Sorry I haven't been around for a while. Especially sorry to my watchers. I deleted a whole bunch of blogs from my watched list the other day, because they simply hadn't written anything in months, and I could definitely understand why people would do the same here when I don't post for a long time.
Nothing's really wrong in my life right now, it's just...ehh. Little irritations, like that stupid ear infection, and the tiredness I've been feeling for the last couple of weeks from lack of sleep, and rotten weather, and not really having a proper regime at the moment. My job at the youth center is...well, not exactly coming to an end, since I'll still be there, but most of the kids are now starting to prepare to go back to school, or looking for jobs, and the few who can afford it are going on holiday, and there isn't all that much for me to do. Come October-November time, they'll all trickle back, but August-September is always the slowest time of year there.
Speaking of holidays, I'm going down to Poole on Thursday, to spend five days at the beach. I'm praying that the weather's nice. Last summer we went down for four days, and it basically rained non-stop. I think we had half a sunny day, and most of the rest of it was spent driving around and freezing in a beach cafe in a sweater. And the summer before THAT wasn't all that great. If that happens again this year, I'm going to be very miserable. I want beach parties and sunbathing and lots of swimming, the way we had a couple years ago. I can smell September in the air, and I'm looking forward to Autumn - it's my favourite time of year - but I really really want my five days of suntans and sand and salt water and the smell of coconut.
I even bought two new dresses, in a show of faith. Strangely enough, they're like nothing I've ever worn before. Both of them are brightly coloured - one with a floral print that's mostly pink and red, but has splashes of yellow and green and purple too, and the other with silk-screened star-flower-thingies and lots of green and purple. Neither of them is harsh or painful to the eyes, though. Despire the brightness, there's something very soft and floaty about them, which I love. They're also both silk, although that was a coincidence - I didn't go looking for silk - and I got them at obscenely good prices in the end-of-summer sales.
I don't usually wear bright colours, at least not all together. In autumn I love clothes that are sort of bright-but-subdued - vibrant colours like cranberry and teal and royal purple and peacock blue, but no mixed colours or patterned clothes. It's very rare for me to wear patterned fabrics, especially bright ones. But these just caught my eye, and they're perfect for a summer evening.
(Of course, ideally they're dinner-in-a-nice-restaurant-in-Menorca or sipping-cocktails-on-a-terrace-in-the-Caribbean dresses, but if Bournemouth and Poole is what I'm getting, then Bournemouth and Poole it shall be.)
The weather didn't bother me last year as much as it could, because the night before we went away last summer was when I gave Oli my cell phone number for the first time, and most of the nights I found myself retiring to my room early (we stay with my mom's friend, who lives in a sort of assisted-living place; they all have their own separate flats and it's open-plan and single-story, so the flats are like little houses, but there's a guest room in the warden's building that anyone can book for a small fee - something like £10 a night - so I'm in a separate building about 100m away from mom and her friend) and texting Oli all night. It was the first time we really flirted, and I was so caught up in it that I sort of ignored the weather to a large extent.
(I also ignored my phone bill. I use pay-as-you-go, and typically get a £10 top-up maybe once every two or three months, since I hardly ever use the phone...but I topped up THREE TIMES in those four days, I was texting him so much.)
But anyway, Oli's not going to be around this time. He's going to Nigeria today with his parents - they might be gone already, actually - and he'll be gone for three weeks. He doesn't seem overly happy about going back, but he won't talk about it - all he says is that it's a miserable place. He seems kind of irritated that I don't get how bad it is, but how the hell can I get it if he won't talk to me? And sometimes I end up saying stupid things, things that I don't realise are stupid at the time - like asking him to send me a postcard - and he either finds it very funny that I'm so ignorant, or he gets even more moody and withdrawn.
(Apparently the postcard thing was funny because I was assuming that they'd have postcards, let alone a working mail service. I didn't find it that funny, personally. I repeat, how the hell am I supposed to know these things? And I thought they *did* have a working mail service. When I send letters and birthday cards to my friend G, he gets them, albeit a bit late. And when he sends letters to me, I get them too. So I don't know what the fuck Oli's on about. But then he has a tendency to exaggerate when he's miserable. I have it too, and so does my mom...I think maybe it's an Aquarian thing.)
But anyway. He's been weird with me recently, and I've been wondering if he's going off me or something, but it's too soon to tell. There are so many things he could be upset about - going to Nigeria, being back at home with his parents, not having any money, not having found a decent job yet, not knowing whether he's going into the army in the autumn (a BIG point of contention between us, and right now the less said the better, IMO ), a couple of health problems he's having (not major stuff, but irritating). Could be any or all of those things. Or actually, it could be none of them - could just be standard mood swings. He has them as much as I do.
I wish he'd talk to me, though.
But the break will probably do us good. I just hope and pray that he comes back safely. I don't know what to believe about Nigeria, honestly - G, who lives there, makes it sound like there are annoyances in day-to-day life (like electricity going out and stuff) but life isn't too bad. Oli makes it sound like you'll immediately get mugged just walking outside your front door. And as much as I've been reading about it, both on the net and in books - because I don't WANT to be another ignorant white person - it's all just either dry academic stuff, with little to no sense of what life is like there, or it's material blatantly promoting the country.
God forgive me, but sometimes I think I should just stick to dating guys who were born and raised in England or America, with no culture to speak of. Too many relationships I've been in have had this culture barrier, where I'm considered the outsider, the interloper, and as much as I try to fit in and learn about the culture and be whatever I'm needed to be, I never quite get it right, never fit in the way I need and want to.
I don't think this always happens. It can't possibly always be like this, or how would people ever date and marry outside their race and culture? I guess a large part of it depends on whether the person you're with is happy or not. I imagine that in a happy family, who love and embrace their own culture as well as people from outside it, I'd fit in fine. I could learn about the way of life, and in time I'd feel like I was part of it - a new part, but a part all the same. But so many of my boyfriends and friends, including Oli, have had this culture-related pain, this sense of misery, and that prevents them from ever sharing it with me. Which puts me in a difficult situation - they don't want to share, want to keep home life and life with me separate, but they become angry or sad when I don't understand things. In a way it feels like they hate - or at least resent - that part of themself, that they want to deny it exists, but at the same time it has such a huge influence on their lives that they can never quite forget their misery.
Which is possibly one of the saddest things I can think of.
Actually, now I think about it, I have had boyfriends who were happy to integrate me. Valentino taught me how to speak Italian. (Badly, but he still taught me.) Paul and Bruno both taught me French cooking. Bobby still teaches me Cajun cooking, and tells me about the rituals that his traiteur mother and grandmother do. Michael - who was white Australian on his father's side, Korean (I think) on his mother's - was always happy to tell me about food and religion and dancing and festivals and music and everything else.
I guess the sad ones are just the ones that stick with me the most.
Anyway...what else? Oh, the wedding. It was beautiful, what else can I say? I don't actually remember it in as fine detail as I wanted to, because the ear infection had me pretty doped up. (The valium worked, btw - I did sleep that night, and once I'd slept it didn't hurt so much. Still hurt, but not as much as when I was sleep-deprived, and then that allowed me to sleep again the next night. God bless prescription drugs, LOL. ) Debbie had the most beautiful dress I'd ever seen, and the really cool thing was that my brother designed the whole thing. If he ever decides he's tired of being a pharmacist, he could probably make a career out of dress designing. There were a couple really classic moments of the day that stick out in my mind. Christie walking down the aisle after her mother, looking all prim and proper in her green silk dress with her little bouquet of flowers, and making it as far as me (in the second row from the front) and then sticking her tongue out at me. I'm just praying that the photographer caught that one on camera. Jamie (Debbie's oldest son, and Christie's brother - he must be 20 now, or coming up) took much of the wedding responsibility on board - organising things, fetching people, etc - and that extended to getting people to dance. The funniest moment for me was when I was standing in the dancing room, just sort of shuffling my feet (dancing is NOT something I do wonderfully) and I obviously didn't look terribly cheerful, so to make me laugh he came up to me and started grinding his butt up against me. For a moment I was totally horrified - I was like, "Jay! You're my nephew!" - but everyone was smiling and laughing, and his girlfriend was practically wetting herself with laughter, so I danced. And I grinded. (Is that a word?)
I love Jay. He's such a character. His younger brother Craig is a lot more introverted, quiet where Jay is lively and chatty, but I love him too. And Christie...I adore her. Even though she drives me crazy half the time. I couldn't have inherited a better bunch of niece and nephews. With their ages what they are, they're more like brothers and sisters. Or at least stepbrothers and sisters.
And the newlyweds? I've never seen them so happy. I've never seen my brother happy like this, period. They can't keep their hands off each other (not in a porno way, perv) - they're constantly touching each other, just little pats on the arm or linked fingers when they're sitting down. And every opportunity they get to speak, they say "my wife and I"; "my husband" and all those things - you can see they're just so thrilled to be able to say that.
Yes, I am very very happy for them.
And I imagine once I start living instead of just existing, I'll be happy for me too. After my holiday I need to make a serious effort to get a better job, one with regular hours, and then I can start planning a schedule. And I also need to think about college, if I'm going to do any courses this year. I'd like to, I always like to, but the finance problems I had last year with the college were never completely sorted, and they may not let me in, which would mean I'd have to go to Hemel or Watford for West Herts College - everything closer is part of Oaklands.
Oh well. I'll think about that in a week or ten days. Until then, I'm off to the beach, and will hopefully return refreshed, happier, and with pretty golden skin.
Hope everyone's well, and enjoy the last couple of days of summer!
Tuesday 26 August 2008
Friday 22 August 2008
The Month From Hell
Now, see, months like this are why I don't want children.
Kids are great. Kids are wonderful. I love seeing Jay, I love taking care of friends' babies, I'd even like to adopt some day. Babies or older kids, I don't know which. Maybe both.
But kids of my own...far too dangerous.
I was watching Private Practice with Mom the other night. (For anyone who doesn't know, that's Addison's spin-off from Grey's Anatomy - Addy moves to LA, joins up with a friend's clinic there. It's a great programme - classic Grey's flavour, but a lot more humour.)
Anyway, much of the storyline in this week's episode focused around a woman with Huntington's Disease in her family line, who wasn't sure whether she wanted to have a baby or not. After she got tested and found she had the gene, she left her husband, but then by the end they got back together and decided to try for a baby. You know how it goes, typical happy ending. (I do like those happy endings, you know.) And Mom and I had very differing opinions on this. I didn't state my opinion, since I knew that was one good way to piss her off, which was something I didn't really want to do right before bed. But anyway, her view was that their choice to try for a baby , despite a 50/50 chance of passing the gene on, and a certainty that the mother was going to die young, was a brave and noble thing to do. Whereas I was sitting there thinking, Woman, are you insane?
I simply cannot fathom why anybody would have a child when they know that there's a 50% chance that that child will have an illness that will cause them to die a horrible, scary, undignified death in their middle age. Some people view this as a show of faith, of hope, but to me it's the ultimate selfish act. If I found that I carried that gene, I'd book myself in for sterilisation right then and there. Some things simply should not be passed on.
The condition that runs in my family isn't as horrible and life-destroying as Huntington's. (Come to think of it, few illnesses are.) But it's definitely something that shapes your life. It's not something that you can escape. And unlike with a lot of genetic conditions, you can't really shrug it off and tell yourself that by the time your kids are grown-up, they'll probably have a cure. There isn't a cure for what we have.
And it's not something that merely increases your chances of getting the symptoms, the way the genes for certain cancers or things like asthma or glaucoma are. I am as certain as I can be without doing genetic testing that this is dominant. I base this on the fact that every woman on my mother's side of my family tree, as far back as I can trace, has had this in some shape or form. Most of the men, too. It doesn't seem to matter whether we marry someone with a similar genetic disposition or not: the children get it. And as far as I can tell, from looking at past relatives and talking to my Ancestors, it gets stronger with each successive generation.
The Ancestors don't agree with me on the no-children front. They tell me it's something my family line have coped with for millennia, and that my children and their children will continue to cope with it, increased strength and all. But dammit, I don't want them to have to. Nobody should have to. TV and books make it look so easy, even pleasant. It's not pleasant or easy. The reality is a life that's never your own. It's being dragged out of bed at all hours of the night for problems you can't do anything about. It's saying goodbye to any personal space. It's machinery that doesn't work, £899 laptops that constantly break down because of electrical interference, being unable to make a cellphone call within your own house because of the static and crossed lines you get. It's frequent headaches, nasty burns on the hand from where someone decided to turn the heat on the cooker up for a practical joke, sprained ankles from where you got tripped while going down the stairs. It's an estrangement from your father, and a boyfriend who left you after a pregnancy scare that occurred because some jackass decided to switch around the contraceptive pills in your medicine dispenser. It's finding soap on your toothbrush and sugar in your shampoo, and it's getting to the gym to find that your gym clothes are missing from your bag, and it's being late to work because all the clocks in your house miraculously got set back an hour. It's friends who accuse you of becoming cold and heartless, and wanting to scream at them and cry because that's not the way it is at all, it's just that you have to close yourself off from a lot of it if you want to survive. Most of all it's never having any peace, never ever being alone, because there's always someone who needs attention.
And that was just this month. Aside from the boyfriend and father bits.
...And I'm just realising that most of you guys will have no idea what I'm talking about here. But that's just the way life goes sometimes.
Krista passed this curse onto my mother. My mother passed it to me. And I am simply not willing to pass it further. I do not want to breed yet another generation of children who will be forced into this...slavery.
This stops here.
Kids are great. Kids are wonderful. I love seeing Jay, I love taking care of friends' babies, I'd even like to adopt some day. Babies or older kids, I don't know which. Maybe both.
But kids of my own...far too dangerous.
I was watching Private Practice with Mom the other night. (For anyone who doesn't know, that's Addison's spin-off from Grey's Anatomy - Addy moves to LA, joins up with a friend's clinic there. It's a great programme - classic Grey's flavour, but a lot more humour.)
Anyway, much of the storyline in this week's episode focused around a woman with Huntington's Disease in her family line, who wasn't sure whether she wanted to have a baby or not. After she got tested and found she had the gene, she left her husband, but then by the end they got back together and decided to try for a baby. You know how it goes, typical happy ending. (I do like those happy endings, you know.) And Mom and I had very differing opinions on this. I didn't state my opinion, since I knew that was one good way to piss her off, which was something I didn't really want to do right before bed. But anyway, her view was that their choice to try for a baby , despite a 50/50 chance of passing the gene on, and a certainty that the mother was going to die young, was a brave and noble thing to do. Whereas I was sitting there thinking, Woman, are you insane?
I simply cannot fathom why anybody would have a child when they know that there's a 50% chance that that child will have an illness that will cause them to die a horrible, scary, undignified death in their middle age. Some people view this as a show of faith, of hope, but to me it's the ultimate selfish act. If I found that I carried that gene, I'd book myself in for sterilisation right then and there. Some things simply should not be passed on.
The condition that runs in my family isn't as horrible and life-destroying as Huntington's. (Come to think of it, few illnesses are.) But it's definitely something that shapes your life. It's not something that you can escape. And unlike with a lot of genetic conditions, you can't really shrug it off and tell yourself that by the time your kids are grown-up, they'll probably have a cure. There isn't a cure for what we have.
And it's not something that merely increases your chances of getting the symptoms, the way the genes for certain cancers or things like asthma or glaucoma are. I am as certain as I can be without doing genetic testing that this is dominant. I base this on the fact that every woman on my mother's side of my family tree, as far back as I can trace, has had this in some shape or form. Most of the men, too. It doesn't seem to matter whether we marry someone with a similar genetic disposition or not: the children get it. And as far as I can tell, from looking at past relatives and talking to my Ancestors, it gets stronger with each successive generation.
The Ancestors don't agree with me on the no-children front. They tell me it's something my family line have coped with for millennia, and that my children and their children will continue to cope with it, increased strength and all. But dammit, I don't want them to have to. Nobody should have to. TV and books make it look so easy, even pleasant. It's not pleasant or easy. The reality is a life that's never your own. It's being dragged out of bed at all hours of the night for problems you can't do anything about. It's saying goodbye to any personal space. It's machinery that doesn't work, £899 laptops that constantly break down because of electrical interference, being unable to make a cellphone call within your own house because of the static and crossed lines you get. It's frequent headaches, nasty burns on the hand from where someone decided to turn the heat on the cooker up for a practical joke, sprained ankles from where you got tripped while going down the stairs. It's an estrangement from your father, and a boyfriend who left you after a pregnancy scare that occurred because some jackass decided to switch around the contraceptive pills in your medicine dispenser. It's finding soap on your toothbrush and sugar in your shampoo, and it's getting to the gym to find that your gym clothes are missing from your bag, and it's being late to work because all the clocks in your house miraculously got set back an hour. It's friends who accuse you of becoming cold and heartless, and wanting to scream at them and cry because that's not the way it is at all, it's just that you have to close yourself off from a lot of it if you want to survive. Most of all it's never having any peace, never ever being alone, because there's always someone who needs attention.
And that was just this month. Aside from the boyfriend and father bits.
...And I'm just realising that most of you guys will have no idea what I'm talking about here. But that's just the way life goes sometimes.
Krista passed this curse onto my mother. My mother passed it to me. And I am simply not willing to pass it further. I do not want to breed yet another generation of children who will be forced into this...slavery.
This stops here.
Sunday 17 August 2008
If It Ain't One Thing...
...it's another, no?
My brother's wedding was today. A lovely day, except that I have an ear infection. A really nasty ear infection. I get them like clockwork every August (I don't know if it's the heat or bugs or what...they come even when I don't swim) but this is the worst one I can remember having, and that includes the time I picked up pseudomonas in Greece. Doc started me on eardrops yesterday, but it seems to be getting worse. I'm hoping and praying I don't have to call out the emergency doctor tomorrow, since they're a nightmare to find on a Sunday.
I'd like to tell you about the wedding, but the pain (it's quite excruciating, really, and most pain I can usually deal with) has kept me up the last two nights, I've had 4 hours sleep in the last 64, and tonight - against my better judgement - I've actually doped myself up with the valium that Dr. Williams gave me a couple of years ago for PTSD, just to get some shut-eye. And if this doesn't work, I'm either going to go completely nuts, or call the out-of-hours service tomorrow and beg for painkillers and different antibiotics.
*sigh* Whatever problems I have, they always seem to come in clusters. In church today the vicar was saying something about how God never gives you more than you can handle, but sometimes I think he - or the universe, or who / whatever - is enjoying pushing me right to the limit.
My brother's wedding was today. A lovely day, except that I have an ear infection. A really nasty ear infection. I get them like clockwork every August (I don't know if it's the heat or bugs or what...they come even when I don't swim) but this is the worst one I can remember having, and that includes the time I picked up pseudomonas in Greece. Doc started me on eardrops yesterday, but it seems to be getting worse. I'm hoping and praying I don't have to call out the emergency doctor tomorrow, since they're a nightmare to find on a Sunday.
I'd like to tell you about the wedding, but the pain (it's quite excruciating, really, and most pain I can usually deal with) has kept me up the last two nights, I've had 4 hours sleep in the last 64, and tonight - against my better judgement - I've actually doped myself up with the valium that Dr. Williams gave me a couple of years ago for PTSD, just to get some shut-eye. And if this doesn't work, I'm either going to go completely nuts, or call the out-of-hours service tomorrow and beg for painkillers and different antibiotics.
*sigh* Whatever problems I have, they always seem to come in clusters. In church today the vicar was saying something about how God never gives you more than you can handle, but sometimes I think he - or the universe, or who / whatever - is enjoying pushing me right to the limit.
Friday 15 August 2008
Growing Up
I am somewhat happier today, although still thoughtful.
Oli came to visit on Tuesday, and most of it was great, although I found out that he's actually lying to his parents when he comes to visit me, so they don't give him grief. He swears that their disapproval wouldn't be anything to do with me being white, that they'd disapprove of him having a girlfriend (especially one who he sleeps with) whoever she was. I'm not sure if I'm convinced, but I suppose it's pretty moot anyway. I don't much like the lying, but since I don't have a better alternative, I guess we'll stick with it. The only ones I can think of are either to not see each other (or at least not sleep together) anymore, or to come clean with his folks and run the risk of having them forbid him from seeing me, in which case either he'd obey them and we'd split up, or he'd disobey and it would drive a rift between them. I wouldn't like to take bets on which it would be, either. Oli loves his parents, and is generally obedient, but he's also older than Richard was, and knows his own mind, and might well come down on my side.
But as I said, it's irrelevant, because neither of those two scenarios is something I'm willing to risk happening, so for now we stick with the "I'm in _____, Ma, just seeing friends" instead of telling the truth.
Some of the time this pisses me off, but mostly I'm OK with it.
The Richard-stuff screwed me up, admittedly. But it's also that fibromyalgia basically decimated my teenage years. So in some ways, I'm a teenager now. Still living with mom, still working teenage-type jobs, still perpetually broke (heh). And I sometimes get so caught up in my teen angst that I forget that I'm not a teenager anymore, I'm a fully grown woman, and I'm perfectly capable of making my own way in the world. Parents should not faze me one bit. And Oli's an adult now too, albeit one who's moved home for a while now that uni is over.
And I'd do well to remember that.
Oli came to visit on Tuesday, and most of it was great, although I found out that he's actually lying to his parents when he comes to visit me, so they don't give him grief. He swears that their disapproval wouldn't be anything to do with me being white, that they'd disapprove of him having a girlfriend (especially one who he sleeps with) whoever she was. I'm not sure if I'm convinced, but I suppose it's pretty moot anyway. I don't much like the lying, but since I don't have a better alternative, I guess we'll stick with it. The only ones I can think of are either to not see each other (or at least not sleep together) anymore, or to come clean with his folks and run the risk of having them forbid him from seeing me, in which case either he'd obey them and we'd split up, or he'd disobey and it would drive a rift between them. I wouldn't like to take bets on which it would be, either. Oli loves his parents, and is generally obedient, but he's also older than Richard was, and knows his own mind, and might well come down on my side.
But as I said, it's irrelevant, because neither of those two scenarios is something I'm willing to risk happening, so for now we stick with the "I'm in _____, Ma, just seeing friends" instead of telling the truth.
Some of the time this pisses me off, but mostly I'm OK with it.
The Richard-stuff screwed me up, admittedly. But it's also that fibromyalgia basically decimated my teenage years. So in some ways, I'm a teenager now. Still living with mom, still working teenage-type jobs, still perpetually broke (heh). And I sometimes get so caught up in my teen angst that I forget that I'm not a teenager anymore, I'm a fully grown woman, and I'm perfectly capable of making my own way in the world. Parents should not faze me one bit. And Oli's an adult now too, albeit one who's moved home for a while now that uni is over.
And I'd do well to remember that.
Tuesday 12 August 2008
My Demons
I'm not honestly sure how things are right now.
After Oli's visit the day before yesterday, I went to bed and slept for fourteen hours. I typically sleep for five or six hours a night, with maybe another two or three in the evening when I nap (if I'm lucky) so for me, that's huge. I woke up yesterday with a sleep-and-sex-hangover and basically muddled through the day with a goofy look on my face, smiling every time I felt the sore muscles in my thighs (and between them) or glanced in a mirror and got a glimpse of the bruises on the left side of my neck from where he sucked and bit me. I went to the garden center with Mom to find a rose for the soon-to-be newlyweds. I stopped in at the gym, only to find that my body wouldn't obey any of my commands, and even the stretches that I always start off with were difficult. I ended up stretching, doing about 15 minutes of cardio stuff (pathetic - my every-other-day workouts have now morphed into 20-30 minutes stretching, then 45 mins - 1 hr weights, then 30 mins cardio, maybe more) after which I gave up and went to sit in the sauna and steam room for a half hour before showering and heading home to bed. I took a bath, since I got caught in the rain between showering at the gym and getting home. I read some Mills & Boon. I slept for a couple of hours.
All in all, it was one of the laziest days I've had in a long time. But not lazy in an, "Oh, I'll curl up in bed and take a day off to read and be comfy all day" way. It was simply that my body and brain refused to work for me. The brain fog I'm used to some days, but I don't usually get the body and brain stuff together. Even walking was like I was trying to move through treacle.
(Thankfully, today was a lot better - but more about that in a while.)
Then I talked to Oli last night. And I honestly don't know what went wrong. He's the sweetest guy, and I know he would never in a million years say or do something to hurt me deliberately. But even with that knowledge, sometimes he says something that should be totally innocuous and I just take it the wrong way, and totally overreact, and it pulls me down into this state of misery. Last night it was about finding out that now he's back at his parents' place, he's not able to come and go as he pleases. Naive as I am, I figured he'd be able to come visit whenever he wanted, and stay over if he wanted, without having to answer to anyone. Turns out that he CAN stay over, but he has to give them advance notice. And since he's just got back, he doesn't really want to rock the boat at the moment by staying at a girl's house.
And I should understand that, I really should. The logical part of me does. I understand that not all families are alike - hell, I've lived it. (At my mom's, I bring guys home all the time, or stay at friends' houses whenever I want. At my Dad's, I'd never dream of doing such a thing.) And I understand that there's a culture difference, and things that seem normal to people born and raised in Britain aren't always acceptable to people born and raised in other countries - Nigeria, in Oli's case. (Actually, my mother is more permissive than even the average British or American parent.)
I should just shrug and accept this, because I know there's nothing to be gained by being upset about it. And really, it's not a huge crisis. It shouldn't be, anyway. There is no logical reason for me to feel the way I'm feeling.
Which is basically miserable. Self-pitying. Not good enough.
I know what I'm doing, of course. The practical part of my brain that I'm always able to set above the rest of me to keep an unbiased, objective eye on my behaviour, realises that what I'm doing is shoving all my Richard-issues onto my relationship with Oli.
Richard was my Ghanaian boyfriend when I was 17-18. He started off as my mother's lodger, and a couple of months after he moved in we became a couple. We had problems to start with - too young, too inexperienced, neither of us good at communication, he was a typical over-sensitive Virgo and I'm a typical cold and sometimes thoughtless Aquarian, plus when I met him I had a thing for my friend Curt from college - but after a year of screw-ups and arguments and apologies (as well as friendship, love and incredible sex) everything had gotten a lot better. Things had settled down, and we were happy - at least I thought we were. I was no longer thinking about Curt, he was no longer thinking about the girlfriend who cheated on him right before we got together. We loved each other, and we were getting better at the communication. I was learning to think before I spoke, and he was learning not to take everything personally. He had finished college and needed to stay in the UK, and we (or I, at least) thought that we wanted to build a life together. So we decided to get married.
And then his mother came to visit. And it all went to hell.
I never actually got to meet his mother - the day she came to meet us, I was in Bristol, celebrating my best friend's 21st. But when I came home, Richard was different. More quiet. More sad than usual. When we sat and watched TV, he'd hold me so tight I sometimes couldn't breathe, and when he kissed me there was a sort of desperation in it. He spent every night for a couple of weeks in my bed, under the pretext that it was cooler in my room (it was an incredibly hot July and August, 35-40 degrees in the daytime and not much cooler at night) even though previously he'd only shared my bed at night on occasion, since he was paying for his own room. And when we made love, he'd hold onto me afterwards, refusing to let me go, burying his face in my neck and wrapping his arms tight around me, instead of rolling over onto his side and letting me spoon him the way we usually did.
He never told me what was wrong. I thought it was just his normal depression, which was something he'd struggled with since his father died a couple years previously. He'd been mostly better for a couple of months, since we'd worked things out, but I figured it was coming back, the way depression does. He'd lost his job recently, so I thought that could have been the trigger. And then one day, he just left. Told me he had to move in with his uncle in London in order to find a job, but he'd be back to see me in a couple of days, and that we'd work things out. And he never came back.
That's when I started getting the phone calls. Hang-up calls, but not the type where the person hangs up immediately. Nor were they pervy breathing calls. The caller just called, and then never said anything. If Mom answered, they hung up pretty much straight away. If I answered, they sat there, listening but not saying a word. I'd hear them breathe (not in a panting, perverted way), and eventually I figured out who I thought it was, and started talking to him. I'd sit there, talking about my day or my life in general or basically anything I could think of, to a person who never introduced themselves or said one word. Sometimes he'd call twice a day, every day, for a couple of weeks, and other times it wouldn't happen for a month. Sometimes I'd talk for only a minute or two before he hung up, and other times it would be a half hour and I'd just keep on rambling about the dream I had, the donut I ate for breakfast, the three-legged dog I saw when I was walking to the mailbox, the yellow Ferrari that was parked at my neighbor's house. Random, everyday things. It never seemed to matter what I said, really, as long as I kept talking.
Mostly the calls would come between lunchtime and dinnertime, although sometimes they'd be later in the evening. And very occasionally, I'd get them late at night, and when I picked up I'd hear someone crying on the other end, never saying a word, just breathing hard and making that noise a man makes when he's sobbing and trying not to show it. Those were the calls that really broke my heart.
I thought about changing my number, but in the end I couldn't go through with it.
Richard left me in August 2003. Five full years he's been gone now, and I still get the calls now and then, although they don't come often anymore. Mostly I don't get them for five or six months, and then I'll get a cluster of them, every day for maybe two weeks, and then nothing again for months and months.
I never had any proof it was him, but I know, in the way you sometimes just know things, deep inside.
Most of the time I don't think about him much. I can't, because I have to move on with my life, and if there were any way he could come and get me, he'd have done it already. I know that it isn't going to happen. But when I get the calls, I get this mixture of sadness and rage. 80% of me wants to curl up in bed and cry, both for me and for him, but 20% of me wants to hunt down his mother and smack her for what she did to us. For what she's done to him, really. Because I eventually found out, that was what went wrong that weekend I was away. As a host family for her son, she liked us a whole lot, and she thought it was wonderful that we were taking such good care of him. But as a girlfriend and prospective wife, I was Not Suitable. She didn't even have to meet me to make that choice. I was too young. Too western and liberated. Too English.
Too white.
And good Ghanaian Christian boy that he is, he would never disobey his mother over something like that. So he spent that last month with me, wrung every bit of time and love out of it that he could, and then left. No explanation, because he knew there was nothing he could have told me that wouldn't have hurt me. I guess he figured it would hurt less if he didn't tell me the truth.
Most of the time I've moved on from this. It's Richard I hurt for, because he's the one who has to live with it all the time. Me, I have a pretty happy life most of the time. I've had plenty of dates, a handful of boyfriends, and now I have Oli - who's like the sun to me.
But clearly I bear my own scars from it, ones that I didn't really know about and are just coming out now. Now I have another love, a best friend rather than a boyfriend and fiancee, but a love all the time. And he's from a similar culture - Ghana and Nigeria are pretty close on the map, and Ghanaians and Nigerians, though they don't always get along, are very similar in a lot of ways - and here I am, projecting all my Richard-issues onto Oli, letting a stupid thing like him needing to keep his parents informed of his plans, get me down. Because I'm terrified that the same thing's going to happen again. That Mom and Dad are going to rail against the idea of their son being with a white English girl.
I have no real reason, aside from my paranoia, to think this would happen. Richard's Mom lived in Ghana, and rarely came to visit. Not to mention the fact that she was upper-class and close-minded the way the upper classes (of any country) often are. Oli's parents, on the other hand, have lived in England for years. And even if they hadn't, I would still have no real reason to think they would react the same way. One person is not the same as another. One person does not think the same as another. Assuming that they will, purely because they come from similar parts of the world, is totally illogical, not to mention more than a little offensive to them.
But the terror is still there, and with it the overreaction and the tendency towards bitchiness, the way I always am when I feel under attack. I have to keep reminding myself to be nice, to not throw little barbs at him, because the last thing I want to do is make him hurt or worry. Because I can't tell him about this. If I did, he'd feel bad. Likely he'd feel guilty, when he hasn't even done anything wrong. None of this is his fault, it's all me.
So I'm managing to be nice, most of the time, and pretend like nothing's wrong. But he knows me. He knows my speech patterns, the way I know his. We're just that close, just that attuned to each other. He knows something is up with me. So far I've managed to pass it off as PMS and preoccupation with my computer viruses.
I know in a few days I'll feel better. He's only been back for a few days, for pete's sake. Things will improve, and we'll settle into a routine, and my insecurities will put their fangs away and just settle into the background and eventually disappear. Actually, despite this depressing entry, I feel a lot better tonight than I did last night. I had a great workout at the gym - so much better than yesterday, it's not even possible to compare the two. I'm finally settling into the crosstrainer, managing to spend 5 minutes jogging on it without having to take a break, and I've pushed my time on the treadmill and bike up to 10 minutes each, with no breaks. And it actually feels good. Or at least it did today.
It's just hard not to have him here. I've only seen him once since he got back to London, and already I crave him all the time. But I doubt that I'll get to see him this week. Today he went to the British Museum with his sister. Tomorrow and Friday are the only days my mom gets off work, and we have to do last-minute wedding preparations. Wednesday Oli's going back up to Liverpool to collect the rest of his stuff from his room there and bring it home, and Thursday he'll probably be tired from the long trip, even assuming that he doesn't stay up there until Thursday. And Saturday is the wedding, and Sunday will be recovery day. Maybe he can come on Sunday, and we can nap together. He promised he'd teach me how to play chess next time he visits.
But man...I wish he were here now. My bed feels so cold and empty without him.
After Oli's visit the day before yesterday, I went to bed and slept for fourteen hours. I typically sleep for five or six hours a night, with maybe another two or three in the evening when I nap (if I'm lucky) so for me, that's huge. I woke up yesterday with a sleep-and-sex-hangover and basically muddled through the day with a goofy look on my face, smiling every time I felt the sore muscles in my thighs (and between them) or glanced in a mirror and got a glimpse of the bruises on the left side of my neck from where he sucked and bit me. I went to the garden center with Mom to find a rose for the soon-to-be newlyweds. I stopped in at the gym, only to find that my body wouldn't obey any of my commands, and even the stretches that I always start off with were difficult. I ended up stretching, doing about 15 minutes of cardio stuff (pathetic - my every-other-day workouts have now morphed into 20-30 minutes stretching, then 45 mins - 1 hr weights, then 30 mins cardio, maybe more) after which I gave up and went to sit in the sauna and steam room for a half hour before showering and heading home to bed. I took a bath, since I got caught in the rain between showering at the gym and getting home. I read some Mills & Boon. I slept for a couple of hours.
All in all, it was one of the laziest days I've had in a long time. But not lazy in an, "Oh, I'll curl up in bed and take a day off to read and be comfy all day" way. It was simply that my body and brain refused to work for me. The brain fog I'm used to some days, but I don't usually get the body and brain stuff together. Even walking was like I was trying to move through treacle.
(Thankfully, today was a lot better - but more about that in a while.)
Then I talked to Oli last night. And I honestly don't know what went wrong. He's the sweetest guy, and I know he would never in a million years say or do something to hurt me deliberately. But even with that knowledge, sometimes he says something that should be totally innocuous and I just take it the wrong way, and totally overreact, and it pulls me down into this state of misery. Last night it was about finding out that now he's back at his parents' place, he's not able to come and go as he pleases. Naive as I am, I figured he'd be able to come visit whenever he wanted, and stay over if he wanted, without having to answer to anyone. Turns out that he CAN stay over, but he has to give them advance notice. And since he's just got back, he doesn't really want to rock the boat at the moment by staying at a girl's house.
And I should understand that, I really should. The logical part of me does. I understand that not all families are alike - hell, I've lived it. (At my mom's, I bring guys home all the time, or stay at friends' houses whenever I want. At my Dad's, I'd never dream of doing such a thing.) And I understand that there's a culture difference, and things that seem normal to people born and raised in Britain aren't always acceptable to people born and raised in other countries - Nigeria, in Oli's case. (Actually, my mother is more permissive than even the average British or American parent.)
I should just shrug and accept this, because I know there's nothing to be gained by being upset about it. And really, it's not a huge crisis. It shouldn't be, anyway. There is no logical reason for me to feel the way I'm feeling.
Which is basically miserable. Self-pitying. Not good enough.
I know what I'm doing, of course. The practical part of my brain that I'm always able to set above the rest of me to keep an unbiased, objective eye on my behaviour, realises that what I'm doing is shoving all my Richard-issues onto my relationship with Oli.
Richard was my Ghanaian boyfriend when I was 17-18. He started off as my mother's lodger, and a couple of months after he moved in we became a couple. We had problems to start with - too young, too inexperienced, neither of us good at communication, he was a typical over-sensitive Virgo and I'm a typical cold and sometimes thoughtless Aquarian, plus when I met him I had a thing for my friend Curt from college - but after a year of screw-ups and arguments and apologies (as well as friendship, love and incredible sex) everything had gotten a lot better. Things had settled down, and we were happy - at least I thought we were. I was no longer thinking about Curt, he was no longer thinking about the girlfriend who cheated on him right before we got together. We loved each other, and we were getting better at the communication. I was learning to think before I spoke, and he was learning not to take everything personally. He had finished college and needed to stay in the UK, and we (or I, at least) thought that we wanted to build a life together. So we decided to get married.
And then his mother came to visit. And it all went to hell.
I never actually got to meet his mother - the day she came to meet us, I was in Bristol, celebrating my best friend's 21st. But when I came home, Richard was different. More quiet. More sad than usual. When we sat and watched TV, he'd hold me so tight I sometimes couldn't breathe, and when he kissed me there was a sort of desperation in it. He spent every night for a couple of weeks in my bed, under the pretext that it was cooler in my room (it was an incredibly hot July and August, 35-40 degrees in the daytime and not much cooler at night) even though previously he'd only shared my bed at night on occasion, since he was paying for his own room. And when we made love, he'd hold onto me afterwards, refusing to let me go, burying his face in my neck and wrapping his arms tight around me, instead of rolling over onto his side and letting me spoon him the way we usually did.
He never told me what was wrong. I thought it was just his normal depression, which was something he'd struggled with since his father died a couple years previously. He'd been mostly better for a couple of months, since we'd worked things out, but I figured it was coming back, the way depression does. He'd lost his job recently, so I thought that could have been the trigger. And then one day, he just left. Told me he had to move in with his uncle in London in order to find a job, but he'd be back to see me in a couple of days, and that we'd work things out. And he never came back.
That's when I started getting the phone calls. Hang-up calls, but not the type where the person hangs up immediately. Nor were they pervy breathing calls. The caller just called, and then never said anything. If Mom answered, they hung up pretty much straight away. If I answered, they sat there, listening but not saying a word. I'd hear them breathe (not in a panting, perverted way), and eventually I figured out who I thought it was, and started talking to him. I'd sit there, talking about my day or my life in general or basically anything I could think of, to a person who never introduced themselves or said one word. Sometimes he'd call twice a day, every day, for a couple of weeks, and other times it wouldn't happen for a month. Sometimes I'd talk for only a minute or two before he hung up, and other times it would be a half hour and I'd just keep on rambling about the dream I had, the donut I ate for breakfast, the three-legged dog I saw when I was walking to the mailbox, the yellow Ferrari that was parked at my neighbor's house. Random, everyday things. It never seemed to matter what I said, really, as long as I kept talking.
Mostly the calls would come between lunchtime and dinnertime, although sometimes they'd be later in the evening. And very occasionally, I'd get them late at night, and when I picked up I'd hear someone crying on the other end, never saying a word, just breathing hard and making that noise a man makes when he's sobbing and trying not to show it. Those were the calls that really broke my heart.
I thought about changing my number, but in the end I couldn't go through with it.
Richard left me in August 2003. Five full years he's been gone now, and I still get the calls now and then, although they don't come often anymore. Mostly I don't get them for five or six months, and then I'll get a cluster of them, every day for maybe two weeks, and then nothing again for months and months.
I never had any proof it was him, but I know, in the way you sometimes just know things, deep inside.
Most of the time I don't think about him much. I can't, because I have to move on with my life, and if there were any way he could come and get me, he'd have done it already. I know that it isn't going to happen. But when I get the calls, I get this mixture of sadness and rage. 80% of me wants to curl up in bed and cry, both for me and for him, but 20% of me wants to hunt down his mother and smack her for what she did to us. For what she's done to him, really. Because I eventually found out, that was what went wrong that weekend I was away. As a host family for her son, she liked us a whole lot, and she thought it was wonderful that we were taking such good care of him. But as a girlfriend and prospective wife, I was Not Suitable. She didn't even have to meet me to make that choice. I was too young. Too western and liberated. Too English.
Too white.
And good Ghanaian Christian boy that he is, he would never disobey his mother over something like that. So he spent that last month with me, wrung every bit of time and love out of it that he could, and then left. No explanation, because he knew there was nothing he could have told me that wouldn't have hurt me. I guess he figured it would hurt less if he didn't tell me the truth.
Most of the time I've moved on from this. It's Richard I hurt for, because he's the one who has to live with it all the time. Me, I have a pretty happy life most of the time. I've had plenty of dates, a handful of boyfriends, and now I have Oli - who's like the sun to me.
But clearly I bear my own scars from it, ones that I didn't really know about and are just coming out now. Now I have another love, a best friend rather than a boyfriend and fiancee, but a love all the time. And he's from a similar culture - Ghana and Nigeria are pretty close on the map, and Ghanaians and Nigerians, though they don't always get along, are very similar in a lot of ways - and here I am, projecting all my Richard-issues onto Oli, letting a stupid thing like him needing to keep his parents informed of his plans, get me down. Because I'm terrified that the same thing's going to happen again. That Mom and Dad are going to rail against the idea of their son being with a white English girl.
I have no real reason, aside from my paranoia, to think this would happen. Richard's Mom lived in Ghana, and rarely came to visit. Not to mention the fact that she was upper-class and close-minded the way the upper classes (of any country) often are. Oli's parents, on the other hand, have lived in England for years. And even if they hadn't, I would still have no real reason to think they would react the same way. One person is not the same as another. One person does not think the same as another. Assuming that they will, purely because they come from similar parts of the world, is totally illogical, not to mention more than a little offensive to them.
But the terror is still there, and with it the overreaction and the tendency towards bitchiness, the way I always am when I feel under attack. I have to keep reminding myself to be nice, to not throw little barbs at him, because the last thing I want to do is make him hurt or worry. Because I can't tell him about this. If I did, he'd feel bad. Likely he'd feel guilty, when he hasn't even done anything wrong. None of this is his fault, it's all me.
So I'm managing to be nice, most of the time, and pretend like nothing's wrong. But he knows me. He knows my speech patterns, the way I know his. We're just that close, just that attuned to each other. He knows something is up with me. So far I've managed to pass it off as PMS and preoccupation with my computer viruses.
I know in a few days I'll feel better. He's only been back for a few days, for pete's sake. Things will improve, and we'll settle into a routine, and my insecurities will put their fangs away and just settle into the background and eventually disappear. Actually, despite this depressing entry, I feel a lot better tonight than I did last night. I had a great workout at the gym - so much better than yesterday, it's not even possible to compare the two. I'm finally settling into the crosstrainer, managing to spend 5 minutes jogging on it without having to take a break, and I've pushed my time on the treadmill and bike up to 10 minutes each, with no breaks. And it actually feels good. Or at least it did today.
It's just hard not to have him here. I've only seen him once since he got back to London, and already I crave him all the time. But I doubt that I'll get to see him this week. Today he went to the British Museum with his sister. Tomorrow and Friday are the only days my mom gets off work, and we have to do last-minute wedding preparations. Wednesday Oli's going back up to Liverpool to collect the rest of his stuff from his room there and bring it home, and Thursday he'll probably be tired from the long trip, even assuming that he doesn't stay up there until Thursday. And Saturday is the wedding, and Sunday will be recovery day. Maybe he can come on Sunday, and we can nap together. He promised he'd teach me how to play chess next time he visits.
But man...I wish he were here now. My bed feels so cold and empty without him.
Sunday 10 August 2008
Oli
WARNING: This post contains sexual references.
If you're wondering what that glazed over expression on my face is, I got well and truly fucked today.
And possibly made love to, too. Hard to say. Most likely it was a bit of both.
(This is a pretty big event for me, since it's the first time in months that didn't involve my hand and something battery-operated.)
I don't really know what to say, honestly. My brain isn't functioning properly tonight. I'm very tired. After battling rogue antivirus software all night, I then got four hours of sleep, then got up at 12 noon and cleaned my room in preparation for Oli's visit. (Although I've known him for a year and a half now, he's never seen my house, since he's been away at uni.) After cleaning I headed to John Lewis, got rained on, decided on a mirror and some napkin rings for the wedding present, got rained on again, came home and bathed, and then Oli came over. And...well, this is where you came in.
Some people say that great sex plus friendship equals love, and others say that love is so much more. I'm not sure which camp I fall into. I suppose it's a moot point really, since whichever it is, I know I love Oli. I don't know if I'm *in love* with him, but I know I love him. I know that I light up when I see him, and he does the same. I know that I trust him in a way I don't trust anyone else in the world. I know that I can lie there with my boobs hanging out and my stomach all flabby and not feel particularly self-conscious, and that he'll tell me I'm beautiful and I'll believe him. More than believe him, actually - I'll feel beautiful.
I also know that I'd rather sit and watch boring TV with Oli than have incredible orgasmic sex with anyone else. Of course, incredible orgasmic sex with Oli would be my first choice.
So why are we not together, you ask? I don't know, really. The reasons are becoming less and less clear to me as time goes by. Maybe we will be one day, or maybe we're just better off as best friends who sleep together.
Whatever. I'm very happy right now. Oh sure, part of it is that goofy-happy you get from sex hangover, but a lot of it is also just from seeing him, hearing his voice say my name, holding his face between my hands and running my thumbs over his cheeks and lips and kissing his nose.
I'm also very sleepy. I was hungry and sleepy, but I ate an obscenely large Indian takeaway (I can see I'll have to work out for several hours tomorrow at the gym, but it was worth it) and now I'm just sleepy. Well, happy too.
So I'm going to go bed. *tired smile* Alone tonight, but I can still feel his presence here.
If you're wondering what that glazed over expression on my face is, I got well and truly fucked today.
And possibly made love to, too. Hard to say. Most likely it was a bit of both.
(This is a pretty big event for me, since it's the first time in months that didn't involve my hand and something battery-operated.)
I don't really know what to say, honestly. My brain isn't functioning properly tonight. I'm very tired. After battling rogue antivirus software all night, I then got four hours of sleep, then got up at 12 noon and cleaned my room in preparation for Oli's visit. (Although I've known him for a year and a half now, he's never seen my house, since he's been away at uni.) After cleaning I headed to John Lewis, got rained on, decided on a mirror and some napkin rings for the wedding present, got rained on again, came home and bathed, and then Oli came over. And...well, this is where you came in.
Some people say that great sex plus friendship equals love, and others say that love is so much more. I'm not sure which camp I fall into. I suppose it's a moot point really, since whichever it is, I know I love Oli. I don't know if I'm *in love* with him, but I know I love him. I know that I light up when I see him, and he does the same. I know that I trust him in a way I don't trust anyone else in the world. I know that I can lie there with my boobs hanging out and my stomach all flabby and not feel particularly self-conscious, and that he'll tell me I'm beautiful and I'll believe him. More than believe him, actually - I'll feel beautiful.
I also know that I'd rather sit and watch boring TV with Oli than have incredible orgasmic sex with anyone else. Of course, incredible orgasmic sex with Oli would be my first choice.
So why are we not together, you ask? I don't know, really. The reasons are becoming less and less clear to me as time goes by. Maybe we will be one day, or maybe we're just better off as best friends who sleep together.
Whatever. I'm very happy right now. Oh sure, part of it is that goofy-happy you get from sex hangover, but a lot of it is also just from seeing him, hearing his voice say my name, holding his face between my hands and running my thumbs over his cheeks and lips and kissing his nose.
I'm also very sleepy. I was hungry and sleepy, but I ate an obscenely large Indian takeaway (I can see I'll have to work out for several hours tomorrow at the gym, but it was worth it) and now I'm just sleepy. Well, happy too.
So I'm going to go bed. *tired smile* Alone tonight, but I can still feel his presence here.
Saturday 9 August 2008
Meh
OK, just a quick note -
I have a really nasty computer virus that I can't seem to get rid of, so I have to call in the techie guys (again) this weekend if they're working, and on Monday if they're not. Usually I can get rid of these things myself, and I've managed to kill off about half of this one, but parts of it are hiding very well (and it has to be really good to hide from me, LOL - like John Taylor, I find things. It's what I do.) I don't know if it can be passed onto anyone through msn conversations, so I'm staying offline for now, so apologies for my lack of appearance.
Thank god I didn't cancel the computer insurance, eh?
Hope everyone's well, and with any luck I'll be back on track in a few days.
*hugs* xx
______________________________
Oh, and before I forget, I managed to answer some of those additional questions on your profile that most people never seem to get round to filling in. Go read if you like - New Questions!
______________________________
UPDATED at 7.38 am:
Touch wood, I think I might have just about killed it. And it only took me all night. *yawns*
Oli's coming over later (he's back in London now - did I mention that? Yay!) and before that I have to go to John Lewis to look for a wedding present, so I'm now going to grab the two or three hours sleep that I can, and just keep hoping and praying that the computer stays fixed.
I have a really nasty computer virus that I can't seem to get rid of, so I have to call in the techie guys (again) this weekend if they're working, and on Monday if they're not. Usually I can get rid of these things myself, and I've managed to kill off about half of this one, but parts of it are hiding very well (and it has to be really good to hide from me, LOL - like John Taylor, I find things. It's what I do.) I don't know if it can be passed onto anyone through msn conversations, so I'm staying offline for now, so apologies for my lack of appearance.
Thank god I didn't cancel the computer insurance, eh?
Hope everyone's well, and with any luck I'll be back on track in a few days.
*hugs* xx
Oh, and before I forget, I managed to answer some of those additional questions on your profile that most people never seem to get round to filling in. Go read if you like - New Questions!
UPDATED at 7.38 am:
Touch wood, I think I might have just about killed it. And it only took me all night. *yawns*
Oli's coming over later (he's back in London now - did I mention that? Yay!) and before that I have to go to John Lewis to look for a wedding present, so I'm now going to grab the two or three hours sleep that I can, and just keep hoping and praying that the computer stays fixed.
Wednesday 6 August 2008
Why I Am Not Asleep
I don't seem to be sleeping well recently. This isn't an entirely new thing, I've had sleep problems for years, but it's especially irritating now because for the last couple months I've actually been really good about sleeping decent hours. I had even been turning my light off at night, which is something I hadn't done in years. (Don't ask. Really.) And now it feels like I'm back to square one - exhausted all day, then wired all night. And forcing myself out of bed in the mornings doesn't even seem to help: I either pass into unconsciousness in the afternoon as soon as I sit down, or I stay awake all day, fall asleep as soon as my head hits the pillow that night, and then return to my screwed-up schedule the next day.
If I were still working from home all the time it would be fine, but I have more going-out jobs to do right now, both with the youth group and the modelling I'm picking up with Kell for extra money (not that it's making much difference to my bank account - I've basically accepted that I'm going to have to live off my overdraft until after the wedding is over, at which point I can slowly start building up my savings again), and I have the gym and various other daytime stuff that needs doing, and I really really need to get back onto a decent schedule again asap.
*sigh*
I've been fighting with a sleep disorder since a couple years after the fibromyalgia was diagnosed. Apparently quite a few FM sufferers have this particular disorder, although a lot of doctors deny it exists. Among those who do believe in it, it's generally known as the Alpha-EEG anomaly. To understand it, you need to understand a little of how the brain works. The brain produces different types of waves at different times, see? Beta waves usually occur when a person's busy or concentrating hard on something. Gamma waves can't be picked up by an standard scalp EEG, only by taking readings right off the surface of the brain, but they occur when the brain is readying itself for particular cognitive or motor actions. Theta waves are a sign of drowsiness (or occasionally sexual arousal), Delta waves are the type seen when a person's asleep. And Alpha waves are seen when a person's physically relaxed but alert, for example during meditation. Most extremely vivid dreams take place during Alpha-wave times*.
A person can sleep during Alpha-wave activity, but it's not relaxing sleep. Alpha waves are fast waves, they're very active waves. Delta waves are the slow waves, and it's during Delta-wave periods - i.e. most of the sleep time, in normal adults - that we get the sleep that refreshes us and recharges our batteries. In the case of the Alpha-EEG anomaly, the brain can't produce Delta waves for long, because every time it tries, it automatically starts to produce Alpha waves and wakes itself up. Your body doesn't always come fully awake, but your brain pulls itself out of that deep sleep stage that's needed in order for your body to heal itself and recharge itself with energy.
So I don't sleep well. It's been many years since I had any sleep whatsoever where I wasn't at least 80% aware of my surroundings. I've learned to turn off a reaction to stimuli that isn't in my direct surroundings i.e. in my bedroom, so the doorbell ringing or Mom doing the hoovering doesn't disturb me. But anything in my room, I'm completely aware of, even when I'm sleeping. Something as little as a spider moving over the wall above my head is enough to jolt me out of sleep. And the sleep I do get, isn't refreshing sleep. Some days I wake more tired than when I went to bed. I dream constantly, too. Not a night goes by when I don't dream, and they're unusually vivid, and often precog.
I go through periods where it's somewhat better, and then periods when it's a lot worse. At least I'm not being haunted at night at the moment, touch wood.
Usually things get quite a lot better in the summer, because I can take in the sun in the daytime and then nap in the evenings, which somehow makes for better sleep. But the last two summers have been so crummy, I haven't been able to do that. Damn global warming. And if one more person tells me global warming is something that's been made up to scare people, I'm going to thump them. Seriously. Global warming is no more made up than AIDS is. Sure, it's cyclical, but a cycle shouldn't ever be *this* short.
Anyway, there's my whine for the day. Oli's off playing Xbox somewhere (he's coming home next weekend! Yay!) and my at work friends are...well, at work, and not chatting. So since it's nearly 3.30 and all, I'm going to head out. I have my gym review tomorrow, so I have to get up for that. Ola, who'd dealt with me previously, has now left, so I get someone called Steve. The gym's going OK - I don't think I look any better yet (although it's hard to tell - PMS has me horribly bloated atm) but I certainly feel better when I'm doing my cardio; the crosstrainer isn't so horrible anymore, and I'm very happy on the treadmill. And I've used the sauna a lot - I used it three times today, between showers. Once I get past the initial panic, it's very relaxing.
My ankles are knackered, though. The right one in particular is horribly sore. I don't know if I should rest it or just push through the pain the way I do when I overstretch my muscles.
Anyway, I'll catch you guys later. Hope y'all are well.
______________________________
*Interestingly Alpha waves are also reputed to be present during psychic activity, but that's a whole other ball game that we're not getting into here.
If I were still working from home all the time it would be fine, but I have more going-out jobs to do right now, both with the youth group and the modelling I'm picking up with Kell for extra money (not that it's making much difference to my bank account - I've basically accepted that I'm going to have to live off my overdraft until after the wedding is over, at which point I can slowly start building up my savings again), and I have the gym and various other daytime stuff that needs doing, and I really really need to get back onto a decent schedule again asap.
*sigh*
I've been fighting with a sleep disorder since a couple years after the fibromyalgia was diagnosed. Apparently quite a few FM sufferers have this particular disorder, although a lot of doctors deny it exists. Among those who do believe in it, it's generally known as the Alpha-EEG anomaly. To understand it, you need to understand a little of how the brain works. The brain produces different types of waves at different times, see? Beta waves usually occur when a person's busy or concentrating hard on something. Gamma waves can't be picked up by an standard scalp EEG, only by taking readings right off the surface of the brain, but they occur when the brain is readying itself for particular cognitive or motor actions. Theta waves are a sign of drowsiness (or occasionally sexual arousal), Delta waves are the type seen when a person's asleep. And Alpha waves are seen when a person's physically relaxed but alert, for example during meditation. Most extremely vivid dreams take place during Alpha-wave times*.
A person can sleep during Alpha-wave activity, but it's not relaxing sleep. Alpha waves are fast waves, they're very active waves. Delta waves are the slow waves, and it's during Delta-wave periods - i.e. most of the sleep time, in normal adults - that we get the sleep that refreshes us and recharges our batteries. In the case of the Alpha-EEG anomaly, the brain can't produce Delta waves for long, because every time it tries, it automatically starts to produce Alpha waves and wakes itself up. Your body doesn't always come fully awake, but your brain pulls itself out of that deep sleep stage that's needed in order for your body to heal itself and recharge itself with energy.
So I don't sleep well. It's been many years since I had any sleep whatsoever where I wasn't at least 80% aware of my surroundings. I've learned to turn off a reaction to stimuli that isn't in my direct surroundings i.e. in my bedroom, so the doorbell ringing or Mom doing the hoovering doesn't disturb me. But anything in my room, I'm completely aware of, even when I'm sleeping. Something as little as a spider moving over the wall above my head is enough to jolt me out of sleep. And the sleep I do get, isn't refreshing sleep. Some days I wake more tired than when I went to bed. I dream constantly, too. Not a night goes by when I don't dream, and they're unusually vivid, and often precog.
I go through periods where it's somewhat better, and then periods when it's a lot worse. At least I'm not being haunted at night at the moment, touch wood.
Usually things get quite a lot better in the summer, because I can take in the sun in the daytime and then nap in the evenings, which somehow makes for better sleep. But the last two summers have been so crummy, I haven't been able to do that. Damn global warming. And if one more person tells me global warming is something that's been made up to scare people, I'm going to thump them. Seriously. Global warming is no more made up than AIDS is. Sure, it's cyclical, but a cycle shouldn't ever be *this* short.
Anyway, there's my whine for the day. Oli's off playing Xbox somewhere (he's coming home next weekend! Yay!) and my at work friends are...well, at work, and not chatting. So since it's nearly 3.30 and all, I'm going to head out. I have my gym review tomorrow, so I have to get up for that. Ola, who'd dealt with me previously, has now left, so I get someone called Steve. The gym's going OK - I don't think I look any better yet (although it's hard to tell - PMS has me horribly bloated atm) but I certainly feel better when I'm doing my cardio; the crosstrainer isn't so horrible anymore, and I'm very happy on the treadmill. And I've used the sauna a lot - I used it three times today, between showers. Once I get past the initial panic, it's very relaxing.
My ankles are knackered, though. The right one in particular is horribly sore. I don't know if I should rest it or just push through the pain the way I do when I overstretch my muscles.
Anyway, I'll catch you guys later. Hope y'all are well.
*Interestingly Alpha waves are also reputed to be present during psychic activity, but that's a whole other ball game that we're not getting into here.
Sunday 3 August 2008
The Desensitization of Humanity
There's so much tragedy and pain in the world that a lot of the time we become desensitized to it. We have to, if we're to survive with our life and sanity both intact. One reason that all the money in the world wouldn't be enough to get me to live my teen years again is that when you're a teenager, you're not capable of that sort of dissociation - at least not if you want to remain functional at the same time. For teenagers, filled with hormones as they are, every world tragedy is a personal tragedy; every injustice feels like it's directed at them. I know this period of pain is necessary, because it's how we learn compassion for others, but I doubt that there's anything in the world that would be a big enough incentive for me to go through it again.
As adults, we learn to compartmentalize. Some of us more successfully than others. But now and then, some story you hear on the news hits you the way all the similar stories you heard previously didn't. Perhaps it takes place in a town where a friend lives, or the victim shares a name with someone close to you. I heard two things yesterday that hit me hard, for various - basically silly - reasons. Firstly was a guy who was beheaded on a bus in Winnipeg, Canada, which is where a good friend of mine lives. When my friend came on msn in the evening, the first thing I said was, "oh thank god, you weren't beheaded". Which is a pretty dumb thing to say, since, let's face it, Canada isn't small. And Winnipeg, although small by the standards of London or New York, still has round about three quarters of a million people in the general area, I believe. My friend pointed out how slim the chances were of him having been on that bus. And although I get his point, there was still that initial worry.
It's strange, because when the 7/7 bombings happened in London in 2005, I wasn't all that worried about my friends and family, and I know hundreds - perhaps thousands - of Londoners.
The other thing was the death of Doujon Zammit. Doujon Zammit was the young Australian tourist who was savagely beaten early this week in Mykonos by bouncers posing as police. Yesterday his father made the choice to turn off his life support machine. I came across the story completely by accident, and my first reaction was to hope and pray that he was no relation to my friend Michael (who shares his surname). Then I was instantly ashamed by my reaction - everyone is someone's sibling, someone's child, someone's cousin, someone's friend. And while my reaction is probably very human, a lot of us make the mistake of thinking "human" is synonymous with "decent". Not everything humans do is decent, as proven by the very fact that news stories like this exist. While I still believe that most humans are basically good, human nature - or human habit, whichever it may be - isn't always altruistic and kind. The survival instinct is deeply embedded in most of us, and that survival instinct prevents us from taking each and every horror to heart, makes us pick and choose which ones we weep over and which ones pass us by with barely a thought.
Most of the time I recognize this. But sometimes you can't help but feel a bit demonic.
I know you probably have felt this way at some point. Like you're an awful person for caring about some people and not others. But take it from a girl who still occasionally cries over the death of Tupac Shakur, more than ten years later, but has yet to shed a single tear for the recent earthquake and tsunami victims. You're not the only one to feel like hell about it. Most of us do, at some point.
And perhaps that's where our redemption lies.
As adults, we learn to compartmentalize. Some of us more successfully than others. But now and then, some story you hear on the news hits you the way all the similar stories you heard previously didn't. Perhaps it takes place in a town where a friend lives, or the victim shares a name with someone close to you. I heard two things yesterday that hit me hard, for various - basically silly - reasons. Firstly was a guy who was beheaded on a bus in Winnipeg, Canada, which is where a good friend of mine lives. When my friend came on msn in the evening, the first thing I said was, "oh thank god, you weren't beheaded". Which is a pretty dumb thing to say, since, let's face it, Canada isn't small. And Winnipeg, although small by the standards of London or New York, still has round about three quarters of a million people in the general area, I believe. My friend pointed out how slim the chances were of him having been on that bus. And although I get his point, there was still that initial worry.
It's strange, because when the 7/7 bombings happened in London in 2005, I wasn't all that worried about my friends and family, and I know hundreds - perhaps thousands - of Londoners.
The other thing was the death of Doujon Zammit. Doujon Zammit was the young Australian tourist who was savagely beaten early this week in Mykonos by bouncers posing as police. Yesterday his father made the choice to turn off his life support machine. I came across the story completely by accident, and my first reaction was to hope and pray that he was no relation to my friend Michael (who shares his surname). Then I was instantly ashamed by my reaction - everyone is someone's sibling, someone's child, someone's cousin, someone's friend. And while my reaction is probably very human, a lot of us make the mistake of thinking "human" is synonymous with "decent". Not everything humans do is decent, as proven by the very fact that news stories like this exist. While I still believe that most humans are basically good, human nature - or human habit, whichever it may be - isn't always altruistic and kind. The survival instinct is deeply embedded in most of us, and that survival instinct prevents us from taking each and every horror to heart, makes us pick and choose which ones we weep over and which ones pass us by with barely a thought.
Most of the time I recognize this. But sometimes you can't help but feel a bit demonic.
I know you probably have felt this way at some point. Like you're an awful person for caring about some people and not others. But take it from a girl who still occasionally cries over the death of Tupac Shakur, more than ten years later, but has yet to shed a single tear for the recent earthquake and tsunami victims. You're not the only one to feel like hell about it. Most of us do, at some point.
And perhaps that's where our redemption lies.
Love, Just Because
Love is a word that we hear a lot. It's a word we say a lot. Sometimes we even mean it. A lot of the time we want to mean it. Calling something love cleanses it, it sanctifies it, and that makes it more acceptable in our eyes as well as those of other people, even when it could be more accurately called lust / like / friendship / co-dependence / insecurity / need. Oddly enough, it's the people who use the word most often, the people who say "I love you" a dozen times a day, who aren't terribly sure that what they have is love at all.
And yet I still have faith that true love exists. I've experienced it - not forever love, but love nonetheless.
Love doesn't need to last a lifetime to be true. Although in other people, I've seen that lasting love, that love that will in all probability stay with them until the day they die.
Love is taking a morning off work, unpaid, to sit with your other half while they have a routine blood test because you know they're petrified of needles. Love is picking chicken meat off the drumsticks before serving when you bring home a bucket of KFC because they hate bones. Love is mentally shrugging and buying your girlfriend a cactus for Valentines Day instead of the dozen roses you wanted to get, even though you think it's totally weird, because you know the cactus will please her more than cut flowers ever could.
Love changes from situation to situation. Love is compromising...and it's also knowing that compromise doesn't necessarily mean you each get what you want 50% of the time. Sometimes love means letting your partner have his or her way more often than you get yours, because the thing he / she wants is more important to them than the thing you want is to you. Love is sometimes shrugging and giving your blessing for something you really don't approve of, and sometimes it's putting your foot down about something you know isn't good for the other person, and it's knowing when to do which.
Love is giving in gracefully and letting your husband wear a kilt to your wedding, even though it makes you cringe inside, because he's just so proud of his Scottish heritage. It's seeing your partner come home at night and seeing how tired he is, and washing his back in the shower without jumping on him, even though you've been sitting around with damp panties since 2.30 that afternoon, just waiting for him to come home. It's learning to cook a dish they love and not throwing a hissy fit when they say "it's interesting...not quite how my mother makes it". A lot of the time it's forgiving occasional thoughtless comments, because you know they weren't meant with any malice, and you also know your partner would be horrified if they knew they'd given offense.
Love is respecting someone's morals, and living with them as best you can. In some cases, it's letting them go to find someone they'd be better suited with, if you find that you're simply too different to get along. Love is wanting your partner to be happy. Sometimes it's letting them go gracefully, if they think they'd be happier without you.
Love isn't a set of rules. You may have done all of these things or none of them. Most of all, love is learning about the other person, how they react to things, what they like, what drives them crazy, what fills their heart with joy, what they dream of, and trying your best to do right by them - whatever right is.
Love is a hundred thousand things, and probably the least important bit is saying it out loud, if you can show the person in little ways every day.
And yet I still have faith that true love exists. I've experienced it - not forever love, but love nonetheless.
Love doesn't need to last a lifetime to be true. Although in other people, I've seen that lasting love, that love that will in all probability stay with them until the day they die.
Love is taking a morning off work, unpaid, to sit with your other half while they have a routine blood test because you know they're petrified of needles. Love is picking chicken meat off the drumsticks before serving when you bring home a bucket of KFC because they hate bones. Love is mentally shrugging and buying your girlfriend a cactus for Valentines Day instead of the dozen roses you wanted to get, even though you think it's totally weird, because you know the cactus will please her more than cut flowers ever could.
Love changes from situation to situation. Love is compromising...and it's also knowing that compromise doesn't necessarily mean you each get what you want 50% of the time. Sometimes love means letting your partner have his or her way more often than you get yours, because the thing he / she wants is more important to them than the thing you want is to you. Love is sometimes shrugging and giving your blessing for something you really don't approve of, and sometimes it's putting your foot down about something you know isn't good for the other person, and it's knowing when to do which.
Love is giving in gracefully and letting your husband wear a kilt to your wedding, even though it makes you cringe inside, because he's just so proud of his Scottish heritage. It's seeing your partner come home at night and seeing how tired he is, and washing his back in the shower without jumping on him, even though you've been sitting around with damp panties since 2.30 that afternoon, just waiting for him to come home. It's learning to cook a dish they love and not throwing a hissy fit when they say "it's interesting...not quite how my mother makes it". A lot of the time it's forgiving occasional thoughtless comments, because you know they weren't meant with any malice, and you also know your partner would be horrified if they knew they'd given offense.
Love is respecting someone's morals, and living with them as best you can. In some cases, it's letting them go to find someone they'd be better suited with, if you find that you're simply too different to get along. Love is wanting your partner to be happy. Sometimes it's letting them go gracefully, if they think they'd be happier without you.
Love isn't a set of rules. You may have done all of these things or none of them. Most of all, love is learning about the other person, how they react to things, what they like, what drives them crazy, what fills their heart with joy, what they dream of, and trying your best to do right by them - whatever right is.
Love is a hundred thousand things, and probably the least important bit is saying it out loud, if you can show the person in little ways every day.
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