Monday 31 January 2011

The Chosen Ones, And Why They Are So

I love my family. It has to be said. I love my crazy, unpredictable, statistical-anomaly-in-every-possible-area mother. I love my kind, distant, overly cerebral father and my perpetual cheerleader of a stepmother. I love my go-with-the-flow-and-you'll-never-have-a-problem eldest sister, and my dynamic, makes-me-dizzy middle-up sister, and, even though I don't think I'll ever quite understand them, I love my younger sisters.

I love my blunt, sometimes insensitive but good-hearted brother. I love my super-mom-super-wife-super-nice-person (and she really is!) sister in law. I love my prim, proper sister in law's mother (who I still don't know what to call, even after five years; I simply CANNOT bring myself to call such an upright, British, elderly person by their first name) and I love my party-boy nephews and I especially love my passionate, exuberant, fiercely loyal manic-depressive niece.

I do not love that my family are always trying to fix me. I know they love me - they DO it because they love me - but I don't always think they respect me. I am not broken. I do not need fixing. My body is bruised and battered, my brain is chipped and cracked, but my soul is intact.

When I break my finger trying to carry ten litres of water, I don't need Captain Hindsight to fly in and tell me I shouldn't have been doing that, or for well-meaning relatives to insist on going to the emergency room, even though I tell them repeatedly that I know my body, I can feel that it's not a bad break, and the only thing the hospital will be able to do is tape the fingers up. I want someone who'll tease me about having a stash of deuterium (a component of heavy water) and how he didn't know I was taking up terrorism, like Daniel does.

When I tell people that I don't want to go out for my birthday, that I'm not feeling well enough to celebrate, I don't need people to assume that I'm saying, "please push harder to make it bigger and more fabulous". When I say that what I really want to do on my birthday is stay in bed and play Pokemon and eat potato chips, I don't need people to react with horror and say, "You can't do that! You have to do something fun, something like everyone else likes!" I want someone who'll laugh and say, "Then do it!" like Dee does.

When I go on a date, I don't need people to phone me every half hour and ask me if I'm still safe, or to wait up until I get home. I want someone who'll tell me to have a good time, like Cam does.

When I'm whinging about how much weight I've put on in the last year, I don't need people to tell me not to go overboard with dieting and exercise. I want someone who'll say, "You're lovely, but if you feel you need to lose weight, I'll help you, and give you any advice that you ask for, and trust you to be sensible enough not to take it too far," like James does.

When I'm in an antisocial phase, when I'm not feeling well enough to be out and about, I don't need to be dragged out "to have fun, for {my} own good", or have someone text me a dozen times a day to ask if I'm feeling better yet. I want someone who'll let me be alone for a couple weeks, and trust that our relationship is strong enough to survive any absences, like Elle does.

When I do something stupid, that I'm really really embarrassed about, I don't need people to try and soothe my ruffled feathers under the mistaken impression that humiliation is fatal. I want someone who'll laugh at / with me and tell me I'm such a loser, and that was a really dumb thing to do, like Ricky does.

My family think that, at the age of nearly thirty, I need to be coddled.

My friends know better.

Sunday 30 January 2011

Chronic Horny Insomnia. Or Chronic Horniness. Or Chronic Insomnia. Or Something.

I can't sleep. This sucks, because last night (as in, Friday night - since I'm still awake I consider it Saturday night, even though it's actually 8.17 am Sunday morning) I slept maybe five hours. The night before that I didn't sleep. Now, this last night I haven't slept.

Please, oh please, let this not be the start of another hundred hours. Back in September, when Oli and I broke up, I stopped sleeping. I blogged about it back then, in a couple different posts, but the long and short of it is that I spent near-enough 100 hours awake, broken up by three 2-hour naps and one single 6-hour nap. Eventually the cycle broke, but for that week it was quite frightening. Combined with the fact that the first time we split, a couple years previously, I lost a pound a day for a month plus a handful more besides without even realising it, I figured that I had a physical addiction to him - the only other thing I've ever felt that compared to Oli-withdrawal was drug detox. (Yes, it's a long story, and no, you're not going to get to hear it. Probably ever. Suffice it to say that I have never willingly taken anything harder than marijuana in my life; that I was drugged against my will over a period of some days, and that whether you choose to take the drugs or not the physical feelings during the detox period are much the same.)

Sheesh, if I end up with another acute insomnia bout I'm going to be really frustrated. I'm wondering now if it wasn't Oli-withdrawal that caused it, but a more general emotion overload. Because I've certainly been suffering from that for the last few days. Oh, suffering isn't really the right term, because the majority of the emotion - of MY emotion, anyway - has been joy and jubilation. Although my Tommy Jay, the other piece of my soul, is having a hard week - today (Saturday 29th) was the second anniversary of his mother's death, and much of his emotion is transmitted down the silver cord.

Even without Tommy's pain, though, joy and jubilation can make you jittery after a while.

Pain doesn't help with insomnia, either, and my ear's still not quite right. It's so much better than it's been for the past two weeks, but still not quite how it should be. And my back and legs are killing me from all the London activities yesterday. And yes, I'm aware that some of you will be thinking, Ooh, what did we miss that she didn't blog about? You just keep it in your imagination, pervs, because there's nothing to see here.



So, this girl is very tired, and very horny, and the two sides are in a Mexican standoff. I'm too tired to relieve the horniness, but too turned on to sleep. Eventually one side will have to win, and then they can both turn around and go home, and I'll be a lot more comfortable.

Until then, I guess I'll play some Pokemon. You can't stay turned on while playing Pokemon.

Oh, I expect there are some people out there who can - one thing I've learned is that for every imaginable fetish, there's someone who has it - but that's just something I don't want to think about.

Until then, enjoy - or laugh at - this "I look like I just woke up but actually haven't been to sleep" picture.



Kisses to all.

Open-Hearted

I owe you guys a post about Kidfos and bubblevishious, and you will get it. At some point. I'm still processing, mentally and emotionally.

I can tell you that it was a day of firsts for me, both the prosaic and the slightly more interesting.

Including, but not limited to:

~ I had my first Lebanese food. Which was neat. Some of it I liked, some of it I didn't. The lamb wasn't too bad (and since I took a chance on the lamb, does that mean I don't have to take a chance on anything else? LOL ) and the falafel and pitta things with halloumi cheese and olives were awesome. Ummmm...black olives. I <3 black olives.

By some miracle, the only thing I was allergic to was the agave nectar in the tea. And I mixed up agave and agape, LOL. "Agave love? Like, fermented cactus love?"

~ I took my first tentative steps into a goth / death-metal bar. Wearing a white cotton sundress with frills around the bottom and little purple flowers on, a white cardigan with fabric roses and pearl buttons, and a lilac pashmina. Do I know how to rock it or what?

;)

~ It was definitely the first - and I hope the last - time that I made comments about the absolute perfection of a pair of buttocks to a friend, only to find out an hour later that the owner of those buttocks is my friend's more-than-a-friend. Blush. Oh well, what can you do? I called that particular backside a work of art, and I'm sticking to that.

~ I'm sorry to say it was NOT the first time I've had a total meltdown when somebody tried to talk to me on the phone. It never fails to amaze me that I can deal with more or less everything life throws at me, and then a phone call sends me into a frozen panic. It was, however, the first time that I've scrunched my eyes tight shut while someone else holds the phone up to my ear, all the while saying, "Talk! Talk!" and then covered my face in my hands while my cheeks flamed bright red, and laughed until tears ran down my cheeks and my sides hurt. Double, triple, quadruple blush.

Luckily, nobody seemed to think that I was a complete idiot; instead Bubbles said, "That was so cute! Who should we call now? Shall we call X? Shall we call Y?" Please, no!

~ And after I unwillingly left to catch my train, it was not the first time that somebody tried to pickpocket me when I wasn't looking - but it WAS the first time that someone tried to steal my iPod out of my pocket, WHILE IT WAS PLUGGED INTO MY EARS.

=))

It was a glorious day and night. Every muscle in my body hurts now, and it was absolutely worth it. When my emotions are not so topsy-turvy, I'll write about it properly.

I really, really wish I could come to Vegas. I didn't realise it was happening so soon - I thought it was later in the year, and that I might get there. There are so many people I want to meet, and some of you are already so dear to me, even before meeting, that you're all I can think about today.

Thursday 27 January 2011

We're Not All Lucky Enough To Be Bitten By A Radioactive Spider

- OPEN SCENE -


{Sati is lying in a hospital bed, looking fragile and stunningly beautiful without any makeup on at all. A tall man in a doctor's white coat is standing over her. He has caramel-colored skin, high cheekbones, blue-green eyes and buzz-cut dark hair.Sati's eyes flutter open.}

Sati (with a slightly dry throat that gives her a husky, sexy voice): What happened? How did everything go?

Doc: You gave us all a scare there. You're going to be fine now, though.

Sati: What's going on?

Doc: You're in hospital. I'm Doctor Avery, remember?

Sati: I remember. {Pause.} How's my mom?

Avery: Your mother's fine. The transplant went successfully, and she's eating and walking around a little bit. Her gastroenterologist said he's fairly sure that in a month or two, primary sclerosing cholangitis will be a thing of the past for her. {He smiles.}

Sati: Wha- walking around? I thought she was supposed to take it easy for a couple days?

Avery (with a serious look on his face): Well, you see, you've been out of it for a couple weeks. The operation was on the 15th of March, and it's now April 3rd. You've been very sick.

Sati: What happened to me?

{Avery sits on the side of the bed.}

Avery: There was a problem with the surgery. Your mother's part went just fine, but you sustained a tear in your inferior mesenteric artery when we were detaching the part of the liver we were transplanting, and you nearly bled out. We gave you a transfusion, but the shock from it sent you into a coma, and you've stayed like that for some weeks. We weren't quite sure why. Everyone's been praying for you to wake up.

Sati: Three weeks...I thought I looked thinner.

Avery: You look lovely.

Sati: Can I see my mom?

Avery: She's asleep right now, she has to take regular naps. But she should be waking up in - {looks at watch} - about ten minutes. I'll bring her right in when she wakes.

Sati: Thank you, Doctor Avery.

{Avery takes Sati's hand.}

Avery: We've all been really worried about you, you know. Your family, of course, but me as well.

Sati: ...You?

Avery: Yes. I've been coming and sitting with you after work for a little while, just hoping that you'd wake up.

Sati (blushing, with eyes downcast): ...I don't know what to say. {Looks up and puts a hand - the one without the IV - to Avery's cheek.} The whole time I was asleep, I felt...safe. Like I wasn't alone. I think that must have been your presence, Doctor Avery.

Avery: {Leans closer and looks Sati deep in the eyes.} Don't you think it's time you called me Jackson?

Mom: San? Honey, are you awake?

{Sati wakes up.}

Sati: Dammit, Ma, I just gave you half my liver, and Jackson Avery was just about to kiss me, and you pay me back by waking me up?

- END SCENE -
(I should mention, before anything else, that I know perfectly well that the inferior mesenteric artery is nowhere near the liver, and I have NO idea why my brain put that in there - both I and Dr Jackson Avery are too well-educated to make that mistake.)

Dreams when I'm sick, and particularly when I have a high fever, are extraordinarily vivid. Mine are vivid most of the time anyway, due to the high proportion of time I spend in REM sleep (I wrote about this in a note about two years ago, I'll try and either find the link or make a separate post another day), but fever dreams are extremely so. They tend to be either really really bad, really really good, or just so out there and WTF that I don't even bother trying to work them out. I've been coping with yet another bout of otitis externa - and a particularly bad bout this time - for about ten days, and a high fever for maybe five days, and during that time I've been swinging between sleeping eighteen hours a day (because my body's trying to repair itself) or not at all (because every time I move and / or touch the ear the pain wakes me up, and I am not a still sleeper).

Wow, wasn't that a convoluted paragraph? :P

So anyway, the night before last - or maybe it was last night; somehow I seem to have lost a period of about 24 hours, including Tuesday evening and night, and Wednesday morning and afternoon - I dreamed about getting shot, and dying, and wandering around in a place that was all misty and I couldn't find Curt, and then making a bargain with God, and coming back to life, and finding out that (perhaps as part of my bargain?) my ex-boyfriend Richard had died in the same shooting. Horrible stuff, although Curt did tell me he loved me, which went a little way (like, a teeny weeny way) towards cancelling the bad stuff.

Today, though, I got the treat of Jackson Avery, so I guess it balances out. :D Although my ratty mother went and woke me up right before we got up close and personal.

Dreams are funny things for me. My bad dreams are fairly unpredictable - they may be precog, they may be a manifestation of subconscious worries, they may be random crap that means very little. Very rarely, they may be memories. You'd think that any nightmares I have would be about the rape or any of the various other bad things in my past. But it's only once in a blue moon that I dream about Obie, usually when I've been spending a lot of time in London. I've had more nightmares about LOML sleeping with a friend of mine than I have about Obie. My bad dreams tend to be more global, and usually apocalyptic.

Good dreams, on the other hand, never fail to fall into one of several categories:

a) The ones where I'm with a guy I really like, whether real or celebrity or fictional character, and we're blissfully happy and in love;

b) The ones where I get to save the world, or some small part of it;

c) The ones where I'm married with kids - which I believe are precog dreams, but I'm not entirely sure.

Category C is really an extension of category A, so if you believe in dream analysis, there are really just two main things that I crave in life: true love (or my idea of true love, which may or may not be realistic and attainable) and the chance to be a hero. I mock myself quite often about these two things, because they just seem so cheesy, like something you might hear at a Miss America pageant. "What do you want out of life, Sati?" "I want to be loved, and I want to help others."

Yet am I right to tease myself for this, or am I being too hard on myself? A lot of the time I think that these are two things that most of us want. Love, well, that's a given. We all want to be loved. Being a hero? That's a harder one, but in truth, I think that most of us have hero-complexes. It's why we love movies so much. It's why sci-fi and fantasy books sell so well. It's why the paranormal, as a subject for literature and television, never loses its appeal - because it offers an arena where the battle between good and evil can be fought in a very literal sense. In today's world, few of us are able to be heroes in any kind of flashy way, unless we go into medicine or the emergency services or the military. And from what I understand, a lot of people who do go into those fields soon become jaded, and focus more on the ones they couldn't save than the ones they did.

Wanting to save - or even improve - lives doesn't concern me too much. It seems like a very natural thing to want to do, and I'm convinced that most of us are just the same as me in their wish to help others. It's the reasons behind this need that worry me a little. Why is this need to save, this thing that in my teens I mockingly called my catcher-in-the-rye complex, so strong? Why is the one thing, aside from love, that I want enough to dream about on a regular basis? It would be so easy to cast these concerns aside and tell myself that I'm just a totally awesome person, but there are days when I wonder if it's not hiding some darker desire, some need to be indispensable to people, to have everyone around me adore me. Is it about some lack of self-confidence that makes me want people to lean on me, so that they never kick me away? Am I just such an attention whore that I need everyone I know to love me? Do I use this love-everyone-help-everyone policy as a way of distancing myself from the people who love me, so I don't have to risk rejection? Is my Tommy Jay right, when he says that I'm happy sharing myself as long as it's on my terms? Does my tendency to play the benevolent goddess around my friends have anything to do with my name, or is that just a weird coincidence?

Of course, as I said, there's also the possibility that I'm just really freakin' cool.

*rolls eyes*

:D

This post didn't really have a point. I have no answers, just more questions. And I don't want to you to think I'm anguished about this stuff - I am what I am, for better or for worse, and most of the time I'm pretty darn happy with the person that I am. The fact that I think self-reflection is often helpful and always interesting doesn't change that happiness. Really, this post was for me, rather than for an audience, and you're just here watching me put my thoughts on paper. Tired, feverish thoughts at that.

It's getting late, and I need sleep if I'm not to lose a whole other day and sleep right through till Friday. So I'm off, to eat some brownie and play a couple minutes of Pokemon and then catch some Zs. If I'm really lucky, maybe I'll save a whole bunch of kids from a serial killer and win myself a night in bed with Agent Derek Morgan.

Sweet dreams.

Sunday 23 January 2011

Meetings

Just not feeling it at the moment. I have so much I want to write about, and so many comments to reply to, but I just can't seem to get my act together - or, indeed, string my sentences together. I feel kind of guilty about the comments especially, because you've all made the effort to respond to what I've written, and I feel like I owe it to y'all to reply to your responses. I do try and reply to every comment I get, but sometimes it takes me longer than I'd like.

I am, however, going to meet
bubblevishious and Kidfos - two of the most awesome bloggers on the site - in London in a few days, which makes me really really happy.

It seems to be the year for meeting A F F members, actually.
AirForceBloke999 took me out for dinner last weekend, which was very nice - he's a sweetheart, and we had a nice time stuffing ourselves with Nandos chicken burgers and looking at pictures of the stars on his iPhone afterwards. Plus, he brought me a cactus (because I mentioned in a blog that I'd rather have a cactus than flowers) and some lucky bamboo (because it's Japanese - sort of) which was really sweet - it's not often that guys go to the effort of bringing a gift that I'd really like.

I should have got pictures, but I still haven't gotten a good camera - although I saw an ad on TV today that showed a nice Canon in the half-price Argos sale. Not sure when it ends, but I need to go into town tomorrow and take advantage of the last day of the Ann Summers sale, so perhaps I can check it out then.

I'm also hoping to meet a guy I met on here, whose current username I'm not sure of - he signed up, didn't get any replies except me and eventually gave up and cancelled his membership, although I think he may be back on with a different name - but I'm not sure when that will happen, I can't seem to shake off the blahs atm, plus my sister massacred my hair last week (something that will get its own post in due course) and I've put on weight and my skin's all pale and blotchy and...egh.

And I so wanted to look pretty for Bubbles and Kid, too!

*sigh*

I know, it'll be great. I just wanted to LOOK great as well. Good old vanity.

I think it's going to be a year for firsts in general. Not only am I meeting fellow bloggers (I met a couple of A-Double-F members last year, but one of them didn't blog at all and the other, the wonderful
diablophallus - who I wrote about in this post last August: I finally met another guy from here! Yay me! - only blogs once in a blue moon) but I've been much more social - although admittedly that's at least partly to do with Christie demanding my presence a couple times a week - and have already done a couple new things this year. I already blogged about my first hockey game. Last fortnight I bought my first - and second - vibrator from a real shop, instead of online. (Previously I'd always got all my sex toys through the mail.)

I went into Ann Summers with the Glitterati in mind, but got drawn in by the sale items, and ended up with something called a Triple Treat instead. Not my best purchase ever - the vibrations aren't strong enough to really do anything for me - but it has changeable heads, and the curved one (for the G-spot) feels kind of nice inside. I went back about a week later and got the Glitterati gold, and it's quite amazing. It's a little too thick to work well inside (I don't think of myself as a particularly tight girl, but it's verrrrry thick), but that's OK since I bought it mostly for external use anyway. At first I thought that it wasn't fast enough, but the vibrations are so strong - almost like pulses, really - that I think if it'd been any faster, it might have killed me, LOL. The orgasms are so different from the ones I get from my old BOB - and yes, women DO have different types of orgasms, five or six kinds at my last count. The orgasms from my old one were the kind I think of as the "usual" type of clitgasms, the kind that I get with an average partner, but the ones from the Glitterati are more like the squirting ones that I got when I was in my early teens, the kind that makes you feel like your whole pussy's on fire. I don't think I've had one of those since I was with Oli, and before that, since I was about 15 and first discovered the miracle of sex toys.

The only real problem with it is the smell and taste, which is nasty, but I'm hoping that's just because it's new and that it'll go with time.

So yeah, plenty of new experiences being had here. The guy I mentioned up there is coming to see me on Tuesday. I'm a little bit concerned, because even though we've agreed not to count our chickens too early, and we both say that you can't ever know if there's chemistry until you meet, I still think he wants to see me naked. I don't know if I'm attracted to the guy or not - it's hard to tell from photos - but I know I'm not feeling sexy right now. Sexy when alone, yes. Full of fantasies, yes. Up for getting naked with another person, no. I'm sleeping so much lately, trying to repair my body after all the infections of the last couple months - I actually fell asleep whilst walking down the hall, the other day - and I have this worry that I'm going to drop off to sleep while we're getting to know each other. And my skin's gone all blotchy, and I have some sort of insect bite / allergic hives on my face and my breasts and bikini area, that don't seem to want to heal, so my boobies are covered in bandaids. (The bikini area I just have to leave open, unfortunately.) The stress of the last season has caused another shingles outbreak along my spine. My hair is a nightmare, all weird and asymmetrical and far too young for me, and my eyes are dull and have shadows under them. And I'm fat, because every time I start up a new workout plan, I get another ear infection and can't exercise.

So yeah, not feeling sexy at all. And yet, if Oli or LOML saw me right now, and told me that they loved me regardless, and that they still thought I was beautiful, I'd jump straight into bed with them. It's not my sex drive that's flagging, it's the rest of the physical stuff.

I guess that despite all the new experiences I've been getting recently, despite enjoying a lot of them, what I really crave is someone old and familiar and comfortable, someone where physical attraction (on my part) comes guaranteed instead of all this will-I-like-him-won't-I-like-him junk. Someone who knows my body as well as I know it, and who loves it anyway.

I guess I'd better end here; I'm trying not to stay up all night, although I'm not sleeping well at night - pain keeps me awake - and then I sleep late into the afternoon. I HAVE to get back to the gym - even though it'll kill me for the first week, I know it's the only thing that will ease up the muscle pain - but it's easier said than done, especially with the infections.

*sigh*

I'm not depressed or anything, just blah. Winter blues, maybe. I just wish I could stay awake more of the time; I'm fairly useless the way things are.

Wednesday 19 January 2011

Friends Do Not Let Friends Dial Drunk

I am wasted.

Half a glass of wine. Shit, that's pathetic.

Last time I drank alcohol...I had a glass of rose grenache in August. And before that, I had two bottles of Bud Lite in March or April.

*sigh*

The text I meant to send to Curt said (just because I was feeling sorry for myself):

I am so wasted and nobody's texting me. I feel very unloved, boo hoo.

But I actually sent:

I am soo wastrd snd mobifux texting me...??i feel very unlobved, boo hoo

Mobifux? How did nobody's turn into mobifux? I suppose the letters are near each other on a qwerty keyboard (as I have on my phone), but really.

To which he responded, in a very mature way:

Why's that babe?

(I should add here that I absolutely love the man for not throwing a wobbly at me for being drunk on a Tuesday night when I swore I'd go to the gym this evening; a lot of guys would.)

So I said:

OMG, sooo sorry...half a glass of wine and my writing was illegible! Better now, not 100% but better.

I should have stopped there. I know I should. But noooo, I had to add:

Just be glad I didn't text you "I want your cock" which is what my girlfriends ordered me to say!"

Fuck. I don't know why girls - especially drunken girls - always feel the need to push the envelope. I would never text him that when I'm sober, why on earth would I when I'm drunk?

Bless him, though, he just made a joke about it. I love that man more and more every day. Especially since he's grown older and wiser, and now instinctively knows how to handle a situation to put me at ease.

*sigh*

So yeah, not a totally bad evening. I had fun with Olivia and Christie. I'm horrible when I drink, though - I become positive that I'm really really funny, and convince myself that everyone else finds me funny too.

Well, I'm going to bed - that's all I have to share with you lot tonight.

Friday 14 January 2011

Never Wear A Push-Up Bra To The Ice Rink

[Parts of this post have been removed. Privacy, and all that jazz.]

There simply is no way to skate gracefully when your breasts are hoisted up and outwards.

My old and dear friend B took me to my first ice hockey game on Saturday. There are a couple of surprising things in that sentence there: a) that I've never been to an ice hockey game, since it's something that's happened in my dreams for years, and b) that B was the one to take me. I've known her since fifth grade, been good friends since seventh, and of all my friends back then I'd have put her right at the bottom of the list when it comes to enjoying things like sporting events. B has always been the traditional one, sweet and nice and not at all bloodthirsty, and I would never ever have imagined her for a hockey fan. I guess she picked it up from her current boyfriend, who plays.


The ice hockey was fucking awesome. It's not as big and bright and dramatic here as it is in the US, or Canada, but it's still totally cool. We watched Milton Keynes ("our" team) v Peterborough (which was fun, because that's where Curt is living during the week while he's at uni, although he comes back to London at weekends, and even though he doesn't watch ice hockey it's fun to rub the scores in his face - well, if I can't rub anything else in his face, LOL) and we won 4-0. The first third was hard for me; we were right in front of the goal, and Wall - the keeper for the other side (I'm assuming that's what they're called?) - let two goals in during the first third, and he was a strong projector, and I could really feel his sadness and frustration, and could have cried for him. I know, I know, I'm entirely too soft - I'm not supposed to feel sorry for the other team, dammit! For the second third, he was at the other end, and had a bit more spirit, but for the last third he was back at our end, and I could just feel him giving up. Very sad. Although not sad enough to keep me from cheering as we kicked their butts.

I learned quite a bit about our players, just from that one game. Grant McPherson is a vicious little bastard, and barges into everyone, but he's entertaining as fuck. Blaz Emersic is the new boy, poached from someone (Slough, maybe?) and is spectacularly good (and also pretty hot), although he fell over a couple of times - I don't think he's quite used to the ice here. Barry Hollyhead, our keeper, was man of the match, and nobody deserved it more - he made some spectacular saves. Andre Smulter is the guy whose number I want on my shirt, partly because he's good, but also because I loved his smile; he always looks like he's about to burst into laughter. And I have a crush on Dwayne Newman - who unfortunately does NOT play for our team.

Rereading that, it looks like I'm saying he's gay. I have no idea if he's gay or not. But he does play for Peterborough, and he used to play for MK, and I want him back on our team, dammit! I only have the vaguest idea of what he looks like, because they wear those helmets and all the padding and stuff. But he had the most beautiful form out there, skated like he was trained for ice dance, and I fell for his body as soon as I saw him skate. I've always adored skating, always been utterly in love with the way a great skater looks when he moves. When I was in my teens, I skated once or twice a week - sometimes alone, sometimes with friends - and while my girlfriends were perving on the cute boys in there, I was perving on their bodies from the neck down, and especially their feet. I couldn't have told you if a guy was good-looking or not, but I fell in like a hundred times with torsos and legs.

Newman was also the first player to come over and shake Wall's hand, and commiserate on their loss. I can tell he's a kind person, and that goes a huge way with me. I checked out the player profiles on the net the next day, and found out that he's from Winnipeg, and used to play over there, which helps to explain his incredible form - American and Canadian kids seem to be raised on skates, at least the ones who live in cold climates, and as such they seem to take to the ice naturally, in a way that even the best British skaters can't quite emulate.

After the match, B and I skated a little bit. Not for too long, because Milton Keynes is an hour's drive each way. The ice was all cut up from the hockey game - I don't know why they don't clean it before they let skaters on, the way they do during the games and on Sunday mornings - so it wasn't easy, and since my amnesia and subsequent loss of everything to do with coordination, I'm not a good skater. I was never spectacular, the way my mom was at my age, but I was fairly good. Nowadays the first ten minutes are spent just trying to stay up, and it takes an hour or so before I stop feeling wobbly - and even after I stop feeling wobbly I can fall at any time, particularly when my breasts are sticking out halfway to Cape Town - but always, just towards the end of a skating session, I start to feel like I can remember how to do this.

There are some sports that, no matter whether I totally suck or actually become quite proficient at, never feel natural to me. My body is just not made to do them. Running and aerobics are two of the things that I never enjoyed and never got good at, but there are a couple of things that I got quite good at, and still hated. Hurdles was one of these things. In high school, for some bizarre reason, I was really good at hurdles. I never had decent form, I looked like some alien creature who did not belong on an athletic field, but show me a bar and I could haul my overweight, stubby-legged body over it. Hurdles wasn't something that we were taught much of in PE lessons, and as such, hardly anyone at school but the hard-core athletes ever learned to do it. So I got "volunteered" for it on Sports Day, for several years running, and I competed. Occasionally I won. And I loathed every minute of it. It terrified me. I never hurt myself badly, and I was always convinced that I was going to any minute. It felt totally unnatural, and the only reason I continued to do it was that I wanted an A in PE in my end-of-year reports, and the gym teachers - alone of all the teachers in the school - based our report grades on achievement rather than effort. (A total con, IMO - other kids could get an A in any other subject just by trying hard, even if they were really bad at it, but in gym you could only get an A if you had natural talent, and on several report cards I had to face the humiliation of a B, even when I put everything I had into it. And yes, that last sentence is sarcastic.)

But skating was never like that for me. Skating always felt like it came naturally. Aside from the beach, which is where I do my meditation and my communion with god, there is nowhere where I feel more at home than on the ice. B, who is now a better skater than I am, says she doesn't feel this way. She got fairly good, but it isn't natural to her. But for me, it feels right. I push myself round and round, and my hair whips behind me and I know I have this stupid grin on my face, because I have these flashes of memory, or what I think is memory - and I think that I know how to dance, and to jump, and to twirl, if my body could just remember.

It never remembers, but getting on the ice still feels like coming home.

Sunday 9 January 2011

BHL's Beautiful Human Awards

BlackHeatLust came up with the idea for this post: ♥ ♥ ♥ BEAUTIFUL HUMAN AWARD ♥ ♥ ♥, which I think is a really lovely thing to do. We're all supposed to nominate 9 people who we think are really amazing human beings. Although I don't often participate in list games, when I DO I go a bit OTT - as you may have noticed from my Christmas lists - but I'll try and restrain myself.

I could easily have just put down my whole watched list here, since they're all amazing people, but I've already made that post (although it does need some updating), so I'll try and make this one a bit different. Generally, I'm not adding most of my close friends on here, since I've already sang their praises quite enough. (Some people will cross over, though.)

In no particular order:
HollyVanDeFlash - because she's so honest and out there with her feelings, and even when she's upset about something you can still tell she's a really nice, happy person.
Mygentlecaress - because he never has a bad thing to say about anyone (except the PTBs).
kelidgh - because she's so smart and so perspicacious (one of my new words! I hope I used it correctly) and always says the things I want to say about a situation (and says them better), before I even know that I want to say them.
bubblevishious - because she makes me want to be a better person - my conscience now looks like Bubbles. *grins*
aspiringbo - because he has such a well-tuned moral compass, and always tries to live up to his ideals.
ThomBombadil - because he has so much courage, and because he's willing to show his good AND his bad bits, and doesn't try to paint himself in an overly flattering light.
LadyUnlaced - because regardless of anything negative said about her on here, she has NEVER been anything other than kind and lovely to me, nor have I seen her be mean to anyone.
templar_s - because he's a true gentleman, and even when he's mad about something he never makes it personal or hits below the belt.
christylovesfun - because you can always rely on her to see a situation from both sides, and to keep a cool head and be the voice of reason.

If I can get my tech-retarded brain into a place where it can work out how to post the pictures for each profile, I will. Otherwise, I'll just keep my fingers crossed that I did the links right.
=))

Who's on your list?

Thursday 6 January 2011

Final Farewells - The Artist

So I try to write these things every NYE. I'm a bit late this year, but knowing me, can you really expect anything else?

Thought not.

I'm lucky, I only had three to write about this year, and none of them were people who were a huge part of my life.

I won't say enjoy.



I can picture the scene like it was yesterday, although it - for me - was half a lifetime ago. I was 14, chubby, shy, and my elegant European boyfriend had dragged me to London one Spring afternoon. He liked to shop. I did too, but his idea of shopping was vastly different from mine. I was ready for a hellish day, but I was not prepared for you.

We walked in, and you were right there. A giant of a man, and still not big enough to contain the energy that I could feel as soon as I walked through the front door. I remember tangles - almost dreadlocks - of long reddish hair, a crumpled dress shirt and a beard that made you look like some ancient Viking, but what really caught me was that we were in a prestigious store on one of the best streets in London, and you were barefoot. I was so mesmerized by that, and by the size of your feet, that I forgot to be scared.

Ju said something to you, and then you looked at me and smiled, and said, "I'm Lee."

This was not the name I knew you as.

It should have been a terrifying moment, but somehow it wasn't. Everything I'd heard said that you were a diva with a bad temper, but all I saw was someone sweet, and perhaps a little bit shy, who made a fat teenager from the wrong side of the tracks feel welcome.

We looked at clothes. You found me a pistachio-green suede skirt with a handkerchief hem and button detail. Julian wanted me to get the complementary black top with a peekaboo slit just above the breasts (and actually ended up buying it for me later, without my knowledge), but I was 14 and embarrassed to already be a C cup, so I ended up with a scoopneck sweater in a black silk-and-cashmere blend. Julian bought me knee-length Jil Sander boots, and I wore the whole outfit for years.

You told me that I was pretty, and because it was you, I believed it. Even though I hadn't felt pretty for a long time. It's funny, I'm looking at another post I just wrote for Final Farewells, and I said much the same thing about him. I don't think you can ever overestimate the impact of telling an insecure teenage girl that you can see beauty in her.

And that was it. One meeting. I wish there'd been another.

You died this year. February, not long after my 26th birthday. Nearly 12 years since I'd met you, and the memory was as clear as day.

People the world over will talk about your talent. And they're right to - you had more than most people can ever imagine. But I choose, instead, to talk about your kindness, about a moment of welcome that left a memory as vivid as you were.

Thank you for that.


Lee Alexander McQueen - 17th March 1969 - 11th February 2010

Final Farewells - The Ray Of Sunlight

So I try to write these things every NYE. I'm a bit late this year, but knowing me, can you really expect anything else?

Thought not.

I'm lucky, I only had three to write about this year, and none of them were people who were a huge part of my life.

I won't say enjoy.


 I met him once, and talked to him on the phone once, and that was enough to think of him as a friend. From other people I've talked to, I understand he had that effect on a lot of people, and not just because he was pretty. He made friends everywhere he went. He made people feel happy and good. He was one of the few true empaths I've ever met, and whether he consciously knew what he was - I have no idea if he believed in esoterica or not - he knew instinctively how to use that ability to improve people's lives. All the conversations I've eavesdropped on, all the forums that I've lurked in, and I have yet to hear ONE person say a negative thing about his personality.

His music, sure. He was approximately two thirds of a boyband (with the other two members comprising the other third) that made pretty appalling music, that I nevertheless happened to quite like, because it made me happy. In this country at least, he and his boys have been forgotten, except perhaps by a couple of women around my age who remember a year or so in our teens where we found ourselves periodically squealing with joy when he came on the television.

Of course, anyone who's privileged enough to have been able to call him a friend, will never ever forget him.

I was sick a lot when I was in my early teens, and spent many school days in bed, bored out of my mind, watching Trouble (a teen channel) and waiting for California Dreams and Saved By The Bell to come on. One day Mom let me call in to the channel, for a competition they were running, and to my delight I got to chat to their resident celebrity. I answered the questions correctly, and won concert tickets. And I made a friend, when he called me back after I'd given my details to the officials. He wanted to know about school, and my friends, and my illness, and my family - and unlike most people in his position, he genuinely cared about the things I was telling him, however stupid they were.

Even as a kid, it wasn't ever possible for people to hide how they felt from me.

I went to the concert, although Mom tried to ban me from doing it, saying I was too young. I met him and his band. He hugged me, and kissed me on my cheek, and called me beautiful - and he meant it. This piece of blonde hotness, who teenyboppers went wild for, really truly thought that chubby awkward me was beautiful.

In 2005, he'd long stopped releasing music - in England, anyway - and when I happened on a news article that said he was sick, I was worried. And then I stopped worrying, because it seemed utterly ludicrous that someone who was so full of life, someone who brought sunshine and goodness to the lives of everyone he met, could have something inside him that wanted to kill him. It couldn't possibly beat him, could it? He'd fight. Of course he would.

He did. He beat AML once. He went into remission after six months of fighting, and stayed that way for several years. He wasn't WELL, but he didn't have leukemia. He had to take a lot of drugs, including steroids that made his weight balloon. He didn't look anything like a boyband member anymore. He lost his hair, and I'm told, his sex drive. He never lost his goodness. He never stopped caring about people, never stopped wanting to make things better for everyone he met.

I'm not sure when his cancer came back. I know that he died on September 8th. I didn't find out until October, and after the initial tears, one of the things I felt most was cheated. Like someone had stolen something from me that was irreplaceable. Strangely, I was also a little offended, because he died and he didn't come to me. I know how ridiculous that is, especially considering the amount of bitching I do about ghosts. I guess I just wanted to see him again.

He made me laugh. He made me yearn. He made me lose a lot of my early cynicism about love. I've had a lot of wonderful men in my life since, but he planted the seed that eventually chipped away at the walls that I built around myself as a pre-teen and teenager. He saw the beauty in me at a time when I couldn't, or wouldn't.

I will never forget him, and I truly believe that everyone who ever met him will say the same.

Rich Cronin, here's to you.



 



Richard Burton Cronin - August 30th 1974 - September 8th 2010

Final Farewells - The Grandmother

So I try to write these things every NYE. I'm a bit late this year, but knowing me, can you really expect anything else?

Thought not.

I'm lucky, I only had three to write about this year, and none of them were people who were a huge part of my life.

I won't say enjoy.

Her name was Norma, and in fourteen years of having her in the grandmother role, I never managed to learn her last name. I feel bad about this, because the dead ask so little of us. With very few exceptions, they only want two things: they want to be found if they haven't already, and they want people to know their names. Her daughter - my stepmama - has had three surnames in the decade and a half that I've known her (and her daughters have yet another one, from their father) and I truly don't know which of them, if any, came from her mom. So Norma's surname could have been Baker, or it could have been Cushing, or it could have been something totally different.

What can I say about this woman? Very little, and I feel bad for that. I have far more to say about my other FFs, and they weren't family. I feel like I should have more to say about a woman who I considered my grandmother, but truth is that I barely knew her. I saw her maybe once a year, some years not at all. I know she was kind to me. I know she was down-to-earth and friendly. I know that when she got the lung cancer diagnosis and they gave her three to six months, she had the stamina and sheer stubbornness to hang on nearly four years.

What I can tell you about is the reaction that her death has brought about in my stepmama, who I AM close to, and who loved her mother dearly. I saw her before Christmas, for the first time in a couple months, and she has quite simply turned gray. Not her hair, but her whole aura. Stepmama is one of the brightest, strongest people I've ever had the pleasure to meet. She's coped with my father's incapacity over the last eighteen months with grace and humor, and while she's looked tired nothing ever dimmed her inner flame until her mother died in the spring of 2010.

For your death - expected as it was - to evoke that kind of reaction in your fifty-year-old daughter, that the pain still shows clearly eight months later...well, to me that says a lot about the kind of person you are.

So here it is, a tribute to a woman that I wish I'd known better. Happily she's never haunted me - I can only assume that her pragmatic nature ensures that she has no unfinished business here. She deserves much better than the little that I can write about her, but if she could hear it she would go out of her way to make sure I know how much she appreciated it, and how perfect it all was (even if it wasn't). Because that's just the kind of person she was.

Monday 3 January 2011

Crisis Averted!

Thanks be to all the benevolent Powers, my boy is okay, and his mom is recovering.

No energy right now. I don't know if I've got some low-grade virus or something, or if it's just a reaction to the stress and the accumulated illnesses that have had me struck down for the last few months, but for the last couple of nights I've wanted to be in bed by nine pm, and even in the daytime I've been finding it hard to keep my eyes open.

Posts that I'm mid-way through writing:

- Details of my Christmas / New Years
- x3 Final Farewells (something I try to do every NYE)
- Odi et Amo: new series coming soon! (I had so much fun with the Christmas posts, I decided that I'd do more serials)

So don't delete me from your watched lists just yet, mmmkay? I'll be back soon.