kerouac says

really, i'm tired. and besides, i don't even like beer.


(jerks.)

it had been so long i accidentally posted the belows in the wrong blog. wope. i suppose it doesn't matter, but i'd meant them to be more me than us.

i'd come by to say that sometimes a well-placed pop song can remind your guts that you really do have the thing most worth having. and then it got diluted by the homework of moving the posts, but i'm seeing if i can carry it around for a while. i have, in a sense, so much more than my share.

i'm back, and the monkey is still in kentucky. it's lonely, but also sort of relieving in the way being alone can be when you have too much to do and not enough grace. i'm hungry for things to be "back to normal," and while sleeping in my own bed is a nice part of that, sleeping in it alone isn't quite right. since the good job we thought he had right before leaving didn't work out (not because of his absence; there was some weird miscommunication that led even the very wary monkey to celebrate prematurely), there's no real reason for him to come home when his family can still use his help.

in the meantime, i'm locked in a dead sprint toward the end of the quarter. meh. it'll get done, or it won't. i think things are looking okay.

i keep meaning to write something down about what it was like out there, about how i feel closer-knitted to him that i did before, even though i stopped suspecting that was possible about three years ago. selfishly--so selfishly--i'm grateful that this kind of tragedy befell him first, so that my fear of it, which has always been much greater than his, can be tempered by knowing what it is to have someone un-alone you in the loneliest time of loss. the world has never been so small.

things i do when my husband is gone:

1. eat veggie corndogs for dinner two evenings in a row.

2. sleep flat. i really didn't realize that he makes a BIG dent in the bed, so i'm always sleeping on something of a slant. i woke up this morning feeling amazing. flat!

3. put stuff away without thinking about whether *he* should put it away. and then it stays put away.

4. not enjoy star trek.

5. notice the quiet.

6. wonder when the magic robot will appear to take the garbage and the recycling out.

7. miss him.

he said today, while in kentucky dealing with the impending loss of his dad, that he loves me in a whole new way. i know what he means; as awful as this is--and don't think i don't occasionally feel guilty for being intensely relieved that it is not, at this juncture, my parent who's dying--it's one of the biggest things you help someone through. there's a bond being forged that wasn't there before, as tied up with each other as we are. i'm a little in awe of it.

is it possible that facebook makes me more lonely?

is it true that i would be less lonely if i had friends to take hilariously kooky photos with? or knew better adjectives?

we had such a wonderful weekend, all birthday for the monkey all the time. i took him to a crazy expensive hotel that was running a sunday night special and we lived pretend luxe for about 24 hours. which, honestly, as much as there's stuff i'd like to do and things i'd prefer not to worry about, is right about enough. i felt so relaxed, and we had a few of those sappy, amazing in-love moments that transcend the here and now.


i'm sure the drugs helped.


but still. it was like someone handed me a polaroid of what life would be like if i could let go of my bitter and at least half of my anxiously selfish. (and grab onto a room service champagne cocktail.) i'm not so bad, but this glimpse of what it'd be like to be generous, all the time? as the base coat, as the default setting? gah. it was marvelous. kind of scary-marvelous.

and then we came home, and there was about 24 hours of afterglow until a perfectly natural argument erupted. but it was one of those repeaters, the ones you have over and over again. those are the ones that kill. maybe precisely because they're important and necessary and ineffectual. and while the dilemma and the anxiety were real, the part of me that's still in that two person spa bathtub in manhattan beach with personal chromatherapy controls was all like:

maybe you could just let go.

maybe. i don't know. don't tell anyone.

the year is young, but i have said this to myself many times. and not only about cookies, also about skirting up to make important phone calls and occasionally clean something. we'll see how far i get.

the monkey is off to an audition and there's a little bit of a thorn in my heart that i'm not going with him. so, maybe time to dust off some monologues (bleech). and maybe return my hair to its headshot length. healthier feels better.

PS, world, you win. i am now on the facebook.