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.

Sometimes I catch myself thinking I would have been better off getting accidentally knocked up and having a baby in my twenties.  Then I shudder and think about the potential fathers of these accidental would-bes and I thank the gods that I’m not dealing with that hot mess of a parenting situation.  Alcoholics, slam poets, and randoms from Amsterdam, oh my!  But babies are on my brain and they just so happen to be pressing uncomfortably in the ‘lifestyle’ and ‘fun’ sections.  And boy, am I a worrier!  I have pretty much worried the shit out of this whole babies ruin your life situation, and have come to the conclusion that be that as it may, I have a very good friend whose relationship with her son reminds me that kids can also be kick ass sidekicks, not to mention the two really good examples of how awesome my genes are when it comes to making cute babies.

Meanwhile, life keeps happening, my writing keeps being blocked and my world keeps feeling like it’s going to collapse in on itself in a gigantic black hole of missed opportunities and blown exits.

So, Valentine’s Day was spent sleeping in and ambling around trying to find a restaurant that served a full menu at 3pm.  Interspersed with comments like, “So if we have this theoretical baby, will it sit there with Lula on her bed and entertain itself jovially while I try to figure out where my pants are?”  To which Seth replied, “Fuck no.”  To which I further pressed, “But, um, Lula will be CPR trained by then and she seems to have a good head on her shoulders, are you sure she won’t be able to babysit?”  To which Seth replied, “Baby, we’re going to have a nanny, and it isn’t going to have a pelt of black fur.”  And then I made some crude joke about women from Romanian and we laughed.  By the time we settled on El Cholo, I was starving and freaking out about the fact that if you have a baby it will sometimes scream and ruin your Saturday morning, which led to me gulping down a strong margarita and then another and oops, there went the third.

About mid-way into margarita number two I started crying about the life I was giving up by wanting to have a baby.  Which is when Seth tried to surreptitiously slide the margarita glass away from me, and I snatched it back out of his grasp, because I was drunk, but not that drunk.  Half-way into margarita number three, I was really giving it the old tears in my Chile Colorado routine and Seth wrestled the last half out of my trembling hands and wow, I really am not allowed to drink tequila anymore.

Sunday was good until it was bad and that was when Seth pressed me a little about my writing and had to admit to him that while I still write here, and occasionally am able to spew out a few days worth of morning pages, I’m not really writing.  I’m (god it’s such a cliche!) blocked.  And good.  He asked me if it was a mental block or a motivation block.  And honestly, I think it’s neither, I think I’m just fucking tired of writing.  Tired of caring about these lives I spent so much of my time creating and bending and making say words.  I want to be done with them, but they keep running around in my head and I want them to shut up.  I want them to take it easy for a few months, and let me just live my life without having to think about whether or not they’ve made it through the second act without boring the reader to tears.  I want to be able to write, the way I do here, without pressure, without worrying about selling something, without the added dread of getting people to like what I do.  For the most part, here, you like me, you have told me as much with your comments and e-mails and aside from that one time when someone told me I was a big ol’ sack of repetitive complaining, you seem to get it.  Which is why I feel so comfortable here.  Which is what I’m looking for when I write, just a few less voices in my head.  Which is what I used to get when I wrote my other stuff.  And I want to get it back.

I wasn’t able to articulate any of that to Seth and just started crying.  Again.  And he took me up in that way that no one else can and told me I needed to talk to someone.  And that it’s important to him that I get it sorted out.  Important to him, because he knows how important it is to me.

And I know I sound like a broken record, but yeah, the signs are clear, the road is paved, the exit is looming, I just need to get off this interstate and back on that side road, the one that has the words on it.   Because as soon as that baby comes, it’s gonna send me on another path, and I want to make sure I saw all I needed to see on this other one before I get off.

I’m really regular.  I know my cycle like the days of the week.  Wednesday comes after Tuesday and Sunday is at the end of the week.  And I ovulate on the 24th and there’s a week of irritation and all the other bleeding stuff is right.  on. schedule.  Give or take a day.  Except the time I used the morning after pill and that made my period come a whole 2 weeks early, which was a totally welcome surprise, given that I was so not ready to have a baby.

Last night, over a glass of wine, Seth and I were doing our disgustingly loving daily check in, in our cozy booth at Dusty’s when Seth said, “Hey, it’s the 10th, no period?”  And I replied, “No.  No sign.”

“So, you’re pregnant?”

And I replied that I was 90% sure I wasn’t pregnant, 10% unsure with a side of sort of hopeful that I had accidentally mistaken my normal PMS for pre-pregnancy irritation and I was unintentionally knocked up.  And he hugged me and said all the perfect things about the possibility that I might be pregnant and we walked home and I started my period.

Just. like. clockwork.

So, to be clear, we aren’t trying to have a baby.  But we aren’t trying not to.  And this was the first month in my entire life that I was actually a little sad to get my period right on schedule.  But I have to say, when Seth said I’m the most regular woman he’s ever been with (and then he clarified by saying,”You know, ‘period-wise’ because you aren’t ‘regular…’”), I got a little proud.  Which is crazy, because who gets proud about their period being regular, like I somehow have control over it?  I do, that’s who.

Two nights ago, I saved a cat from the sewer, I saw two skunks on my walk that Lula was serious about giving what-for, and then past midnight Lula got into a scrap with an animal of unknown origin (it was dark, and I didn’t have my contacts in, raccoon?  cat?  night bird? wraith?).  I think I officially earned my stripes as country girl while I was living in the country, can I have less run-ins with wild life now?  Seriously.

I am in desperate need of a martini tonight, extra olives, best vodka in the house, high high heels and pretty winter coat.  But I have this sneaking suspicion I’m going to get home, throw on my flannel pants and fall asleep in a puddle of drool.  My glamorous LA life is starting to feel like a big fat lie.

I also can’t shake this feeling I’m going to hit a deer on my way home from work.

Send help.

And a bucket of vodka.

Also, an attitude adjustment.

Last year I only read 16 books? I’m trying to do better this year…  UPDATE:  And clearly… I failed.

14. The Crow Road by Iain Banks (12/08/09) Excellent.  The telegraphed ‘twist’ at the end didn’t hurt it at all. I really loved the characters in this book, and it made me want to be part of a sprawling Scottish family full of dysfunctional love. Recommended winter reading.

13. Animal, Vegetable, Miracle: A Year of Food Life by Barbara Kingsolver (11/27/09)  I mostly liked this book, but I did find a couple of her chapters irritating.  The one I found particularly offensive was about how women who work full time jobs and can’t find time at night to cook for their families are basically lazy and fucked up and fucking up their families by not being able to put a balanced organic meal on the table for them.  To which I say, listen lady, if you’ve ever worked a 12 hour day, had to take an hour bus ride home and hoped your kids made themselves some Top Ramen by themselves then you can talk to me, until then, you can cram your organic garden up your ass.  Other than that, she seemed earnest, etc.  I guess I just find her evangelical protestelitizing of wholesome eating kind of disengenous.  Especially when the picture of her ’svelte’ family on the back cover of the book looked like a bunch of doughy losers who don’t know what the word svelte means, much less working for a living.  Well…. I guess I’m a little more bitter about this book than I originally thought.  Hm…  Guess I won’t be recommending it.

12.  Story of the Eye by Georges Bataille (10/25/09)  There was a time when I probably wouldn’t have written about a book like this for the public eye.  I would have just hidden it in my dirty book drawer and returned to it when I needed a little “inspiration.”  But here’s the thing, this is a fascinating story, not to mention, twisted, dirty and well written.  It’s the best piece of erotica I’ve read, hands down, but it might not be your cup of tea.  There’s some graphic abuse of a priest, and… yeah, probably you might get offended by that.  Not to mention what they do to poor Marcelle.  Anyway,  I loved it.

11.  White Teeth by Zadie Smith (10/ 23/09) It took me almost three months to read this book.  It should have taken about 2 days.  So by the end I had totally forgotten what had happened in the beginning which was sort of important, and I totally don’t get the end now.  Because I drink.  So…  I guess that’s not much of a recommendation, but I really don’t blame the writing, because the snippets I was able to read of it in a single sitting were very entertaining.

10.  Women: A Novel by Charles Bukowski (8/1/09)  Reading this made me realize where Seth gets a lot of his vernacular.  It was disturbing and comforting.  I might go kill myself now.  After I have another drink.

9. A Fine Balance by Rohinton Mistry (7/30/09) I think if I had bombed through this faster the Victorian use of coincidence wouldn’t have irritated me as much as it ended up doing.  I really loved the characters, and the story is heart breaking, but god…  If I wanted to read Dickens, I would, you know?

8. A Song of Stone: A Novel by Iain Banks (4/15/09)  This is a really disturbing read.  So, of course, I loved it.  A civil war is raging, an incestuous family is caught in the middle and wow, the ending really brutalizes you.  He’s got a way with torture!

7. Rockabye: From Wild to Child by Rebecca Woolf (4/4/09) This is a nice counter point to the ‘mother-hood-is-beautiful’ and ‘I-love-my-child-full-life’ books and blogs.  She’s a good writer, and I think will continue to grow especially if she listens to some of the critics that accuse her of over-writing.  It’s the sign of someone who’s just figuring everything out and I think she definitely will.

6. Out Stealing Horses: A Novel by Per Peterson (3/30/09)  I love this book.  It’s a gut punch with a satisfying if a bit mystifying end.  Highly recommend.

5. Espedair Street by Iain Banks (3/7/09)  This has a strong start and keeps really good pace almost all the way through, but there’s something lacking for me in the last 3rd of the book.  I still recommend it for a vacation read though, and can totally see this being adapted for the screen.

4. Venus in Furs by Leopold von Sacher-Masoch (2/15/09)  So, this is where masochism comes from.  There’s some great stuff in here, entertaining and heart-breaking, and wow, Wanda is quite a character.  Seth encouraged me to read it… Which is kind of hilarious because he’s not a masochist, but thought I would find it entertaining.  Which I did.  Also, kind of depressing.

3. Peter Pan by J.M. Barrie (2/9/09)  Seth has been talking about this book since we started talking.  I think I’ve seen all the modern film versions of the story, and the most recent live action one was my favorite, probably because it’s the most faithful to the story. There’s such intricate relationships explored and despite the overt anti-feminist slant and the racism, it’s a well told story.  It is great to read aloud, which I did in bed on Sunday while it was raining outside.  God, I love my life.

2. Wishful Drinking by Carrie Fisher (2/7/09) I expected this to be a little darker and examine her life as an alcoholic, bi-polar writer effected her relationships, etc. It was light, and didn’t talk very much about either of those things, except in vague relationship to the life she’s lead. I think the one-woman show would be fantastic, though.

1. The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle: A Novel by Haruki Murakami (2/4/09) The violence in this book is pretty graphically rendered, but the book is so good. There were a few times when I had to put it down and try not to think about things like men being skinned alive and baseball bats crushing skulls. Highly, highly recommend. There are a few things not specifically wrapped up, unfortunately, but it still is very satisfying.

I have had Port of Shadows and Wet Hot American Summer sitting by my DVD player since September.  Netflix has been charging me $14.00 a month, faithfully, every month since I got them.  Carry the two… that’s, $70.00!  To let two movies sit beside my DVD player.  I’m a money managing genius!

Granted, Seth and I don’t go to movies, so it’s not like we’re wildly spending money willy nilly on films while those two sad selections sit at home.  (His dad gets the Academy screeners, so I’ve seen almost everything out now, my favorites are either Vicky Christina Barcelona or The Reader.) Right now I’m just sort of holding on to them for the sheer personal torture it affords me to think about how I have had them for 5 months and haven’t watched them.  It’s a thing.

But now that I’ve seen the video below, it’s the only thing I want to watch.  Over and over.  (via Sundry)