Random Acts

This is my second day home in a row this week…and I had no idea when I left twenty minutes early on Wednesday afternoon that I would not be coming back until next week. I am exhausted. I feel like I didn’t get much done today, but my muscles are telling a different story. I decided to work on the backyard and managed to mow down eighty percent of the weeds and grass. When I was smoking, it would take everything out of me just to mow the front lawn. Now it takes me twenty minutes if that. The hardest part is getting that damned weed whacker started. I love the smell of the exhaust, though. I barbequed tri-tip for dinner after I had decided to call the gardening quits. It’s the perfect combination of muscle and domesticity…the heavy yard work and cooking. My mind wandered as it often does…in strange narratives and digging through the junk I’ve filed away. An odd memory of my late teens flashed through my head. I must have been a senior in high school, and although I have no musical abilities whatsoever I would imagine having a band in which I was the lead singer, songwriter and guitarist. I called it “The Lesbian Pedestrian”, and I even drew up a shirt/logo. It was, not quite originally, the yellow, universal walking person. The twist, of course, was the sillhouette with spikey hair, chain wallet and chunky shoes that are suspiciously similar to a pair of dr.martens. I have not been without a pair of docs since I was thirteen years old and managed to buy a pair during each major phase of my life. There were the first ones…the eight-eye brown boots that I wore long past the time when the soles developed holes through which rain water and various puddles would permeate. The second was a pair of plain brown oxfords. I saved for months to buy those shoes. My feet had ached from hours of retail hell, and I finally was able to splurge on myself. They’re now my lawnmowing shoes…and I love them dearly. Six years later, when I had met my wonderful fruit, I bought a pair of black ones. They, too, have seen better days, but I still wear them to work. They aren’t quite everywhere like they used to be…and I am a little too happy that they are no longer trendy.
My fruit should be home any minute now. I am peeking for the car through a whole in the blinds. It’s pathetic, really. I miss her so much when she’s gone during the day…and we still hardly spend time when she’s home because of the critters. We’ve been trying to have a lazy weekend for a while now. Last weekend, I cracked open Mrs.Dalloway again and cracked away at my St.John painting for a few hours. Today I’m so fried that I can’t do more than think about my next strokes…and pathetically ramble away at this den of narcissism as I wait for my Fruit. I suppose it can’t be all that narcissistic, though. I don’t advertise this blog, and it’s private enough that I can write like no one’s reading…because nobody is reading…except for myself…a few weeks older and none the wiser. Staring out this little hole…pondering moving the trash bin…and still no Fruit.

I was supremely annoyed at work yesterday when SysAdminBoy left inexplicably and never came back. He sent an email this morning that he “injured his back” and needs to spend the day lying down. It looks like there won’t be any IT support there today…and frankly, I don’t care. They can survive a day without us. I was thinking about how hard it was yesterday to deal with certain people. I try to be non judgemental and patient…and there really are only a handful of people who are like nails on a chalkboard for me. One of those people, however, is the worst of all…and I am having an increasingly hard time dealing with her.
She walked in yesterday suffering an odor of unimaginable proportions. My sense of smell hasn’t worked properly for years now, but I could smell this distinctly…like sweat and raw onions having sat in the sun for far too long. She plopped her bag on my desk and started talking just shortly after the cacauphonous smell assaulted my nostrils. I swallowed hard and conjured a friendly smile. I dislike dropping everything…breaking concentration…and I loathe when it’s by someone who is so abhorrent. I don’t know why I dislike her so much…what the root of the issue is. I feel badly…guilty even that she is such a source of disgust for me. Try as I might, I can’t help myself. I just can’t stand her. She was complaining of a problem that synchronization would fix. I asked her if I could take a look and she said no. It went on like this for a few minutes…and my annoyance level was rising to the point where I could no longer control myself.
“I can’t help you if you won’t let me look at the problem”.
“But, I told you what the problem is.”
“Yes, but I need to see it for myself to know for sure what the issue is.”
“Don’t you trust what I’m telling you? I just told you exactly what the problem is.”
“I need to see it. It is probably something you’re doing.”
“I don’t want you to look at it. “
“Then I can’t help you.”
“What should I tell my supervisor?”
“Tell her that you won’t allow me to assist you.”
She finally caved and, belching loudly, placed her tablet too close to me. My eyes stung and watered as torrents of nausea threatened. I mentally surveyed for my trashcan should I be unable to retain the contents of my stomach.
“That was incredibly disgusting of you.”
She excused herself.
The issue really was entirely her error…the same error she always makes. The error I make her fix herself because the first time it happens, it’s a training issue. The second time, she could have forgotten. The third time, maybe ignorance. The fourth…you’re just plain dumb as a box of hammers and not nearly as useful.
There aren’t very many people in this world who are so grotesque as to drive me, quite literally, to the brink of vomit. Some have made me cringe…like the kinds of people who talk too much because the have no friends and foamy spit forms in the corners of their lips that one tries a little too hard not to look at, but ultimately can’t help. I feel sorry for her…a kind of pity that I would have had for the kids at school who were even more unpopular than I was. The kids I was secretly grateful to because the objects and insults that were flung my way were temporarily diverted. I would befriend them until I could no longer take it…and they were usually so inept that they didn’t realize nobody could stand them…and if they did, certainly could not fathom why.
It’s people like this woman who make me suspect I may be a horrible person at heart.

I have finally gotten to the point of being so tired that I’m mentally docile. I have a ton of work on my desk…and the urgent issues I’m working on are just a fraction of everything I need to do. SysAdminBoy has been out of the office inexplicably since eleven o’clock. Maybe he’s afraid that if he were here I’d ask him to do something. It shouldn’t but it really angers me that he makes so much more than I do and I do so much more than he does. I know more than he does…most of the time I’m doing his job in addition to mine and it’s just pissing me off. They keep saying they’ll let me work from home once we hire a help desk person. I’m not holding my breath, but, if it doesn’t happen by the June deadline, I’m getting out of here. I’m tired and I just want to go home.
Yesterday, my Fruit and I decided to book a getaway to Big Bear with the girls. Mags had so much fun last time, and Nut needs to be exposed to the fundamentals of being a dog in nature. She gets more adorable every day, and I wish I was around more to watch her personality develop. I missed it with Mags. The change was so gradual and natural that we didn’t even realize that she has become a fully grown dog. I sent an email to the IT boys telling them that I’m taking next thursday and friday off. I didn’t ask…I’m just going to do it. If I don’t, I may surely go insane…become disgruntled…follow my friend out the door and go home to take care of my family…after, of course, a full week of detox. That’s about what I’d need. Five working days of totally zoning out…reading, watching stargate, wearing grungies all day.
Little things have been bothering me today. I’ve caught myself picking up the phone to call my Fruit and then hanging up when I’m half finished dialing the number because she had to go so abruptly when I called last. We’ve barely been talking during the work day anymore. She’s been busy on projects and I’ve been busy cleaning up messes and trying to get some of my damned queries done. It’s only wednesday and I’m completely fried. Nut woke us up at 3:30 this morning…and when I finally did get back to sleep, I had a horrible dream that dragged itself into my morning. I’m ready to go home now…it’s only 3:00…but, I need to get out of here before I go crazy.

If you were still alive, you’d be 88 tomorrow. You always thought we wouldn’t remember…or maybe you just said that in the hopes that it would ensure at least one of us did. You’ve been gone thirteen years…one year longer than I knew you. It’s been nine years since I dreamt of you. Seven years since I’ve been on my own. Two since I’ve been married. I don’t think a week goes by that I don’t talk to you in my head. It’s odd how a person becomes sanctified when they die or become otherwise docile with age or sickness. When I try to conjure vivid memories of you, I find that the have all started to fade. Your face is a blurred image in my mind…the most vivid of which was that portrait you had done by your church three years before you died. You were wearing your white blouse with the black and red pattern on it, and smiling the way a person only can when they pose. When we got our copy, my mother said that you looked like you thought you were going to die. It scared me when she said that…and it frightened me more that losing you would hit me harder than losing her. A few years later, you got cancer…and you beat it. Of all the things a person could die from, it wasn’t that…or the three heart attacks you had before I was born. You got a bleeding hernia from picking up your cat. Tammy was the fattest cat I’ve ever seen. You wanted to make sure she had variety and never got bored with her food…so she always had at least three dishes to choose from. I have never seen an animal as spoiled as she was…and I have that tendancy you did with my pets. When you died, she laid on the bed with you until they took your body away. She stayed on that bed for the weeks after you were gone…as we cleaned your house and tried to figure out what to do about her. She died on August 14th the year after you. I try to remember more, but my memory fails me. Little things come up like bubbles in a boiling pot…like the day you took Tammy in…or the smell of your vegetable garden as I came up to the wooden gate in your backyard. I remember feeding peanuts to the bluejays that sat on the brick wall or the clothesline. They would grab them right out of my hand if I was very still. I remember spending weeks at your house during the summers when I was finally old enough to not fear being away from home. You would take me to church with you and introduce me to your friends. We would go shopping at the mall where you got your hair done by the same woman every week for many years. I remember that her name was Yoshi, and she loved you so much that even after you were sick, she would come to your house and do your hair for you. You became embarassed to have her come after a while…when the dye wore out and the veritable helmet you once had became thin and translucent. You were always so happy when she was done…and even though you didn’t know what you were saying in the end, you still talked her ear off.
I wish I had just five more years with you. Five years to shake off the fogginess of childhood…to ask you the questions only a teenager or young adult would think to ask. Five more years…lucid years…and I could have gotten to know you beyond the fog of a spoiled granddaughter. Sometimes I feel like one conversation now, as an adult would be enough…but, I know that couldn’t possibly be true…even if it could happen. All I can say…honestly say…is that you were the best part of my childhood and I will always miss you.

The puppy is chewing a pig ear on the tile in what used to be the dining room, and I am seeking solace in the only quiet room downstairs. I have too much here to go to work today, and I may be sabotaging myself with all this recent time off. I am feeling the panicky guilt of not going into the office…the nagging of an impending talking to has been weighing heavily on me. Sometimes I feel tugged in all directions with the demands of the new puppy and the ever increasing responsibilities at work. The first I would answer to is always going to be my family, and the last thing I want to deal with is drama right now.
Yesterday was the first Easter that I’ve not called or seen my parents. I knew I should have at least sent my mother an email, but I honestly couldn’t bring myself to. Maybe I’m tired of trying to be a good daughter…or maybe I never was. She would always say (and probably still does) that we don’t “think of” her on “her holidays”. I always thought it was presumptuous of her to claim ownership to them, not to mention hipocrytical when not only does she not go to church or otherwise practice her religion, but I have yet to see her support my father in his. He is far more religious than she ever was and she treats his Judaism like a disease she doesn’t want anyone else to catch. I think the thing I always liked about religion was the history involved…and the largeness of a belief that so many take to heart. I respect Catholicism as the religion I was born into, and the thing that was the center of my Grandma’s life. While I vehemently disagree with the Vatican and the right wings…and pretty the misguided beliefs of the whole, I enjoy the ceremony of the mass and the musky smell of old churches…when one can be found. I felt the same way about temples on the off chances I was able to go with my dad on high holy days. My paternal grandmother wanted me to be blessed in the temple when I was a baby, but my mother would have none of it as we were to be Catholic. She didn’t even come to my baptism because she had nothing to wear, but she’d be damned if a Rabbi were to bless me. Hell, as long as there aren’t any blades involved, I don’t see the harm.
I know she’s angry at me, and I feel incredibly guilty that I don’t much care. I said to Fruit as I was cleaning the table yesterday that if I wanted to eat with trash, I would invite my parents. If there is a hell, I’m probably going for that but I don’t see how it’s a false statement. She sent an email saying that she loves me and is thinking about me, and I can’t help but feel repulsed…like she has no right to think about me. I don’t want her thinking about me. Why should she start now? She’ll be saying to my father that it’s his fault…and it partially is. She’ll be saying I didn’t think about her. But, the truth is, I did think of her. I am thinking of her…and I’m fighting back the anger and nausea that is involved when thinking of that vile, hypocritical, and ignorant woman.
When I was a young child, I was convinced that I had been adopted. Now, I much prefer to imagine that I sprung fully formed from the bowels of the earth and was brought back to their house amidst a pile of random artifacts Papo found in his travels.

This has been such a draining and exhausting week. I think I probably have a touch of PMS, too. I had to close the door just a minute ago to keep from hearing the cooing in the hallway over a woman who just found out she is pregnant. We decided not to try this month since that issue over the sample last time and the new puppy. I still can’t help but feel that unwelcome twinge…which isn’t to say I’m not happy for her, but why can’t it be us this time? Maybe we’ll try next month…and maybe it’ll work next time…and maybe I won’t obsess about it to the point of being bitchy…and maybe I won’t be so upset when I start to bleed.
I have been getting up with the puppy two or three times a night all week. She has had an upset tummy for some reason, and the poor thing wakes up fussing and wimpering. Unlike I did when Magpie was little, I snap awake at the first little stirrings in her crate. I get out of the bed and into the cold without even thinking about it to clean her up and change her bedding. Sometimes my Fruit doesn’t even wake up until the little Nut starts her protesting at being put back down to bed. She turns toward me and shakes me or nudges me with her knee to go take care of the baby, and I explain to her that I already did. Last night, Magpie decided she had to go down to potty too after I got Nut situated. Three o’clock in the morning, and I’m sitting downstairs naked, waiting for her to come back in from the cold. I hope this isn’t the start of a trend with Mags…and if it is, I hope I adjust to this schedule soon so it won’t be such a drain when we do have a baby.
I have been working hard all week and I am completely drained. The drive to and from the office has been almost therapeutic on those days when I can look at the scenery as I speed down the 15. I was thinking this morning how lucky I am to be driving through lush hills and vinyards rather than the cement jungle that I used to live in. I never realized then how ugly the 101 was. The streets exuded this inexplicable stench to which I had grown accustomed, and when a rain would fall or the sun was sweltering it seemed to permeate everything tenfold. I’ve been thinking about my former home a lot lately. I want to go down to the cemetery for my grandma’s birthday on the 22nd, and at the same time, I don’t want to go to L.A. Sometimes I think of moving my grandparents back to Ohio, but, I doubt that the family plots in Clevelend would be much better…and I definitely wouldn’t be able to bring her flowers. She has been dead longer than she had been in my life, and I still think about her everyday. I wonder if she would still love me the way she did then, or if she would reject me because I’m gay. I wonder if she’d be proud of me…and if I would still feel the same way about her if I knew her as an adolescent.
I suppose I should get back to work…having distracted myself from the lump in my throat that grew with every squeal from the women in the hallway.

On Sunday afternoon, my Fruit and I took the Magpie to Grubby Dogs as promised. The poor thing was in desperate need of a bath and required a bit more than we could muster in the shower. Half an hour later, wet shirts and perfumed puppy, we walked next door to a little pet store. We usually get the pie a treat for being such a good girl during her bath and she was out of pig ears anyway. Walking through the store, though, the unexpected happened. In a plexiglass case in the big fat middle of everything, this little one to the right was napping. The second she saw Maggie, her little puppy tail started wagging wildly and I had to call my Fruit over to take a look. We’ve been talking about getting Mags a friend for a long time now. We had concluded in the past that it would have to wait until I come home full time and take care of the house. In a matter of minutes though, this little one was in my Fruit’s arms giving kisses and being an all around adorable bundle of fluff. Long story short, we are once again the proud owners of a golden retriever puppy. I have a whole new appreciation for how good a dog our Magpie has become. The late night yapping and early morning whining had become a distant memory. Asking if she had to go potty was simply to find out if she wanted to go outside and no longer an urgent plea not to go on the carpet. A friend asked me if we were gluttons for punishment. I think we’re just big softies…and seriously, who can resist a puppy? I knew the second she was in my Fruitpie’s arms that she was the newest addition to our family. She certainly wasn’t the kind of baby I was expecting to welcome into our home next, but I am definitely the proud mommy all over again.
My Fruit and I also got a trial membership to a gym by our house on Sunday morning. In retrospect, that day was full of life changes in subtle and not so subtle ways. I decided that I want to lose at least the weight I gained when I quit smoking before I try getting pregnant again. 2007 is probably a better year to have a baby anyway since I still haven’t quite gotten over my 6 phobia. We worked out together for the first time on Tuesday night and I am actually looking forward to going again tonight. I feel like I’m finally doing something about the disgusting state I’ve been in for the majority of my life. Hopefully it will last. I really don’t want to be another fat mom.