Who gave me "Mermaid Ave"? It's awesome.

Songs of the hour: California Stars by Wilco, Red Elvises’ My Love is Killing Me

It’s been such a busy few weeks I’m not sure where to begin.Well, I’ve moved. Brian and I, in unfathomable wisdom, took it upon ourselves to move a 3 BR house by ourselves during a southern summer. I could write at length about a weird class of white spiders and how they spawn (and the baby ones die and just wait suspended in their webs for someone like me to come along and slip into a fugue staring at the sheer enormity of their numbers, everywhere, in every imaginable furniture crevice, corner, or handhold while their parents continue spinning and writhing on spindly legs) and other such events that storage units generate, but I’ll spare you. I managed to get through it somehow.

The house is in Cary, in an as awesome location as one could get in Car, given the nature of Cary. Joss than a mile from a park, Joss’ school, a movie theatre, and I-40, it’s nearly perfect—you know, except for the Cary part. It’s great neighborhood and though I feel like a huge hypocrite for making fun of Cary for my entire life and then subsequently moving there, not having to worry about Joss being set on fire by neighbor kids helps me sleep pretty well at night. I’ll post pics when I get my camera out my glove compartment in my car in my dad’s driveway—but until then we’ll have to settle for the street view from google. It has more trees/spiderbreedinggrounds than I would like, but again, managing.

The day after I moved out, my new Chinese step-sister told my dad that she was selling her interest in the restaurant she works at/part-owns, and was moving in with him for a few weeks before moving to NJ where her husband works/lives. And then she did. She moved in with my dad. I think the plan is that her mother, my father’s new wife, is leaving China in November and will be moving in with Anna (step-sister) in NJ. What this requires, though, for INS regulations, is that she has to live with my dad, which puts him moving to NJ too. If you flip back a dozen blog posts or so, you’ll see the frustration and anguish of my putting off graduate school because I didn’t want to leave my father all alone and him refusing to move, saying “I’m 68 years old and there’s still a lot I want to do, and it don’t involve moving.” Everything’s still up in the air, but I hate that he may be pressured into moving to Jersey of all places. Maybe also, I might be a little peeved if Anna gets him to move when I couldn’t—but that’s petty sister business, and I shouldn’t indulge in it. Okay, the surrealness of the situation just won out—what the fuck?! My dad is married and has an entirely new demanding family to deal with. I’m speechless, really. So, we’ll leave it at that, and I’ll keep you posted.

As a side note, my brother is dating someone. I really, really hope she comes from a small family. I can’t even begin to express the enormity of that hope.

A couple weeks ago, I was talking to a coworker about how much I hate the weekly dept. meetings and avoid them whenever I have a remotely plausible excuse, because going to them runs the risk of impromptu public speaking moments. She has similar anxiety issues, and talking about how ridiculous we are, I thought about the extended laundry list of little horrors my social anxiety spells have had on my life: an extra semester of college from dropping classes w/ oral reports on the syllabus; dodging phone calls of people I love dearly; leaving parties 30 minutes after arriving; sneaking out of Sara’s wedding reception (she’ll never let me live it down); untold amounts of money lost to various errors I’ve been too timid to confront customer service people about; procrastinating to mootness parent teacher meetings; and really, living in a cave in general as much as humanly possible. I’m tired of it. So a couple weeks ago I signed up for a social anxiety study. They’re experimenting with a medication already used for other disorders (like bipolar) to see how it works with anxiety. What I’ve learned, is that I really HATE being medicated, but I’m not sure if I hate it more than being a total hermit. I am so frackin’ tired in the mornings I’m not sure how I even get out of bed. By afternoon, I’m okay, but I’m drinking coffee again… which I had mostly given up because it makes me more anxious. What the hell. Anyway, I’m going to see the study through, but the side effects are really annoying—grogginess, difficulty concentrating, and a weird… I don’t know what to call it, suppression, maybe? I don’t get as excited about things I like. On the other hand, I’m not freaking out either. Talking to the docs running the study in that weird psychiatry environment, I feel as uncomfortable and queasy mentally as I would pre-meds, but my body/heart rate is completely relaxed at the same time. It’s a weird dissonance, I guess. I don’t like it, whatever it is, and I can’t wait until it’s over.

I hung out with Amanda this weekend, and she brings up memories that make me wonder how the hell I ever got this way. I wasn’t always this way, right? We looked back at our teenage selves and tracked the things we learned, both the hard way and from each other. She reminded me how lucky we were to have met the people we did, when we did, and I see clearly how lucky I am to still have you all. Eh, I’ll save the gushing gratitude for another time. But damn, the universe dealt me goodness when I was young, more than making up for the bad that slipped through the cracks. Love you guys.

Joss has been experimenting with sarcasm lately, and I have to say, it’s damn annoying. The flippant tone and non-answers make me crazy. It’s only fair, though, given how I crowned myself Queen of Sarcasm for a few years and inflicted it on everyone else—karmically I deserve it. I used to think I was clever, I guess. But I’ve given the nature of sarcasm a lot of thought and, at the ripe old age of 31, I see its latent implications in a different light. I guess I must have thought it created an air of wisdom and street-wiseness (streetwisdom?), like I knew better than to believe in anything because the universe is fixed, against us, and dark, and there’s no point believing in anything (if you know Carmen, you know exactly what I mean). But really, how sad is that? Sarcasm is so easy, you know? To just dismiss. To naysay. To find fault, flaws. Because believing is hard. Hope is hard. Faith is hard. I’m not much for the latter, but I respect the hell out of people who put faith in something. It’s tough—it takes a unique courage and strength to be truly faithful.  Sarcastic attitudes are just a shield against disappointment. I realize that sarcasm can cover a range of attitudes and dispositions, and that answering a roommate’s question from the kitchen “are you still here?” with “no, I just left” isn’t exactly a subtle statement of hopelessness and pessimism, but I trust you know what I mean.

Well damn, I’ve written a treatise on nothing. Third one this year, most likely. I’ll try not to wait so long next time, less time=shorter posts. I do have an ounce of compassion for you, dear reader.

Quick notes. Amanda, stumbled on this and thought of the God/Faith discussion we had—thought you’d like it. And everyone, if you haven’t already, meet the cutest thing of the millennium and send Ms. Sara J. Allen happy restful vibes, because she and Mr. Allen are going to need them. :)

Love.

 

 

 

 

 

Comments

[Amanda]

If I had written God a letterwhen I was little it would have read somthing like this:
"Dear God,
If I'm good do you promise to tell me the truth about the following:
The Bermuda Triangle
Aliens
Amelia Earhart
The Mob
If pets go to heaven.
Thanks
Amanda