Awkwardly Social

Last weekend, my mom met Seth for the first time.  I’m happy to report that everyone seemed like they were ok with everyone else.  My mom called Seth a Jewish version of one of her closet friends and I relayed that to Seth, to which he said, “So, she thinks I’m Jewey?”  And I laughed.  Then he said, “Like really Jewy?  Is it my nose?”  And I laughed and told him while it might sound like some kind of insult, it most assuredly is not.  My mom loves Jewish people!  Some of her best friends are Jewish!  (I’m still chuckling.)

There is a semi large amount of stress going on in my life right now, partly because last weekend was spent almost completely filled with anxiety about the big weekend meet-up of my mother and the love of my life, giving me no time to recharge my batteries for the battles of the weekday.  I find I really need a good 48 hours of being slack-jawed and semi-comatose while someone waits on me hand and foot so I can pull myself together and be strong-jawed and conscious for the week.  What continually troubles me is that my best self is mostly given to people other than my partner.  It upsets me that I can’t be happy fun time Tamara with the person who appreciates her the most.  How can long I expect someone to put up with the Terry Schiavo version of myself? (Especially since we all know what happened to Terry in the end. He straight up pulled the plug!)

It’s not all bad, I’m just feeling sorry for myself.  And nothing makes me feel more like a loser than knowing I’m just feeling sorry for myself but can’t pull it together and get over it.

My eyeballs hurt from crying, or maybe it’s from wearing contacts for the first time in a week.  Or maybe it’s from wearing eye shadow, or going to the mall.  Maybe they just hurt.

I think I’ll go to bed now and rest them.  I hear rest heals things.

Tara made me dinner tonight. There isn’t much that’s better than having a friend take care of you when you feel a little low.  It helps that she’s a good cook with a well stocked liquor cabinet.

I almost smoked a cigarette tonight, but Tara didn’t have any so I got to save 2 years of smoke free living from oblivion.

It’s been a rough weekend.  The only way out is through.

I’m not sure if the Christmas music is making me happier or just more depressed. I’m going to miss Christmas with my family again, which on one hand, no sitting through a weird Christmas church service with kids I don’t know butchering the birth story, on the other hand, no Swedish meatballs or Chicken and Dumplings and seeing my nieces open presents, or just seeing them period.

It doesn’t help that Louie is Jewish so he doesn’t get excited about getting a tree or baking cookies or singing Christmas carols.  While he’s been off at a wine tasting, I’ve been hanging lights and generally making it look like a one armed Christmas elf was feeling drunk with the Christmas spirit and took matters into his own hands.

We have a holiday party to go to tomorrow, so maybe that will cheer me up. If not, there’s always the old stand-by’s, inappropriate mid-day drinking and bing eating.

My friends are moving away.  My friends are moving, and it isn’t fair.  My friends are moving and I should have seen it coming.  I should have stored all of our friendship up and kept it close and tight and never let them see how much I need them, because when you least expect it, when you’re comfortable that if you need a moment with them, they’re going to be gone.

I just spent the evening with my friends.  My fine Canadian friends.  My friends that are moving in a week.

I don’t know if you have any Canadian friends, but you should.  I recommend them.  There’s something about our neighbors to the North that breeds the best kind of friend, the kind that has eggs in the fridge and a story about a moose.  Or a bear.  There’s always a story about a bear.  These friends even have a story about trudging through the wetlands wearing only a mosquito net and carrying a kayak.  If you don’t have a Canadian friend, you are missing out.  If you are Canadian, you are getting two of the best back.  I hate you for that a little.

The one little thing I’m holding on to, is the fact that their son is an American.  He was born here.  They have a little American baby that they’re bringing back with them, to remind them that we aren’t all so bad down here. We have some redeeming qualities.

I’m going to miss them like crazy.

I was getting ready to crow about what an awesome weekend I made for myself - equal parts getting shit done (oh man, you should see how clean the bathroom is!), taking time for myself (The Artist’s Way is going to be my bitch with the help of Anne Lamott’s Bird by Bird) and Civilization III (I had to limit myself to three songs on the iTunes and then back to the To-Do list) - and then my dumb car went and busted something so now it’s pouring oil out everywhere.  I think it’s a little embarassed, like it started its period and no one was there to tell it that tampons are way better than pads (my mom was out of town the weekend I got my period and my sister made me go into the Circle K and buy pads because she didn’t think I could handle the Super Plus Extra Big Ass Mom Tampons that my mom had in her cupboard… ah, humiliation).

Anyway, it was a good weekend until I realized my car had sprung a leak.  I fretted a bit.  I grumped a bit.  I drank a bit.  And now I feel like I can handle whatever the diagnosis is, that I will meet this next difficulty with the grace of a much younger woman, with tears and chocolate.  (That might be the liquor talking.)

I made a delicious lasagna from the Ina Garten book and we have leftovers.  Nothing makes you feel like you’re being frugal quite like eating leftovers.

I hope the rest of the week is better.

So remember when I said I wanted an animal to live in my apartment?  And then I talked about a rabbit or a fish or a bird or a mouse?  Well… I was talking to Louie the other night and I told him what I really wanted was a cat.  But since we both happen to be allergic to cats, I guess I want a dog.  Louie gave me specific reasons why he didn’t want a dog.  Reasons that were so specific I guessed that he just in general never ever wanted a dog.  Because if you tell me that a dog needs a yard and should live outside while we live (probably forever) in an apartment without a yard and no real way to house a dog outside, I’m going to guess that you just actually never want a dog.  Ever.  Which, I guess is what happens when you’re used to not having to pick up feces two to seventeen times a day.

I bullied him into considering a dog in 4 to 6 months.  But as I’ve been thinking about it, I don’t really want a dog.  I want a cat.  I love cats.  Cats purr.  Cats bury their poo.  Cats sit on the couch and stare at you without requiring you to do anything for them. Dogs drool and lick you and try to hump your leg and bark and… well you get the point.  I’m cat sitting right now.  I walked into Tars apartment to feed her two adorable kittens and in order to keep one of them from rushing out the door I scooped her up and she immediately started purring.  I mean!  Come ON!  How awesome is that?  She just wanted to say, “Hey, I wasn’t trying to escape I was just wanting you to pick me up so I could purr for you!”  She was lying but would a dog do that?  No.  A dog would just wiggle around wagging its dumb tail waiting for you to put it down so it could drool and piddle by your feet in an act of excitement.

It’s been a rough week for me.  I got hit with a wave of brain chemicals that have quite literally made me feel like I’m being held down with a big pillow of sad.  So big, this sad pillow, that I haven’t been running.  Yeah.  I know, if I go running the sad pillow will lift.  You without this disease will just never understand that we know that is absolutely true, but we will be so trapped we just can’t put on our running shoes and three bras and charge our iPods and wait at stop lights and… it’s all too overwhelming.  Last night as I drank the glass of wine Tars had left for me with a sign that said, “DRINK ME, TAMS!” I realized that no, I absolutely don’t want a dog at the moment.  I can barely handle getting into the shower in the morning, the last thing I need is a drooly, barky, shitty beast that requires me to take care of it because Louie has promised me it will be entirely my responsibility.  I just want a cat.  A cat, however, is entirely outside of the realm of possibility.  So, the sad pillow crushes down a little farther and I try to visualize the tying of my running shoes, the charging of my iPod, the dressing of myself in three sports bras.  I’ve heard that visualizing can help, but all I can see is a little cat curled up on the couch.  Purring.

My sale turkey lunch meat kind of smelled and tasted like garbage.  My outline continues to not be a complete outline.  My car doesn’t really want much more out of this life and is thinking about retiring to Palm Springs.  I think I missed some sort of life looking glass that I could have fallen through and taken a much easier and more fruitful path.  A path that had “this or that, either one is good” decisions not, “there is no answer and you’ll choose wrong anyway” decisions.

I kind of hate it here right now.  I sort of want to tell LA to go fuck itself.  It’s not like it’s going anywhere.  It’ll forget all this even happened in the morning, it’s so drunk and stoned and coked up all at once at the moment.  LA is totally River Phoenix outside of The Viper Room, except LA doesn’t die at the end of all of this.  LA gets up and walks across the street and starts hitting on a 19 year old who will possibly go down on it if given the right combination of booze and finger banging.  So listen, LA, I don’t need this right now, you fucking whore, let’s act like adults and get through this without any screaming or tears or mention of your stupid penis, ok?

GAH.

I’m not sure if it’s the bleeding of both money and actual blood or if it’s the current life cycle I’m in but I’m barely holding it together today.

Send me your good thoughts, people.

[sigh]

I’m sad today. Not super sad, just sort of sad. Super sad leaves me crying into my pillow. Sort of sad makes me go to bed early and hit snooze for two hours, except that I can’t hit snooze for 2 hours anymore, because skipping work isn’t like skipping class. I have to go to work. Class was optional. I think I’m having a bit of post-grad school blues. How lame.