place to be. I am no longer impressed with the length of time someone has worked somewhere and certainly don't accept it as shorthand for competency unless we're counting not getting fired as competency.

The only area where I think this place in life works against me is in relationships. I'm far less open, and I wasn't terribly open to begin with. To be fair, a good number of my peers paired up in their 20's so the field I'm playing in is littered with more undesirable variables; exes, children, whatever has made us both resistible to the opposite sex if we have neither (exes/children). I continue to get the periodic earnest e-mail from guys 10 years younger and I adore how simply they view relationships. If I love her, it will work. It doesn't matter if I live 5 hours away, it doesn't matter if you get a warning saying your don't meet my message filters for age and distance. It's adorable and annoying because you are usually the same guy going on and on about how women say they want a nice guy and here you are, great guy getting regularly dissed by women who really don't want what they say they want. Can't think of a faster turnoff besides tragic personal grooming.

So anyway, I'm old.

Open letter; Dr. C.

Dear Dr. C (how apt),

Here's the deal. When I come in for a broken ankle, you don't write me a prescription for cough medicine. So today, when I came in for a hernia and you ordered blood work, I was already confused. When you suggested if I fasted we could also get my blood sugar, I was even more confused. I asked why you were ordering the test noting I've never had an issue in blood work or symptoms of diabetes. You said you like to get that blood work when patients are carrying "a little extra weight," because "it can creep up on you." Bitch, I will creep up on you. No immediate family history of diabetes, healthy enough to give away a kidney, the removal of which is directly related to my complaint today, and which incidentally with any risk for diabetes, would have never been approved. I'm surrounded by diabetes posters, there is an illustration of a black man with his shoes off encouraging diabetic patients to show doctors their feet which already annoyed me for its stereotypical bias, and now with absolutely no reason, complaint, or history to support it, you ordered a test and called me fat. Don't think I missed the comment when you were feeling my abdomen noting my muscle was covered in fat. I caught that too. Almost forgot your parting shot about not needing a pap smear because I was so ridiculously low risk. If you weren't so patronizing and passive aggressive I might give you props for deft ninja-like dismemberment of my self-esteem.

Why are you such a bitter hater? Just because you can be mistaken for a teenage boy? Did your boyfriend date a black girl after he broke up with you? I'm sorry about your eating disorder. Not my problem. Women should never do that to one another. Especially heinous to dispense that haterade cloaked in a white doctor's coat. You should have a cracker and check your blood sugar. So annoyed with myself that I didn't call you out on your passive aggressive shit. Next time...both barrels Dr. C. Creeping up on you with a little extra.

Mixing it up

I've been low lately. There's the in-betweens, the dwindling daylight, mercurial weather, lack of companionship, and my growing separation anxiety over having to work in an office without my boss. His presence makes it just a little bit easier to come in. And he's leaving in six months. I'm borrowing that misery well in advance and I know its dumb to do so. Work today was heavy cloud, no rain, thin grey-ish silver lining. When I got the text from a friend in town for work to grab a drink, I was finally home and really just getting into organizing my bookshelf and tempted to decline. I mean bookshelf organizing people, that's some high speed engrossing shit. But I tore myself away and I'm so so glad I did. Had a ball. Reminded me I am capable of laughter and can go to a bar with someone and have more fun than I do alone which had been my habit here after a couple of turns at going out with the girls. Not for me. Too Mutual of Omaha for my taste. I founded this friend's fan club so he gets to take most of the credit for how fun it was but it was also just great to talk to someone who understood. Who I can have a conversation with about the world and the places to go in it. This might be why a girl I know here can't not hang with her nurse friends, though she swears half the time she hates them. They can speak in shorthand about their work. I don't realize I miss that until I have it again and find it so refreshing to be understood and to be able to tell a story without having to provide all the context. In short, it was fun and I'm glad I went. It shook off the funk of the day.