Flailing

It's feels like failing, but kind of like being flayed too. Every time I have to write a paper, it's like I'm in an unknown room flailing around looking for the light switch, but I'm failing so bad I can't even find a wall, much less a light switch, but hey, maybe it's going to be a cord dangling from the ceiling this time. Flail flail flail. I might as well lay down and take a nap. As soon a I find the damn switch and turn on the light they're just going to put me in another room that I don't know my way around and leave me to find the switch. Flailing around, waving my hands like I'm trying to say something. I try to have a system. I walk straight forward first, because eventually I've got to hit a wall, and even if there's no switch on the wall, there's probably an outlet, with a cord leading to the light, and somewhere on there, the switch. but then I wonder if I'm really walking straight, or if I'm like a lost person in the forest who takes a longer step with their right leg than their left and ends up walking in circles. I get bored and run and leap and it's fun and I get distracted from the task at hand, but after a while I'm tired, and it's not fun anymore and I just want to be done, and I don't want to flail anymore.

Random, Bold and Early

10:30 AM on a Saturday morning

Acch, I overslept again. My body aches from working out too much yesterday. Even my teeth hurt. I must have been grinding my teeth. Again. Okay, got to settle down to business. If I can finishing reading the paper I started last night, then I'll go and get coffee and think about it while I'm walking. Mmm. so sleepy - I still have my sleepy breathing. but I'm reading, getting though it.

The phone rings, as it does in all my stories. Probably my sister. No - it's CC, the woman I met last week for coffee. We totally hit it off, but she's just looking for friends. We had made plans to go to Osento tonight, so I suppose that's why she's calling.

CC: "Are you awake?"
me: "I'm not sure - working on it. why? what's up?"
CC: "I have a little proposition for you"
me: "Am I being propositioned this early in the morning?"
CC: "Well, actually, first promise that no matter what comes out of my mouth next, you'll still hang out with me and we'll be friends."
me: "Sure, of course - what could you possibly ask that would offend me that much?"
CC: "Are you having casual sex with anyone right now?"
me: "You really are propositioning me, aren't you?!? But, no I'm not sleeping with anyone. Why else would I be on the Onion?"
CC: "Do you want to have casual sex?"
me: "I guess so, yeah. I think that's what I need to do before I'll be ready to be in a relationship."
CC: "you know I'm emotionally unavailable. I'm emotionally involved with two women, neither of which I'll sleep with. And you - I know what the poison of love does to someone, you're not emotionally available."
me: "true, quite true"
CC: "And it would be really nice to just touch someone. I'm not really a casual person. I definitely get attached to people, but that doesn't necessarily mean falling in love."

Anyways, I still have to read that damn article and write my paper and call RockGirl for some coffee, so the story is to be continued.

The keeper

Did you know that supposedly most women only bleed 2 to 4 ounces each menstrual cycle? At least this is what it says on the keeper's website. Now, most women don't really know how much they bleed. It might seem like a lot. Or a little. But how do you really know? Are you going to collect your tampons and pads and weigh them before and after? Even I think that would be pretty gross.

My favorite thing about the keeper is that I know it holds an ounce of blood. So, if it's full, I must have bled an ounce. If it's half full, that was half an ounce. I don't mind if it's not exactly full or exactly half full - it's much more than I knew before. So now, I don't just think I'm bleeding heavily - I know that I bled a full 5 ounces in the last 6 hours. I have a right to be tired and cranky. I bleed more in one day than the imagined most women bleed over their whole period! I am a super bleeder. yup.

Bartholin's gland

Words wing their glistening way against bloodshot eyes, prying at her innards, tearing at her skin. The light yellow, the indoor air heavy with bitter herbs and chicken flesh. A pear core stands independently erect, ghostly white, elegant and sculptural bitten down, innards revealed. The trendy ambient electronica of yesteryear clashing with common household dischord and comfort.
Calm
Peace
Security
Oh, and that swelling. Why is it on the other side now? What is it doing there? On both sides, no longer a little cyst, but spread out as through a vein or vessel. Or perhaps it is just fear and imagination. Perhaps.

When does writing, expression of any kind, for that matter, come from joy? So much art is dark, expressing the inner turmoil and terror of us. Where is the genuine joy, not the cliché’d forced joy, but the real joy. The reveling in skin on skin, the salty sting of seawater, the illicit joy of stolen moments on the path between other people’s houses. The terrifying joy of frenzied lovemaking, slow hairstroking, tendernesses forgotten in the bliss of many?

Vomitus

It was a friday night. The cookies were done baking and I was ready to walk out the door. I was dressed, had the cookies in a tupperware with a little label recommending the proper dosage. I felt good. A little too good. I had forgotten something upstairs in my room. My the bed looked inviting. hhmmm. What was the line from Something About Mary? It goes something like - that's like going out with a loaded gun! How can you expect to play it cool if you haven't released the pressure? yeah. There's nothing like a little cookie to make the self-love soooo good. And there's still plenty of time to get to the party.

Recovering from my interlude I go back downstairs and start towards the door. I have the bus schedule, I have the cookies. I have my phone. Oh, wait, someone called. Probably W to get directions to the party. I check the message. No. It's A. How did she know? How can she have such impeccable timing? Of course I shouldn't have called her back then. I mean, shit - I'd eaten a cookie and a half. I was high as a kite, horny as a 16 year old boy - much better off going to a party then talking to an Ex on the phone. But how could I resist? What was she doing calling me at midnight on a Friday night? And I did ignore her last call. It would be cruel to not call her back. immediately. chances are she wouldn't answer anyways. but she did. there it is. the sound of her voice. so tiny and sad and far-away.

Let me spew forth my love torn spleen upon thee. Let me revel in angst and emit tumultous anguish and bore the world to tears with the tales of unrequited love. Tender reader, I advise you now to avert your eyes from the drudgery of what lies ahead. Return a few pages/chapters/ days or years later. Perhaps like a fine wine, you will find the story improved with age.

What a long strange trip it’s been. How do I love thee? Let me count the ways. When will I learn to let go? Should I even try?

It’s very exciting that A is actually going to counseling now. But I am so bad. I was totally ready to have phone sex with her tonight. I would have felt so bad tomorrow, and she is the one who said, "I don’t think we’re supposed to do this." It’ so hard to express where I am and how I feel without going too far and violating our boundaries. Like I told her, I wish I could say that we could see each other, and we would talk and we wouldn’t have sex, but I just can’t say it – it’s not true. I do want to have sex with her and I don’t have that kind of self-control. Part of me is relieved to hear that she’s been having a hard time – (I can figure that is why she didn’t call, instead of it being that she’s so happy she just doesn’t think about me any more.)

She also acknowledged that she and M are in a relationship just by virtue of how long they’ve been doing it – and she said she was sorry for cutting it off so abruptly with me. I feel like that’s kind of big – maybe it’s not really. She’s acknowledging that it was hurtful, but not only that - but also that maybe it wasn’t the best thing to do, and that maybe it complicated it all and made it harder to resolve things with me.

I told her about wanting to ask her if it was worth it, and she asked if what was worth it? And when I said whether being with M was worth breaking up with me about, she said she hadn’t even thought about it that way before – although now that I've pointed it out, in effect that’s the way it is. And she acknowledged that part of her getting together with M may have been to bring an end to what we were doing – not all of it, but perhaps part of it.

Part of me had wanted to tell her to fuck off – it’s too late. I’m done and I’m moving on, but I didn’t. I made myself vulnerable again – I let myself want her. And I let her know that I wanted her. Maybe now I can move on? I don’t know. I need to get laid, regardless. I have reached the point that I’m not caring so much about the relationship/emotional setting of the sex – I just need some god-damned affection. I need someone to push me up against the wall and press their body up against me, to run their fingers along my sideds, to cup my breasts and nuzzle them. Anyways, you get the point. I need a good fuck. But even a good fuck is not the same as saying that I’m really and truly done with A.

What does it mean for her to say that she wants to want me to move on and be with someone else so that it’s not a possibility for us to get back together? Wait a second! Isn’t she the one that got all indignant about someone saying that to me? Funny that, no? Well, no, actually, what the other had said is that she did want me to be with someone and be happy – not that she wished she could want that, but that that was actually what she wanted. So it is different – perhaps in a way even more fucked up.

So what do I do with this? Has anything changed or is it all just staying the same? She’s going to go on a neo-zen buddhist retreat. maybe. She was talking a lot about feeling depressed and overwhelmed with her life – she has no creative outlet, no sprititual outlet, she’s not taking time to exercise. How can I expect her to be in a relationship if she’s not taking care of herself? I can’t make her take care of herself. And I can’t take care of her for her. She has to do it herself. I have to let her do it herself. But I want to be there and give her hugs and kiss her so she smiles and feels good and wants to take care of herself.

A, my monstruous love. You know how much I love the sound of your voice, the feel of your hands and your intense eyes with their dark and wild brows. How much I want to be inside – how much I want to feel you wrapped around me, excited and tender-hard. When we were talking, I think I must have mis-heard you because I thought I heard you say that you wanted me inside, but I realized you must have been saying something else. It’s just what I wanted to hear you say.

You said that you were thinking about what it would be like if we were closer together – you said you saw something you weren’t supposed to see – me in my shirt dancing to the milkshake song. That even the gay boys can see that I’ve got it. That's right baby, I got the organic melons. You were silent – thinking – were you thinking what I was thinking? You said you weren’t doing anything – but you sounded surprised (disappointed?) that I wasn’t either. I said your name. A. Just like I used to say it. And you said my name. S. Just like you used to say it. I wanted you so so so much then - like a stuttering cliche-ridden 12 year old girl reading a harlequin romance. We were silent. I think that might be when I asked you what you were doing? You laughed and said “nothing”, what was I doing? I said “nothing”, but I was thinking about it. I told you I was thinking about it. I didn’t tell you how I’d arched my back and taken my breath in. Or that the room had become suffocatingly hot and I didn't feel so cold anymore - that I was just waiting for you to lay your hands on me, waiting for you to say you wanted me too. Baby - I love you so much. So much, so much. I miss you. I wish I could kiss you goodnight and fall asleep with our limbs intertwined listening to you breathe and feeling your body start in your dreams. I wish you could love me the way I love you. I wish you could love you the way I love you. Would it really be so bad to let the rest of the world disappear? at least until it reappeared? Perhaps the difference is that for you it reappeared. For me, it is still gone.

Fact is stranger than Fiction: Cell Phone

My cell phone rang last night when i was hovering in that state where you don't think you've fallen asleep until something wakes you up. It was about 12:30, but I couldn't see the clock and was wondering if somehow it really was 7:00 in the morning and time for me to get up. Could it really still be dark at 7AM in August? I wouldn't know since I usually sleep until 10:00. Anyways, the only way to find out was to open the phone - it wasn't the alarm at all. It was a familiar woman's voice, but I had no idea who she was. She sounded like a woman who had called once before, about the same time of night, except for that time I was studying. But it couldn't be her, because that call had been a wrong number, although it took us 20 minutes to establish that. The conversation had gone something like this:
Her: Hi baby, (breathey) What are you doing?
Me: I'm studying.
Her: I was just thinking about you and had to try calling you
Me: I'm so glad you were thinking about me, uhmm I'm sorry but who is this?
Her: You don't recognize my voice?
Me: (looking at my caller ID and seeing that the call is supposedly coming from my own number) I'm trying to place it, but I'm not having any luck - J, are you doing wierd things to your voice?
Her: I can't believe you don't know who this is.
Me: I can't either - I'm so bad. Who is this?
Her: Just try guessing.
Me: Are you in the state? In Californina?
Her: yeah
Me: Do I know you from school? From Cal?
Her: Maybe - I went there.
Me: Are you friends with E?
Her: Well, I have a friend named E. I don't know if it's the same one.
Me: Help me out here, I feel like such an idiot.
Her: You should - it was only a few days ago
Me: What was only a few days ago?
Her: You really don't remember.
Me: I don't know what you're talking about.
Her: We were at a party....
Me: I haven't met anyone at a party in a while. Do you know who I am?
Her: Isn't this C?
Me: No, this is S
Her: Oh my god - she must have given me the wrong number. I feel like such a fool.
Me: Maybe you just mis-read it, or mis-dialed it. What number do you have?
Her: 555 221-9870
Me: Yeah, that's my number. But it's a new cell phone, I've only had it about a month.
Her: But she only gave me the number a couple of days ago. I thought we had a connection. Oh well.
Me: I'm sorry. But I have to admit I am so relieved. I was starting to feel like a total shmuck there for not recognizing you.
Her: Yeah, I feel better to - I was like, how could I have made so little of an impression that she doesn't even recognize me?
Me: Yeah, that sucks.
Her: Well, I'm glad that I got you - you seem pretty nice.
Me: What are the odds that you would get a woman in the right age range and who hooks up with other women?
Her: Yeah, that's pretty crazy.

And so we kept talking for awhile, establishing that we really didn't know each other. I was still suspicious, thinking in the back of my mind that maybe a friend of mind had given her my number, maybe was even there coaching her on what to say. But how could they get it so that it showed the number coming from my own phone? It was just too unreal.

The next morning I thought, maybe it was just a dream, and checked my phone, and sure enought there was a half hour call from my own number. I even showed it to a friend, just to establish that I wasn't hallucinating.

But back to last night. There she was again. This time she said, " I don't know if you remember me." I'm like: "Of course I remember you - that was such a bizarre conversation." She asked if I was awake. I lied and said yes. We talked for a while and she said she had had a guy friend visiting all day and all she wanted was some time to myself, and he had just left. And I'm like, "So you really wanted some time to myself - and you call me?". She was like, "yeah, I almost chickened out, but I came across your number the other day and was thinking about you." And I replied "Well I'm glad you called" and I was, though quite a bit confused. She asked if I was seeing anyone and I said, "Yes. No. I mean, it's kind of complicated. Not really. I'm still hung up on this woman in New York, but I went on a date for the first time tonight in ages - with a boy." She asked, " Do you want to be with a boy?" I said " I don't know. I want to be with the woman in NY, but I can't, and I feel like it's time to move on." And she said,"well maybe you need to be with a woman" and I said "Well maybe. But it's much scarier to think about being with another woman than to be with a man. Women are so much more....intense, and likely to bring stuff up." And she said "Maybe you just need to jump in the pool." I laughed. "Maybe"
She said, "My phone is about to die, but if you meet 5'8" Tara, say Hi." I said, "Well, I might just have to hunt you down."

I checked my recieved calls this morning, and this time there was a real number. I stored it under Tara.