seismic activity

my brainplates are cranking.
new blog concept forthcoming.
my head is full of ideas.

pothole

Last night I found myself in a dark headspace that I haven't been in since April.
Luckily, I didn't remain there for very long.
I don't know what I want right now, but I want it pretty bad. These women I love and admire keep making ballsy life changes to do what's best for themselves. Maybe I should follow the example. I guess I have already begun the process, with the cleaner living and everything. I guess I get frustrated when I expect instant returns and they don't come.

douchebag savant

Armed with a GT's Kombucha and quart of trail mix, I am going to write tonight.
But first, I am going to fall asleep watching a movie inspired by a Nicholas Sparks novel. On a national holiday. In the middle of the afternoon.

worst blogger ever.

but i'll be back soon.

everything that happens is from now on

that one Bon Iver quote keeps resonating. and i keep deleting months of my life, and filing it away. i have internalized the lessons, that's what matters.

orchidaceae

Summer is Portland is some kind of narcotic and its effects change my body chemistry so quickly. I spent most of the the shitty, snow-ban-filled winter with a major life jones, and it's like, one night's sleep and suddenly everything is lush and vibrant again. My stir-crazy tendencies are amplified by the fact that I am so healthy right now... clear weather and a clear head. I'm writing from my front stairs...just got home after taking the long route back to the West End from India St. I love to meander through downtown after any long shift at work, but there's something about those crosstown sojourns that are even better in the summer. The wall of heat that has pushed through town over the past two day has coaxed the last bastion of stragglers out of their long winter's nap. The bikes are out, the patios filled, more hobos, more cigarettes, more hipsters, the murmur of backyard barbecues throughout my residential neighborhood. And all of the carnal molecules we release attach to the humidity and hang in the air.

I guess, technically, there's still a month left of spring...but this has been a promising trailer for the feature to come.

Thanks to exercise, kombucha, consistent sobriety and a few time(and trial by fire)-tested connections with some beautiful people, I have strengthened my immunity to the universe and the wrenches it tends to hurl in my direction (such a big toolbox). It's no fool-proof formula, but it's working. Negative energy is easy to maintain for some people and, historically, I am one of those people. It's like ivy: all you have to do is plant it and walk away, all reckless and unaware. Without a watchful eye, it will creep it's way into the mortar and destroy the substrate it was meant to accentuate. Once that shit is out of your control, it takes some committed hedge-trimming to reveal what's left beneath-if you're lucky, something will still be there.

You know, it's a common misperception that the cultivation of orchids is reserved for the skilled botanist. The truth is, they're no different than any other plant, you just have to relinquish your apprehensions, employ a little care and embrace the beauty of it.

forego the parable

Oh hey.

These days are swirling by in flares of intensity. All I'm really focusing on is being obsessively healthy (except for cigarettes, damn you). It's just about the only thing I have control over, so I'm just going focus on ensuring I'm in peak performance mode for whatever the hell is gonna get thrown my way. Fairly awesome. Fairly daunting.

More later.

this is what the world is for

I have had an almost perfect morning: got up early, walked to Aurora to get coffee, came home to do the crossword and eat a big bowl of cereal, cleaned my kitchen, threw my stinky work clothes into the wash.... all before 10 AM! Now I have time to write before I walk to work on the first gorgeous day since...well... since my vacation ended. Funny, that. This morning is almost perfect but it's up against some damn good ones, it's not even a fair fight. When my friend went home and routine resumed, it manifested in the form of a close/open and a deluge of rain. I could have either become completely bummed out or realized that the universe really does reward us for our good behavior, and kept up momentum.

Here I was last week, in this familiar city in a newish configuration of my life (that I am still growing into), with a person who knew me in a completely different city and definitely under different, often-tense circumstances. I wasn't really sure what to expect, but by suspending expectations, this merging of experiences tugged the marionette strings of my perspective in a way that cast a floodlight across some dimly lit corners.

I feel very...clear, in many ways. I'm placing a moratorium on over-thinking, because it's really evident that doesn't get me or anyone else anywhere worthwhile. No good sightseeing there.

Also:
1) The Sounds were flippin' awesome. I haven't seen a show like that in ages (except maybe NKOTB).
2) I found my new favorite ambience and margarita @El Camino in Brunswick. I would love to redecorate my apartment just like that restaurant, except I fear it would yield a blow habit.
3) I learned that kombucha, while conceptually quite revolting, is actually delicious. That said, I am fairly certain that over-consuming that stuff will turn me into a X-man. Woman. Person. You know, like Wolverine.
4) I have fallen into a heated love affair with MGMT's Oracular Spectacular (approximately two years after everyone else, i know).
5) Really. Fucking. Happy.

What else? No brilliant elocution this morning, apparently. I gotta go to work. Oh, and for those of you keeping score, brunch was Caiola's again, because it is fucking yummy (pop tart).

if it's bitter at the start

Quick one: I need to get some sleep between walking and working and walking. The thing is, I'm not tired. Even though I am going to joyfully hop off the wagon to have fun with R this weekend (I said I was going to make it until The Sounds show, and I have, so I'm set) I am going to keep this no-booze, lots of exercise, green juice routine going, because I seriously feel the best I ever have in my life. I know I keep saying that. But it's excellent. I am doing dishes and dancing my ass off to Madonna's Confessions on a Dance Floor , which i will forever contend is one of the best pop albums of the past few years. If only I could dance with such abandon and inhibition at an actual dance party! Oh well, i guess this is why I am going to the head-repair place... I had my first appointment today and it was a very intense purging. I think it's going to take a lot of work for me to evict anxiety and learn to navigate boundaries, but it'll happen. I am exhausted by my own compulsion to freak people out with my emo intensity. Don't be polite and say it doesn't happen, because it does. And those of you who are worth your goddamn salt have stuck around.

"particularly lucid"

One week, no booze. Walking to work every day. I feel physically incredible (and thinkin' i'm looking kinda fine too without that pesky PBR bloat!). I'm a little anxious, but I'm not going to make any progress if I don't deal with what triggers my anxiety with a clear head. One thing I've learned this week is that i am more in control of my impulses than I estimated. The hardest part has been enduring bourbon-fueled, criticism-filled WPR dinners. For so long I have fought bourbon with bourbon.

This afternoon I stopped by TWH to say hello to everyone at the tail end of brunch, and it was kind of obvious that I need to practice reconfiguring myself in that setting. I want to be able to socially drink without drinking to alleviate social anxiety. So I'm going to test out different scenarios, try to pinpoint what makes me nervous and when I am the most comfortable. Today, at TWH, I was feeling so clearheaded, but skittish. I'm guessing that most of it was simply the presence of the last bird to do wrong by my heart. Eh, that's not really fair. Miscommunicado and it broke my heart. Yeah, sure, it's been well over a month, but the thing is, only NOW am i starting to reflect upon what I can learn from this relationship. Instead of taking heed to the lessons, I've been anesthetizing rejection.

The thing is, it wasn't until this week until I realized it wasn't rejection. None of this is a reflection of me as a person. Thus, with the suggestion of my friend E., I've started wearing a rubber-band around my wrist to snap whenever I apologize unnecessarily or say something self-deprecating. Do I think the Pavlovian conditioning is working? Not necessarily. But it is increasing my awareness of unwarranted low self-esteem.

This is going to be a great summer. Just on friday, two friends named C., within hours, told me that I should seriously consider getting a bike for both transportation and adventuring purposes. I told them both that I have not ventured into urban cycling because I have a profound fear of being hit by a goddamn car. They reassured me that they have both been hit by cars while bicycling and survived, so I think I'll give it a shot. They just have to teach me. My friend A. lent me Eckhart Tolle's A New Earth and while I am apprehensive about hippie, new-agey shit, I'm open to anything that's going to expand my horizons, even just an inch.

I was just taking a break from writing to chill on my steps, and thinking about my two friends coincidental timing of the bike suggestion, which yielded a reflection upon how, in December, the two completely unavailable women, that I conflated into a fake-girlfriend band-aid for my break up with B, gave me (within days of each other) bottles of vodka (in conjunction with their respective dudes) and mix CDs (both in green cases) that contained one common track: Beck's "Lost Cause". This is not suggesting a conspiracy theory, but it seems a little foretelling in retrospect (hello, oxymoron).

No more "fighting for a lost cause"...no more distracting crushes. I'm excited to work through the rest of the upcoming (hopefully still sunny and warm, please) week, and have my friend R from Buffalo come and hang out for a few days. More on that later though... there is a heck of a good ballgame to watch right now. Man... the Sox are en route to a 10-game win streak concurrent with my sobriety streak. Will not drinking become less self-discipline and more baseball-related superstition? Oh well, I guess it could be worse: I could not be washing my underwear or something. Ew.

this time, underthinking

I have been bunkered and watching movies, drinking detox tea and I feel awesome. Last night I watched American Gangster which has been sitting around here forever.... Actually, I had a great conversation about temporality with the clerk at Blockbuster today:

BR: Uh, I have had these out forever. Can I still return them?

Clerk: How long is forever?

BR: How long? what do you mean? Forever is just...forever. That's kind of its thing.

Anyway, AG was good, and now I am sitting on my couch watching the Blu-ray menu for Milk and I'm going to press PLAY. Oh, and on the subject of, err...gay political things, I will share this video.

A Gaythering Storm from Jane Lynch

Life as it is

Today I actually went and did it. MIND THE GAP, tattooed right across my wrist. I have been repeating the phrase to myself for months now, and at this point, I really needed something to solidify my commitment to living in reality. I had C. write it facing me so that I was the one who could most readily read it... it's not as much a prescription for other people, but a reminder to myself to be more aware.

My family is going to freak out so I'm going to try to keep it concealed in their presence for as long as humanly possible (uh, hello, internet disclosure! I guess now i'll find out if they read this junk). So I'm going to be rocking a cuff every once in a while...or maybe I could just bust out my Ritchie Tenenbaum sweatbands from Halloween...or...maybe I'll just wear a dozen different Livestrong-eqsue wristbands and not only conceal the ink but look like I am half-heartedly committed to a handful of causes.

A reminder to myself to be more aware.

Where did Rogue Brunch go? Well, two weeks ago was a bye week because of Easter, and honestly I wish I had done a better job at mentally archiving (or Twittering) that day. And then, a week of unravelling ensued. Last Sunday, I ended up at TWH because AS was working and I had a mad craving for Mystery Ranch. I should have known, however, that when the day began with WPR asking me to relocate an armload of rifles (nine, to be exact) and ammo at ten in the morning that the day was destined to be weird, and I should have just stayed home. But I didn't. And part of it was damn fun, but when I woke up with a pounding headache and a missing pair of sunglasses, I decided that enough was enough. So I'm taking brave and responsible measures towards getting into a better headspace.

When C was tattooing me today, one of the most important things I said out-loud was that I am never, ever going to consider myself worthy of other people's friendship, let alone love, if I continue to consider myself unworthy of my own love. I wasn't the first to say it, but today might be the first day I genuinely believed it. Low self-esteem is terribly unsexy, anyway.

So here we go.

*i just realized some of you thought i was going to get the London Underground logo tattooed on me. Uh. No.

steps are being taken

i'm headed in the right direction.
thank you for your continued love and support. and LOLs.
for now, i am going to drink detox tea and watch Bravo...

Lower your voice, Ron

I think I am still over-thinking, and it goes at such a frantic pace that it's best to be quiet and eat a lot of takeout (hello,sweatpants!) until it's over.

Last night was generally a pretty fun night @the Best of Portland awards but MAN, you mix me with whiskey and if a trigger point gets hit, I'm ten shades of completely crazy.

I'm still obsessing over this people-lust thing. I guess my choice of words there is revealing enough. People LUST. Yeah, I'm a flirt and my lack-of-charm usually comes across as quite charming (Tonight, Amie compared it to the scene in Anchorman when Ron Burgundy blurts in loud monotone "YOU CAN USE MY OFFICE AND AFTERWARDS, MAYBE WE CAN GO TO LUNCH" which is apropos) but truthfully, I'm kind of lonely, and now that it's summer, I just want to sit on patios or even just my front steps and drink a beer and have lots of conversation. Talking to new people doesn't just teach me about them, but reveals how much I've grown (or as the case may be, not grown). Ok, I guess I also want to fumble around in the dark with someone who isn't unavailable or an idiot (basically ruling out all of my options). What I don't want is to spend the summer slamming back whiskeys and leering. I want to talk.

NO!

I am over-thinking again.

Rogue Brunch Bye Week Edition

Coming soon. For now? Big Sigh, and XO.

i think that people are the greatest fun

While i am more than aware of the liabilities of living in "a lot of fun for a little city," i am still perplexed by happenstance, and the dogma of prescribed by my blog title (however ironically) resonates.

It's just that whenever I try to relinquish some ridiculous hang up-- mind the gap --there is something, or someone, thrown in front of me that makes me question my resolve.

And I try to act normal. But when I try to act normal, I act fucking weird. I think this is because I've convinced myself that in certain scenarios, I am supposed to act how I perceive normal is to...other people?

The truth is "causal" really does not come easy to me. It's funny, I recently posted about how I seem to find myself in these really intense relationships, and without having read that post, a new friend remarked on the fact that I really seem to love people.

I do. And it's not humanity in general. But certain people strike me, and I want to know everything about them. It's that Calexico lyric: "I could be in love with almost everyone" . I think that scares people sometimes... or maybe life just happens. IDK.

word.

Minus the whole "worst start in the AL East" business, this was a nearly perfect day.

so rich so pretty

This is the kind of day where a post could and, probably will, go in a thousand different incongruous directions. My double-lives are surging forth and I'm tired of them feeling so independent of each other. The thing is, it is REALLY difficult to explain what dealing with my family is like... it requires so much backstory and an ability to articulate nuance that is somewhere slightly beyond my reach as a writer (for now). After my last post, I had, perhaps, one of the most difficult nights of my life sleeping over at my grandparents. I am not a nurse. I don't have the physical strength or proper training to do what my grandpa requires right now... But I pushed through a sleepless night, called out of work, and he had to be transported to Maine Med in the morning, where I remained all day. I don't mind doing stuff like this. I love my family. I just get frustrated when i feel like I am dealing with more than my share of the responsibility. Luckily, I had my dad around on Monday to eat meatball subs with in the cafeteria and as a witness to the depressing, human grossness of the ER. And then we went and hit up Yosaku for sushi and sake.

Where was I going with this? I am multitasking and getting ready for work. I was just @WPRs where she set me up as her primary contact for her newly acquired Lifeline---you know, "I've fallen and I can't get up". I am impressed that she has swallowed her pride enough to enroll in that program, and I don't mind being the primary contact: I am, more or less, fairly available. The tension emerged when it appears that I am the ONLY contact. I don't like being taken advantage of, but I possess this compulsive, child-of-an-alcoholic quality that insists that I ensure that everything is taken care of.

As a result, I am fucking tired. I have gone through this gauntlet of playing too hard on a damp first friday, working, spending 16 straight hours changing bedsheets and carrying around an old man, and then fucking opening. I would be really happy sitting on my couch eating Et Tu Tofutti from Silly's and playing that wacky new-age Flower game on Playstation all afternoon.

I don't want to sound like I am whining or not being recognizant of the fact that sometimes life simply demands that one steps up and takes responsibility.

When I say that I live double-lives, I refer to the fact that a lot of people don't know that when I'm not boozing and being charming, or pouring coffee, I deal with intense real-world adult stuff. That said, when i am not dealing with intense real-world adult stuff, i am often out playing. Thing have been calm, and I'm grateful for that. Still, I am more aware than ever of this magnetism I apparently exude that pulls the most spectacular people into my orbit in frantic bursts of physical, emotional or intellectual energy. Electromagnetism is a technology used in bombs. I would like to harness that power for good and not evil. Whether it is an emailing frenzy or a one-night stand, it feels like most interactions I have with "new" people are relegated to brief and intense. I am grateful. I am learning. And my one line of inquiry right now is wondering if there is something I am doing subconsciously that boots people out of my gravity's range. I always find myself coming out of a frenetic cloud, standing on my front steps, smoking a cigarette, wondering "what just happened?".

No matter, I'll be in Fenway Park tomorrow. The rest of this is irrelevant.

Rogue Brunch Vol. 2

This is the kind of day that cannot be condensed into a few paragraphs. Yes, I went to brunch this morning with A. Caiola's did not fail to meet my expectations after months and months of lusting for their brunch... and if I could make one recommendation it would be this: homemade pop tart. If I could offer constructive criticism it would be MORE HOLLANDAISE. PLEASE. Maybe I have an unrefined palette but I don't understand why "nice" restaurants always skimp on the hollandaise on their eggs benedict. The Empire Grill in Buffalo was the same way. The only thing that makes me mourn the fact that Eggspectation folded here in town is that they were serious hollandaise hedonists.

Rogue brunch is my new favorite thing... as much as I was lamenting the absence of that collective breakfast chaos last week, I really enjoy being able to have a decent conversation over a Bloody (and a coffee and a water).

Like every Sunday, it seems, this day has really veered in intense directions. I walked over to the Baltimore Block to do the crossword with Wilma (per usual, one hour, pwned)... when I entered, I found GCB on the living room couch with a hospital bracelet on. As it turns out, he took a bad fall this morning and roughed himself up. My dad came in and took him to the hospital, and while all that matters is that someone was there, it makes me really frustrated that WPR calls me for the most ridiculous reasons during the week, demanding I rearrange my plans to facilitate their needs (i.e. go to the grocery store to pick up pickles and condensed milk. seriously. why?) but they don't call me in an ACTUAL emergency? Anyway, I was here through a very chaotic and depressing afternoon, and I am here now, at 10:30 PM, sitting at their kitchen table with a Shipyard and contemplating why I have spent so much time as a sentinel for the infirm. I have stared mortality in the face too much for someone my age. It was not that long ago that I was taking care of my own mother when she could no longer care for herself, and lately it is evident that my grandparents have turned a corner after which there is no U-turn escape route. I feel like these next months are going to be very hard.