After nine hours of running around doing things and being nice to people I am once again taking a few minutes to sit and have a coffee and do my daily word-arranging for your consideration.
Nine hours! What the hell? I'm a writer (read: unemployed). I really don't get how people with jobs get anything at all done. My bobby pins are off to you, in lieu of a hat. You have my admiration.
I've gotten twenty letters of thanks this morning from everyone born in the seventies for reminding them of that Chris De Burgh song last night. You're welcome. It is amazing, isn't it? It's made me cry every time I've ever heard it, starting when I was four years old. Neat.
I've done a hell of a lot of cleaning and organizing toward the move, and entertained the second of three moving estimators. I'm practically a pro this time around. Great fun. I'm feeling better about the packing part. I think I have that part under control.
Not sure I will ever be a pro at Missing Ben. And Ben has been gone a billion times before. That was then, this is now. Now he is mine and I finally have him to revolve around, tiny planet-moon that I am, without distractions and bullshit and whoops, there he goes again. He is very grumpy today. It isn't helping but I have been a worse pain in the ass than usual.
Ah well. Hopefully the time will go fast. I was talking to a military wife today who moves every nine months or so and she was incredibly supportive and encouraging and oddly it helped. I'm a detail person. The boys fly by the seat of their pants. They assume all will be well and I ask questions and organize things so that I don't have to assume. Otherwise I just wind up picturing the worst or wishing I had asked more questions.
I try to temper my rigidity with honesty though. The very first thing I do is thank people for their help and point out I am apprehensive/worried and then everyone is rocked off their guard and I get actual help. If it's a gift I don't know how it translates but it's always been the way I do business. Don't give me your spiel, give me your heart. Maybe that's how I wind up collecting so many, I disarm.
Now that the coffee is gone and the words have arrived I notice the children should be home any minute now. It's a lot warmer today, still cold by most sane people's standards. I am feeling better too. I still have a bad headache but the queasies and achies have all but vanished after three days of yuck. Whatever it is thankfully moves fast. No fever anymore either which is nice and I managed to achieve a full six and a half hours of sleep last night.
The sun is going down. Early next week is the winter solstice and then I will await the longer days with hope. I don't enjoy the very short days. It seems to make everything harder altogether. The first day of winter marks those precious moments of daylight that are tacked on to morning and night and I count every last one of them.
Every last one.
Wednesday 16 December 2009
Tuesday 15 December 2009
Better for it.
Today I have the usual confidence daylight seems to bring.
I'm wrapping presents and cleaning and doing things toward the move and I'm battling an epic headache and chills and flu and really I'm thinking this is just all more life experience that I'm supposed to get and then maybe I'll be promoted to the next level.
Oh, wait, this isn't Warcraft and I don't get to level up. I won't be sainted or martyred and apparently Dirt Devil is not going to read my mind and send me a vacume to roadtest because I still can't spell vacume and guess what, I now refuse to ever buy another Dirt Devil again because it can't manage to do fuck-all on the four carpets in the entire house, two of which are actually classified as throw rugs, I would imagine. Seriously. Whoever designed these things should be crucified slowly and obviously has all wood and tile floors and a really kick ass broom.
Let's see. What else? The children are home because it's Fucking Cold Out and they are battling the same headache/chills/mild fever thing I am. Really going to school to watch a movie and decorate a gingerbread house is not as exciting as doing it here and not having to wait turns, miss pivotal dialogue because someone is talking or watch the other kid that you hate put the last gumdrop on the roof. Fuck it, kids, stay home and we'll build a whole gingerbread village, or maybe a city, or perhaps a municipality! And you'll hear the movie you watch and I'll make popcorn and you don't even have to put on snowpants. Not even once.
I am the coolest mom ever.
Well, I am.
Maybe you are too. It's okay. We can share the trophy and the glory. Or maybe you don't have kids but you made a kick-ass lunch or had a good sleep last night. Here, grab a hold, hoist it high.
I'm going to need to go scrap some of this confidence into a jar or something so I can bring it out when the vampires come. Nights and early mornings are no longer doing me any favors. I just lie there and imagine the furnace breaking, the car not starting, being out of liquid assets and having the rapture break loose all in the same night and winding up outside with the kids when it does.
That seems to be my nightmare.
That and missing Ben. You haven't met him, you don't understand what he means to me or how much I love him. If you have met him then I know you understand, and that this is practically incapacitating me.
I am trying to remember it's less than a deployment, less than a season and less than a lot of people endure. I am loved and spoiled and the odds are those awful vampires from 30 days of night probably won't find me. My father says the odds are small, if any.
He has not seen the movie.
My dad likes movies like Out of Africa. I did too, but I doubt it's for the same reasons. I don't think one of my father's daydreams involves Robert Redford washing his hair.
At least I hope not.
I am finished shopping for Christmas, the flu hasn't brought me down yet, and I'm caught up on laundry and cleaning now. I have not hired any Russian, Polish or Belarusian hit men to take out my evil brother-in-law yet (I SAID YET) but I do have their numbers in case I decide to later and I am grateful that the dog has finally learned he doesn't have to go out every two hours anymore. We are up to four or six. Which is nice in the cold.
I would babble at you just a little more but in the feverish, overtired state I am in, I would just stop making sense (what?) or say too much and then everyone would freak out. Instead I'm going to go rustle up some lunch and do a little more towards the move. It's a big job moving a spectacle of this size across the country. Didn't I tell you that last time?
I guess you didn't believe me.
I'm wrapping presents and cleaning and doing things toward the move and I'm battling an epic headache and chills and flu and really I'm thinking this is just all more life experience that I'm supposed to get and then maybe I'll be promoted to the next level.
Oh, wait, this isn't Warcraft and I don't get to level up. I won't be sainted or martyred and apparently Dirt Devil is not going to read my mind and send me a vacume to roadtest because I still can't spell vacume and guess what, I now refuse to ever buy another Dirt Devil again because it can't manage to do fuck-all on the four carpets in the entire house, two of which are actually classified as throw rugs, I would imagine. Seriously. Whoever designed these things should be crucified slowly and obviously has all wood and tile floors and a really kick ass broom.
Let's see. What else? The children are home because it's Fucking Cold Out and they are battling the same headache/chills/mild fever thing I am. Really going to school to watch a movie and decorate a gingerbread house is not as exciting as doing it here and not having to wait turns, miss pivotal dialogue because someone is talking or watch the other kid that you hate put the last gumdrop on the roof. Fuck it, kids, stay home and we'll build a whole gingerbread village, or maybe a city, or perhaps a municipality! And you'll hear the movie you watch and I'll make popcorn and you don't even have to put on snowpants. Not even once.
I am the coolest mom ever.
Well, I am.
Maybe you are too. It's okay. We can share the trophy and the glory. Or maybe you don't have kids but you made a kick-ass lunch or had a good sleep last night. Here, grab a hold, hoist it high.
I'm going to need to go scrap some of this confidence into a jar or something so I can bring it out when the vampires come. Nights and early mornings are no longer doing me any favors. I just lie there and imagine the furnace breaking, the car not starting, being out of liquid assets and having the rapture break loose all in the same night and winding up outside with the kids when it does.
That seems to be my nightmare.
That and missing Ben. You haven't met him, you don't understand what he means to me or how much I love him. If you have met him then I know you understand, and that this is practically incapacitating me.
I am trying to remember it's less than a deployment, less than a season and less than a lot of people endure. I am loved and spoiled and the odds are those awful vampires from 30 days of night probably won't find me. My father says the odds are small, if any.
He has not seen the movie.
My dad likes movies like Out of Africa. I did too, but I doubt it's for the same reasons. I don't think one of my father's daydreams involves Robert Redford washing his hair.
At least I hope not.
I am finished shopping for Christmas, the flu hasn't brought me down yet, and I'm caught up on laundry and cleaning now. I have not hired any Russian, Polish or Belarusian hit men to take out my evil brother-in-law yet (I SAID YET) but I do have their numbers in case I decide to later and I am grateful that the dog has finally learned he doesn't have to go out every two hours anymore. We are up to four or six. Which is nice in the cold.
I would babble at you just a little more but in the feverish, overtired state I am in, I would just stop making sense (what?) or say too much and then everyone would freak out. Instead I'm going to go rustle up some lunch and do a little more towards the move. It's a big job moving a spectacle of this size across the country. Didn't I tell you that last time?
I guess you didn't believe me.
Monday 14 December 2009
Home Alone.
It's been a long day. A long day with Caleb's choice of soundtrack leaving me just about blind with a headache. Add it to the other aches, I'm curled up now in a heated blanket nursing my cold, tired self and happy that the day was a success for so many others.
The music in question was church bells. Central European church bells. It was pretty but after an entire day of it fading in and out I found myself hypnotized and distracted by them to the point that my head continues to ring and I've been home for quite a while now.
Today Caleb and Mike picked me up just after nine. Mike driving, Caleb smiling and handing me a coffee, made just the way I like it, Second Cup to prove he is always paying attention to the details. Infuriatingly smooth. I thanked him and took a sip, burning my top lip just enough to scowl a little and retire the cup to the holder beside my seat.
You look beautiful.
Thank you. You don't look so bad yourself.
I could be in rags and no one would notice with you there.
Sure they would. Hugo Boss doesn't put out a rag line.
He laughed and then settled back to look out the window and listen to the music. I could only hear a little and I squinted at nothing in particular and Caleb pressed a button on the console that sent the bell ringing swelling to the forefront.
I looked at him and without saying a word, was treated to a rather strange peace of nostalgia I didn't know he even held. Some of the years that Cole kept Caleb absent from our lives are still a mystery. He is the most well-traveled man I know.
I did give it my best shot. I was hostage to it anyway, between the car and the day's schedule and the take-no-prisoners shoes, the six inch ones with the satin ankle bows and the lovely dress that was so festive and yet seemed garish and fabulously inappropriate for a Monday morning wasn't going to allow for me to become part of the landscape.
We spent the first three hours riding elevators and walking labyrinths of corridors to surprise most of the recipients on Caleb's list with cheques and small gifties and wishes that they enjoy a wonderful holiday. Polish businessmen with their brittle hugs and humble tears and mobsters with their questionable glances and bruising cheek-kisses and semi-false dismissal of Caleb's gestures in order to cover their joy. It became exhausting. If there is one thing Caleb is known for, it's his generosity in rewarding people who work hard. If he benefits from it so will you.
(Nevermind the other things Caleb is known for, this is not the day for that.)
We took a long lunch, fueling up on Pad sew, coffee and sugar cookies and then ventured out in the cold once again, surrounded by bells and cash, and I had a positively hilarious conversation with one man who asked me if I knew where he was from and I guessed Georgia and he said Belarus and laughed and laughed like I was the most delightful girl, because I at least chose the Russian Empire. He said most people say France. I told him I had been to France, for a day, and his accent was definitely not French.
He howled and told me his mother was French.
Then I noticed he passed a padded envelope to Caleb and told him that he should treat me well, that I was positively engaging. Caleb said he would do his best. I was more interested at that point in why they were trading bonuses but on the way to the car Caleb took my elbow and squeezed it harder than I liked to keep my attention and changed the subject to dinner out, later on, with the children and some of the boys, to cap off a wonderful day.
As in, you saw nothing.
Right. Bridget sees nothing. Just words. Words to arrange. Words to pay for later.
I'm not sophisticated enough to want to take that further. It just looked weird and that's when I pretty much stopped enjoying myself and hung back a little more, prompted politely but forcefully more than once to inject the situation with a little more of the morning's brevity. But I was getting tired and we had crossed off the entire list by four, and I called Daniel to make sure the children were home from school and warmed up and then Caleb said he wanted to stop by the loft and then we could continue to the house.
I rolled my eyes.
You really don't want to miss this, princess.
I can wait in the car.
I promise. Just come with me. Mike will leave the car running.
Sad that I expect that promise and you make it without being led.
It is, but I deserve it.
I was happy to escape the bells, so up we went.
I waited by the door. He disappeared into his office for a moment and then returned with an envelope. A large manila one, like the ones I keep in his desk to keep his travel itineraries organized. He passed it to me.
What is this?
Don't you want to look inside?
I frowned at him and then looked inside. It took a moment to pull out a heavy sheaf of papers and I started going through them. Arrangements for trips to Vancouver and New York. For everyone. Everyone except for me.
What is this?
This is your independence, princess. You've spent your entire life hiding behind Cole, and then Jacob, and now Benjamin and the others. Only in a few years you're going to officially be a grownup and yet you don't qualify. Not yet. So this is your chance. Ben and only Ben will be home on Jan. 16 for a weekend, and then not until mid-February. Then mid-March. There will be one trip for you and the children to go and see him and then you all fly out to Vancouver once the house sells. For everyone who fights your battles for you and keeps you handicapped by your own fears and doubts I'm going to play the bad guy one last time and give you a little tough love. Just a little and just for a couple of months. You can do this, princess. You're going to do this and you'll thank me when it's over.
My whole head tightened up and began to throb and I started to cry before I even finished working through what he had said. And he smiled like I was the most pathetic thing he had ever seen and said this:
My God, it's so easy to want to save your life. I'm sure now my brother died of a broken heart and I can't say I blame him. And Bridget, I am not trying to be cruel. I need the boys to help get this show on the road out west, Ben needs to go to New York and then join us later and you need to show the children that you are strong, and capable, and confident. Do it for them and do it for yourself.
I nodded. (Words. I need words and there's nothing there. I can't find any. I can't say don't. Please don't.)
You will thank me.
He took my hand and I followed him back onto the elevator, down to the car and then we were back at the house.
In the car on the way here he said not to worry, that my Christmas bonus would be in my account on Friday as well as gifts that he would bring over closer to Christmas day and that he would be flying into the city regularly as well to check on us and that no one would ever be more than a couple of hours away at any time, and that our extended families and all of the boys were already aware of the situation and supportive of it.
(Traitors.) My mind found a word!
Everything will be fine, Bridget.
I know.
What?
I know. I'm not thanking you though.
You will when it's over. And your bonus? The largest one I have even paid out.
I don't want your money.
Why not? You could use it to play airplane tag.
The kids have school, idiot.
That's the smartest thing you have ever said to me. Wait, no, second smartest. The first was when you said to make the pain go away.
Was it tough keeping the evil all bottled up inside all day, Cale?
No, actually. I've learned to harness both the good and the evil inside. Just like you, princess. Just like you.
The music in question was church bells. Central European church bells. It was pretty but after an entire day of it fading in and out I found myself hypnotized and distracted by them to the point that my head continues to ring and I've been home for quite a while now.
Today Caleb and Mike picked me up just after nine. Mike driving, Caleb smiling and handing me a coffee, made just the way I like it, Second Cup to prove he is always paying attention to the details. Infuriatingly smooth. I thanked him and took a sip, burning my top lip just enough to scowl a little and retire the cup to the holder beside my seat.
You look beautiful.
Thank you. You don't look so bad yourself.
I could be in rags and no one would notice with you there.
Sure they would. Hugo Boss doesn't put out a rag line.
He laughed and then settled back to look out the window and listen to the music. I could only hear a little and I squinted at nothing in particular and Caleb pressed a button on the console that sent the bell ringing swelling to the forefront.
I looked at him and without saying a word, was treated to a rather strange peace of nostalgia I didn't know he even held. Some of the years that Cole kept Caleb absent from our lives are still a mystery. He is the most well-traveled man I know.
I did give it my best shot. I was hostage to it anyway, between the car and the day's schedule and the take-no-prisoners shoes, the six inch ones with the satin ankle bows and the lovely dress that was so festive and yet seemed garish and fabulously inappropriate for a Monday morning wasn't going to allow for me to become part of the landscape.
We spent the first three hours riding elevators and walking labyrinths of corridors to surprise most of the recipients on Caleb's list with cheques and small gifties and wishes that they enjoy a wonderful holiday. Polish businessmen with their brittle hugs and humble tears and mobsters with their questionable glances and bruising cheek-kisses and semi-false dismissal of Caleb's gestures in order to cover their joy. It became exhausting. If there is one thing Caleb is known for, it's his generosity in rewarding people who work hard. If he benefits from it so will you.
(Nevermind the other things Caleb is known for, this is not the day for that.)
We took a long lunch, fueling up on Pad sew, coffee and sugar cookies and then ventured out in the cold once again, surrounded by bells and cash, and I had a positively hilarious conversation with one man who asked me if I knew where he was from and I guessed Georgia and he said Belarus and laughed and laughed like I was the most delightful girl, because I at least chose the Russian Empire. He said most people say France. I told him I had been to France, for a day, and his accent was definitely not French.
He howled and told me his mother was French.
Then I noticed he passed a padded envelope to Caleb and told him that he should treat me well, that I was positively engaging. Caleb said he would do his best. I was more interested at that point in why they were trading bonuses but on the way to the car Caleb took my elbow and squeezed it harder than I liked to keep my attention and changed the subject to dinner out, later on, with the children and some of the boys, to cap off a wonderful day.
As in, you saw nothing.
Right. Bridget sees nothing. Just words. Words to arrange. Words to pay for later.
I'm not sophisticated enough to want to take that further. It just looked weird and that's when I pretty much stopped enjoying myself and hung back a little more, prompted politely but forcefully more than once to inject the situation with a little more of the morning's brevity. But I was getting tired and we had crossed off the entire list by four, and I called Daniel to make sure the children were home from school and warmed up and then Caleb said he wanted to stop by the loft and then we could continue to the house.
I rolled my eyes.
You really don't want to miss this, princess.
I can wait in the car.
I promise. Just come with me. Mike will leave the car running.
Sad that I expect that promise and you make it without being led.
It is, but I deserve it.
I was happy to escape the bells, so up we went.
I waited by the door. He disappeared into his office for a moment and then returned with an envelope. A large manila one, like the ones I keep in his desk to keep his travel itineraries organized. He passed it to me.
What is this?
Don't you want to look inside?
I frowned at him and then looked inside. It took a moment to pull out a heavy sheaf of papers and I started going through them. Arrangements for trips to Vancouver and New York. For everyone. Everyone except for me.
What is this?
This is your independence, princess. You've spent your entire life hiding behind Cole, and then Jacob, and now Benjamin and the others. Only in a few years you're going to officially be a grownup and yet you don't qualify. Not yet. So this is your chance. Ben and only Ben will be home on Jan. 16 for a weekend, and then not until mid-February. Then mid-March. There will be one trip for you and the children to go and see him and then you all fly out to Vancouver once the house sells. For everyone who fights your battles for you and keeps you handicapped by your own fears and doubts I'm going to play the bad guy one last time and give you a little tough love. Just a little and just for a couple of months. You can do this, princess. You're going to do this and you'll thank me when it's over.
My whole head tightened up and began to throb and I started to cry before I even finished working through what he had said. And he smiled like I was the most pathetic thing he had ever seen and said this:
My God, it's so easy to want to save your life. I'm sure now my brother died of a broken heart and I can't say I blame him. And Bridget, I am not trying to be cruel. I need the boys to help get this show on the road out west, Ben needs to go to New York and then join us later and you need to show the children that you are strong, and capable, and confident. Do it for them and do it for yourself.
I nodded. (Words. I need words and there's nothing there. I can't find any. I can't say don't. Please don't.)
You will thank me.
He took my hand and I followed him back onto the elevator, down to the car and then we were back at the house.
In the car on the way here he said not to worry, that my Christmas bonus would be in my account on Friday as well as gifts that he would bring over closer to Christmas day and that he would be flying into the city regularly as well to check on us and that no one would ever be more than a couple of hours away at any time, and that our extended families and all of the boys were already aware of the situation and supportive of it.
(Traitors.) My mind found a word!
Everything will be fine, Bridget.
I know.
What?
I know. I'm not thanking you though.
You will when it's over. And your bonus? The largest one I have even paid out.
I don't want your money.
Why not? You could use it to play airplane tag.
The kids have school, idiot.
That's the smartest thing you have ever said to me. Wait, no, second smartest. The first was when you said to make the pain go away.
Was it tough keeping the evil all bottled up inside all day, Cale?
No, actually. I've learned to harness both the good and the evil inside. Just like you, princess. Just like you.
Sunday 13 December 2009
Where I explain Warcraft to the masses.
I swear I could have gotten away with remaining in pajamas today. Ben even sat up at eight and offered to walk the dog. I usually take the dog out for his first walk of the day. I declined. I don't have to walk him after dark. Not yet, anyway. Ben went back to sleep for an hour or so and I made coffee and had breakfast with the children, who are completely nonplussed that so far their advent calendars have yielded five poinsettia-shaped chocolates, which is five too many considering we are only thirteen days in. Next year we're going to do a fun-activity advent, even though every day we do something.
Today it appears to be eating Pringles in our pajamas, playing Warcraft and reading (Ben and the children play the game, I try to read in between shouts of joy for leveling and finding razorbacked critter pets.
Ben yells CONSECRATE! and I jump twenty feet. I would play but it seems rather agressive and involved and I like games to be short and sweet. Like Pac-Man. Half the level cleared, killed by ghosts three times and YOU LOSE, BRIDGET.
But the wackawackawacka noise is supremely comforting somehow. Much better than these squealing pig sounds during battles. I can sit here and picture them being attacked by roving bands of wild boars dressed as characters from Lord of the Rings and every now and then everyone starts dancing onscreen and it looks funny.
So there you have it. They could kill whole days doing this but I have managed to kick them off at least a few times for meals or non-essential events like..oh, bedtime.
But I try. Someone has to be the bad guy and keep order in the guild.
Or something.
(I really have no idea, but they seem to like it.)
Today it appears to be eating Pringles in our pajamas, playing Warcraft and reading (Ben and the children play the game, I try to read in between shouts of joy for leveling and finding razorbacked critter pets.
Ben yells CONSECRATE! and I jump twenty feet. I would play but it seems rather agressive and involved and I like games to be short and sweet. Like Pac-Man. Half the level cleared, killed by ghosts three times and YOU LOSE, BRIDGET.
But the wackawackawacka noise is supremely comforting somehow. Much better than these squealing pig sounds during battles. I can sit here and picture them being attacked by roving bands of wild boars dressed as characters from Lord of the Rings and every now and then everyone starts dancing onscreen and it looks funny.
So there you have it. They could kill whole days doing this but I have managed to kick them off at least a few times for meals or non-essential events like..oh, bedtime.
But I try. Someone has to be the bad guy and keep order in the guild.
Or something.
(I really have no idea, but they seem to like it.)
Saturday 12 December 2009
Reluctance.
Indict the blameless, transparent designsGood evening.
Pathetic and shameless, crucified
A legend in his own mind, enthroned by lies
A cheap Machiavelli plots his demise
Caught in your words, sever the knot this time
Somebody show me their true face
Face me once as I leave all that I despise
Face me as I unleash this hate refined
Face me as I leave all this far behind
It's three hundred and twenty-four degrees below zero tonight and I just stopped moving. Which means I'll probably get cold. I just went around the house delivering steaming mugs of hot chocolate (the kind with the sugar cane and coconut bits) to everyone. I've got a big warm black sweater on. I even took my hair down and I still find my shoulders creeping up and the shivering settling in. I turned up the heat. The woodstove is all but red-hot. There isn't much left that I can do so my action of choice will be to find the warmest guy and curl up beside him for a bit. It's always too bad that's never ever Ben.
This morning we had wind chill warnings and slippery roads to wake up to so I took my car and went and got some gas and a load of groceries. Why? Because it's too easy for me to depend on the boys and I need to get away from that a little. Maybe a lot. Do one thing every day that scares you, she said. Sometimes I actually give that a shot. Driving on slippery roads may not be scary for you but Cole taught me how to drive when I was sixteen and we lived on a hill until I was thirty years old and it was always easier to just stay home.
I dunno. I'm still having a hard time with being able to get through a day without dissolving into huge blubbery inconsolable tears at the thought of Ben being away for such long periods into the new year. He hates the blubbering because it makes him feel bad and it makes him sad so he's trying to just keep busy/occupied/removed which only succeeds in making me feel worse.
More than a few moments have completely degenerated into who is going to be more miserable.
Obviously I will win. I am Bridget. Hear me cry.
Heh.
Aw, geez.
Hence the never-ending busywork. Only I think right through whatever I'm doing. I can't get away from it. In my head my fucked-up brain is telling me I'm being abandoned. It's relentless. A fucking woodpecker inside my head that just makes every step some sort of agonizing litany of every last unhappy ending I must be in for between now and the spring.
Only I'm fighting it.
So hard.
You wouldn't know it by the way I can fall apart but at the same time I am making a concentrated effort to have fun over the next twenty days. We're winding down the involved work on the house, just a couple large projects left and the rest is all little projects I can manage and enlist some help with. Painting. Finishing up things here and there. Heavy cleaning once the house goes to market and continuing to keep things ordered and neat as a pin. Like it always is, because I insist. Even the messes are neat. Even the ruin orderly.
Ben worries. Oh, how he worries. Only I'm torn between feeling sorry for him and the doubt inside my head that ruins everything good. I'm working on it. Slowly, not in a procrastinating way, just in the Bridget-way. Damn thoroughly.
The good news is that for tonight my raging insecurity is frozen solid and the only heat signature in sight is soon to be joined by the princess and her petulant little icy scowl, that one that she wears when she's pretending everything is a-okay.
She's still not sure if it is, though. It is far too soon to ask.
Friday 11 December 2009
Ruling planets: Venus Rising.
Since I'm in an upswing right this second (because hallo, sometimes I am not), I thought I would get a lot of things done.
My mom sent me out a package containing her famous cherry-chocolate chip jewel bars. All is right with the world for the moment.
I weeded through the camping equipment, out of season clothes and holiday decorations and took out another rickety chair, table and chest to the garbage. I called two moving companies to come to the house to provide estimates next week and I put the last load of laundry for today in the dryer and I'm out of dryer sheets and everything is going to be Static City in an hour.
Okay, I ate a jewel bar already. Give me credit, it's been four hours since breakfast and I've been crawling around in the basement for two hours already. Cottage cheese on toast doesn't go very far.
This weekend we're taking the kids to see Santa for their devil horns photo and we'll go to Build-a-Bear. Ben wants to let them each design a stuffed animal and you can record a message that they will play when hugged so he's going to sing a lullaby to each child that they can listen to whenever they choose. I would like one too. I know what I'm in for with this move, the children were toddlers when we moved here. They don't have a sweet clue. Which is good. It might make things easier.
Whoops. I lost a rung right there.
I am still hunting down a third number to call for moving estimates and then I will consider calling my real estate agent. The moment I do that I'm living on borrowed time and that's tough. We're planning to do the usual work one day/rest one day this weekend and I really really need the rest day. I'm considering sleeping pills tonight just because I seem to wake up every hour sometimes. Bad dreams, noises, dog rearranging himself on the bed. Or no dreams, no noise, dog in his own bed on the floor by the fireplace. You pick. I'm awake.
The good things list for British Columbia includes moving next to the largest ocean on the planet, a one-piece driver's license, easy access to epic snowboarding and beaches and islands, beautiful Haida art and culture, big ass trees and mountains and we can transfer our MEC memberships painlessly.
And donairs.
Oh yes.
It's been rather hellish getting them here. I made them myself once, and people have brought them back from Halifax for us and you really have to be from home to get it right. Ben doesn't understand. Haha. He will when I find a legitimate one for him to eat. Fresh instead of coolered.
Ah. Such is the stuff of dreams.
Back to work for me. Organizing! Chucking stuff! Lamenting just about everything I've ever bought. And five more days until the children are off school for Christmas. Monday is going to be my last day out, hopefully and then I am hunkering down for the holidays. Wringing the last few weeks of love out of this precious house.
My mom sent me out a package containing her famous cherry-chocolate chip jewel bars. All is right with the world for the moment.
I weeded through the camping equipment, out of season clothes and holiday decorations and took out another rickety chair, table and chest to the garbage. I called two moving companies to come to the house to provide estimates next week and I put the last load of laundry for today in the dryer and I'm out of dryer sheets and everything is going to be Static City in an hour.
Okay, I ate a jewel bar already. Give me credit, it's been four hours since breakfast and I've been crawling around in the basement for two hours already. Cottage cheese on toast doesn't go very far.
This weekend we're taking the kids to see Santa for their devil horns photo and we'll go to Build-a-Bear. Ben wants to let them each design a stuffed animal and you can record a message that they will play when hugged so he's going to sing a lullaby to each child that they can listen to whenever they choose. I would like one too. I know what I'm in for with this move, the children were toddlers when we moved here. They don't have a sweet clue. Which is good. It might make things easier.
Whoops. I lost a rung right there.
I am still hunting down a third number to call for moving estimates and then I will consider calling my real estate agent. The moment I do that I'm living on borrowed time and that's tough. We're planning to do the usual work one day/rest one day this weekend and I really really need the rest day. I'm considering sleeping pills tonight just because I seem to wake up every hour sometimes. Bad dreams, noises, dog rearranging himself on the bed. Or no dreams, no noise, dog in his own bed on the floor by the fireplace. You pick. I'm awake.
The good things list for British Columbia includes moving next to the largest ocean on the planet, a one-piece driver's license, easy access to epic snowboarding and beaches and islands, beautiful Haida art and culture, big ass trees and mountains and we can transfer our MEC memberships painlessly.
And donairs.
Oh yes.
It's been rather hellish getting them here. I made them myself once, and people have brought them back from Halifax for us and you really have to be from home to get it right. Ben doesn't understand. Haha. He will when I find a legitimate one for him to eat. Fresh instead of coolered.
Ah. Such is the stuff of dreams.
Back to work for me. Organizing! Chucking stuff! Lamenting just about everything I've ever bought. And five more days until the children are off school for Christmas. Monday is going to be my last day out, hopefully and then I am hunkering down for the holidays. Wringing the last few weeks of love out of this precious house.
Thursday 10 December 2009
Thursday afternoon and it's not so evil after all.
I'm finished pulling together all of the cards, tiny packages, cheques, cash (where necessary) and gift cards for Caleb's Christmas and I have his flight booked. He is spending the holidays in Montreal (!) and will be returning prior to New Years to see us and finish up at the loft. It's already been sold. Ye Gods, I can only wish and hope that my house sells as painlessly as the loft and Lochlan's house did. John is also hoping much the same thing. His house is smaller though, it will probably go quickly.
Monday we will head out and distribute all of this goodness. Caleb is generous to a fault around the holidays and forgets no one. Right down to the postal worker who delivers his mail, his dry cleaner and the suitmaker who sends his bespoke jackets from overseas.
I think everyone's going to be very happy.
Apparently I will get something as well. I really hope it's a gift card for the Keg. Bridget loves the Keg! I said that to Caleb over lunch (which was not at the Keg) and he almost spit water all over me.
You're family. Number one on my list.
List of what?
People I want to be generous with.
Oh, that list.
I'm trying hard to act accordingly, princess. To make you comfortable around me.
It's been better recently.
I'm pleased to hear that.
I wait for the other shoe to drop though.
Maybe you should give up that wait. I'm not as young as I used to be.
I look at him and he does look older. Like James Bond meets Tom Ford. Lines around his eyes but little else to reveal his age. Dresses better than both and has the manners of a king in mixed company and a wolf alone.
Things will be different when we get you out of here, Bridget.
This is a rescue mission then. I was right.
Of sorts, yes. It will also be good for business and I'm sure that you, Ben and the children will find life more rewarding on the coast.
I hope so.
We'll make it easier, princess.
He smiled then, but I knew he wasn't lying to me. He doesn't lie about the very big things.
Why are you really going to Montreal for the holidays? To see Sophie?
I will see her while I'm there, yes. Montreal at Christmas is spectacular. Not to mention Ben has two weeks with nothing scheduled so I want the two of you to enjoy your holidays together before he leaves. In private.
I nodded. I still can't wrap my brain around that. Two whole weeks with Ben at home. We'll kill each other. In a good way.
So now you have a long weekend ahead of you and I will see you for breakfast on Monday?
Yes. What time is Mike coming by the house?
Eight-thirty sharp. He'll take the kids to school and bring you to me.
Okay.
And Bridget?
Yes?
Everything's going to be fine.
Tell me that on the other side.
I promise I will. Goodnight, princess. Be happy, princess. You're not. Not yet.
It was an odd thing for him to say but I think I understand.
Monday we will head out and distribute all of this goodness. Caleb is generous to a fault around the holidays and forgets no one. Right down to the postal worker who delivers his mail, his dry cleaner and the suitmaker who sends his bespoke jackets from overseas.
I think everyone's going to be very happy.
Apparently I will get something as well. I really hope it's a gift card for the Keg. Bridget loves the Keg! I said that to Caleb over lunch (which was not at the Keg) and he almost spit water all over me.
You're family. Number one on my list.
List of what?
People I want to be generous with.
Oh, that list.
I'm trying hard to act accordingly, princess. To make you comfortable around me.
It's been better recently.
I'm pleased to hear that.
I wait for the other shoe to drop though.
Maybe you should give up that wait. I'm not as young as I used to be.
I look at him and he does look older. Like James Bond meets Tom Ford. Lines around his eyes but little else to reveal his age. Dresses better than both and has the manners of a king in mixed company and a wolf alone.
Things will be different when we get you out of here, Bridget.
This is a rescue mission then. I was right.
Of sorts, yes. It will also be good for business and I'm sure that you, Ben and the children will find life more rewarding on the coast.
I hope so.
We'll make it easier, princess.
He smiled then, but I knew he wasn't lying to me. He doesn't lie about the very big things.
Why are you really going to Montreal for the holidays? To see Sophie?
I will see her while I'm there, yes. Montreal at Christmas is spectacular. Not to mention Ben has two weeks with nothing scheduled so I want the two of you to enjoy your holidays together before he leaves. In private.
I nodded. I still can't wrap my brain around that. Two whole weeks with Ben at home. We'll kill each other. In a good way.
So now you have a long weekend ahead of you and I will see you for breakfast on Monday?
Yes. What time is Mike coming by the house?
Eight-thirty sharp. He'll take the kids to school and bring you to me.
Okay.
And Bridget?
Yes?
Everything's going to be fine.
Tell me that on the other side.
I promise I will. Goodnight, princess. Be happy, princess. You're not. Not yet.
It was an odd thing for him to say but I think I understand.
A good jolly December wind.
Next person who starts a fight finds somewhere else to live. Now who is coming to watch the movie?
It was a sentence I heard clearly as I contemplated the shelves full of soups and spices in the pantry and wondered why I should be the one heartbroken by their behavior when they should have to deal with it instead.
The door opened and Ben poked his head in and he laughed when he saw me standing there holding bottles of tumeric and oregano.
What are you doing, princess?
Rearranging my spices alphabetically.
I see. Do you think you'll be finished soon?
No...see, there's so many. This could take all night.
He came inside and tried to close the door behind him but he's too big and there's too much stuff inside and he tried to straighten and the shelf of candy boxes behind him lifted and crashed down onto the pasta shelf below it. He gave up and threw the door wide open and ducked back out.
That's too bad. We're going to call the kids down and put on a movie.
Are you going to stop fighting?
Yes, princess.
Right.
We've already kissed and made up. Your boyfriend doesn't like my lip gloss.
He's not my boyfriend, and yes, he's very picky.
I told him I'd try all different kinds of flavours until we hit on one that pleases him.
What did he say?
He swore at me.
I'm not surprised.
You think it's my breath?
No, Ben. It's not your breath.
Come on, princess. Everyone is waiting.
I'm coming. Here's the popcorn.
Oh, it's really handy, you living in there.
Yeah, see?
It was a sentence I heard clearly as I contemplated the shelves full of soups and spices in the pantry and wondered why I should be the one heartbroken by their behavior when they should have to deal with it instead.
The door opened and Ben poked his head in and he laughed when he saw me standing there holding bottles of tumeric and oregano.
What are you doing, princess?
Rearranging my spices alphabetically.
I see. Do you think you'll be finished soon?
No...see, there's so many. This could take all night.
He came inside and tried to close the door behind him but he's too big and there's too much stuff inside and he tried to straighten and the shelf of candy boxes behind him lifted and crashed down onto the pasta shelf below it. He gave up and threw the door wide open and ducked back out.
That's too bad. We're going to call the kids down and put on a movie.
Are you going to stop fighting?
Yes, princess.
Right.
We've already kissed and made up. Your boyfriend doesn't like my lip gloss.
He's not my boyfriend, and yes, he's very picky.
I told him I'd try all different kinds of flavours until we hit on one that pleases him.
What did he say?
He swore at me.
I'm not surprised.
You think it's my breath?
No, Ben. It's not your breath.
Come on, princess. Everyone is waiting.
I'm coming. Here's the popcorn.
Oh, it's really handy, you living in there.
Yeah, see?
Wednesday 9 December 2009
Part 2: Where I lose track of everyone's agendas completely.
I've spent the better part of the evening deflecting Lochlan's request to remove the previous entry. He used to be my biggest champion for having this outlet, a place where I mostly work through the words I need to arrange. Probably because I looked up to him. I craved some kind of approval and affection from Lochlan that I have chased since I was a child. Even when Jake and I were newly married it was so easy to go find Lochlan and curl up in one of his arms and close my eyes and I know Jake worked very hard to make peace with that history. Most of the boys have. It was a given and I would not apologize for it. I don't apologize for much of anything. I haven't had to.
What's interesting is that when I stopped regarding him as the hero in the words here, he stopped advocating for the lack of censorship here. I stopped seeing him as the hero when I realized that in a misguided attempt to continue to play the role of the good guy in my eyes, Lochlan had inadvertently driven me into the arms of his intended fall guy. He left Ben to do the dirty work and through that I came to see how selfless and compassionate Ben could be. Maybe he wasn't the shallow fratboy of our group. Every other emotion towards Ben quickly followed and it was an epiphany of the grandest sort to get another chance to see Ben the way no one else does. He doesn't let people in, he'd rather pretend to be the monster, and then he doesn't have to let people see that sometimes he isn't fifteen feet tall, and he doesn't have to be strong. He just stays mean outwardly and then it's easier. Push them all away and keep things light.
Ben still attempts to live this philosophy even though we all tore it down a long time ago. True to form tonight he came barging into the house, took a quick inventory to ensure that the children were in another part of the house entirely and gave Lochlan a shove that sent him stumbling backwards onto the couch in the living room.
The shouting commenced, as Ben tried to intimidate and Lochlan chose to reason, charming the ever-loving shit out of impressionable unrefined Ben, extolling the virtues of being permitted close access to Bridget and how perfect she is and how lucky Ben is.
Compliment everyone. Diffuse the bomb. Quiet the monkey. Reassure the princess. Everyone settled back in and for once I spoke up. For once. Jesus, I never bother but sometimes I have a question and I'll be damned if I'm going to take a hug over an answer.
Okay, most times that's preferable. Sometimes, though, I really want to know.
Are we going to keep living this way forever?
True to form, I was given hugs instead of words.
Answer me, Ben. Please.
Nothing. He just held on tighter.
Death by frustration! Who knew it was an option? If anyone needs me, I'll be in the dumbwaiter banging my head against whatever's hard enough to knock me out.
What's interesting is that when I stopped regarding him as the hero in the words here, he stopped advocating for the lack of censorship here. I stopped seeing him as the hero when I realized that in a misguided attempt to continue to play the role of the good guy in my eyes, Lochlan had inadvertently driven me into the arms of his intended fall guy. He left Ben to do the dirty work and through that I came to see how selfless and compassionate Ben could be. Maybe he wasn't the shallow fratboy of our group. Every other emotion towards Ben quickly followed and it was an epiphany of the grandest sort to get another chance to see Ben the way no one else does. He doesn't let people in, he'd rather pretend to be the monster, and then he doesn't have to let people see that sometimes he isn't fifteen feet tall, and he doesn't have to be strong. He just stays mean outwardly and then it's easier. Push them all away and keep things light.
Ben still attempts to live this philosophy even though we all tore it down a long time ago. True to form tonight he came barging into the house, took a quick inventory to ensure that the children were in another part of the house entirely and gave Lochlan a shove that sent him stumbling backwards onto the couch in the living room.
The shouting commenced, as Ben tried to intimidate and Lochlan chose to reason, charming the ever-loving shit out of impressionable unrefined Ben, extolling the virtues of being permitted close access to Bridget and how perfect she is and how lucky Ben is.
Compliment everyone. Diffuse the bomb. Quiet the monkey. Reassure the princess. Everyone settled back in and for once I spoke up. For once. Jesus, I never bother but sometimes I have a question and I'll be damned if I'm going to take a hug over an answer.
Okay, most times that's preferable. Sometimes, though, I really want to know.
Are we going to keep living this way forever?
True to form, I was given hugs instead of words.
Answer me, Ben. Please.
Nothing. He just held on tighter.
Death by frustration! Who knew it was an option? If anyone needs me, I'll be in the dumbwaiter banging my head against whatever's hard enough to knock me out.
The human cannonball.
On the road we pass the time playing cards behind the tent.
Lochlan is capable of acting exactly the way I do, which flies in the face of how generally logical and steadfast and stern he is. And it was the same old argument we always seem to have. The one revolving around why I rejected their grand polyamoric plan in favor of marrying Ben, so I will save you the nitty-gritty shout-for-shout repost and Lochlan the abject embarrassment. Besides, it was disconcerting enough to watch him weasling out of PJ's good graces. I almost felt sorry for him.
Almost.
But not.
Because he is hard on me.
Or maybe it's because I know had he played his cards a little better he wouldn't be in this position and neither would I, the open secret that waits like a disloyal, eventual trophy on the shelf to the winner with the strongest hand. Ben got a royal flush, Lochlan revealed a full house. It isn't my fault he sucks at cards. He said he wanted to sit in on the game so he can't complain that he doesn't understand the rules. The rules are so very simple but he won't listen.
And I don't mean eventual trophy, because there is no eventual for Lochlan, except maybe in his dreams. He does not believe me and just about every week now he comes to me with threats and ultimatums and figures I'll throw in more value if he raises the ante.
I ignore the threats and life continues on. Seriously. It does. It's sadly comical and frustrating and maddening that sometimes my neighbors probably don't understand the history here or the arrangments but we all just point out that we are co-tenants who are also friends and the big old house is subdivided and everyone seems satisfied and says they hope we can reach a resolution.
The resolution here would be for Lochlan to learn what "good enough"means and eat some goddamned crow of his own because he's cutting into the joy I feel for knowing we won't leave Sam behind, that Ben managed to get another chip and spend another week learning how to put things behind him instead of pushing things along in front of him, and for the fact that Lochlan totally ruined a day that I was going to spend eating chocolate-covered cherries and writing cheques with a four-thousand-dollar fountain pen. Instead I stuck pins into Loch with my imagination and fended off Caleb's inquiries into where I was with feeling feverish enough that he didn't even want to speak on the phone for fear that he might catch something and ruin his perfection somehow.
I suppose this entry will out me in that tiny white lie but really when it comes to Lochlan barging through my heart and throwing pieces around until the whole thing collapses like a house of counted cards, there is a sort of fever that makes me want to go sleep until I don't feel sad anymore and avoid him until he has a change of heart and comes crawling back for absolution from both myself and Ben, because messing with me is messing with the big guy. Only I worry because Lochlan knows how to play Ben and Ben hardly notices because he is busy Not Drinking and busy Holding Bridget's Heart.
Those are full time jobs and Lochlan is the homeless ne'er do well on the corner of my life.
(Thatreallyreallycompellingone.)
It doesn't matter. I have to work tomorrow now because I didn't work today. I have to contend with Ben's sidelong glances when he thinks I'm not paying attention and wonder what's inside his head but then he'll encourage things and feelings and actions that lie perpendicular to what he should be feeling and that I will never understand. I am such a reluctant prize.
Lochlan is a con artist. If this were Vegas he would be in prison, but since it's the circus he's one of the star performers. (Just keep your eye on your valuables, namely your wife!)
So save your breath, I will not hearLochlan wasn't getting enough attention so instead of just acting like a grownup, he decided to take the princess route and throw a shouting party with me in the driveway this morning. I'm guessing my neighbors are thrilled we're leaving, in spite of the fact that their leaves are raked and snow is shoveled year after year. Lochlan waited until I dissolved into tears and flutters and THEN he dropped the subject. Or maybe it was because PJ finally came out and threatened to put him in his place, which was ten feet straight down into the frozen ground. And I had to come inside and hold ice under my eyes and try and fix myself up to deal with Satan all morning, working on his Christmas cards/bonuses/everything that has to be wrapped up for the end of the year here business-wise.
I think I made it very clear
You couldn't hate enough to love
Is that supposed to be enough?
I only wish you weren't my friend
Then I could hurt you in the end
I never claimed to be a saint
My own was banished long ago
It took the death of hope to let you go
Lochlan is capable of acting exactly the way I do, which flies in the face of how generally logical and steadfast and stern he is. And it was the same old argument we always seem to have. The one revolving around why I rejected their grand polyamoric plan in favor of marrying Ben, so I will save you the nitty-gritty shout-for-shout repost and Lochlan the abject embarrassment. Besides, it was disconcerting enough to watch him weasling out of PJ's good graces. I almost felt sorry for him.
Almost.
But not.
Because he is hard on me.
Or maybe it's because I know had he played his cards a little better he wouldn't be in this position and neither would I, the open secret that waits like a disloyal, eventual trophy on the shelf to the winner with the strongest hand. Ben got a royal flush, Lochlan revealed a full house. It isn't my fault he sucks at cards. He said he wanted to sit in on the game so he can't complain that he doesn't understand the rules. The rules are so very simple but he won't listen.
And I don't mean eventual trophy, because there is no eventual for Lochlan, except maybe in his dreams. He does not believe me and just about every week now he comes to me with threats and ultimatums and figures I'll throw in more value if he raises the ante.
I ignore the threats and life continues on. Seriously. It does. It's sadly comical and frustrating and maddening that sometimes my neighbors probably don't understand the history here or the arrangments but we all just point out that we are co-tenants who are also friends and the big old house is subdivided and everyone seems satisfied and says they hope we can reach a resolution.
The resolution here would be for Lochlan to learn what "good enough"means and eat some goddamned crow of his own because he's cutting into the joy I feel for knowing we won't leave Sam behind, that Ben managed to get another chip and spend another week learning how to put things behind him instead of pushing things along in front of him, and for the fact that Lochlan totally ruined a day that I was going to spend eating chocolate-covered cherries and writing cheques with a four-thousand-dollar fountain pen. Instead I stuck pins into Loch with my imagination and fended off Caleb's inquiries into where I was with feeling feverish enough that he didn't even want to speak on the phone for fear that he might catch something and ruin his perfection somehow.
I suppose this entry will out me in that tiny white lie but really when it comes to Lochlan barging through my heart and throwing pieces around until the whole thing collapses like a house of counted cards, there is a sort of fever that makes me want to go sleep until I don't feel sad anymore and avoid him until he has a change of heart and comes crawling back for absolution from both myself and Ben, because messing with me is messing with the big guy. Only I worry because Lochlan knows how to play Ben and Ben hardly notices because he is busy Not Drinking and busy Holding Bridget's Heart.
Those are full time jobs and Lochlan is the homeless ne'er do well on the corner of my life.
(Thatreallyreallycompellingone.)
It doesn't matter. I have to work tomorrow now because I didn't work today. I have to contend with Ben's sidelong glances when he thinks I'm not paying attention and wonder what's inside his head but then he'll encourage things and feelings and actions that lie perpendicular to what he should be feeling and that I will never understand. I am such a reluctant prize.
Lochlan is a con artist. If this were Vegas he would be in prison, but since it's the circus he's one of the star performers. (Just keep your eye on your valuables, namely your wife!)
Tuesday 8 December 2009
All this and he's handsome too.
Christmas is all about slick sidewalks and icy cold city lights. Hazy piano bars soundtracked with whiskey-throated singers and eggnog that can be lit on fire. Tiny well-wrapped boxes belie things like diamonds and silver or money or a handmade ornament. It's about trees planted everywhere, directly in your path and crowds who are holding onto their sanities with ragged fingernails. It's about taking an extra moment to buy the completely ludicrous cookies at the bakery because they are snowman-shaped, and to drive around on a Saturday night looking for the block with the most lights.
It's about the chipped, ancient nativity set in the yard of the church further up from my house, the baptists who suffer the theft of Jesus and his manger every single year and yet somehow it's always returned in time for storage again, and it's about dipping into those bakery sugar cookies with the gritty, glittery sprinkles on top that always taste good no matter how long they've been sitting out on the plate. It's about the arguments over construction of the gingerbread house and the worries over money and the anticipation of the new year following close behind.
It's about family and friends. Yes, the spirit has hit. Rather abruptly as usual. Normally I wait for it to arrive just as the children have their Christmas concert at school. We didn't go this year so I've been patiently wondering how long it would take to kick in otherwise.
And then I got the phone call which let everything else fall into place. Sam has had his third phone interview with a church on the west coast and they're flying him out in February to complete the approval process and he will be moving too. It never occurred to me that he would now have enough time invested to be considered for endorsement. It never occurred to me that he would seriously consider coming with us.
I never actually thought that Sam liked me all that much, frankly. I am such a pain in the ass. I cut into his friendship with Jacob, I was the liturgical equivalent of Yoko Ono when Jacob chose to leave the church and begin teaching, and then I fought physically and emotionally against Sam through every single day of the program he enlisted to help me deal with my grief over losing Jacob. He's not winced when I've sworn in the sanctuary and he's chosen to always ignore the moments I would lean over his desk to show him something on his computer and realized maybe a different, higher-cut shirt would have been a better choice for the church office and he's calmly and rationally diffused the neighborhood gossip that focused squarely on me when he split with Lisabeth.
Better than that, he's embraced Benjamin as his friend and he loves all the boys as brothers, in spite of a huge mile-wide rift that sometimes divides them into two camps, one of Cole's friends, the other of Jacob's. He is the glue, as it were and has incredible patience. For the God jokes and the What would Bridget Do? braceletgate and stepping in to shoulder the hard parts where someone has to be put back together. He has sat outside my pantry door many a night on the freezing cold kitchen floor while I told anyone who would listen from inside the door that God didn't exist and to please tell me again why I should believe otherwise.
He put Jake back in the box after I dumped it out not once but eleven times so far.
He's a recovering alcoholic, which means he helps the rest of us understand what makes Ben tick, or better yet why he keeps getting run over by the wagon. He hasn't touched a drink in years, and never will again, and the other boys are learning volumes about inner strength and determination and compassion from the guy that was once referred to as Reverend Jake's mini-me.
He's God in Sam-form to most of us and we worship him accordingly. Which pains him but at the same time I think he's incredibly touched to understand how much he means to us as a group and individually and he has chosen to repay us in kind by remaining part of the family. An active part, instead of a former part.
I did not expect this gift, and it makes me wonder if we're on a roll. If so, I'd like a pocket big enough to hide Ben inside and a few people brought back from the dead. Also, bring a woman for PJ. He is far too in love with this Victoria's Secret commercial to notice that Michael Bay doesn't direct real life so his standards need to come back down a little. Perhaps they will, abruptly, just like my Christmas spirit.
If not I'm sure we can instead be incredibly thankful that our bizarre and unconventional and deeply loyal circus family will be together in the new year.
I'm going to go back to putting the lights on the tree now. The day has gotten a whole lot better. Ben is going to be so excited. Everyone is.
It's about the chipped, ancient nativity set in the yard of the church further up from my house, the baptists who suffer the theft of Jesus and his manger every single year and yet somehow it's always returned in time for storage again, and it's about dipping into those bakery sugar cookies with the gritty, glittery sprinkles on top that always taste good no matter how long they've been sitting out on the plate. It's about the arguments over construction of the gingerbread house and the worries over money and the anticipation of the new year following close behind.
It's about family and friends. Yes, the spirit has hit. Rather abruptly as usual. Normally I wait for it to arrive just as the children have their Christmas concert at school. We didn't go this year so I've been patiently wondering how long it would take to kick in otherwise.
And then I got the phone call which let everything else fall into place. Sam has had his third phone interview with a church on the west coast and they're flying him out in February to complete the approval process and he will be moving too. It never occurred to me that he would now have enough time invested to be considered for endorsement. It never occurred to me that he would seriously consider coming with us.
I never actually thought that Sam liked me all that much, frankly. I am such a pain in the ass. I cut into his friendship with Jacob, I was the liturgical equivalent of Yoko Ono when Jacob chose to leave the church and begin teaching, and then I fought physically and emotionally against Sam through every single day of the program he enlisted to help me deal with my grief over losing Jacob. He's not winced when I've sworn in the sanctuary and he's chosen to always ignore the moments I would lean over his desk to show him something on his computer and realized maybe a different, higher-cut shirt would have been a better choice for the church office and he's calmly and rationally diffused the neighborhood gossip that focused squarely on me when he split with Lisabeth.
Better than that, he's embraced Benjamin as his friend and he loves all the boys as brothers, in spite of a huge mile-wide rift that sometimes divides them into two camps, one of Cole's friends, the other of Jacob's. He is the glue, as it were and has incredible patience. For the God jokes and the What would Bridget Do? braceletgate and stepping in to shoulder the hard parts where someone has to be put back together. He has sat outside my pantry door many a night on the freezing cold kitchen floor while I told anyone who would listen from inside the door that God didn't exist and to please tell me again why I should believe otherwise.
He put Jake back in the box after I dumped it out not once but eleven times so far.
He's a recovering alcoholic, which means he helps the rest of us understand what makes Ben tick, or better yet why he keeps getting run over by the wagon. He hasn't touched a drink in years, and never will again, and the other boys are learning volumes about inner strength and determination and compassion from the guy that was once referred to as Reverend Jake's mini-me.
He's God in Sam-form to most of us and we worship him accordingly. Which pains him but at the same time I think he's incredibly touched to understand how much he means to us as a group and individually and he has chosen to repay us in kind by remaining part of the family. An active part, instead of a former part.
I did not expect this gift, and it makes me wonder if we're on a roll. If so, I'd like a pocket big enough to hide Ben inside and a few people brought back from the dead. Also, bring a woman for PJ. He is far too in love with this Victoria's Secret commercial to notice that Michael Bay doesn't direct real life so his standards need to come back down a little. Perhaps they will, abruptly, just like my Christmas spirit.
If not I'm sure we can instead be incredibly thankful that our bizarre and unconventional and deeply loyal circus family will be together in the new year.
I'm going to go back to putting the lights on the tree now. The day has gotten a whole lot better. Ben is going to be so excited. Everyone is.
Too much time and then too little.
(Alternately titled Goldilocks and the 3 Husbands because it's funny.)
Someone sent me an email recently asking me what my deal is. That was it. One line. What's your deal?
If that wasn't a rude demand for something for nothing I don't know what is.
And then it occurred to me that I've removed all of the archives that would have led readers back to oh, 2004. Even though nothing much happened until 2006. That was the year I think the world as I know it exploded.
Here's a really truncated look back because I can barely do this but it's been demanded of me and who am I to ignore a direct command, ever? To match, it's staccato, and just as rude. There will be no poetry today.
I grew up on the shores of the Atlantic, with Lochlan, Caleb, Cole, and Christian. The moment I could I ran away with Lochlan (young love, don't you know, we were practically a Bon Jovi song) to join the midway and then the circus. You will find many references to it. I can't help it, it's in my blood. I read music lyrics like other people read the newspaper because I have a degenerative hearing loss that someday not so far off in my future will leave me with only the music in my head and I'll be damned if I'm going to forget the words when the time comes.
But let's skip forward twenty years or more, shall we?
In April of 2006, I left my artist/photographer husband, Cole. We had been married for twelve years, having just bought a house after he was transferred from the east coast to the Prairies. We had two small kids, Ruth, who was six at the time, and Henry, who was four. Cole was a sadist. I was submissive and already incredibly fragile. I left Cole for Jacob, one of our best friends. He, like many of our friends, had followed us to the middle of the country. Maybe I was never one to play very fairly. The separation began amicably enough but stopped the night Cole broke into the house when I was there alone and hurt me. He broke a lot of bones, I'm five feet tall and ninety-five pounds, fighting back was a fool's game. Jacob saved my life that night and Cole went to jail. Two months later Cole suffered a massive heart attack and died. He was thirty-seven years old. We were not yet divorced.
Something in my head broke and I was never the same again.
In August, Jacob took me for a hot air balloon ride. He proposed, I said yes. We were married two days later in his church. He was a Unitarian Christian minister/University prof. In September we got pregnant and in October we learned that the pregnancy was ectopic. We were doomed but we struggled mightily through the next full year trying to stay afloat. He was trying to fix everything and I kept trying to break it, trying to keep normal going when normal had packed up and moved away.
In October of 2007, Jacob left me. Left us. Just up and said he was already gone. That he wasn't a good person, that he needed to leave. I broke a little more. The resiliency of this one little human must be positively outstanding. I foundered around numb for a week and then on Jacob's birthday, my friends came and told me that he was dead, having taken his own life the night before. He left letters. Hundreds of them. Five years later I still can't get through some of them and so I don't know what they say.
This was when my head exploded. I did a lot of very self-destructive things and then I went away to a lovely place where they fix heads like mine. I came home weeks later, too soon, incapable of being any better off but loathe to abandon my children the way that Jacob had abandoned us. I continued to be self-destructive for a long time after coming home. Honestly I still am sometimes.
The winter after I came home Ben began to show me who he really was. I liked that person. I don't wait anymore. There is no point, I knew what he felt for me. Those of you who have read here for years have witnessed our comment wars and real-life difficulties. We've never had a dealbreaker, he's my boomerang boy. He always came back.
Ben has an unconventional job that I don't talk about much and he may or may not be on the road or in the studio for a good three-quarters of most years but if you ask me I will tell you he's a door-to-door tattoo machine salesman. Hell, we have enough tattoos between us to make a stab at the truth with that one. He is none of your business in that respect so don't ask me what his last name is or if he's famous because that is the only time you will ever catch me in a lie anymore. I'm fine with that.
By April of 2008 we were married and oh, here she goes just like Elizabeth Taylor but really, Ben and I bicker just enough to pass for normal, married people. So far so good. He's lost both of his parents in the midst of all this. He's been to rehab a number of times and fights hard to stay sober. He's been through more than I have, but that's for another day, again. He's a beautiful human and he values his privacy so I don't actually write about him as much as I once did.
When I'm not sharing too much information with the readers who wander in and out and number in the thousands now (thank you for the daily collection of outraged emails) I write short stories and novels too and I look after my friends and my two not-so-little kids (Ruth is now a full-fledged teen and Henry isn't far behind and yes, they were named for candy bars but it could have been worse if I liked Kit-Kats and 3 Musketeers) and I cook dinner for a crowd every night.
In the spring of 2010, the whole extended intentional family (the collective, as we usually refer to it) moved to the west coast. I sold the castle that Cole bought for me in the Prairies and we bought a house that juts out from a cliff, overlooking the beautiful Pacific ocean. Then we bought the one next door to it and now the whole point is ours. We decided to make it into a compound for our intentional family. Our collective. Others have called it a commune. Doesn't bother me one bit, as I would not trade it for the world now.
Caleb lives in the Boathouse, as it's called. It's a two-bedroom modern cottage a stone's throw from the main house. He is Cole's older brother. He's a lawyer/CFO/venture Capitalist/self-made man. He is the Devil incarnate sometimes.
I live in the main house with Ben, Ruth, Henry, Lochlan (like Cole he is also an artist, but more about him in a minute), Sam (Jacob's former student), Dalton, Duncan (Dalton's older brother), Gage (Schuyler's older brother) and PJ. The new house next door holds Andrew (my oldest and dearest friend), John, Christian, Daniel (Ben's younger brother) and Schuyler (Daniel's husband).
Jacob's best friend and my favorite sounding board August lives above the garage in a beautiful airy loft that I designed myself.
Other friends I mention often include Corey, Keith, New-Jake, Joel, and Batman (a nickname for someone who flies into my life when I ask for him. I don't do that anymore.)
In 2011, Ben and I made a huge decision to include Lochlan in our marriage. Lochlan and I have been in love since I was nine. He raised me on the midway circuits and then later in the circus. I am who I am today (strange and wonderful) because of him. He's had a tough job being half-parent, half-lover, we struggle with that every day but some things are just meant to be. Some things just work, you know?
In 2015, Ben and I took a step back, reevaluating what we both want, changing things here, tweaking things there and chose to divorce each other but not break up. In the summer of 2016 I married Lochlan. Legally. He asked, I said yes, We ran off to Coney Island and sealed the deal on the Wonder Wheel. He's the one on the paper now and Ben is 'the main boyfriend' (I sometimes have another or two) and it works, so far. This is a dream I gave up on and then got back and it's one I plan to live to the end.
That's my deal, in a nutshell. What's yours?
[PS: I'm not on very many places on the internet. I am playing with Pinterest just a little. That's all. At last count I saw seventeen 'Saltwater Princess' accounts in one formation or another on Twitter and on Instagram, and people keep googling me, sending me pictures of other Bridgets and such. It's not me. Stop looking. In spite of the fact that I live in a commune, I'm actually a really private person without much internet time at all. The boys don't have any internet aside from the occasional facebook or instagram account but those are all set to private so don't bother. We don't talk to strangers anyway.]
Someone sent me an email recently asking me what my deal is. That was it. One line. What's your deal?
If that wasn't a rude demand for something for nothing I don't know what is.
And then it occurred to me that I've removed all of the archives that would have led readers back to oh, 2004. Even though nothing much happened until 2006. That was the year I think the world as I know it exploded.
Here's a really truncated look back because I can barely do this but it's been demanded of me and who am I to ignore a direct command, ever? To match, it's staccato, and just as rude. There will be no poetry today.
I grew up on the shores of the Atlantic, with Lochlan, Caleb, Cole, and Christian. The moment I could I ran away with Lochlan (young love, don't you know, we were practically a Bon Jovi song) to join the midway and then the circus. You will find many references to it. I can't help it, it's in my blood. I read music lyrics like other people read the newspaper because I have a degenerative hearing loss that someday not so far off in my future will leave me with only the music in my head and I'll be damned if I'm going to forget the words when the time comes.
But let's skip forward twenty years or more, shall we?
In April of 2006, I left my artist/photographer husband, Cole. We had been married for twelve years, having just bought a house after he was transferred from the east coast to the Prairies. We had two small kids, Ruth, who was six at the time, and Henry, who was four. Cole was a sadist. I was submissive and already incredibly fragile. I left Cole for Jacob, one of our best friends. He, like many of our friends, had followed us to the middle of the country. Maybe I was never one to play very fairly. The separation began amicably enough but stopped the night Cole broke into the house when I was there alone and hurt me. He broke a lot of bones, I'm five feet tall and ninety-five pounds, fighting back was a fool's game. Jacob saved my life that night and Cole went to jail. Two months later Cole suffered a massive heart attack and died. He was thirty-seven years old. We were not yet divorced.
Something in my head broke and I was never the same again.
In August, Jacob took me for a hot air balloon ride. He proposed, I said yes. We were married two days later in his church. He was a Unitarian Christian minister/University prof. In September we got pregnant and in October we learned that the pregnancy was ectopic. We were doomed but we struggled mightily through the next full year trying to stay afloat. He was trying to fix everything and I kept trying to break it, trying to keep normal going when normal had packed up and moved away.
In October of 2007, Jacob left me. Left us. Just up and said he was already gone. That he wasn't a good person, that he needed to leave. I broke a little more. The resiliency of this one little human must be positively outstanding. I foundered around numb for a week and then on Jacob's birthday, my friends came and told me that he was dead, having taken his own life the night before. He left letters. Hundreds of them. Five years later I still can't get through some of them and so I don't know what they say.
This was when my head exploded. I did a lot of very self-destructive things and then I went away to a lovely place where they fix heads like mine. I came home weeks later, too soon, incapable of being any better off but loathe to abandon my children the way that Jacob had abandoned us. I continued to be self-destructive for a long time after coming home. Honestly I still am sometimes.
The winter after I came home Ben began to show me who he really was. I liked that person. I don't wait anymore. There is no point, I knew what he felt for me. Those of you who have read here for years have witnessed our comment wars and real-life difficulties. We've never had a dealbreaker, he's my boomerang boy. He always came back.
Ben has an unconventional job that I don't talk about much and he may or may not be on the road or in the studio for a good three-quarters of most years but if you ask me I will tell you he's a door-to-door tattoo machine salesman. Hell, we have enough tattoos between us to make a stab at the truth with that one. He is none of your business in that respect so don't ask me what his last name is or if he's famous because that is the only time you will ever catch me in a lie anymore. I'm fine with that.
By April of 2008 we were married and oh, here she goes just like Elizabeth Taylor but really, Ben and I bicker just enough to pass for normal, married people. So far so good. He's lost both of his parents in the midst of all this. He's been to rehab a number of times and fights hard to stay sober. He's been through more than I have, but that's for another day, again. He's a beautiful human and he values his privacy so I don't actually write about him as much as I once did.
When I'm not sharing too much information with the readers who wander in and out and number in the thousands now (thank you for the daily collection of outraged emails) I write short stories and novels too and I look after my friends and my two not-so-little kids (Ruth is now a full-fledged teen and Henry isn't far behind and yes, they were named for candy bars but it could have been worse if I liked Kit-Kats and 3 Musketeers) and I cook dinner for a crowd every night.
In the spring of 2010, the whole extended intentional family (the collective, as we usually refer to it) moved to the west coast. I sold the castle that Cole bought for me in the Prairies and we bought a house that juts out from a cliff, overlooking the beautiful Pacific ocean. Then we bought the one next door to it and now the whole point is ours. We decided to make it into a compound for our intentional family. Our collective. Others have called it a commune. Doesn't bother me one bit, as I would not trade it for the world now.
Caleb lives in the Boathouse, as it's called. It's a two-bedroom modern cottage a stone's throw from the main house. He is Cole's older brother. He's a lawyer/CFO/venture Capitalist/self-made man. He is the Devil incarnate sometimes.
I live in the main house with Ben, Ruth, Henry, Lochlan (like Cole he is also an artist, but more about him in a minute), Sam (Jacob's former student), Dalton, Duncan (Dalton's older brother), Gage (Schuyler's older brother) and PJ. The new house next door holds Andrew (my oldest and dearest friend), John, Christian, Daniel (Ben's younger brother) and Schuyler (Daniel's husband).
Jacob's best friend and my favorite sounding board August lives above the garage in a beautiful airy loft that I designed myself.
Other friends I mention often include Corey, Keith, New-Jake, Joel, and Batman (a nickname for someone who flies into my life when I ask for him. I don't do that anymore.)
In 2011, Ben and I made a huge decision to include Lochlan in our marriage. Lochlan and I have been in love since I was nine. He raised me on the midway circuits and then later in the circus. I am who I am today (strange and wonderful) because of him. He's had a tough job being half-parent, half-lover, we struggle with that every day but some things are just meant to be. Some things just work, you know?
In 2015, Ben and I took a step back, reevaluating what we both want, changing things here, tweaking things there and chose to divorce each other but not break up. In the summer of 2016 I married Lochlan. Legally. He asked, I said yes, We ran off to Coney Island and sealed the deal on the Wonder Wheel. He's the one on the paper now and Ben is 'the main boyfriend' (I sometimes have another or two) and it works, so far. This is a dream I gave up on and then got back and it's one I plan to live to the end.
That's my deal, in a nutshell. What's yours?
[PS: I'm not on very many places on the internet. I am playing with Pinterest just a little. That's all. At last count I saw seventeen 'Saltwater Princess' accounts in one formation or another on Twitter and on Instagram, and people keep googling me, sending me pictures of other Bridgets and such. It's not me. Stop looking. In spite of the fact that I live in a commune, I'm actually a really private person without much internet time at all. The boys don't have any internet aside from the occasional facebook or instagram account but those are all set to private so don't bother. We don't talk to strangers anyway.]
Monday 7 December 2009
I played my best for Him.
Was going through my tech cupboard, deciding which things to keep and which to discard and on one of my old cellphones was a video of Jacob singing Little Drummer Boy in church to the Sunday school classes, Christmas Eve 2006.
Wow.
To keep, by far. I would post it if I still had the software to get it off the phone. Arms thrown back, messy blonde curls, eyes closed at the end. Dear lord, my boys singing Christmas carols is oddly especially stinging. All of them. It doesn't matter if PJ is crashing through the house singing I saw Mommy kissing Santa Claus or Ben with O Holy Night last year.
It's just a thing, okay?
A really hard thing.
Upward, princess. Onward, go! he would say.
Wow.
To keep, by far. I would post it if I still had the software to get it off the phone. Arms thrown back, messy blonde curls, eyes closed at the end. Dear lord, my boys singing Christmas carols is oddly especially stinging. All of them. It doesn't matter if PJ is crashing through the house singing I saw Mommy kissing Santa Claus or Ben with O Holy Night last year.
It's just a thing, okay?
A really hard thing.
Upward, princess. Onward, go! he would say.
Crumb tinies.
I have a wicked awesome Christmas tree!
Which I would have skipped this year if the children weren't my big picture, because it seems really counterproductive to be moving and suddenly drop everything and erect a tree in the living room that we'll spend hours lighting and decorating only to take it all down January first.
I'm working on the bright side, the part that I can see up high if I stand on my tiptoes. And the fact that Ben will be away from us for a few months is maybe a price that must be paid for temperatures currently forty degrees higher than they are here. Maybe it's a small test before the easy part of life kicks in. Maybe it's par for the course and it will shake me out of my now harmless but annoying doom-and-gloom personality that throws shadows on these walls in the absence of light.
Maybe I will gain perspective.
Maybe I'll even get a grip.
Okay, let's not get ahead of ourselves. Let's just roll on with one foot in front of the other until we're up to our ankles in the saltwater of the Pacific.
We're going to see Santa this weekend, to ask him to stop bringing character-building kits as gifts and to throw up the horns for a rocking photo op. I may ask him for just a little more luck like the kind that Ben is to me, resplendent in full beard and flannel these days because he's cold and sad that he's leaving ahead of the move and pulling out all the stops to block my tears before they can make it over the falls.
Sorry, the melodrama is just everywhere today. I'm tripping over it and pulling it out of my hair, unsticking it from my lip gloss and clearing it off the window so I can look out. I'm not so sad this morning. Just determined. Frighteningly determined.
I really really really won't miss the cold. In fact, I'll probably rejoice for having made it so many winters here without going entirely crazy.
Wait. What?
Which I would have skipped this year if the children weren't my big picture, because it seems really counterproductive to be moving and suddenly drop everything and erect a tree in the living room that we'll spend hours lighting and decorating only to take it all down January first.
I'm working on the bright side, the part that I can see up high if I stand on my tiptoes. And the fact that Ben will be away from us for a few months is maybe a price that must be paid for temperatures currently forty degrees higher than they are here. Maybe it's a small test before the easy part of life kicks in. Maybe it's par for the course and it will shake me out of my now harmless but annoying doom-and-gloom personality that throws shadows on these walls in the absence of light.
Maybe I will gain perspective.
Maybe I'll even get a grip.
Okay, let's not get ahead of ourselves. Let's just roll on with one foot in front of the other until we're up to our ankles in the saltwater of the Pacific.
We're going to see Santa this weekend, to ask him to stop bringing character-building kits as gifts and to throw up the horns for a rocking photo op. I may ask him for just a little more luck like the kind that Ben is to me, resplendent in full beard and flannel these days because he's cold and sad that he's leaving ahead of the move and pulling out all the stops to block my tears before they can make it over the falls.
Sorry, the melodrama is just everywhere today. I'm tripping over it and pulling it out of my hair, unsticking it from my lip gloss and clearing it off the window so I can look out. I'm not so sad this morning. Just determined. Frighteningly determined.
I really really really won't miss the cold. In fact, I'll probably rejoice for having made it so many winters here without going entirely crazy.
Wait. What?
Sunday 6 December 2009
A moment to remember a night that never should have happened.
* Geneviève Bergeron
* Hélène Colgan
* Nathalie Croteau
* Barbara Daigneault
* Anne-Marie Edward
* Maud Haviernick
* Maryse Laganière
* Maryse Leclair
* Anne-Marie Lemay
* Sonia Pelletier
* Michèle Richard
* Annie St-Arneault
* Annie Turcotte
* Barbara Klucznik-Widajewicz
Saturday 5 December 2009
Hex is fairly obvious, but that's it.
Not a lot has changed since 1987.
I spent the better part of the day passing tools to the boys, much like in the garage out in the country in high school where I would sit on the workbench and pass things.
Bridgie, hand me a Phillips.
Is that the star shaped or the straight slot?
Almost twenty-five years later I'm still asking the same questions, because it's dumb to give last names to screwdrivers when 'straight', 'star' and 'square' would suffice. The boys just sigh and calmly repeat it without the fancy names.
The star one.
Oh, this one! Here.
Today we finished putting insulation in the ceiling of the addition. I call it the addition because it's a rather large and wonderful extra entire house that was tacked on to the main house in the late nineteen forties and it accounts for why there are so many rooms within rooms in my house and very few hallways. It's wonderful. But it was very cold and had wonky doors and windows and odd wiring and coins and love letters in the walls.
All that is gone now.
I kept the coins and love letters. And the 1920 theatrical face paint sticks that I can't explain but somehow it brings joy to me to imagine that other performers lived here once upon a time.
The doors and windows are new now. The wiring has all been replaced and today the boys finished insulating all three floors that were virtually uninsulated up until now. It's so much warmer now. It looks clean and fresh and ready for plasterboard.
Yeah, yeah, just in time to move.
There are still two and a half rooms left. I know we'll run out of time but for now it's good to keep chipping away at finishing the house up to show.
I also managed to fit in a full grocery shop and lunch with chopsticks today. Ruthie had her final painting class (she'll follow her father's footsteps come hell or high water) and Henry helped at the hardware store.
Now everyone has scattered to the four corners of the house to read on laptops, listen to music, or watch sports on television and I'm cooking up a big dinner of beef dip sandwiches and green beans. Then after dinner we'll scatter again to rest up for another round of whatever we can come up with tomorrow to be productive imminent house sellers and human beans.
Off to study my screwdriver names while the garlic bread warms.
I spent the better part of the day passing tools to the boys, much like in the garage out in the country in high school where I would sit on the workbench and pass things.
Bridgie, hand me a Phillips.
Is that the star shaped or the straight slot?
Almost twenty-five years later I'm still asking the same questions, because it's dumb to give last names to screwdrivers when 'straight', 'star' and 'square' would suffice. The boys just sigh and calmly repeat it without the fancy names.
The star one.
Oh, this one! Here.
Today we finished putting insulation in the ceiling of the addition. I call it the addition because it's a rather large and wonderful extra entire house that was tacked on to the main house in the late nineteen forties and it accounts for why there are so many rooms within rooms in my house and very few hallways. It's wonderful. But it was very cold and had wonky doors and windows and odd wiring and coins and love letters in the walls.
All that is gone now.
I kept the coins and love letters. And the 1920 theatrical face paint sticks that I can't explain but somehow it brings joy to me to imagine that other performers lived here once upon a time.
The doors and windows are new now. The wiring has all been replaced and today the boys finished insulating all three floors that were virtually uninsulated up until now. It's so much warmer now. It looks clean and fresh and ready for plasterboard.
Yeah, yeah, just in time to move.
There are still two and a half rooms left. I know we'll run out of time but for now it's good to keep chipping away at finishing the house up to show.
I also managed to fit in a full grocery shop and lunch with chopsticks today. Ruthie had her final painting class (she'll follow her father's footsteps come hell or high water) and Henry helped at the hardware store.
Now everyone has scattered to the four corners of the house to read on laptops, listen to music, or watch sports on television and I'm cooking up a big dinner of beef dip sandwiches and green beans. Then after dinner we'll scatter again to rest up for another round of whatever we can come up with tomorrow to be productive imminent house sellers and human beans.
Off to study my screwdriver names while the garlic bread warms.
Friday 4 December 2009
Real and Imagined.
Here's this year's Christmas card, another Edward Gorey masterpiece. I love all things Gorey.
I've paired it with a matte pewter wrapping paper this year which is kind of pretty, actually.
I didn't go out for lunch today, instead I joined Schuyler in the tiny kitchen in their wing for some leftover mac and cheese and then I trailed around after the boys while they ran some errands. I didn't buy anything, and I even turned down a chance at Thai takeout for dinner because it's so cold and on top of things I just didn't feel so adventurous today.
My nose is running. I'm worn out. Tonight I hope to sleep more deeply and in larger blocks of time than in recent nights. I'm trying to keep busy, stay organized and remain calm in the face of future chaos.
This weekend is hopefully tree-weekend, and other than the tree, a wreath on each door and the lights damned near everywhere, I'm not decorating. I wrapped all the presents going home this morning, and now I have to find boxes to send them in. I have ordered and shopped for all the gifts staying in the house and need to get two more things for the children and I am finished.
Early for once. With it for once. Hoping to have a really nice peaceful Christmas with Ben before he's banished to never-never land once again and I forget what he looks like.
Okay, that part never ever happens.
I hope I do okay while he's away. That part has decidedly overshadowed just about everything else lately, because I'm dreading his departure. I don't want him to go. I don't want to be here without him. But this is one of those dumb things that must be done and so off he goes and here I stay and I can be peculiar and strange and lonesome and he will be invisible and creepy and uncommon. We'll be who we are apart and then we'll be who we are together and on the other side of this will be the remembered visit.
I'm still so cold though. Thinking of setting my sweater on fire.
But not really.
I've paired it with a matte pewter wrapping paper this year which is kind of pretty, actually.I didn't go out for lunch today, instead I joined Schuyler in the tiny kitchen in their wing for some leftover mac and cheese and then I trailed around after the boys while they ran some errands. I didn't buy anything, and I even turned down a chance at Thai takeout for dinner because it's so cold and on top of things I just didn't feel so adventurous today.
My nose is running. I'm worn out. Tonight I hope to sleep more deeply and in larger blocks of time than in recent nights. I'm trying to keep busy, stay organized and remain calm in the face of future chaos.
This weekend is hopefully tree-weekend, and other than the tree, a wreath on each door and the lights damned near everywhere, I'm not decorating. I wrapped all the presents going home this morning, and now I have to find boxes to send them in. I have ordered and shopped for all the gifts staying in the house and need to get two more things for the children and I am finished.
Early for once. With it for once. Hoping to have a really nice peaceful Christmas with Ben before he's banished to never-never land once again and I forget what he looks like.
Okay, that part never ever happens.
I hope I do okay while he's away. That part has decidedly overshadowed just about everything else lately, because I'm dreading his departure. I don't want him to go. I don't want to be here without him. But this is one of those dumb things that must be done and so off he goes and here I stay and I can be peculiar and strange and lonesome and he will be invisible and creepy and uncommon. We'll be who we are apart and then we'll be who we are together and on the other side of this will be the remembered visit.
I'm still so cold though. Thinking of setting my sweater on fire.
But not really.
By Satellite.
Here. Go watch this. I'm going out for lunch.
PS. Not only are heights my absolute downfall, the dark is not far behind as enemy number two. Any suggestions for getting rid of either fear?
PS. Not only are heights my absolute downfall, the dark is not far behind as enemy number two. Any suggestions for getting rid of either fear?
Thursday 3 December 2009
Midnight in the garden of evil only now.
Morning comes in Paradise, morning comes in light.She extended her wings, full into the dark early morning. The snow fell gently on the stones at her feet, flakes landing in her hair, on her hands, clasped together with the remnants of wildflowers, placed there by the oldest child, a girl. Her right wing ached, chipped when the woman-girl with the wet eyes tried to move her to a new place and she was returned by the tallest man with the kind eyes.
Still I must obey, still I must invite.
If there's anything to say, if there's anything to do,
If there's any other way, I'll do anything for you.
I was dressed embarrassment.
I was dressed in wine.
If you had a part of me, will you take your time?
Even if I come back, even if I die
Is there some idea to replace my life?
Time to go.
She darted into the night, leaving the gate open behind her. When the man came out he admonished the tiny woman for leaving the gate open. The angel didn't stay long enough to hear the words, she caught the tone and was gone. The downside of explaining her absence would be to pin it on theft and gently place blame rather than to stand and explain miracles in the light.
This is what I choose to believe, because last night someone opened the biggest gate of the four that lead into my backyard and took the angel statue who lived there. Defying three security lights and two neighbors who are in and out at all hours of the day and night.
They just took her. She wasn't theirs. She was MINE.
I won't get her back. That's my out, my final farewell in a city that barely welcomed me and even though I love this house I never really felt safe here and hardly ever ventured out alone as a result.
I think someone was actually in my backyard when I brought the dog home from our early morning walk, because when I left the gate was closed and when I returned it was closed. When Ben went out it was open. I didn't use that gate for my walk anyway, so it's not like maybe I goofed and left it open. More likely someone had cased the yard and made off with the angel because everything is nailed down. The barbecue is locked down. The old stone garage is locked up tight. Good luck getting anything but I really thought no one would have the gall to steal a statue of an angel. How do they know it isn't very important or part of a memorial?
I hope they burn in their shoes, frankly, and when we make it to the pacific I will get a new statue and cement it to the ground this time.
Sometimes I really can't wait to leave.
In other news, box one of the Christmas clementines was a smashing success. It lasted four days and they were all good. Ben's birthday party was a smashing success also. There is leftover cake. The cake theme was monster trucks and Ben ate a hot wheels. Yes he did. Of course he will probably be sorry. That's okay, I say nothing.
No, wait, I actually said Are you going to eat the rest of your cake? Because if you don't want it, I do!
Damn thief.
Wednesday 2 December 2009
B is for Birthday.
Ben is forty-one today and the fun is just starting. Everyone is coming to dinner tonight and we had so many offers of breakfast and lunch it just seemed easier to bring extra chairs to the barn door table and cook up three packages of bacon and two of eggs. I really should get a bigger stove.
And I got the first gift, when his hand slid over my mouth before six this morning. So I wouldn't wake the whole household with joyful noises he was creating by touching different places. They slept on and we played until the sun came up and then very reluctantly tore ourselves away from our bed. Everything holds more meaning now again. He'll be spending the majority of the days of January, February and possibly March away from me.
Away.
Again.
Aren't you excited? You have all that to look forward to. A midwinter rollercoaster. Bring the de-icing machine and your best sense of adventure. This is going to be very tough. I will be packing. He'll be working in New York, mostly, I think. Again nothing is carved in stone and I swear I only cried once because we figure we'll get through it (he will, I will fall apart) and soon everything will come out okay on the other side (last time took years).
I really don't think I can do this and so I hope it's all just a bad dream. Only it isn't and I'm very immature and that's okay for today. I will just quietly fall apart late at night when everyone else blindly sleeps, secure in the fact that their lives are easier while mine is not.
I'm trying to find the silver lining. First I need to polish off all this tarnish. It's going to take forever, this is years of buildup and I'm not very skilled with optimism. I'll admit it. I will try and really that's all I can manage for today. Still not crying so maybe something will go less difficultly for ONCE IN MY LIFE.
Here's hoping. Here's to grace. Here's to Bridget with a smile on her face.
Anyway, yesterday saw one single egg lobbed very gently at my back by Daniel but it's okay, when he was otherwise engaged I went out and filled his boots with snow and brought them in to melt on the grate in the back porch. I am still waiting to see if he's maybe removed all of the tires from my car or replaced the Count Chocula cereal with dog food.
So at twelve we'll drive downtown and meet August, Sam, Dalton, Corey and Caleb for lunch and then some shopping at the music store and some of the record stores too and then dinner here (I can't say much more about that part because he reads this) and then maybe some late night fireworks or a long walk in the snow. Or maybe we'll just clear everyone out of here early and get the kids off to dreamland and we can finish what we started this morning.
Oh, look. Here's hope once again.
Nice to see it still thrives here.
And I got the first gift, when his hand slid over my mouth before six this morning. So I wouldn't wake the whole household with joyful noises he was creating by touching different places. They slept on and we played until the sun came up and then very reluctantly tore ourselves away from our bed. Everything holds more meaning now again. He'll be spending the majority of the days of January, February and possibly March away from me.
Away.
Again.
Aren't you excited? You have all that to look forward to. A midwinter rollercoaster. Bring the de-icing machine and your best sense of adventure. This is going to be very tough. I will be packing. He'll be working in New York, mostly, I think. Again nothing is carved in stone and I swear I only cried once because we figure we'll get through it (he will, I will fall apart) and soon everything will come out okay on the other side (last time took years).
I really don't think I can do this and so I hope it's all just a bad dream. Only it isn't and I'm very immature and that's okay for today. I will just quietly fall apart late at night when everyone else blindly sleeps, secure in the fact that their lives are easier while mine is not.
I'm trying to find the silver lining. First I need to polish off all this tarnish. It's going to take forever, this is years of buildup and I'm not very skilled with optimism. I'll admit it. I will try and really that's all I can manage for today. Still not crying so maybe something will go less difficultly for ONCE IN MY LIFE.
Here's hoping. Here's to grace. Here's to Bridget with a smile on her face.
Anyway, yesterday saw one single egg lobbed very gently at my back by Daniel but it's okay, when he was otherwise engaged I went out and filled his boots with snow and brought them in to melt on the grate in the back porch. I am still waiting to see if he's maybe removed all of the tires from my car or replaced the Count Chocula cereal with dog food.
So at twelve we'll drive downtown and meet August, Sam, Dalton, Corey and Caleb for lunch and then some shopping at the music store and some of the record stores too and then dinner here (I can't say much more about that part because he reads this) and then maybe some late night fireworks or a long walk in the snow. Or maybe we'll just clear everyone out of here early and get the kids off to dreamland and we can finish what we started this morning.
Oh, look. Here's hope once again.
Nice to see it still thrives here.
Tuesday 1 December 2009
Food fight, twelve sharp.
Daniel and I are home today. Alternating kangaroo care and wrapping presents and cooking. It's snowing. It's actually snowing pretty hard but that's okay because we have lots of things to keep us busy. We're getting ready for tomorrow.
Tomorrow is a very important day. Ben's birthday. Which means.....
Yes.....
You got it right....
CAKE.
Tomorrow is a very important day. Ben's birthday. Which means.....
Yes.....
You got it right....
CAKE.
Monday 30 November 2009
Cringeworthy.
Caleb had a huge vase of cattails on the island this morning when I arrived at the loft. I asked him if that represented the remains of his weekend. He gifted me with his unabashed laughter. Pure joy, a rare display from someone who checks every last nuance obsessively. He told me Sophie had been in town for the weekend and a weird stabbing pain shot right through my body like a bolt of agony and disappeared into the floor.
I would have said something incredibly unladylike but I couldn't. It's Sophie. I don't have anything over her. She can run circles around me with...well, everything. The one person who still can make me feel like an incredibly unpulled-together chaotic mess and short and ungraceful to boot.
That and I'm weirdly jealous that she was with him for the weekend.
Oh my God, I am insane.
I'm not all that sure which part I'm jealous of. Maybe just that they had a fun weekend where I was at the farm feeling disconnected and shut out while the boys bonded and did man things and I was sort of an afterthought until late into the evenings and I am so short on affection and time and support right now it was almost an attempt to thumb my nose at Benjamin, coming here, only Benjamin wouldn't notice because he is busy being taken care of so he can be whole and manage without so much handholding.
I'm not sure it ever matters what I do because their eyes are blind and then other times I feel like every move is going to be the wrong one or a lesser one or a total incendiary action that will blow up my world again.
So I go to see Cale and feel even smaller and even less significant but vaguely evil and it's enough to keep a spark lit so that I feel like I have something to offer or withhold from SOMEONE only he isn't really doing it for me so I come home early and Benjamin is playing Sufjan covers and hardly looks up which means he is processing things and this is a good sign. So I go and track down PJ and PJ is all about food and what food should I make and I hesitate one second too long and so we wind up going out for Thai takeout and Ben doesn't say much and the kids are lost in their own worlds and PJ starts to zone out on me and I slip. Just a little. Knuckle to wristbone. Enough so that I get another jolt, only this time it's less jealousy and more plain old vanilla fear.
Stop it, Bridget.
Hmm?
You're worrying yourself to death.
Right, Lochlan. Think it will work this time?
Not funny.
No one cares.
I care.
I don't care that you care.
Stop being difficult.
Stop being an opportunist.
Okay.
Just like that?
Sure. If that's what you want.
I never ever get what I want.
You got all of us.
Okay, then I get everything I want.
Except?
Ben.
Bridget, I had this conversation with Ben word for word three years ago. This is hilarious.
What's so funny about it?
That you two are married and you're acting like he's dead.
We're all dead.
It's going to be one of those nights, isn't it?
Yes, Lochlan, it is.
What can I do?
Put a heated floor in Narnia for me.
What?
Nevermind.
Bridget?
Yes?
Time for some sleep.
Is it ever. Good night.
I would have said something incredibly unladylike but I couldn't. It's Sophie. I don't have anything over her. She can run circles around me with...well, everything. The one person who still can make me feel like an incredibly unpulled-together chaotic mess and short and ungraceful to boot.
That and I'm weirdly jealous that she was with him for the weekend.
Oh my God, I am insane.
I'm not all that sure which part I'm jealous of. Maybe just that they had a fun weekend where I was at the farm feeling disconnected and shut out while the boys bonded and did man things and I was sort of an afterthought until late into the evenings and I am so short on affection and time and support right now it was almost an attempt to thumb my nose at Benjamin, coming here, only Benjamin wouldn't notice because he is busy being taken care of so he can be whole and manage without so much handholding.
I'm not sure it ever matters what I do because their eyes are blind and then other times I feel like every move is going to be the wrong one or a lesser one or a total incendiary action that will blow up my world again.
So I go to see Cale and feel even smaller and even less significant but vaguely evil and it's enough to keep a spark lit so that I feel like I have something to offer or withhold from SOMEONE only he isn't really doing it for me so I come home early and Benjamin is playing Sufjan covers and hardly looks up which means he is processing things and this is a good sign. So I go and track down PJ and PJ is all about food and what food should I make and I hesitate one second too long and so we wind up going out for Thai takeout and Ben doesn't say much and the kids are lost in their own worlds and PJ starts to zone out on me and I slip. Just a little. Knuckle to wristbone. Enough so that I get another jolt, only this time it's less jealousy and more plain old vanilla fear.
Stop it, Bridget.
Hmm?
You're worrying yourself to death.
Right, Lochlan. Think it will work this time?
Not funny.
No one cares.
I care.
I don't care that you care.
Stop being difficult.
Stop being an opportunist.
Okay.
Just like that?
Sure. If that's what you want.
I never ever get what I want.
You got all of us.
Okay, then I get everything I want.
Except?
Ben.
Bridget, I had this conversation with Ben word for word three years ago. This is hilarious.
What's so funny about it?
That you two are married and you're acting like he's dead.
We're all dead.
It's going to be one of those nights, isn't it?
Yes, Lochlan, it is.
What can I do?
Put a heated floor in Narnia for me.
What?
Nevermind.
Bridget?
Yes?
Time for some sleep.
Is it ever. Good night.
Sunday 29 November 2009
Pale Shelter.
I have this now on my Blackberries, which makes me very happy. It's lovely to be able to keep track of the games without having to plunk down in front of a television on Saturday night at six o'clock.
Speaking of television, the program we have settled on this winter is Ice Pilots NWT. It's very good. Much along the same lines as Ice Road Truckers. I loves me some Northwest Territories. I bet I'd do well there save for the 30 Days of Night-caliber vampires that might appear. But then again I do well anywhere, I bloom where I'm planted. Or maybe it's that I rot where I am tossed. Oh, the vampires will love me now. The sweet, sweet smell of decay and desperation could melt the snow for miles, and I will gather handfuls of blood into my handbag and keep limping along down the middle of the deserted street calling for someone to come and be my company. Or maybe for someone to just leave me alone.
We're heading home in the morning. Ben has been reinforced, patched and repaired and feels strong for having siphoned strength and wisdom from those ahead of him on the difficult path. The ones holding the flashlights while he trips gainfully along in the dark following my drops of blood and the smell of cloying fear that has lead him to me every night for the past two years.
Bridget is not reinforced. Bridget is a mess of sleeplessness and a runaway train of brewed coffee and frustration, a bundle of nerves and a frightful little thing right now.
Just frightful. I won an Ambien for my performance earlier. I plan to take it in about an hour and with a little luck I can begin the week on a better note. I have pulled all of our things together and I'll leave here reluctantly tomorrow. Looking back down the drive until I can't see the porch anymore. Wishing our visit had been longer or successful at all but instead we eat the wasted effort, a non-weekend. No do-overs, no time machine, no grace.
I can't help the past.
Off now to watch a bit of a movie (escape, Bridget) and snuggle down between Ben and Lochlan, human insulation from my relentless nightmares, deflection for the jealously I feel when Ben gets all the attention and I am left to slide.
Thank heavens I slide whoreizontally sometimes. I did not invent that word. Bet you can guess who did. But I can't say anything, I won't mess with the Witch-Lochtor when my sleep is at stake.
Will write when we are home tomorrow. We're leaving here super earlier. So early I don't know why I'm going to bed at all.
Speaking of television, the program we have settled on this winter is Ice Pilots NWT. It's very good. Much along the same lines as Ice Road Truckers. I loves me some Northwest Territories. I bet I'd do well there save for the 30 Days of Night-caliber vampires that might appear. But then again I do well anywhere, I bloom where I'm planted. Or maybe it's that I rot where I am tossed. Oh, the vampires will love me now. The sweet, sweet smell of decay and desperation could melt the snow for miles, and I will gather handfuls of blood into my handbag and keep limping along down the middle of the deserted street calling for someone to come and be my company. Or maybe for someone to just leave me alone.
We're heading home in the morning. Ben has been reinforced, patched and repaired and feels strong for having siphoned strength and wisdom from those ahead of him on the difficult path. The ones holding the flashlights while he trips gainfully along in the dark following my drops of blood and the smell of cloying fear that has lead him to me every night for the past two years.
Bridget is not reinforced. Bridget is a mess of sleeplessness and a runaway train of brewed coffee and frustration, a bundle of nerves and a frightful little thing right now.
Just frightful. I won an Ambien for my performance earlier. I plan to take it in about an hour and with a little luck I can begin the week on a better note. I have pulled all of our things together and I'll leave here reluctantly tomorrow. Looking back down the drive until I can't see the porch anymore. Wishing our visit had been longer or successful at all but instead we eat the wasted effort, a non-weekend. No do-overs, no time machine, no grace.
I can't help the past.
Off now to watch a bit of a movie (escape, Bridget) and snuggle down between Ben and Lochlan, human insulation from my relentless nightmares, deflection for the jealously I feel when Ben gets all the attention and I am left to slide.
Thank heavens I slide whoreizontally sometimes. I did not invent that word. Bet you can guess who did. But I can't say anything, I won't mess with the Witch-Lochtor when my sleep is at stake.
Will write when we are home tomorrow. We're leaving here super earlier. So early I don't know why I'm going to bed at all.
Saturday 28 November 2009
Important update.
Going to go with broccoli and cauliflower roasted with garlic and parmesan for vegetables.
And Nolan had these on my bedside table when we arrived. Are they not the prettiest damned things ever? Oh, I know, but sometimes it's the little things.
Lochlan is being nice. Still. A new record.
And Nolan had these on my bedside table when we arrived. Are they not the prettiest damned things ever? Oh, I know, but sometimes it's the little things.
Lochlan is being nice. Still. A new record.
Hoping for sleep.
I'm making meatloaf for dinner. Everyone is turkeyed out, smoked out, worn out, rode hard and put up wet and there are places all over this house where you can find a boy with a beard and a book or a laptop and a hot cup of coffee and a lamp on low.
It's snowing again to add to the coziness.
It's grown dark so I went around and closed all the curtains in the bedrooms.
It's grown a bit chilly so I checked on the kids and saw that they were warm and I went and got one of Ben's hoodies because I always was a girl to steal a t-shirt/flannel jacket/suit coat from a man if cold.
Why not?
Ben has learned and he doubles up because he gets cold too.
Only now he has his beard to keep him warm and even though Movember comes to an end Tuesday he has been threatening to go all Wolverine on us and keep it. I love it, he looks beautiful with the longer hair and the beard. Wild, almost. Untamed.
Apt, perhaps.
We're missing Karsh by being here. We're missing the fake-ass black weekend pseudo-sales and the crazy Christmas traffic and the chaos of the city. We're missing the take-out and the noise and church tomorrow and that part is okay because Sam is here so we brought the God and the rest of them can suffer through substitute sermons and cold formal greetings. Tomorrow we'll have rock church in the snow, on horseback. Druid church more than Unitarian. Nature-worship while we still can.
I'm baking potatoes now too. One potato, two potato, just about six pounds total for one dinner. I'm still plotting vegetables, probably will use the rest of the cauli and call it good. Bread with garlic and olive oil. Wine for some, water for others. Milk for the children. Coffee for Ben. Coffee doesn't seem to affect Ben the way it affects me. Lucky boy.
Tonight I am planning to work my way through some more of Duma Key. Tucked in the crook of Ben's arm, warm, safe, full, sleepy.
Would like to just stay here for this. Maybe forever.
Calm before the storm.
It's snowing again to add to the coziness.
It's grown dark so I went around and closed all the curtains in the bedrooms.
It's grown a bit chilly so I checked on the kids and saw that they were warm and I went and got one of Ben's hoodies because I always was a girl to steal a t-shirt/flannel jacket/suit coat from a man if cold.
Why not?
Ben has learned and he doubles up because he gets cold too.
Only now he has his beard to keep him warm and even though Movember comes to an end Tuesday he has been threatening to go all Wolverine on us and keep it. I love it, he looks beautiful with the longer hair and the beard. Wild, almost. Untamed.
Apt, perhaps.
We're missing Karsh by being here. We're missing the fake-ass black weekend pseudo-sales and the crazy Christmas traffic and the chaos of the city. We're missing the take-out and the noise and church tomorrow and that part is okay because Sam is here so we brought the God and the rest of them can suffer through substitute sermons and cold formal greetings. Tomorrow we'll have rock church in the snow, on horseback. Druid church more than Unitarian. Nature-worship while we still can.
I'm baking potatoes now too. One potato, two potato, just about six pounds total for one dinner. I'm still plotting vegetables, probably will use the rest of the cauli and call it good. Bread with garlic and olive oil. Wine for some, water for others. Milk for the children. Coffee for Ben. Coffee doesn't seem to affect Ben the way it affects me. Lucky boy.
Tonight I am planning to work my way through some more of Duma Key. Tucked in the crook of Ben's arm, warm, safe, full, sleepy.
Would like to just stay here for this. Maybe forever.
Calm before the storm.
Friday 27 November 2009
Forging halos
Good morning. I've come out very late into the new morning with bedhead and a growling belly. Jeans from yesterday and Ben's hoodie zipped over nakedness because I am so hungry. Nolan left a pot of cream of wheat on the stove for me and a fire in the fireplace and there's a note on the counter that tells me men and children are out on the trail and they will be home in time for a snack mid-morning. Which means I have another hour or so to myself.
It's so lovely here. When we arrived last night, Nolan had decorated for Christmas. Or maybe he decorated for Ben and Bridget and we can become a holiday that people can celebrate. Every tree had lights, the whole way down the long driveway into the woods. Then at the house, the roof, railings and windows were outlined. Multicolored lights because Nolan once said all white lights were less festive and more sophisticated, and Christmas should be a festive time. I agreed but no one questions me leaving my tiny white lights up all year around either.
It looked amazing and I didn't expect it. He doesn't do much in the way of decorating. He has enough to keep him busy. But he did anyway and I love him all the more for the effort.
We came inside, dropped our bags, got hugs and went to our rooms. I tucked the children in in the midst of a huge yawn and I don't think I managed to turn out the light on the table beside the bed before I was in dreamland. Maybe Ben turned it off.
He did not sleep in. Up early to worship the gods of nature and serenity, he's been anxious to get out and get away from it all, so the ride will be good for him. My legs still ache from Christmas shopping in high heels yesterday and I'm thinking a hot bath might round out my lazy morning. It's chilly here. The temperature plummeted overnight and it's hard to get used to the cold outside and even more difficult to get moving now. I could stay under the quilts forever in our bed here, it's hard to imagine that life out from under those covers could be as good as life under them, but I'm up, for what it's worth and I plan to enjoy today. We're having a belated turkey day today. Everyone is here. I couldn't ask for more.
It's so lovely here. When we arrived last night, Nolan had decorated for Christmas. Or maybe he decorated for Ben and Bridget and we can become a holiday that people can celebrate. Every tree had lights, the whole way down the long driveway into the woods. Then at the house, the roof, railings and windows were outlined. Multicolored lights because Nolan once said all white lights were less festive and more sophisticated, and Christmas should be a festive time. I agreed but no one questions me leaving my tiny white lights up all year around either.
It looked amazing and I didn't expect it. He doesn't do much in the way of decorating. He has enough to keep him busy. But he did anyway and I love him all the more for the effort.
We came inside, dropped our bags, got hugs and went to our rooms. I tucked the children in in the midst of a huge yawn and I don't think I managed to turn out the light on the table beside the bed before I was in dreamland. Maybe Ben turned it off.
He did not sleep in. Up early to worship the gods of nature and serenity, he's been anxious to get out and get away from it all, so the ride will be good for him. My legs still ache from Christmas shopping in high heels yesterday and I'm thinking a hot bath might round out my lazy morning. It's chilly here. The temperature plummeted overnight and it's hard to get used to the cold outside and even more difficult to get moving now. I could stay under the quilts forever in our bed here, it's hard to imagine that life out from under those covers could be as good as life under them, but I'm up, for what it's worth and I plan to enjoy today. We're having a belated turkey day today. Everyone is here. I couldn't ask for more.
Thursday 26 November 2009
So break yourself against my stonesThis morning is Slipknot and chili lime pistachios while I write emails and pay some bills and wrap up Caleb's week in business here at the loft. I'm headed out Christmas shopping shortly and then to the school for parent-teacher meetings and then with a little luck by dinner time we will be in the truck to join the caravan for the trip to the farm for 'Merican Thanksgiving. Nolan is waiting with open arms and we really really need a lot of that right now.
And spit your pity in my soul
You never needed any help
You sold me out to save yourself
And I won't listen to your shame
You ran away, you're all the same
Angels lie to keep control
My love was punished long ago
If you still care don't ever let me know
If you still care don't ever let me know
Happy thanksgiving! Again. because we get two. Think we can try for two Christmases too?
I know. Always worth a shot though.
Ben is doing better. Thank you for your kind thoughts.
Wednesday 25 November 2009
Flakes, snow and otherwise.
Show me where it hurtsI have been a busy little bee this morning. I went and bought wrapping paper and stocking stuffers. I found magic drip candles in a store and bought three boxes because I love those almost as much as magic rocks and fire, too. I made my list and tomorrow I plan to go back out and finish shopping for the children and for the out of province family and then I'll come home and finish packing for the farm.
And I will make it worse.
We'd like to be out of here tomorrow evening. I have parent-teacher interviews tomorrow afternoon and then we're good to go. Might even have dinner on the road. Which kind of excites me, because really, Caleb's caliber of restaurant may be just lovely and easy to get used to, but nothing beats truckstop coffee.
And Bridget loves her coffee. I fell asleep in a cup of coffee yesterday afternoon which was a whole new narcoleptic low for me. I will blame the dog. He wakes up at five and so we put him up on the bed and he'll curl up against Ben's legs and sleep for the rest of the morning. But then hallo, Bridget's awake. Ben is awake too but he'll pretend he's asleep until the radio goes off an hour later.
I will sleep this weekend at Nolan's. Next week I will finish up shopping for the boys. Shhh.
I'm trying the Keeping Busy routine and hopefully I can recruit Ben into this plan and maybe we'll squeak through winter without any more upsets. Yesterday we laid low. Ben went to meetings with the boys. I stayed home with the other boys and wrote a little and tried to rest and got spoiled rotten and then Ben came home and rested too and I got a hell of a lot of cuddles and snuggles and a fire lit and kept and I went to sleep in tears anyway because I was worn out and overtired and not feeling so hot and totally frustrated. Ben put his arms around me and pulled me in tight against his chest.
While we slept the snow came, bringing with it a fresh start and a &#^@$* freezing cold morning. We do well when it snows. It's magic of a different sort.
Tuesday 24 November 2009
Hold harmless.
There is a sideshow school (!!) at Coney Island and I'm drowning in sleeplessness today. Ben and I each seem to average about three or four hours a night, less when we are being dramatic, more when we are tired of ourselves and each other and give up the ghosts in favor of healing rest.
It's the way it is.
I still harbor the great escape in my head. For times when I am sitting at the bottom of the pantry in the kitchen and everyone wants me out but no one wants to come in, I run away to join the sideshow freaks and they welcome me home and it's glorious and it's simple. They want bacon and cars from the seventies, they want to find some fun on a cool autumn evening and they want to be love. They want to get some mail and fresh wildflowers and a pretty ring. They want to entertain you for their dollars and they know how to boil life down on the rusted ring burner of an old electric stove in the back of a booth on the edge of the pier and they know how to eat what remains and thrive on it.
We, on the other hand, are just pretending.
Ben opened the pantry door, via the gorilla goalie method because I was already on the island and failed to hear his final warning and I was launched out of the park and back into his arms and he smelled like whiskey and love and cigarettes and sad. He yelled at Lochlan to back away and he put his hand over my ear so I couldn't hear him anymore. He is growing to be attached to my hair. Like the others.
Touch=safe.
He would do well to come back to the carnival with me. There are no devils in New York and no complications and no history of anything. Just grindstones and mermaids and cheap Louis Vuitton fakes and Production. Also there is the Aquarium but I haven't made it there yet, I fell in love with the gritty boardwalk and the lights and I can't be torn away from them, I must be physically carried until I can't see them anymore and then I'll walk under my own power.
I would love, oddly enough, to see that in snow.
I would love to be in the mermaid parade too.
It's the way it is.
I still harbor the great escape in my head. For times when I am sitting at the bottom of the pantry in the kitchen and everyone wants me out but no one wants to come in, I run away to join the sideshow freaks and they welcome me home and it's glorious and it's simple. They want bacon and cars from the seventies, they want to find some fun on a cool autumn evening and they want to be love. They want to get some mail and fresh wildflowers and a pretty ring. They want to entertain you for their dollars and they know how to boil life down on the rusted ring burner of an old electric stove in the back of a booth on the edge of the pier and they know how to eat what remains and thrive on it.
We, on the other hand, are just pretending.
Ben opened the pantry door, via the gorilla goalie method because I was already on the island and failed to hear his final warning and I was launched out of the park and back into his arms and he smelled like whiskey and love and cigarettes and sad. He yelled at Lochlan to back away and he put his hand over my ear so I couldn't hear him anymore. He is growing to be attached to my hair. Like the others.
Touch=safe.
He would do well to come back to the carnival with me. There are no devils in New York and no complications and no history of anything. Just grindstones and mermaids and cheap Louis Vuitton fakes and Production. Also there is the Aquarium but I haven't made it there yet, I fell in love with the gritty boardwalk and the lights and I can't be torn away from them, I must be physically carried until I can't see them anymore and then I'll walk under my own power.
I would love, oddly enough, to see that in snow.
I would love to be in the mermaid parade too.
Monday 23 November 2009
I found miracles there.
I'm at work. I feel like shit. I don't sleep or eat. I just runrunrun and try to stay upright as long as possible and when I get sixteen or eighteen hours into a day I can stop and sit for a bit and sometimes maybe I get a couple hours of sleep.
Right now I'm busy trying to scan in the kid's school pictures. Caleb has the past four years here too so I'm going to make a slide show that shows how much they have grown. Ben should be here any minute to collect me from my day in hell and we're going to go have coffee with Nolan and discuss the weekend. I want to go to the farm for our 'merican turkey day. I want to escape for a few days. I want to go back to where it was when Ben and I were the only two people on earth and it was dark and snowing and we broke the surface of life together and took a really deep breath.
That's what I want.
He's here. See you later.
Right now I'm busy trying to scan in the kid's school pictures. Caleb has the past four years here too so I'm going to make a slide show that shows how much they have grown. Ben should be here any minute to collect me from my day in hell and we're going to go have coffee with Nolan and discuss the weekend. I want to go to the farm for our 'merican turkey day. I want to escape for a few days. I want to go back to where it was when Ben and I were the only two people on earth and it was dark and snowing and we broke the surface of life together and took a really deep breath.
That's what I want.
He's here. See you later.
Sunday 22 November 2009
(Getaway in) Stockholm syndrome.
I say hell it is loveI can be bought for the price of a few pretty little things shipped from Agent Provocateur, so says Caleb yesterday as we were preparing to leave his loft. He laughed as if he was kidding only that's when you know he is not, just like he always smiles when he lies.
You say I must suffer
She's a motherfucker
Resurrect me
Sleep well in your killing bed
Give a jig and show some life
Favor for a favor
Don't separate the
Pain from the knife
All the doctors sing
You got to suffer for the cure
As the world fades away
You wonder where you were
The tightrope is worn rather thin over that part of the city.
And he is right, for I came away from the weekend with some gorgeous new sets of black ribbons and ruffled pink satin, a favorite combination. Dress up the doll and put her on display. Use your timeshare wisely. All girls like to be spoiled rotten and treated well and not the other way around.
Ben's eyes grew dark as he fought to honor his agreements and quell his own appetites and I let the excuses of history serve as our joint confession. He goes with me into hell. I won't be made to choose between Ben's continued success and my intactness. It's a no-brainer. It's a wash. So I kept my apologies to myself and I took my husband by the hand, box under his arm and we took the car that was sent across town and fulfilled obligations that sometimes seem never-ending and decadent and possibly undeserving and sometimes seem as if they were scraped out of the gutter and presented in a silver teacup.
Kind of like how you can scrape a girl out of the gutter and dress her up in pretty pink satin and tell her she's beautiful when it's all a mistake and a miscommunication. An error in being. A flaw in time.
An aberration in humanity. Like a half-formed future reject off the assembly line that makes people, I appeared with broken ears and a broken mind and a heart that loses whole big pieces and a total lack of judgement that makes everyone who loves me want to alternately scream and line up for whatever sort of enkindled torture it is that I can produce for them.
None of this is true, mind you. I don't think I'm flawed, actually. Not all that much, anyway. Ruined for sure, but I can harbour enough of a reasonable facsimile of myself to make Benjamin so incredibly happy he married me if only for claiming ownership of a visual that is tactile for him. Everyone else must be content to entertain it in their dreams save for for a handful of others who have passes but they are only good for certain times and the only way I can rectify that inside the brokenness of my head is to embrace some other part of my personality that remembers these boys don't remark on beauty that isn't remarkable. That I am worthy or they wouldn't want me. And that no one rocks the pink and black satin like Bridget rocks it. Like she rocks everything.
There will be no remorse until tomorrow.
Here where the tightrope is thicker and I have better balance, the pink satin is tucked away in a drawer that sees less of a confident reflection and more than a little doubt, thinner skin with which to be stung by judgement and hurt by glances carelessly stripped of their intended ignorance and doubt bubbling up from a well that should see the most confidence in all.
It isn't a sport, it's an obligation. Hunting princesses in order to leave the knights alone, I have a real life monster who thrives on making me afraid but also knows how I thrive on the attention it gives me.
I am not one to apologize and I know it will be dismissed as Bridget being crazy in the first few years after Jacob..well whatever it is that they say and I pretend not to hear because I am too busy being Shocking and Difficult and Impossible. Too busy making sure everyone loves me.
Just in case.
Just in case something else happens and a little more of my heart gets crushed into glass. In case you fail to understand that there are actual rules of engagement, something I am not required to share. It's a rare and precious occasion for him to actually touch the satin, don't you see? He much prefers to view me like a movie, burning me into his brain. Trying to erase Benjamin out of the picture, maybe. I don't know. I don't ask.
You think I care that you don't understand?
I do not.
Not tonight.
Friday 20 November 2009
Black clouds with silver linings.
Very long day, bear with me. I need a vacation and not like the mini-Vegas one I just had. That didn't count. What will count is the fact that the children brought home their school picture orders and as soon as Ben gets home we are headed back out for Thai food. The fridge is restocked (so you can come back now, PJ) and neither Lochlan nor Caleb gave me a hard time today. August is a prince among thieves and I finally had a whole cup of coffee like ten minutes ago and plan to sleep the sleep of the dead tonight no matter what. Tomorrow has been canceled due to lack of interest and we're going to make fried potatoes, coffee and bacon and build a fire to keep all day long and watch movies. And it ain't even snowin' yet!
See I can be an optimist, I just need something to work with.
But damn, the day was long and difficult. So damned difficult. I'm done with that. No more please.
See I can be an optimist, I just need something to work with.
But damn, the day was long and difficult. So damned difficult. I'm done with that. No more please.
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