I forgive Matt for calling me a dick. Only because he made up for it tonight by telling me sweet words. Okay, so I’m a sucker for a sexy line, but what can I do?

The sweet words only came up because we were having a …well, a disagreement? I guess? It was one of those …disagreements…that comes about as a result of someone, namely me, stumbling on something, namely a long and sordid email chain, and then getting angry with someone, namely matt, all over again. You follow? No, I don’t either.

Okay. So I found an old email tonight. I mean, old. Not like three weeks ago old, more like 5 YEARS ago old. It was an argument between me and Matt, long since resolved. But I got angry. I was surprised cause it just sort of welled up in me, but whooooo boy was I pissed! Matt’s sitting across from me in the living room, blissfully unaware of what’s about to hit him, smiling serenly, not a care in the world. Then KABOOM! I’m all like,

“Oh you BAStarD! I loved you so much and you treated me SO bad. You were HORRIBLE TO Me. HORriBle!@”

And he’s all, “Uh, come again?”

And he’s got that look on his face. That deer caught in the headlights look that means, “Oh frick. I’m in trouble and I don’t know what I did— QUICK! What did I DO!!!?”

We took it out to the garage. I was all like, “Blah blah blah remember that one time you did that one thing in that one place!?”

and he’s like, “Uh, what?”

“And then remember that time you broke up with me in front of the TANNING SALON? RIght in front of the tanning salon! It was broad daylight, Matthew! Broad DAYLIGHT. Not night time. Not on a dark and stormy night when these things are supposed to happen, but in the daytime. ON a TUESDAYYYY!”

and he’s like, “I was — You were — We –uh, what???!??”

“And you just kept breaking my heart and then everytime I tried to get away from you and keep away from you and block your calls and refuse to see you or speak to you or think about you, you ALWAYS had to worm your way back in!”

and he’s like, “….”

“And you took long enough. Holy Taco on Asian Tuesday you took forever! You horrible bastard. Shame on you. SHAME.”

and then he muttered some more and finally, in a last ditch effort to somehow turn this thing around, even though he wasn’t entirely sure what this thing was or how he got in the middle of it, he decided to go all,

“Oh come on, baby. You know I’ve always loved you. You know I couldn’t stand to hurt you….something, something, something, something, drug to me, something, had to have you, something something.”

and then I forgot why I was mad in the first place and then I was fine again.

UNTIL NOW. NOW I see how he does it. All these years. I’ve been such a fool.

Matt called me a dick tonight. I’m not even kidding. Do you people see the abuse I suffer at the hands of this man? Is there no justice? Shameful.

ANYWAY, when Matt and I were out for our walk tonight we passed this field where these two kids were playing. It was a girl of maybe 12 and a boy about a year younger. They were taking turns riding a motor bike that was clearly more bike than they could handle. She got off and he got on, but the whole time he jerked the bike across the field with uneven starts and stops and near-death misses, she was running along behind him, shouting instruction, showing him the “right” way.

It made me think of my brother. He’s eighteen months younger than I am and we used to get up to the dickens, let me tell ya. We rode bikes and built forts. We raced go-carts and made five star restaurants that specialized in mud-burgers and grass fries. Two rocks served quite well as the bun. We climbed trees and got in trouble one time for building a dam in the river that made a difference miles away. We covered for each other. We ratted each other out.

We saved a girl from drowning once. We were at the river and the little section we were swimming in was really the only safe place to swim. There was a rocky drop off not far downstream, but if you stayed well away from it you would be alright. We knew about these things. We spent long summer days learning them. It’s a wonder we made it to adulthood. We were blue and devoid of feeling in our limbs due to the icy mountain water that rushed through the river, but we had no intention of getting out of the water. Our family was back at the campsite, warm and cozy, probably sipping hot chocolate by the fire. They were smart. They were not insane. Because it was the only relatively safe spot to swim in the river for miles, people sort of flocked to it. This one family had two kids, I think. There were a lot of kids there, so I’m not sure how many were theirs. Anyway, that’s not important. We see this little girl is down at that dropoff, way away from the safety zone. She ends up literally clinging to a rock to keep from going over. The rapids are washing over her and she’s maybe 5 years old. People are just sort of standing around with their mouths wide open, looking stupid. Like maybe if they stood perfectly still, she wouldn’t go over. My brother and I ran over to her from the riverbank. Once we got there we scouted out the best position and then, using each other as support, we manuevered our way to the rock where she was stranded. We worked the same way getting her back to shore. Her parents were all grateful and stuff and we were all like, “aw shucks, it wasn’t even hard!” when all the while we were so close to peeing our pants we couldn’t stand it.

We used to hunt spiders. There were these giant, ugly — I mean UGLY assed spiders behind the old outbuilding on our property. We would go out there with big, long sticks and rub them up under the spider’s bellies. These spiders had weird markings and grotesquely long legs with fat, bulbous bodies. They would wrap those terrible legs around the stick we were holding. We would lower the tip of the stick with the spider dangling from it into a jar we would place on the ground before hand. Then we would put a couple dozen more in and watch them all fight. It was horrible and I can’t believe we did it. But we’re being punished now. We’re both horribly terrified of spiders.

We used to breakdance on slick plywood in the grass. My brother would wretch and convulse on the slick top of the wood, spinning on his back or flopping up and down on his belly, doing the worm. I got a big, fat honkin’ splinter in my foot one time from trying to do the moonwalk on that damn wood. Barefoot. What a maroon!

We also used to hold microphones and sing while choreographing dance moves to Michael Jackson’s “Dirty Diana” — we were SUCH dorks.

We used to take the tape recorder and do fake interviews with each other. One person would ask the questions as if they were Barbara Walters or James Lipton and the other would ramble off these ridiculous nonsense answers in absurd voices until we both fell on the floor laughing, completely unable to breathe. My mom found one of those tapes not long ago. It was hysterical to listen to all these years later.

We used to hold marathon sessions on the Nintendo. We couldn’t WAIT to get one and when we finally did we spent all our free time trying to beat Kid Icarus or Mario Brothers. We had spiral notebooks filled with memory codes because back then, in the dark ages, the games didn’t have no fancy hard drive like you whippersnappers today have what with your X-Cube 360 Stations. We would get in trouble for being too loud, sent to bed, and be up half an hour later sneaking in a few more levels. We blew in those damn games so much we shoulda been gettin’ paid. We didn’t have no fancy CDs back then either. It was all cartridges and you had to blow and blow and blow and blow in them to get them to work. Something about them being powered by juvenile saliva, so you had to refill it every once in a while.

Ah, well. That’s the good old days for ya, full of the good — and the bad. I was just thinking about my brother tonight is all. He’s all grown up now with a family of his own. He’s got four handsome boys and he’s teaching them to ride dirt bikes and light a firecracker. All the good and dangerous stuff, like we used to get up to. He’s doing the best he can and he loves them beyond compare. They’re lucky boys.

I’ve still got seniority though. Always had it, always will.

I love that Matt is at his comedic best when I have to pee really, really bad and when I announce this his response is always — always to make me laugh harder, until I’m literally racing down the hall in a frenzy.

I love that about him.

Matt was treating me for an ingrown toenail. I know, it’s gross, but he really loves me and I just had a pedicure today so…

ANYWAY. My toe hurt so bad I couldn’t stand it. We’re talking white-hot, searing, eye-watering hurt here. I’m limping around and grimacing, being oh so very brave, I was. I didn’t complain or whine or even mention it. I just carried on with my tasks of the evening, cooking, cleaning, generally saving the universe from evil on an hourly basis. But still, I said nothing of my pain. It was really touching. But somehow, he notices anyway. He wants to take a look at it. He sterilizes my pedicure nail tool set thingamabobber and whips out his Surefire flashlight. It was all very MacGyver-y of him. So I’m sitting in the living room with my feet up on the ottoman, Matt is bending over my right foot with flashlight and nail file in hand — stabbing -STABBING my toe like there was no tomorrow. I’m moaning in excrutiating pain and Matt is making little man-grunting noises that sound like, “Shup! Me Man. Me Work. You woman. You hush.” But that could have been just my imagination. That’s when Jacob walked in.

“Uh, what are you guys doing?”
I can’t say anything. All I can do is stifle the scream of pain that wants to escape my mouth so therefore my fist stuffed halfway in my mouth is perfectly logical. I turn and look at him through wide, pained eyes.
Without missing a beat, however, Matt says,
“I’m punishing her for her behaviour.”

—-

Jacob sighed loudly and deliberately and escaped through the front door, barely looking over his shoulder to say, “Good luck with that.”

Ah, Matt. Warping our children’s minds in new and exciting ways each and every day. He’s *very* devoted. I’m wondering if that could be the reason Jacob is spending more and more time out of the house since he turned 15?

For the last 3 days, I have been eating like it’s a holiday. What I mean is that I am looking forward to leftovers after the big meal. Kim makes the *best* pulled pork BBQ, and with cole slaw on top, potato salad (with bacon!) on the side.   I have been eating until I am miserable. This meal leaves me with some kind of contentment too though. Even at my fullest I still feel this warm joy at the aftertaste. It’s telling me “you could eat another bite of potato salad. Fork up that bit there with the bacon sticking out. No no no, Do it.” I wish I had pictures of the feast but I’m too busy trying to finish it off.

One of the clever little bits of Wordpress is that the dashboard shows you some stats when you sign in. Mainly stuff like which post has the most views, who has linked to you, blah blah blah. But it also tells you the top searches that led people to your site. Here’s what brought people here lately, though I’ve no idea why….

why can’t you marry your cousin?, beautiful stairway to heaven photos, puppy frenetic, nine 1/2 weeks, now is the time to get drunk! to stop being the martyred slaves

: / Some of it I get. Puppies is obvious. “Time to get drunk” — the same. And I just recently posted something about Kim Basinger and Mickey Rourke, but I’m too lazy to look back and refresh my memory on what it was.

But…Beautiful stairway to heaven photos? Why can’t you marry your cousin? Have I been blogging in my sleep?

Yesterday was my birthday. It was a good birthday, as birthdays go. Matt took me for a romantic weekend in the mountains. He rented the cabin, handled all the details, the works. It was loverly. I, however, forgot my camera so there won’t be any photographic evidence of the beauty of the joint. I’ll just tell you and words will have to be enough.

We stayed in a beautiful chalet-like thingamabob that sat literally right on the river. We took the dogs. We soaked in some rare sunshine on the back deck. We watched some movies and just generally relaxed. One night we stayed up until the sun rose to meet us.

That was by accident. After watching three movies (all horribly done) in a row, we drug ourselves to bed to crash out. Only it suddenly dawned on me that I was now three hours into my birthday and, as such, I am now 36 years old. That’s when I had a complete emotional and psychological breakdown. Poor, poor Matt. He had to sit there and listen as I raged and wept and mourned the passage of time and my inability to slow it. I was bitter and sad and angry and wistful all at the same time. He lay there and held me and encouraged me to get it all out, let it all go, and made me feel just generally better and more hopeful. We finally slept sometime around five in the morning.

It was probably just hormones, just a temporary rush of chemicals and lunacy coursing wildly through my veins. It’s over now. We got through it. It’s nice to know I have someone who cares enough to stay up all through the night with me until I feel like life is worthing living all over again, someone who points out the light when all I can see is the blackness of night. I got a lot of really cool stuff for my birthday, but that was most likely the coolest.

We have a new puppy! Already I love him to bursting and can’t imagine my life without him. Meet Rooster:

We got him from a rescue shelter a week ago Saturday. The people who had him before were bad, bad people who should have sharpened toothpicks inserted under their fingernails and then lit on fire. The toothpicks, not the people. Although I probably wouldn’t complain if they were set on fire as well. I don’t like puppy abusers. Not one little bit.

He’s the sweetest thing! So curious and energetic.

He chews on EVERYTHINGGGGG though. I have to do a sweep of the house every morning before leaving for work because if I don’t I’ll come home to a house that’s been ravaged in a fit of puppy rebellion.

He grabs my slippers off my feet to ferry them away and chewchewchew. He tries to get my sweater off my body by chewing at the sleeves until, he hopes, I slip right out of it and then he came nom nom nom his way to victory. I try to take pictures and there’s this:

But he’s a smart boy and he’s learning quickly. Usually a few words will get him back on track and if he doesn’t let go he’ll at least look at you with those puppy eyes and PRETEND to think about it.

He also falls asleep in the weirdest positions. He likes to sleep all jumbled up and, preferably, leaning on someone.

“It doesn’t matter if you’re sitting here. *I* want to sleep here. I’ll just scoot in behind you.”

What amazes me is that he can actually sleep like that. But he does. For looooooong periods of time. He also falls asleep right in the middle of stuff….stuff like, licking himself. : /

But he’s adorable and has that new puppy smell and we’re so glad he’s here! Even Poe…sorta. He’s pretty much just tolerating him at this point. I get the sense that’s he’s perpetually thinking, “You’re no Rufus, bub. Don’t get too cozy.” –but he’s at least tolerating him and all his puppy frenetic energy — for now.

Puppy breath and wild, reckless energy. That’s what we signed up for. And we couldn’t be happier.

Would you just LOOK at him? Who couldn’t love a face like that?

Oh boy, am I agitated.

That’s not a question. It’s a statement. I’m so irritated and on edge. I wish I had a vice to fall back on, something I could run to and say things like, “You don’t understand. I need it. It’s the only thing keeping me sane right now! Just a little more. I can quit tomorrow. GIVE IT TO ME OR DIE!” and then there would be an intervention and a made-for-tv movie about my epic and harrowing struggle for sobriety – life/limb, good versus evil.

That kind of thing.

But I got nothin’. All I got is a whoppin’ case of the red ass and no real good explanation for where it came from. The boys are driving me to drink. They’re bickering and arguing like — well, like boys do. Matt is making me loopy. I don’t have anything to say to him and I feel like we’re missing each other by the mile. I keep trying to connect with him and end up coming up short at every turn.  Every new endeavor I undertake leaves me feeling flat and fully disinterested. Dissatisfied. Maybe I’m depressed. Is this what depression feels like? I’m not interested in anything. I don’t care about anything. I’m mad at everything. I’ve no patience.

I don’t even have the patience or interest in finishing this entry.

I’ve been trying to make myself come here. I get as far as opening the window then I stare at the screen for a bit and finally give up and close it again. I’m just so busy. I’ve got so much going on it’s hard to find the time to sit and post anything worth reading. Not that anything I’ve posted prior to this is really worth reading, but at least I felt like writing it. Regardless.

The problem is that I think I may have outgrown this. But I’m not sure. It could be that I’m just going through a phase. It could be that I will find the interest in it again. It could be that I just need an extended break.  Or, it could be that I actually have outgrown it. Perhaps the magic of self delusion has been the only thing keeping it going for so long. Maybe I’m just too lazy to give it up. Not doing anything about it, just letting it sit here unattended, that’s easier than thinking about it. Making a decision. Doing something.

I don’t know. I think about not renewing the site and it kills me. I don’t want to think about someone else getting my domain name. I don’t want to watch all those years of posts and pictures and comments to just disappear as if they were never even here. I don’t want to think about all the work — all those hours and hours spent tweaking the look just so. All that time adding features I want and removing stuff that didn’t fit. The phases. The fads. I don’t want to think about it all going away forever. It’s like losing a friend. That’s a hard pill to swallow.

I’ve never done this for the page views or the comments. Those are nice, of course. But if I’m honest about it, I would have to admit that comments and and page views also made me a little nervous. I liked getting comments from my friends, the people I know and love. But that was it. I would frankly freak out when someone new came here and commented. It felt like pressure then. Like I had to perform. Like work.  Be witty. Be interesting. Say something worth saying.

Thing is, I don’t want to say something other people think is worth saying. I want to say what’s in my head. I want to say what I feel like saying. And sometimes those things just aren’t witty. Or interesting. They’re just things in my head and they are looking for a place to come out. This was it. This was that place.  So when strangers stopped by I would censor myself and rein it in, afraid of their judgment. Who wants to write under those circumstances?

So I was okay without the crowds. I just don’t know if I’m okay with it all disappearing for good though. I don’t know if I can do that. I think I’ll percolate on it for a while. I’ll just leave it alone. For now. We’ll see where we go from here.