Day: January 23, 2005

It’s like I’m skimming over the top of something, like I’ll look down and see trees speeding beneath me.

Ethan claimed earlier that I’ve no decorum, “You may know which forks to use, but if you’re doing it in your underwear, it doesn’t count.” and that set me to considering, weakly pondering etiquette on my way home, looking at my life from different points of view for the fun of it. I was talking with my mother yesterday and it struck me rather forcefully that I move through an utterly different life than she does. I wander a Dance of behavioral substance, where she has rules and structures, modes of guideline. Mine is intuitive, mercurial, dependant on everyone involved and the unspoken agreements which bridge the gaps between us. It occurred to me that my life as viewed by a feminist must be a wretched place to live. It’s been a week of abiding by autocratic requests and not minding in the slightest because I have a taste for equity dipped in legitimate balance. The fairness in such a situation does not escape me.

Bliss is coming over this afternoon for tea and a ferret visit, then I have Robin in the evening. I’ve no clue what to do with him and I seem to be losing my voice. It’s his birthday Saturday, he’ll be seventeen. Tomorrow Victoria is dropping by, then it’s Shane’s Last Show. He and I have an odd waltz, he’s stood me up three times and I still respect him utterly. If nothing else, this man has skill enough for me to want to get up and slam for him. Here’s an excerpt:

If I ever only get up on stage this one time to say this,
it may be enough
You may not be here to hear it, but your friends will
and my words to you may find you though hearsay and empathy
It would be best of you to be here to hear this
but you may not be, but it needs to be said
because You stand and you look at me and poems pour out.
They slip under my skin and they try to take me, licking like letters in envelopes closed.
You give me words that almost make me love you
but not quite
Love rolls from you, desire and want like waves cascading and I admit that when I am alone at night that sometimes I think of you.
What you offer me, what you tell from your dictionary glory. I think what I’m willing to take
because when you stand and you berate me, when you orate and confiscate the words of a thousand angels, I consider and weigh the worth

I think sometime I’ll post my recording of it, but not yet. There needs to be more time to distance things from our current truths. At any rate, Tuesday night is essential, for you who can, as well as I. C.R. did a tour with Tom Waits, and Shane has won almost every award there is to win.

TUESDAY JANUARY 25TH @ CAFE DEUX SOLIELS (2096 COMMERCIAL DR)

SHANE KOYCZAN
CR AVERY
MARK BERUBE
and
GRAHAM CLARK

will be ripping the stage apart with a night of music, spoken word and comedy

DOORS @ 8 SHOW @ 9 $5-7

Wednesday I’m uncertain about. My brother, Cale, wants me to “hang out” with him and his girlfriend, Kate. I believe someone else also has dibs but I have no idea who, and Thursday evening is Zatoichi at Mike’s place. Friday is also maybe asked for, though gods know by who. This whole being slightly ill thing is getting a wee bit on my nerves. My skin feels disconnected from me and my voice wears out in under ten minutes. It’s time to chew garlic and go shopping for some real food. I’ve had enough days of living off oranges and grapefruit juice.

The pains of fought sickness are sinking in like a tepid wind is forcing ache into my muscles. It’s nothing I’m used to, but I feel the germs were fairly won, as are the bruises on the back of my legs from dancing. Mission accomplished and food deliveries thwarted today. Perhaps I may have to start looking at this as a usual weekend. One hopes. Tonight is Ellen’s Game evening and I’m finally going. It’s going to be held at Our Town Cafe, located on the corner of Kingsway & Broadway. I’ve been intending to drop in for ages.

It’s quarter to eight and I expected to come home and be able to sleep, but now I’m awake and likely to stay such.

Sometime while I was out, Alastair sent me a Dear John letter. It’s quietly brittle and contains some rather odd thoughts about me regarding things I never considered to bring up. There’s no way to have guessed that I needed to dispel faulty reasoning as I was unaware of any thoughts along these particular paths at all. Communication breakdown without guitars or passion. That what I consider my Family could be construed as sexual is unexpected, as well as the rather odd accusation that I have no compassion or inhibitions. I miss him and I wish I could soothe such things from him, but I suppose if nothing else, such a letter clearly shows things weren’t working out. It’s almost a list of misunderstandings and implicated I know you better than you know yourself, which begins with the line, “Your idle plaything forgotten as you move on to greener pastures, I wasn’t half the man you wanted me to be.” Something nags at me, telling me those are song lyrics, but instead I shake my head, seeing only pathos I can’t access.

Times like now, I wonder about myself. I construct my days honestly, my actions speaking a candor mean, so how is it that I can be seen so skewed? I’m scrupulously aboveboard. What information is required to mend the glass and show the image clear? I want a friend to tell me how they see me. My ferret is curled up in my bed and I look to him and know he’ll never accuse me of treachery. Damned skinny boys with their charming eyes and closed off souls. Forgiveness shouldn’t be construed as chasing my own tail in a denial of “pathological fear”. The things I’m scared of are more shallow than I’d care to admit. I fear that my friends will die, I’m scared I’ll grow up to be a lunatic, I can’t bear to think of living blind, and I hate myself a little every time I can’t figure out what to do. I have a veracity of thought which denies my inherited viciousness. I’m not that different from anyone else. He thinks I’m scared, a misuse of thought brought about because I refuse pressure. I played that game once under the idea that I never have to again. Now it repels me with almost physical force and I never received time to ease into what was required. Perhaps I should apologize for being artless. I don’t know.

I suppose understanding other people is a tricky thing when emotions are strongly involved. After Bill, I sincerely told myself I would never involve myself with anyone else who didn’t trust me, but I must resign myself that I did it again, which was only stupid. It’s not like there aren’t enough people who would shed blood for me, it’s not as if I don’t live as part of a collective of people who breathe the stuff in the face of devious culpability. Our faith is in ourselves and our integrity. Despite my best efforts, I can’t lie to myself. I know at the time. There’s no healthy survival in this particular devotion addiction. It’s a mistake played three times now, three strikes, you’re out. No self respecting honour for idiot girls after that. It’s like turning on myself, relationships which wear me out, that I can’t afford anymore.

There was so little for me when I was there that it hurt. Hardly did I feel my company was appreciated and now my persistence is rewarded with the accusation of being emotionally distant while I had tried so hard to find something to hold. Apparently my coming down for a month didn’t mean enough, it seems that even when present, even when trapped, I’m unavailable. He looked at pictures I took while I was there and they seemed unreal. I’m sorry I understand. I told him that my recent time in Laguna Beach doesn’t seem to have existed. A white room, the couch here, the chair there, a blue sailors chest for a coffee table. Rain in the morning and it’s all a shrug at having a home, nothing to sing for, nothing welcoming in the morning alone, like memories bleached with age, though I returned Monday.

This week I feel released back into time.