OH MY GODRIC I JUST REALISED THAT TOMORROW IS MY BLOGIVERSARY

That's all.

Silence

Dear world, at large. Or at small. Especially at small, really. You are more personable and less scary to talk to. Although I also enjoy talking to nameless, faceless entities. It can be very liberating. And I'm all about liberation. And the connotations that arrive with it. Freedom. Generosity. Things we all need. Macro or micro.

I spend so much time figuring out who I'm talking to. Reaching out into the unknown. seeking diversions and new reasons to be. Mostly to avoid speaking to myself. Or saying anything important whilst I'm within hearing range.
So I've moved someplace quiet.
Lets make it an undisclosed location.
So's I can be mysterious. Fun.

It's quiet and small. And there's no Internet. And no phone line.
Which I think worries some people. But I'm further away from the edge than I have been in a while. I wake up to the sun coming through the window, I get up and make my bed. It doesn't sound it, but it's a big deal. Really.
I'm reading, and writing things that are just for me, and painting things that are for something secret that i can't talk about yet in case everything falls through.
My new jobs are beautiful. I love helping people. I think I'm doing something good here.
It's a nice change, from feeling like a complete failure. And wanting to burn my life down.

So, that's all. I'm not really in a writerly mood. But I thought I'd make use of being here, and give some attention to my poor neglected little blog. And let it know that it's still loved.
From now on i guess I'll only be blogging on days when it's not raining or too cold, and I can use the wifi in the park. Or whenever I'm feeling brave enough to type incredibly personal things in the middle of the library.

Clearing out my head, to make room for the week.

So here's the problem (or a problem, one of many really, since I'm being honest)
I feel stupid. I feel ridiculous.
I feel incredibly young and foolish and gullible, and at the same time, far too old to be handling all of this so badly.
I feel stupid.
Every time I slip up and think of something that makes me think of you (which by the way, is just about anything), every morning that I wake up from dreams of you (about two - three times per week, in case anyone was wondering), I feel stupid.
I feel humiliated.
When I breathe in, and my chest hurts, when I am close to tears, I feel ashamed.
I should be okay by now. I should be better. I should have reduced you to a her, she, or they.
Or a "nobody, just this girl I knew once, for a while, sort of."

But anyway, life goes on. And I'm trying to go with it.
I have a job interview in the morning- for a decent place.
I'm going to see Amanda Palmer on Friday, with my best Fran-friend, and hear Neil Gaiman speak on Saturday.
There's an engagement party the week after that, and I think I'm meant to make a toast maybe.
I don't know how to make toasts.
I'm trying to co-operate with Life, and not resist too much.
Or sleep too much.
Or spend too much time in the bath, staring at my knees.
I think it would be very hard to drown in the bath. I tried it once, not properly, just to see.
An experiment.
I sunk under, filled my nose with water, and came up spluttering.
Not how I thought it would be.
I thought it might be peaceful, maybe.

I played music yesterday, for the first time in two years.
I played Brahms, and Bach, and Beethoven, and Gluck, and Vivaldi.
Gluck is my favourite, even though he has the least beautiful name.

A Sweet Little Postscript

On a more positive note, two of my best friends got engaged today.
They're childhood sweethearts and each other's best friend.
They make me believe in happy endings; something to be grateful for.
(Also I get to be her maid of honour, which is exciting, and gratifying, and made me feel loved)
Thats all folks... thank you and goodnight.

Post Valentines Musings

I read once, that everyone wants to think that their love/ grief/ loss, is unlike any that has been before.
That they are the first to think their thoughts, to walk the exact route across this planet.
That they are new, raw, unmatched.
That if only others could see inside their heads, they would be astounded and overcome.

And before all of this, I thought that it might be true.
It seemed likely enough. Forgivable.
And so, I was ready to experience an ugly, selfish kind of pain. To pull within myself and peer out at the world scornfully.
To watch others, and think that they were only happy because they were somehow, emotionally..less. Not so finely wired.

Instead I find myself wanting to know that whatever it is that I'm feeling is unimportant. I want to know that the middle aged woman next door, despite her dull exterior, has experienced far more, has felt in ways that I'm not ready for.
That the man walking down the street, tobacco stained hands carrying flowers, is bringing them home to his companion of many happy, and some hard, years.
I want to know that if others could hear my thoughts they'd laugh, in that way that adults have, behind their hands.
I want to be patted on the head, called "child", reassured that the best, and the worst is yet to come.

Requiem

I haven't cried since we said goodbye. Not one tear.
I haven't moped around in my pajamas. I haven't consumed vast amounts of sugar.
I haven't listened to whiny rock, ooh baby's, because I'm stronger's or lost without you's.
I didn't throw out any of the stuff you gave me, I like it, you have good taste. Nor did I stow it away in a shoe box, between layers of tissue paper, sealed with kisses.
I haven't pined, or sighed, or gazed out the window with wistful eyes.
I am thinner, but I'm pretty sure that it's because I refused to eat the airport food.
I've always been pale.
I don't think I've been irreparably damaged.
And I'm fairly certain that after an appropriate amount of time, I will fall in love again.
Furthermore I will be entirely sure that I've really never felt this way before/ everything was worth it to get to this point/ that my life will never be the same.
So it goes.

However, given a choice, I would gladly be put onto ice, left undisturbed for a few weeks. Months.
Years.

Nothing, I'm fine.

I keep sitting down, typing out the same sentence five times, changing the order in which the words march (or should I say fall in?) behind each other, rephrasing and rehashing. Pressing delete, staring at the screen, giving up.
I'm about to do it again..
[Delete]
[Sigh]
[Walk away]
A tangle of half thoughts lies to the left side of my brain, a muddle of syntax to my right, and try as I might I cannot make them match up.
There is an unwanted visitor inside my head, a great white tumor. Growing, pushing, pulsing, around corners and into cavities, all my spaces, down into the back of my throat.
I can't see around it, or hear through one ear, and my voice comes out so small.
This makes writing difficult.
The only way to do it, is fast.
Not looking at the screen, ignoring proper form and grammar, hitting "send" aggressively.
With a pen, words too small to read in the morning.
Lulling myself to sleep, with the scritch-scritch of metal transmitting ink to paper.
Because I'm more awake than I should be, and you're not there to talk to anymore.
I have to have something for company. If only a beat up old exercise book, dog eared and faded red around the edges.
And a very small cat. I mustn't forget our (my?.. the? I don't know which I'm meant to say) cat.
When he purrs, I remember that you cared for me once.