Good morning.
Don't cop out.
This will be your last post until Tuesday.
I will miss you, more than you know. But right now I have to be home. Home on my turf, Bridget's territory, resplendent with histories and dead husbands buried in my ocean backyard and the sun glinting on the waves. While I have the strength to have a goddamned opinion. When I come back I might be less strung out. Hopefully not this angry. Buzzy-bumblebee angry.
Here's hoping.
My waves. My ocean. That one you all love but it belongs to the saltwater princess. Me. I've got your bitter right here.
After I wrote last night I went and pulled out that stupid sweater and I put it on and then I went to sleep. With the sweater. With Cole. And as fucked up as that might sound it's a pretty accurate picture of how unbelievably fucked up I feel.
Are you crazy to want this
Even for a while?
We're making this shit up
The reasons for being are easy to pay
You can't remember the others
They just kind of went away
And I didn't ask Jacob if we could go home for a break. I told him I was going and I told him I was taking the kids and that I didn't want to be here anymore and I asked him if he would come too, formally, as if I was looking for distance from us and I put us back into separate places in my head because otherwise I get swallowed alive.
He asked if I wanted him there. I do, and I told him we could go to the cottage he bought for me for Christmas and maybe it'll give us a chance to talk quietly while the kids look for shells in that bitch of a wind that never ceases but takes your pain with it and maybe we can come to some sort of a truce while we're there. Without counselors and without God looking over my goddamned shoulder and without Jacob being right all the time and friends with opinions and bills and phonecalls and laundry and all this goddamned nonsense. And I'm doing it on my terms, because the hearing aids aren't coming either.
I know, it's all going to be waiting when we come back.
Maybe I just won't come back.
we're done lying for a living
the strange days have come and you're gone
either dead or dying
either dead or trying to go
In my perfect world, I have a watch with no hands. Time doesn't move. The sun gives me no indications, the moon lights up on command and I have every precious moment that I might need or want. The seasons would be invited, daylight could be stored, and warmth could be conjured whilst cold is soundly rejected and Bridget could sit in her favorite spot at the edge of her world, and maybe, just maybe...
Not fall off.
Wednesday, 2 May 2007
Tuesday, 1 May 2007
One of those times when the lyrics fit you like a fucking glove.
Just hear me out
If it's not perfect I'll perfect it till my heart explodes
I highly doubt
I can make it through another of your episodes
Lashing out
One of the petty moves you pull before you lose control
You wear me out
But it's all right now
He's singing it with a bitter tongue while he restrings his guitar and I find myself afraid to go in the room in case he's in a bad mood. For Christ's sake it's Jake.
Whoever said Bridget could be fixed with time and love had no idea what we're up against.
Oh, right. That was Jake, too.
Raise your hand if you know I'm really getting kind of worried about how this trip is going to go.
If it's not perfect I'll perfect it till my heart explodes
I highly doubt
I can make it through another of your episodes
Lashing out
One of the petty moves you pull before you lose control
You wear me out
But it's all right now
He's singing it with a bitter tongue while he restrings his guitar and I find myself afraid to go in the room in case he's in a bad mood. For Christ's sake it's Jake.
Whoever said Bridget could be fixed with time and love had no idea what we're up against.
Oh, right. That was Jake, too.
Raise your hand if you know I'm really getting kind of worried about how this trip is going to go.
One more sleep.
I refuse to dignify most of these emails. No, I'm not posting any pictures of naked me, forget it! My parents read here (I know, OH MY GOD). Sure I can write about sex but photographs are a whole different level of privacy to me. Maybe not to you, but to me. The day the minister's wife puts up her own naked pictures is the day the neighborhood revolts or worse, tilts and all the people slide out of their homes and off the edge of the horizon.
And, no I did not just admit the existence of said pictures. But this would be a great segue into a story about the year everyone decided they take Cole's life drawing course because he had a live! nude! model! Which, naturally was...me.
Pictures and drawings. Paintings too. Pick a medium, I think I have a work here in it.
Hmmm. Let's stop here and move along, shall we?
We're packed for the coast. It's the first time Jacob asked me to help him pack instead of him doing everything because I couldn't seem to move. Last time we went home I was put where ever I needed to be, clutching the box with Cole's ashes and feeling so so brittle. I didn't look up or around, I just went in a straight line. I drank too much. I fought with my family. I fought with Jacob. And I cried at the edge of the ocean.
Well, okay, I always do that now. She and I are too far apart, too often and it's so hard.
This time might be happier. No, it will be happier. Jake is taking me to meet the cottage he has transformed into my hideaway. He's taking us away so we don't have to be here during a difficult week. He's giving us all a break. Despite the risk of taking me anywhere, without medication, without Claus and Robert (whom I don't like, so I don't talk about him), without our circus safety net.
I packed my favorite sweater. Jacob frowned when he saw it, but it's a part of me. And maybe it's a 'thing' and I shouldn't be attached to things, but sometimes comfort is found in odd places. It's a sweater that used to be Cole's. A big nubby grey wool hoodie with braided ties and wooden buttons. It comes down to my knees. When I'm at the beach and it's cold it's what I wear. Jacob sees it as a attempt to hold on to something that's gone but it isn't like that. It's my sweater, it's been mine since I took it out of Cole's room when he was 18 and he said I could have it. I don't see Cole in it. I see Bridget, who is warm, and nothing more.
We're bickering, of course, over so many little things like that. We do this, before we travel, before big things. Jacob's anxiety is starting to cloud his demeanor, the fear of flying thing astounds me, coming from him. I can't fix it, and to see him with a ripple where his fabric is usually pulled strong and tight has always bothered me. He can't hypnotize himself. He can't talk himself out of this fear the way he can talk anyone else out of anything. And once we're in the air he will be fine.
My unbirthday is this week too. And I won't be here and I'm happy for that.
I just can't wait to see the cottage. Do I sound excited? No, Jacob told me I sound cautious. I know. I can't seem to exhale. The sun can't seem to come out and we can't seem to find our way past the bitter this morning. I should have run while it was early but instead we tried to take the extra hour to hold each other, awake but not awake, the beautiful in-between. No bitterness there but it crept in later.
I'm freezing. Pants might help that. Jacob's dress shirt from last night and a huge pair of wool socks and it's ten o'clock in the morning. Jacob ran the kids over to school while I started in on the laundry. I need some of it so I can finish packing the kids' bags but while it thumps through that temperamental dryer I find myself uncharacteristically impatient for something to keep my head busy.
Jacob and Sam are off doing some work this morning. Duncan is coming later as the official housesitter and yes, oh my God, if you are lucky, you'll even get an entry tomorrow because I'll be rattling around like a loose bolt waiting to go to the airport. I knew we should have booked an early morning flight because the waits are driving me nuts.
And maybe tomorrow I'll have something to say.
And, no I did not just admit the existence of said pictures. But this would be a great segue into a story about the year everyone decided they take Cole's life drawing course because he had a live! nude! model! Which, naturally was...me.
Pictures and drawings. Paintings too. Pick a medium, I think I have a work here in it.
Hmmm. Let's stop here and move along, shall we?
We're packed for the coast. It's the first time Jacob asked me to help him pack instead of him doing everything because I couldn't seem to move. Last time we went home I was put where ever I needed to be, clutching the box with Cole's ashes and feeling so so brittle. I didn't look up or around, I just went in a straight line. I drank too much. I fought with my family. I fought with Jacob. And I cried at the edge of the ocean.
Well, okay, I always do that now. She and I are too far apart, too often and it's so hard.
This time might be happier. No, it will be happier. Jake is taking me to meet the cottage he has transformed into my hideaway. He's taking us away so we don't have to be here during a difficult week. He's giving us all a break. Despite the risk of taking me anywhere, without medication, without Claus and Robert (whom I don't like, so I don't talk about him), without our circus safety net.
I packed my favorite sweater. Jacob frowned when he saw it, but it's a part of me. And maybe it's a 'thing' and I shouldn't be attached to things, but sometimes comfort is found in odd places. It's a sweater that used to be Cole's. A big nubby grey wool hoodie with braided ties and wooden buttons. It comes down to my knees. When I'm at the beach and it's cold it's what I wear. Jacob sees it as a attempt to hold on to something that's gone but it isn't like that. It's my sweater, it's been mine since I took it out of Cole's room when he was 18 and he said I could have it. I don't see Cole in it. I see Bridget, who is warm, and nothing more.
We're bickering, of course, over so many little things like that. We do this, before we travel, before big things. Jacob's anxiety is starting to cloud his demeanor, the fear of flying thing astounds me, coming from him. I can't fix it, and to see him with a ripple where his fabric is usually pulled strong and tight has always bothered me. He can't hypnotize himself. He can't talk himself out of this fear the way he can talk anyone else out of anything. And once we're in the air he will be fine.
My unbirthday is this week too. And I won't be here and I'm happy for that.
I just can't wait to see the cottage. Do I sound excited? No, Jacob told me I sound cautious. I know. I can't seem to exhale. The sun can't seem to come out and we can't seem to find our way past the bitter this morning. I should have run while it was early but instead we tried to take the extra hour to hold each other, awake but not awake, the beautiful in-between. No bitterness there but it crept in later.
I'm freezing. Pants might help that. Jacob's dress shirt from last night and a huge pair of wool socks and it's ten o'clock in the morning. Jacob ran the kids over to school while I started in on the laundry. I need some of it so I can finish packing the kids' bags but while it thumps through that temperamental dryer I find myself uncharacteristically impatient for something to keep my head busy.
Jacob and Sam are off doing some work this morning. Duncan is coming later as the official housesitter and yes, oh my God, if you are lucky, you'll even get an entry tomorrow because I'll be rattling around like a loose bolt waiting to go to the airport. I knew we should have booked an early morning flight because the waits are driving me nuts.
And maybe tomorrow I'll have something to say.
Monday, 30 April 2007
And again for the latecomers.
Bridget isn't on the web, guys. People regularly send me email with links to Flickr pictures labelled Bridget and Jake wondering if it's us (it isn't, most likely) or ask if I have Myspace or Facebook or other things I know little about. I did spend a couple of months flirting with Myspace but ultimately Loch took it down for me, I don't feel like I need more than this. Though if Blogger gets dodgy again, then I might reconsider a move to Wordpress or something.
But this website is definitely not me. I hope it's a line of cruise ships or fishing tackle supply and not some girl with the same nickname because well, just wow. But I have no right to be offended or upset because I didn't go and buy the domain.
But just so you know, saltwaterprincess.com isn't Bridget.
It's probably someone looking for payback in which case you'll soon see naked pictures of me there. Plus I'm offended by 'saltwater' being two words for some odd reason.
Oh, I'm kidding. No one's blackmailing me.
Of course, the day is young.
And notice I failed to deny the existence of naked pictures.
Oh dear lord.
(I'm still kidding, by the way. You have no faith in me at all, do you, internet?)
But this website is definitely not me. I hope it's a line of cruise ships or fishing tackle supply and not some girl with the same nickname because well, just wow. But I have no right to be offended or upset because I didn't go and buy the domain.
But just so you know, saltwaterprincess.com isn't Bridget.
It's probably someone looking for payback in which case you'll soon see naked pictures of me there. Plus I'm offended by 'saltwater' being two words for some odd reason.
Oh, I'm kidding. No one's blackmailing me.
Of course, the day is young.
And notice I failed to deny the existence of naked pictures.
Oh dear lord.
(I'm still kidding, by the way. You have no faith in me at all, do you, internet?)
Performance tranquility.
There's something really romantic and positively magical about running uphill in the pouring rain while your husband stands at the top and yells at you repeatedly to get your shoulders down, already. Christ.
Jacob is a perfectionist in the few sports he does enjoy. He's really loving running again. I'm less of a technical, more of a cathartic runner. Sometimes I care nothing for form, keeping track or training, I just run until I've left my worries behind. This is why I run each day, because I can't get away from them.
Halfway up the hill I dropped my hands to my knees and stopped dead and yelled for him to fuck off. And he laughed and told me to hurry up. What a sweetheart.
I keep telling him I'm going to take him out and lose him one of these days and he tells me I have to be able to pass him in order to do that. We trash-talk to each other so much when we run you'd think we were bitter rivals instead of husband and wife.
Then we come home and share a hot shower and forget we were ever exasperated. Because...eh, hot showers when you've come home soaked to the bone and freezing cold are the best things ever.
Today's blessing is a well-anchored towel rack. But I'm not telling you why.
Snort.
Jacob is a perfectionist in the few sports he does enjoy. He's really loving running again. I'm less of a technical, more of a cathartic runner. Sometimes I care nothing for form, keeping track or training, I just run until I've left my worries behind. This is why I run each day, because I can't get away from them.
Halfway up the hill I dropped my hands to my knees and stopped dead and yelled for him to fuck off. And he laughed and told me to hurry up. What a sweetheart.
I keep telling him I'm going to take him out and lose him one of these days and he tells me I have to be able to pass him in order to do that. We trash-talk to each other so much when we run you'd think we were bitter rivals instead of husband and wife.
Then we come home and share a hot shower and forget we were ever exasperated. Because...eh, hot showers when you've come home soaked to the bone and freezing cold are the best things ever.
Today's blessing is a well-anchored towel rack. But I'm not telling you why.
Snort.
Drive-thru girl.
In an effort not to be outdone by Loch, I present to you Duncan, your friendly neighborhood Irish Beat Poet. At first I laughed, but it's really freaking cool:
Down dusty roads choked with cars
a ribbon edged in black
traces the path your life has taken
like the map of your soul's travels
This path is marked with milestones
names and symbols you come
to recognize easily
before you are old enough to read
Which hunger are you filling, drive-thru girl?
Sometimes there's a passenger
slouched in the backseat
His name is deadly homesickness
and you wish he would go
Sometimes he likes to go away
while you take your repast.
food your mouth knows, your brain remembers
You feel less alone.
Littered beside the dusty road
like abandoned boxes
like empty houses
the drive-thrus tempt your hunger
Which hunger are you filling, drive-thru girl?
Sliding glass smeared with fingerprints
dirty dollar bills exchanged
a crumpled bag is handed out
and you are on your way
The window a link to your past
the road ahead a map of your future
your blood sugar a reluctant hostage
in your quest for miles before dark.
And once you have left
and eaten your fare
your belly is quiet, your thoughts are spare
and you know, in five hundred miles you'll do it again.
What hunger was that that you were filling again, drive-thru girl?
Down dusty roads choked with cars
a ribbon edged in black
traces the path your life has taken
like the map of your soul's travels
This path is marked with milestones
names and symbols you come
to recognize easily
before you are old enough to read
Which hunger are you filling, drive-thru girl?
Sometimes there's a passenger
slouched in the backseat
His name is deadly homesickness
and you wish he would go
Sometimes he likes to go away
while you take your repast.
food your mouth knows, your brain remembers
You feel less alone.
Littered beside the dusty road
like abandoned boxes
like empty houses
the drive-thrus tempt your hunger
Which hunger are you filling, drive-thru girl?
Sliding glass smeared with fingerprints
dirty dollar bills exchanged
a crumpled bag is handed out
and you are on your way
The window a link to your past
the road ahead a map of your future
your blood sugar a reluctant hostage
in your quest for miles before dark.
And once you have left
and eaten your fare
your belly is quiet, your thoughts are spare
and you know, in five hundred miles you'll do it again.
What hunger was that that you were filling again, drive-thru girl?
Sunday, 29 April 2007
Woozles.
What's with the Piglet nickname again?
I like it, it suits you.
Gee, thanks alot.
Well, not only is Piglet Pooh's best friend and constant companion, but we have to work together to capture all of your woozles and heffalumps.
Oh, I see. Pooh?
Yes, Piglet?
Nothing, I just wanted to be sure of you.
Man, you know more of these quotes than I do, princess.
Oh, thank heavens. I thought you forgot my real name.
It isn't princ-
Oh, yes it is.
Okay, Bridget the Saltwater Piglet.
Take that back!
No way, baby girl. I am the giver of nicknames.
Um.....
Yes?
You'll pay for this, Jacob.
Can't come up with anything?
Nope. I got nothing.
I like it, it suits you.
Gee, thanks alot.
Well, not only is Piglet Pooh's best friend and constant companion, but we have to work together to capture all of your woozles and heffalumps.
Oh, I see. Pooh?
Yes, Piglet?
Nothing, I just wanted to be sure of you.
Man, you know more of these quotes than I do, princess.
Oh, thank heavens. I thought you forgot my real name.
It isn't princ-
Oh, yes it is.
Okay, Bridget the Saltwater Piglet.
Take that back!
No way, baby girl. I am the giver of nicknames.
Um.....
Yes?
You'll pay for this, Jacob.
Can't come up with anything?
Nope. I got nothing.
Record smashed.
Jacob was home in time to offer to take us out for dinner with his characteristic wry smile at our argument. We had sort of made up on the phone but when he came home things were still a bit tense. Over dinner we worked out our remaining issues on the subject that caused our turmoil and then came home to get the kids in bed and warm up to each other. We called it a night at 9:30 and went to bed hand in hand.
And I swear I don't pick fights for this reason, but I would, in a heartbeat. Epic make-up sex.
Last night in his hurry to touch, Jacob managed to rip five buttons off my shirt, one off my skirt and two off his Levi 501s. I'm not sure how he managed that feat considering how tough those buttons are but he did it. It was a new record for us.
We didn't care much about the buttons. He gathered me up into his arms and into his lap and then turned me inside out and pushed me so far into the bed I had to talk him into slowing down. He's proving me wrong on so many levels it's positively joyful.
Afterwards I was lying across the foot of the bed watching him pick buttons up off the floor by candlelight, and I told him I loved him.
He laughed and stopped his button-hunt and sat down beside me on the edge of the bed, and he ran his hand down my back and rubbed the back of my thigh and said,
You drive me right up the wall, piglet, and I love you so very, very much.
And I swear I don't pick fights for this reason, but I would, in a heartbeat. Epic make-up sex.
Last night in his hurry to touch, Jacob managed to rip five buttons off my shirt, one off my skirt and two off his Levi 501s. I'm not sure how he managed that feat considering how tough those buttons are but he did it. It was a new record for us.
We didn't care much about the buttons. He gathered me up into his arms and into his lap and then turned me inside out and pushed me so far into the bed I had to talk him into slowing down. He's proving me wrong on so many levels it's positively joyful.
Afterwards I was lying across the foot of the bed watching him pick buttons up off the floor by candlelight, and I told him I loved him.
He laughed and stopped his button-hunt and sat down beside me on the edge of the bed, and he ran his hand down my back and rubbed the back of my thigh and said,
You drive me right up the wall, piglet, and I love you so very, very much.
Saturday, 28 April 2007
Rebobinage.
Why are you here reading about me? It's a beautiful spring day and we should all be outside. I'm headed there now with a fresh cup of coffee and I'm going to try to reel in my crazy head and salvage the day. Because what's worse than going to bed angry is waking up still angry and then going off to spend the day angry and Bridget at home wishing she could learn to shut her mouth but it's hard when her feet are in it and everything spills out. I'm learning there's a fine, most unwelcome line between being able to share your darkest fears with your best friend and not alienating your husband in the process. Especially when they are one in the same.
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