not a diary

I have a very short blog to make tonight. mainly because i'd like to steer away from that compromise debate, and bring in another question.

the more you mention the word 'love' - does it mean less, or is its meaning enhanced? do people prefer to hear it less often, or more often? how often do people averagely bring the L word into their vocabulary?
I say it rarely.
I refer to it as 'the L word', after all.
I will type it and type it but the word itself sticks in my throat.
I will say it on the phone quite often but when someone is standing in front of you... why is that so much more difficult,

why does saying it outloud make such a difference?

x

What does compromise actually mean? Today I had a conversation with a friend who told me 'relationships are about compromise'. To me, compromise means 'less', or 'accepting less'. So then, was my friend trying to say 'relationships are about accepting less'? I completely disagree that relationships are about compromise. I will explain why below.

Sometimes, the day to day life we experience has to be about compromise. In a sense, I will let my friend 'have' the point about compromising on what film to see at the cinema, or which restaurant to go to that night. but if you begin to compromise on yourself as a person for the sake of someone else, that's not compromising, that's losing.

1 + 1 = 2

1 + 1 is never equal to 1.

When you have two people, you don't have 'two halves making a whole', instead you have 2 people adding to each other's lives. relationships are about appreciating the whole of another person, the good and the bad, and showing them the whole of yourself in return. love isn't all fireworks in the park, it's tears, it's burnt toast, it's embarrassing relations, it's terrible outfits, it's everything.

but the one thing it isn't, is compromise.

Love should be about living your whole life plus one. Not cutting down your life to make way for another person. A person could add a dimension of the unseen to your way of life and suddenly you are able to appreciate things you couldn't see before. when, or maybe if, i ever find that mystery person who will add to my life in the long-term, what i'd expect is more of a 'right, we're in this together now' attitude than 'change for me'. after all, relationships are a team effort. but a team effort where you are your whole self together with another person's whole self. One add one = two every way you look at it.

I can't take the people i love in my life living less than they could. I have a friend, my age, who has been with the same guy for about 6 or 7 years now, and she's one of the most dynamic, daring people i've ever met. yet she is in the most solid, undaring relationship you could imagine. some would argue she needs it to keep her feet on the ground, yet she strays at every turn, she won't discuss her boyfriend unless she's prompted to, she yawns at the thought of seeing him. she lives an entirely seperate life to him in a different city. when she talks about him (prompted) she's a different person. she's cold - it's like she's stepped around the newsdesk and she's giving you a weather report. and it makes my skin go creepy when she does it. i've never lied to her. she knows i think the sooner she ends the relationship the better for everyone long-term. she knows i have nightmares about them both being 40 with little children running around, and her waking up one morning in a cold sweat knowing she has to leave. i have nightmares about her hammering down my door in the rain to tell me she's left her husband. i hope she never gets that far.

but she's compromising for him. and that's where she's losing.

I'll end on a tiny poem - not one of mine - but it illustrates my point:

Relationship - (from the hungarian)

What a silence, when you are here.
What a hellish silence.
You sit and I sit.
You lose and I lose.

Night all.
x

Have you ever dreamt that you fall down a flight of steps? Well, maybe that's what this poem is about, maybe it's not.

Untitled

There is a darkness closing in tonight
the air is tight and parched around the walls
the rain has been and gone and left a mist
this mist remains, and freezes where it falls

I am alone and now the window sticks
the air that is outside cannot invade
this room is burning up with heavy thoughts
the lightest are the ones that will not fade

Like, will I ever really let you go?
or, is this really something i should fear?
In all the times I drove us down that road
I can't believe I always let you steer.

Til thoughts die out. And windows open up
the cold air rushes in along the wall.
I'll come to terms with what I really want.
I'll try to run towards you, but I'll fall.

evening all

I sent myself home from work today and actually got a lot more done than i could have if i was in the office. sometimes being there is like being lost in a forest where the trees trip you up and you can't see where you are going. that would be first on my list of thoughts for tonight.

the second is this:
again, i found it in a poem - it's just a few lines, but very good:

we don't fall in love: it rises through us
the way that certain music does-
whether a symphony or ballad-
and it is sepia-coloured,
like tea that stains as it creeps up
the tiny tube-like gaps inside
a cube of sugar lying in a cup.

the third thought is below:

fear of disappointing those you care about is worse than disappointing yourself. or perhaps i shouldn't generalise, just because it is worse for me. for me, if i'd failed an exam when i was studying, i would have dreaded those phone calls home more than the impact it could have had on my degree. whenever faced with a big life-decision, it's always the people it will affect that matter the most to you, their thoughts and feelings. if you're like me, you'd give anything not to upset a person. maybe it's that desperate need that humans have to be liked.

of course, there are plenty of people out there thinking 'well, i'm not like that', but underneath all of that bravado people have, fundamentally we all want others to like us, even to love us. we might pretend we're 'not bothered' by what people think of us, but of course we are even if being headstrong is one of our strong-points.
again, maybe i shouldn't generalise because it's what i'm like, but there it is in black and white and i guess i'll have to see how many people would agree.

thought four:

my whole body aches from flu.
it's even reached my arms and legs.
and i have 5 hours of meetings tomorrow where i am required to be insightful, inspirational even.
how the hell do people get sick and carry on doing those essential jobs out there, like saving lives?

thought five:
i bought a flat screen telly at the weekend which would all be well and good if i could get the bastard to show me a decent picture. i'm starting to watch only dvds. but being ill really brings home to you the fact that you might feel a little lonely.

that's all for now. hope you enjoyed it. whatever number thought might interest you, that is.

Hello all

i'm not too well this weekend. when i'm not feeling so good, the overwhelming tiredness that creeps up on me from monday to friday takes hold. last night i was asleep by 10pm. i feel as if i'd rather shut down tonight than do anything else. it's amazing how draining the 9 to 5 can be. people drain me more than anything. it strikes me that most of the problems in the world today are caused by people not thinking about the impact that they are having on others. this week i was 'mediator' in a meeting between two colleagues and my manager to try to resolve a conflict. of course, it did not work, and one person stormed out while another (who really had a point) put his head on the desk and just... sobbed. at those moments, there really isn't anything that can be done. if even one scrap of you cares for another, seeing tears is really quite disasterous. i can think of a couple of people in my life who i've never seen cry, and who I don't think I could deal with seeing cry without ending up in the same state myself.

I have mentioned earlier in my blog that my family currently faces a huge loss. as christmas edges ever closer, so the impact of that loss creeps up on us all. will we crawl through those 4 or so days in tact, or will we end up having a moment of collective 'break-down' on xmas eve? i don't know at the moment. i wouldn't like to guess.

I found a poem (which lately I'm inclined to do) which illustrates the way I feel about that loss more so than a longer, more epic one would. I didn't write this one.

This is what I want to sign off with

You know what I'm
like when I'm sick: I'd sooner
curse than cry. And people don't often
know what they're saying in the end.
Or I could die in my sleep.

So I'll say it now. Here it is.
Don't pay any attention
if I don't get it right
when it's for real. Blame that
on terror or pain
or the stuff they're shooting
into my veins. This is what I wanted to
sign off with. Bend
closer, listen, I love you.

x

Hello

What does it mean to really listen to what someone is saying, and to really hear them? Equally, what does it mean to recognise a voice in a mishmash of voices and say 'i can hear what you're saying', above all of that other mess. We live in a world where we say a lot every day. We talk and talk. Looking back on today, how much of what I have said has really meant something to me? How much of it was really heard by others?
Women say on average 7,000 words per day. So, if I've said maybe... 5,000 so far by this time, how many of them should I take back?

I'm full of questions right now. I'm also full of memories. I find it difficult to completely get over the past as I think, people never really do. My past is mine, after all, I own it. It's about whether I use it for good now that it's done. Our experiences with people who perhaps weren't exactly what we needed, or who aren't what we need, only serves to alert us when we find something that is worth being a part of. I have a friend living abroad at the moment and struggling with a relationship. So far away from those who care for her, she called me the other night in an absolute state. She was terrified that she had made a huge mistake. Both of us have had car crash relationships in the past, and I called that up. I said 'you've got a huge warning now, that you should be using from now on. you know what you don't want, you've got to decide what you do'. I think my words may have bounced off between her tears, but I really believe that's what past relationships are for.

x

It's strange how feelings come and go, then come around again. When I was a student I did some work surrounding poetry writing, and on my way home in the car i thought - i'll dig that out. i want to share it on the blog because otherwise, i think, it's just sitting in my old uni ring-binder on the bottom shelf in my room. we were given tasks each week where we had to write a poem based on some discussions we'd had in class. we had to write a sonnet, a song... and so on. obviously the poems were about what i was going through at the time, they are still hugely important to me, but i thought the feelings that dredged them out of my head and onto a page had passed. lately i've been thinking that people pass but feelings never really do. the people they could be about might alter but they are the same beast underneath.

There is one i wrote below. a poem 'of reference' which is built with other pieces from lyrics, from other poems, from the television and then there is a bit that's just me. i wonder if you can spot it.

On a wing

I do not trust it - it has wings, and lacks and lacks again
but then
it turns to wake you this morning with lilies,
tumble-dried and wet with occasional water.
Let this rain be on the lies
which make you sick with sleeplessness.
Let it fall and sink until it settles
on your plane-seat stomach
on your arm-rest guts.

This feeling is, and then it cannot be
because you will not let it,
yet it allows itself, and here's your trouble.
It wants to move, only for a second
it sweeps you up on a sticky roller
and you're covered in straight-up-beige,
which 'does exactly what it says
on the tin.'
You are flat to this wall
lost underneath stickles of paint.

Here we have this newness -
look at it, letting us breathe,
our lungs relax,
we are alone now.
We watch television-
my arm around you
looser than before, and i can feel
your top lip on my forehead.
We touch the feeling for a moment until we
watch it move slowly
arching its back,
edging away
follow it
follow it
chase it now,
run, run on, run through, run back to it
you wanted it to wait.
too late-
remember, it has wings.

Hello everyone

I'm going to blog twice in one day. Mainly because I found that poem and felt compelled to share it, and also because a theme has come to light and i thought I'd write about... bodies. what exactly IS it that makes us love or hate a part of our bodies? where does that huge gap between the way we see ourselves and how other people see us come from?

Maybe I am a strange sort of 23 year old woman, but I rarely think about my body at all. I rarely even wonder what I'm going to wear unless someone somewhere has made a 'big deal' about it. I think about what I should wear to work for about 30 seconds and then I just grab what's clean/wasn't worn the day before. I might think about it for a bit longer if it's a party or a special occassion, but in front of the mirror is not my favourite place to hang out.

I hardly ever consider my physical-self. Now and again i remember the little things I absolutely hate about my toes, for example, or how I have one eye ever so slightly bigger than the other, but I've never been known to lose any sleep over it. The way I see it, we're sort of stuck with our bodies, unless we have enough money stashed away to modify aspects for purely cosmetic reasons.

This weekend has had quite a physical feel to it. I went to see a play yesterday with an old friend which had quite a bit of nudity in it. not bad for a saturday matinee, glass of red wine in one hand, watching some naked bloke reading out a soliloquy ;-)
the night before, a friend had made some comments which forced me into actually thinking about my body for the first time in nearly a year, and as i watched this naked bloke prancing around it made me realise that a person's body is actually entirely empty and devoid of anything unless you know them, even care about them. i thought the guy on stage was quite attractive, but there was nothing more to it than that.

the body is really just a shell, but perhaps we can't just rely on the phrase 'it's what's inside that counts'. The inside has a massive impact on the outside, but i wonder how often what's felt inside matches what's really seen outside?

In that respect, I don't think I match.

Very briefly, I found this in a book late last night.

The Fist

The fist clenched around my heart
loosens a little, and I gasp
brightness; but it tightens
again. When have I ever not loved
the pain of love? But this has moved

past love to mania. This has the strong
clench of the madman, this is
gripping the ledge of unreason, before
plunging howling into the abyss.

Hold hard then, heart. This way at least you live.

---

I almost want to salute the poet for that. I can read it over and over again and each time i think it becomes more gorgeous.

And more true.

Hello everyone

I have reached the end of the week. On Tuesday evening I found myself seriously wondering whether I would end the working week at work, or tucked up in bed suffering from some kinda 'post traumatic' stress disorder brought on by everything suddenly getting a little 'too serious'.
What frustrated me so much and made me so upset on Tuesday was that horrible 'do you actually think i CARE about this?' feeling which I'm sure a lot of people my age get when they are at their 9 to 5 missing being a student.

And I do miss that time so much.

It might also be because I cleared my room out last weekend and discovered our old university house's 'wall of quotes' which is a selection of pieces of paper stuck together which we kept in order to quickly write down funny things that got said or brought up around the dinner table. one of us would leap up, in hysterics, and write it down, so that visiting mates could check it out. it was like living in a constantly growing, constantly recorded, memory.

Some examples I thought I'd write below:

'so what do you think about violent sex and eroticism?'
'i er... need the toilet'

'i need to incorporate that ceramic frog into my dream life'

'do you know what's real? the salami could be talking to the cheese right now.'

'could you just run out and check i haven't dropped quality street all over the road?'

---

ah, the list goes on.

So, it was pretty obvious on Tuesday night that I either needed to grow a few inches and steam roll over a few people, or wither away into a smaller ball than the one i was already crawling into. so, i went for the first option. i tend to always go for the more difficult option of the two, if faced with two options. funnily enough, the first thing a friend said to me last night when i walked in was 'have you got taller?' and i almost said 'kinda', because i did feel much more like myself towards the end of this week.

It's funny how I seem to have moments of feeling like myself, and then feeling like i'm dwelling in someone else's life. i have moments of feeling like i utterly don't belong or believe in something, and then i think 'i'm on fire, i'm taking these people DOWN!'
and then i have moments when i don't really need to think about anything. when i can just breath out, and relax. and it's moments like that when i can really feel a sense of steadiness starting to creep in. i think i need a bit more steadiness generally. perhaps i need to rush about less and do more things that i can genuinely give my time to and at the same time really appreciate.

Another short blog post.
I'm really tired and therefore nothing I say is going to be particularly long or thought out. sometimes i find I'm basically drowing in everything I have to deal with day to day.

I went out for dinner with friends last night. Being with non-work-related friends only reinforces for me the feeling that i really am struggling to work out a way through the mounting pressure in the office. my friends are so care-free, of course they have their own issues, but they actually stopped me 'mid-rant' and asked me 'where have you actually gone, mate? who is this... crazy person?'
i've realised that before, maybe when i first got the promotion, of course i was a little overwhelmed and maybe a bit stressed, but it's not until you're back at home, sitting with someone as near to you as a family member or best friend, that you can really feel it. i will literally buzz until about 9 o clock at night and last night that got passed over into gibbering away long past midnight.

it's times like these when i really need people around me who can see me for what i really am. i'm not a 'career woman', i just like to feel happy in my work. and i'll push for that happiness via success. if i'm not happy, i feel i'm not successful, or i've done something i didn't believe in. right now, that's what's happening. it's possible i'm not doing such a bad job of it all, but seeing as it's not making me particularly happy on a daily basis, i fail to see the point in doing it.
it's always the people who i allow to stand on the 'touch line' of my experiences who i get the most out of, and put the most into. anyone who tries to run into the middle of my life and alter things for me is never really going to get anywhere with me. 'here's what you should do...' is one of my least loved phrases. i much prefer 'i know what you mean'.

x

I have a very small blog to make tonight.

Today is the 10 year anniversary of my Dad's brother's suicide. I can't believe it was 10 years ago. It's a huge thing to happen to a family as small as ours, or any family, infact, and yet it seems to have woven itself into our family history until it's just known and it's never discussed. It's strange how that happens.

Yet I still know it's today. It's odd that I seem able to feel it.
It's never going to go away.
I hold the strong belief that suicide is a brave act. Perhaps that's controversial. I do not believe in 'cries for help' either. If it's too late, it's just too late.

x

To begin, I'm going to quote a poem I happen to love and at the same time struggle to agree with. There aren't many poems I could say i really enjoy yet at the same time don't really connect with, but the below is one of them.

One Art
by Elizabeth Bishop

The art of losing isn't hard to master;
so many things seem filled with the intent
to be lost that their loss is no disaster.

Lose something every day. Accept the fluster
of lost door keys, the hour badly spent.
The art of losing isn't hard to master.

Then practice losing farther, losing faster:
places, and names, and where it was you meant
to travel. None of these will bring disaster.

I lost my mother's watch. And look! my last, or
next-to-last, of three loved houses went.
The art of losing isn't hard to master.

I lost two cities, lovely ones. And, vaster,
some realms I owned, two rivers, a continent.
I miss them, but it wasn't a disaster.

--Even losing you (the joking voice, a gesture
I love) I shan't have lied. It's evident
the art of losing's not too hard to master
though it may look like (Write it!) like disaster.

-
The above is a beautifully constructed villanelle, (for those who care), but it's also an insightful social commentary on modern living. These days all we seem to care about are possessions, material or human. Human possessions may be a lot more complicated.
Losing people I care about has never been easy for me. I'm always the last person hanging on trying to find a reason to stay, even if that reason isn't easy to see. If i suspect that I am going to lose someone, i will fight desperately to cling on. There isn't much I wouldn't do to keep people as near as I'd like them. I explained to my friend yesterday that I tend to keep a lot of feelings inside (even away from this blog) because I would lose people if I ever let them out. The fear of loss keeps me pent up more than any other fear. I wonder whether the fear of loss would actually rank pretty highly in a poll of fears. For me, it's above spiders and flying.

So, what would I be willing to lose?

If there's one thing I've always been pretty confident in, and never really fretted too much about, it's my career. Before that, it was my academic career, before that it was school, and so on. I had confidence in my abilities and I just kept pushing until I ticked all the boxes. For myself more than anything, I pushed the envelope.
Now i'm in a situation where I've graduated, found employment, got promoted, and i should be riding high. But the nature of that promotion and that employment gives me a sinking feeling. I'd be willing to lose it tomorrow.

It is, after all, mine, and therefore i see it as something i possess. My job is mine to be lost, or thrown away. I suppose i'm still at the stage where there isn't really anything i 'have' to do. i resist and resist people who refer to things in terms of 'cvs' or 'qualifications'. It makes me want to ask them how well they really know me.
In the past, I've thought that all i really want to do is something i completely believe in. Now, however, I'm faced with the additional clause 'and provided i can get some recognition'. I don't feel any recognition is forth-coming in my current job. At the same time as I want to believe that if i walked out of it tomorrow it would fall completely on its arse, i know in my heart that it will pick itself up. it wouldn't matter if I stayed or went.

In terms of my current job then, loss wouldn't really be that painful. There isn't a great deal to lose, and a hell of a lot to be gained. I can't say the same for the people in my life. Most of the time there is too much to lose, and very little to be gained, by telling the truth.

Hello

So, I have now had a blog request from a friend. this means I am forced to come up with a blog on demand. it's ok really, because i do feel the need to tell you that my mum has purchased some radioactive cheese which is currently defrosting downstairs and is making everybody's life a misery. it's gotta be uranium or something, it stinks so much.

which brings me to my blog topic... friendship. you'll see how.

'stink', 'stinky' and 'stinker' are all things i have been known to call my friends at times. other affectionate terminology includes 'fatty-bo-hatty', 'pixie poxy', 'schnooka' and my own personal favourite, 'squidge'. i hope my friends have come to appreciate these strange nicknames, as they are only ever given to the most deserving.

i had a drink with a friend tonight who i would never dream of calling 'stinky' purely because, he simply wouldn't laugh, or be too bothered. and it occured to me, while we discussed other people we went to university with who neither of us sees anymore, that the process of 'phasing a friend out' of your life is actually seriously difficult.

friendship is a strange animal. it has peaks and troughs. i have several people in my life who i am at a fairly constant level with, and others who i'll suddenly need, then suddenly won't. what happens, then, when you haven't needed someone for a long time? i have a few people like this in my phone book. i've decided lately that it might be best to phase these people out, and focus on the people who really matter to me.

For me, (simply because I've done this several times), the image of collecting someone from an airport in the early hours of the morning springs to mind. if you go through your phone book and ask yourself, on each name, whether you would collect that person from an airport during a particularly frosty night, and at short notice, then the answer should tell you whether or not that person is a friend, or an acquaintance. for me, if they are truly a friend it doesn't matter so much how much i put my heart on the line for them, i know that their heart would be similarly on the line for me. therefore the core people who i have in my life on a daily basis, i would drive to an airport at midnight, and i'd probably make a stupid 'welcome home' banner too.

it's difficult sometimes to know when is the best time to allow someone to make an exit from your life. i'm in that dilemna at the moment. i have a friend who, to complicate matters, i used to be in a relationship with. i'm starting to feel that now is probably the right time to let that go. we've been clinging on to apparent nothingness for a long time now. my only problem is knowing that it doesn't matter how long i leave it between contacts, he'll make contact, wondering how i am, why i haven't called. i'm starting to think it isn't possible to let him go quietly, and that it actually requires a proper 'parting ways'. it sounds ridiculous. he lives the other end of the country to me, and here i am imagining that it would be best to meet up in order to say 'goodbye'.

But what can I do? It's amazing how terrific close friends seem when you realise how little others give you and how much you have given them. i can't count the amount of airport trips i would have made for him.

is it time to leave him standing alone in 'arrivals'?

I'm actually still at work, but evidently not doing any, so I thought I'd blog to while away ten minutes.
I've recently joined a network via work where people can post thoughts and opinions (one of these new wave ideas, i guess!) and one of the first comments I've seen someone make is that 'people should remain true to themselves.'

Which brings me to the topic of this blog.
'Note to self'.

If you wanted to send yourself a message, or tell yourself the truth about something, what would you say?
Are people, in today's society, ever actually TRUE to themselves or are we always faking it? I'd imagine that people fake it so often in their normal lives, pretending they are something they aren't, that faking it to ourselves that we can handle something, or that we're getting somewhere with a problem, must be getting more common place.

I talked below about that voice, that 'but it HURRRRTS' voice that i quite often hear these days. that little bit of truth that remains sitting on my shoulder. I always KNOW how i truely feel, but that doesn't mean I'm not going to pretend to myself that actually, I feel fine. it happens all the time. those moments when you can't get to sleep at night and you tell yourself 'it will be ok, it will all work itself out' just so you can calm down and get some sleep. but if that's not how you really feel, then surely that's not being true to yourself.

if people were true to themselves 24/7 I'd imagine a completely different society. i'd like to think that people would be a lot more outwardly affectionate, but equally i'm sure they would be a lot more outwardly angry and aggressive. From my personal point of view, i'd do a lot more 'looking directly at' something and just confronting it than i do at the moment. I'd do a lot more letting out of deep sighs and saying 'look... this is how it actually is' instead of what i tend to do, try to rationalise something in my head.

hmm, feelings. that calls for a whole other blog topic.

Evening

I'll be speedy because that's the sort of person I am, and I don't have much time currently for anything.
but i have some important things i wanted to 'get out' into the blog tonight. on my way home from choir, where, by the way, we've started christmas some thoughts kept occuring to me. thoughts occur to me all the time, every day, but lately they are on a reoccuring theme. one which i'll attempt to spell out below.

when i was about 9 years old i did religious ed. at school. in our first r.e lesson of a new term, the new teacher asked everyone to write 'what they believed in' on a card, and give it back to her. of course, i'd imagine this was meant to strike up a conversation about the different kinds of faith in the world, or something like that, but i wrote 'myself' and gave it back to her. i remember not finding that very strange at all, but i soon discovered that everyone else had written things like 'god' or 'pixies' and i was slightly left out of the 'other worldliness' of my peers. but i thought that was the truest thing i could say.
since then i've always had a pretty strong sense of self. i've always known, really... deep down, what i'm feeling or thinking, on the inside, and waited for my consciousness to catch up. everyone has two sides, if you ask me, one which always knows the truth, and the other that battles with that truth with a blunt sword. now i'm working and i've lost quite a lot of the freedoms i had as a kid or as a student, i find my mind ticks over at a faster speed and attempts to battle much more vigorously with the 'reality' voice in my head. i think it must be that 'you don't have TIME to feel like that' or the 'be sensible now, and concentrate' voice, fighting a war with the 'but it HURRRRTS' voice. i wonder how many people that even makes sense to. probably very few.

still, occasionally my defences are down and there is a breach, i guess, in my head... i can't help myself, i suppose, from showing weakness, love, fear, jealously, or any other emotion you care to mention. i give up. and it's the moments when i give up that i'm at my most vulnerable and uncomfortable. I will look at the floor, the ceiling, or even - so i'm told - out of the window, to avoid confrontation with my actual feelings. maybe it does come down to self-belief, and perhaps the need to recapture the sort of confidence i had as a 9 year old in my abilities, let my heart start ruling my head and stop fighting it. however, the moment you stop fighting it, you're opening a whole other door. you're in a minefield, i suppose, which i think is pretty much where i am now give or take the odd day when i'll take a few steps back into safety. today i plummeted back into that dangerous field again and this time i doubt i'll ever make it out.

the hardest battles i've ever fought have been with myself, and it looks like i'm going to have to fight another one.

It's saturday...

Huge
Sigh
of
relief...

and I'm FINALLY beginning to feel quite excited about my trip to the US of A in January. It's really happening, because I've even just booked my hotel for the way there and the way back. I'll be going round New York, Boston, Niagra, Toronto, Montreal... and I can't wait. I've started looking at maps, thinking about sights to see, making a list of outrageously expensive clothes I need... and i've bought myself some floofy boots coz it's gonna be FREEZING.
I think i'm most excited about the new york end of the trip, coz i've got about 4 days there in total and i'm going stay in 'sex and the city' land and trawl around macys with a huge grin on my face.

All of this excitement brings me to the subject of 'deserving', which I think is quite interesting. I know for a fact that I totally deserve my little trip into the unknown. I deserve to stand in the moma and look at the monet with big wide eyes. this is something i'm doing FOR ME and purely for me. I had a little crisis of thinking on the subject about a month ago, when i thought 'but if i don't have anyone to share it with...' but at least this way i won't have to compromise. if i want to stand in front of that monet for 20 minutes of just looking at it, then dammit, i will.

however, i think a lot of people in this life hardly ever pay themselves their own dues. by 'paying urself ur own dues' i also mean 'working yourself out of a dark patch'. Fair enough, i fall into dark patches the entire time. one day i'm zappy, one day i'm almost completely obliterated. the 'hang on a minute, i can deal with this button' can only be pushed by yourself, but the pushing of it can be triggered by people who care for you. sometimes a friend telling me 'this isn't like you' is enough to trigger that thought, that 'i've got to do something about this' thought. maybe it's hope, maybe it's a tiny fire in my belly somewhere, but it's there, and it doesn't go out. but there are some people who, as far as i can tell, lack the personal motivation to think 'hang on a moment, i don't deserve this, i deserve better', and get their arses into gear on making changes.

ah yes, change, my FAVOURITE blog topic. let's not go over that again.