late sunday nights

Crisis averted.

Cuddling resumed.

sunday afternoons

I've come to a time in my life where I'm wondering:

Do I stick to my guns, as they say, or do I cave in and just be nice?

I miss him after two days of not speaking. I keep carrying my cell phone around the house just in case he decides the right thing to do would be to call me. Is that even the right thing to do? We're childish, right now. We're stubbornly giving each other the silent treatment, and that is something that is so not us. We don't do that kind of thing. We talk it out, we get over it, we go out for dinner and have a nice time. We don't hang up on each other and then think it's the other person's obligation to call first. We aren't those kind of people.

I stayed up too late at a barnyard bonfire last night. Three of us rode down the road through the trees in the darkness. We galloped around under the stars for a while. Then, I woke up too early this morning to do some more galloping -- this time it was on purpose, and over cross country obstacles.

And I spent the rest of the day feeling tired and sorry for myself and watching Sex and the City on DVD, thinking about relationships and Carrie Bradshaw. And looking at my cell phone.

Now, I am stressed out about a nonfunctional printer and legal cases that need to be read over before class tomorrow morning, and I feel like it's all hanging above my head. Maybe I need to just put on some makeup, feel pretty, and have a cup of coffee.

dispatches from behind a pile of boxes

Boring classes at 8 AM make me chew my fingernails to a whole new level. I need to find something else to do with my hands during classes like Legal Issues and Applied Editing. My fingers hurt.

I'm sick of making phone calls from a storage closet. It sounds strange, but it's actually what my job entails. Excel spreadsheets, online databases, and phone calls from inside my storage closet. Can I get a window, please? Can I get some stimulation? I'd even settle for good old fashioned motivation.

I am too tired to do anything tonight but I know my horse will be sitting in the field feeling neglected when all of his friends (who have good, non-negligent owners) get taken out to go on trail rides and jump brightly coloured fences and receive treats. And I'll be dozing off on a couch in front of Grey's Anatomy re-runs.

haikus and happiness

For some reason I've had an intense yearning to write haiku. I feel like I could write one every day and then eventually I'd have enough to make a huge poster of them, all typographically aesthetic and all, and pin it to the back of my door to remind me that there are other writing styles besides short fiction and pretty prose.

I am currently annoyed with work, so I am wasting my time blogging for revenge purposes. I just phoned a company and after two rings, I was immediately put on hold. No, "CEB Technologies, can you hold please?" Just, "ring... ring... elevator music." And after listening to a synthesizer remix of Three Times a Lady, I got someone's voicemail. And that voicemail was not that of the person that I was trying to contact.

I know it's not my company's fault, but it's Wednesday. And I've decided that I am ten times more stupid on Wednesdays than any other day. Wednesday is the new Monday. Traffic was exceptionally enraging this morning, which doesn't help Wednesday seem better than Monday. I need to get some audio books. They help me to be less angry while behind the wheel.

september

I love September. It feels so clean-slate new, and it feels so much like all of the thoughts I've jam-packed into summer are falling to the ground in brightly coloured leaves. It smells like death and growth at the same time, and I think it's important to see that the two should always accompany one another.

I find it imperative to my own health that I understand that new things are borne of the old disasters. Life and death happen on the same day, and it's sad and comforting together.

I like the parking lot at school in the fall. I like sun glinting off of car windshields and the big tree at the south end that blows its yellow leaves onto the road. I like coming outside after school and feeling smart and fresh and crisp, like the air. I like knowing that I'm chosing my own life.

validation

As a result of the 3 AM almost-break-in to our hotel room the other night, I've been tired for the past two days. I can't get ahold of myself, and I'm assuming the whole sleepless nights thing is the reason. Am I just too tired to process my own feelings?

I feel disappointed in my abilities and accomplishments, and I've never said that out loud, really. Well, I've never said that out loud in any specific way that goes beyond vague ranting between friends on long car rides. But I can pinpoint the things I feel that I lack, and instead of fixing my own problems, I sought validation from those around me. Of course, they didn't know I was looking for some sort of validation in terms of my abilities and success, so I didn't get what I wanted from them and I just assumed that meant that they agreed with me. That they were agreeing with my own distorted view of myself.

Were they?

I wish that I could read other people's minds from time to time. I wish that I didn't need other people to tell me that I'm fantastic in order for me to think that I am. Why should I need encouragement to feel like I've really achieved anything? Shouldn't my own sense of self-worth just be enough?

I am introspective at work today. I like being introspective, but it's not a good use of time right now. I am way behind.

who ever thought a girl could love office supplies so much?

Today was my first day back at school. We discussed subordinating conjunctions and the woes of dangling modifiers. The text book for this class costs $128, so needless to say, I won't be buying it. I'll just write thorough notes and rely on my previous knowledge of comma splices and rhetorical schemes.

I think that I'd like to work in a stationary store. I want to be surrounded by pretty paper, leatherbound notebooks, interesting photo-albums and thank-you cards. I want to test out cool pens and give my friends the most unique greeting cards they've ever received. I want to fill my house with notebook upon notebook, each with a different cover, each with different line heights, each precious and special and perfect in their own way. I think that a good journal is something that really belongs to a person, you know?

Mine has a Japanese-inspired drawing of a tidal wave on the front, and big spiral coils and it's uncluttered and exactly what I look for in a place to write down my little inspirations and stories of joy and sorrow. Or something less dramatic.

So Thursday morning, on my day off, I'll drive around to stationary stores in town and see if I can force them to hire me. And if that doesn't work, I'll revert to plan B: drive around to flower shops and see if I can force them to hire me. If I can't be surrounded by fabulous stationary, I think I'd like to be surrounded with pretty things. And if that doesn't work, I'll revert to plan C: the toil-filled jungle we call retail.

ghost of a good thing

Today while I drove home from the lake I listened to a CD I haven't listened to in a very long time. Eric made it for me, two summers ago, before we were dating. We'd just had a huge fight in the laundry room at the ranch, and he gave it to me as an "I'm sorry" kind of thing. And the very first time I ever drove home from the lake by myself, on an early Sunday morning, I listened to it. And fell in love with it (and consequently, more in love with the boy as well).

It reminds me of a different time in my life. When I was younger, and had no inkling of the profound ways that my life was going to change in the next year. I would have braced myself for the impact if I'd known.

So the songs on that CD remind me also of the leaves changing in autumn, and of living simply in my tiny dorm room, wearing two sweaters to work and being able to see more clearly because September air in the country feels thinner and purer. The smell of dying leaves and watching my breath hang in the air in front of my face on the road to the main lodge.

Of listening to it while doing my hair and choosing what I'd wear to her bridal shower. Of tires crunching over the leaves that blow across the long driveway on the way into town on the day of her wedding. Of thinking that everything was completely fine.

Then listening to it today, on the highway, and thinking that everything didn't turn out fine. Everything was fine for those few months. I was living in such an in-between state of perfect content. I got up early, ate a good breakfast, worked outside, breathed country air into my lungs, cozied up with big cups of tea at night. Rode horses through the falling leaves of the trees in the back pasture. Watched one of the most important people in my life get married and live happily ever after.

And then things changed, in every possible way, and while I sometimes think about going back to that life I had, I know that things will never be the same. I can’t keep wondering whether or not I’d be able to just go live that life forever.

Why can’t I ever move away from who I once was?