Don't think twice, it's alright

I am excited and anxious to say I am in the beginning stages of Phase 4. What is Phase 4 you ask? Dear reader, let me educate you. Every broken relationship you will have (or had) carries with it secret embedded lists that you may or may not know about. These lists commonly begin with "1. Don't call him." The hardest part of breaking up is indeed the "walking away" phase. I like to visualize my Phases as this:

Phases not Phasers

Phase 1) Break up with bad boyfriend.

Phase 2) Make a life altering decision to move across the United States.

Phase 3) Find your dream job in your calling and background.

Phase 4) Buy a home all by yourself.

Phase 5) Meet a companion that is all you have ever hoped for.

This may seem silly but you know that crazy ol Walt Disney said "If you can dream it, you can do it." It's true, it's on motivational posters allover the internet.

The first four phases are really the most important...the last one is thrown in there for good measure. I have never been a "dater." I am not good at it and I probably never will be. My relationships tend to blossom from happen-stance and who-knows-what. I figured that five phases is better than four; although I could just skip to Phase 5 1/2) Have a baby.

the hair of the dog that bit you

Nighttime is hard. Every time is hard but nighttime is the worst. You have nothing else to do but think about how handsome he was and little trickles of me wonder if I left too quickly...and then floods of me scream NO! as they gush down my face. I did the right thing and I knew it felt right when I did it. I won't pretend that I am not lonely for the good things. The familiarity...getting to know someone in a romantic "yr mine" candy hearts kind of way is work. Testing limits and seeing what they are all about isn't kid stuff. I'm aching for the jokes, the laughter and the kisses. There is a rain barrel of tears gathering behind these eyes. We had so many special moments and I just don't know where they all go to after the fallout. I imagine a memory mausoleum with tattered, tear-stained moments scribbled on slips of paper. Forgotten seconds after sex, the first time they took your hand, getting lost in a corn maze, hearing them beg you to come back...hearing the door shut after they have walked out and left. Knowing I risk a PTSD meltdown if I set foot in a petting zoo seems so absurd, going to Wendy's on a Sunday night is a sacrilege. So what do you do? You wake up in the middle of the night and start crying for no good fucking reason and then you are tired all the next day and you can't for the life of you remember why. For fifteen years I wondered if I would ever love again and I should know by now that I most certainly will. I guess I made a bad investment...people do that sometimes. I didn't do my research and check the statistics and in this case I had plenty to go by. I got burned by someone I cared for and there is nothing I can do about it now but continue on being myself and saying the wacky shit that I say and just hope that out of all the people I offend in Utah that one of them is a man who thinks it's charming and is exactly what he is after. Someone who enjoys to dote and be doted, someone who can smote and be smoted. Someone that likes being a thirty something in America in 2012 and sees it as a challenge fit for the brave and true. My heart may be crumbled up and drying out but oh how it was shining and wet for him. It will be again...I know that, or I just tell myself that in hopes I will believe it again. I have done more for myself as a person in the last thirty days than I did in the last four years. Maybe it is self-preservation but I think it's because I don't have the weight of his pain, ignorance and pessimism holding me down any longer...except when I get night terrors.

Home is where you hide your crap

I crave home ownership. I salivate when I walk past a Lowe's; I watch "This Old House" and wish I could rip out shitty carpet only to reveal gorgeous wood floors. You want to turn an attic space into an opium den? I'm all over it. You know what makes planning for your future home easy? Pinterest.

I want antique chandeliers in every room. I want pedestal sinks and slipper-style bathtubs.

               I need this sofa. 

I would love nothing more than to lay on a thick carpet surrounded by house plants and stare up at this chandelier.

I think it might be the old Hollywood drunk in me who cannot get enough of a big ass chandelier.

Let us not forget the importance of a vanity. A lady must always have a place to set her lipstick.

Pinterest has totally taken over in the way people plan for things. You no longer have to scour design rags with your scissors poised to clip whatever marbled toilet seat and 18k gold faucets flip your way. Who cares about Reese Witherspoon's ranch house in Elle Decor when you have limitless pin boards to post fashionably avant garde photos of a dream house you will probably never attain? Whatever, that's what dream houses are for. If I can manage to have something with crystals dangling off of it in my future home I will feel like a winner. xo

Dear Diary

I am living with my cat, a dead tarantula and lots of mice in my grandmothers basement.

Sounds like a joke.

But it isn't.

After almost five years away from SLC I am back.
I traded in what I ?had? for the hometown I so desperately  wanted.

I broke up with B in May but I think he had broken up with me that fourth of July the previous year. I had pointed out quite violently what he already knew he was: a monster. He isn't strong-hearted enough to break up with anyone so he allowed me to apologize (which I shouldn't have) and then let me retract my statement (which I absolutely shouldn't have). We then carried on with me doing all the carrying as usual in my relationships.

Being in the midst of a full-blown meltdown didn't seem all that meltdown-y at the time. I see now that I handled it just as graciously as any girl in my position and mind set could. Realizing that the one and only reason I would even consider staying in a place that made me cringe was the promise that he loved me and wanted to build a life with me; that is truly pathetic. I had sacrificed so much to build what I thought was my forever; I apologized and said "I can't" to friends, weekends, school, and even parts of myself for him. When I undressed his personality and peeled off those military issue glasses, he was nothing more than ashes of the person he probably would have been had he not turned into the person he, in reality, turned out to be. It all blew away.

I had my job that I loved but they liked holding that carrot in my face to see how fast and far I would run for it with no merit. I realize what a detriment it is to my job hunting now because the job title I had was not the job title I performed and excelled at. That is no way to live.

I gave up approx 180lbs of a man for a freedom that I myself would tell any woman she deserved and I took way too long reminding myself of that. I know in my heart that he felt for me 1/100 of the way I felt for him.

My throat gets that ache, that stinging hurt that sits right above my heart and then burns behind my eyes and that means I am about to cry. What's a girl to do? "you want a fairytale but you don't want to sacrifice anything for it" will stay with me forever, you dick.

This is the place

 

You never knew safety until you felt the awesome hug of the mountains. 

I had so many dreams where I was in Salt Lake doing the things i normally did: working at 4th South, hanging out at Litza's, going to the city library, kamikaze's at Burts. But then I would wake up and it would all be gone, I would be alone in Baltimore in the dark. 

Not anymore though, this heart on ice is packing it all in just like I have done so many times and is heading back to the place where I belong. 

I feel different, I am definitely older now but my feelings are changed, my outlook has shifted. I remember feeling the exact same way when I was living in Oklahoma almost nine years ago. I had no where to be, no place that felt special or people that i loved. When I moved to SLC then it was to help take care of my grandpa. It ended up turning in to my home and being a salve to my young self. I was healed by those mountains; I became a woman up there. 

 So now I return. I do not doubt Brigham Young's feelings at all when he saw the Salt Lake valley and knew "this is the place." This is the place. This is my place. And just like when Dorothy awoke from her concussion induced adventures and knew that home was the only place she wanted to be, I too realize just where my home is. I wish I could click my heels three times, but instead I will fork over $1400 for a Uhaul, have my dad drive my car (with cat and dog inside) and plan to stay in hotels along the way so I can get back to where I belong. 

Henry, Pearl and Charlotte

Today is the first Monday of the month, I celebrate this with my residents by taking them to the Regal Cinema to see a movie. I wanted to see The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel but it was playing one hour too early; we settled for What To Expect When You Are Expecting. Being a woman who just ended a relationship where I thought it was for forever and now scared to death I will be too old and haggard to have children by the time I finally do meet someone, this movie depressed the shit right out of me. Sure, it had some bad writing and corny cliche's but boy was I bummed out when the credits rolled. The tears I shed were brought on by "Home" by Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zero's. I listened to that song the whole plane ride home from Europe last fall and thought about B and how he was my home. 

I just don't feel like feeling like shit because I want a goddamn husband and a fucking baby and I can't understand why this isn't in the cards for me right now. 

Speaking of cards, I dug out the Gypsy Witch fortune telling cards that B bought for me at Toy Joy in Austin, Tx. Most of the stuff that he gave me or belonged to him is in a box waiting until I clean and pack everything of mine; just so I can make sure he gets every trace of himself and his memories back since, you know, we have been living a big fat lie. ANYWAYS. back to the gypsy witch. 
                          

Basically, you take out the #18 and #19 cards and the extra jokers, leaving one joker in the pack. You shuffle the cards while making a secret wish. You then flip a card over face up counting "1,2,3..." until you reach the joker. If you reach him on an even number then your wish will likely come true, if you reach him on an odd number then your wish is doubtful. You then take the joker out and depending on who the reading is for (male or female) you place the #18 or #19 in the middle of your reading space and re shuffle the cards. Starting from directly to the left of your card, you place the first card face up (mine is the heart) and then place a card above that (the clover) and then so on until your inner circle is formed (3 above, 3 below and 3 on each side). You then do your outer circle the same way, 3 above, 3 below and 3 on each side). You start your reading from wherever you want but I always start mine directly to the left of myself (the lady card so the heart would be the first card I read and then I would move up to the clover etc.)This is a perfectly good way to waste time and find out if a close friend will die soon (that is what my reading said last night). 

sex addicts and fiestaware

I attended my first meeting today. I have never been a part of a 12 step program before and it wasn't like i envisioned. 

I laughed, I cried, I cried some more. It was helpful to be able to tell total strangers how I feel like I have been living a lie not just the past two years of my life but the last four. How I am afraid that I am going to not recognize the signs of a co-dependent relationship and fall back into the same patterns. These are valid fears and something I will be working on for a long time to come. I can hope and pray that this is just one of those life lessons that I finally needed to have. I was angry on the drive home: "Why the fuck should I have to deal with this on top of everything that has occurred in the last four years, how come this is my life? How come this is warranted; if everything happens for a reason then what is the reasoning for this!?"
This is a lesson I have not yet learned. I can pretend and dance around the issues all I want but in the end, they always come back to haunt me. Maybe this broken relationship hurts more now because my clock is ticking and I thought we were moving forward in our all-american dream: house, car, mommy, daddy, baby. I never properly dealt with the issues of my other broken relationships; trust, communication, geography, needs and wants etc. These things are true about my last relationship: I was verbally abused; I was afraid of the red flags but stayed in because I wanted the companionship. I allowed him to manipulate me. I have no sense of proportion...he is incredible at compartmentalization, we were both screwed from the start.


I was told that "If I want to feel sad I should live in the past, if I want to feel anxious I should focus on the future, but if I want to feel happiness I should live in the now."
All I can think of is Garth in Wayne's World saying "Live in the NOW!"

I have been reading She's Come Undone. This is one of those books that I have carried with me through the years; I first read it when I was thirteen. I appreciate the fact that this book was written by a man and yet is probably the closest thing to the "female experience" as far as fiction books are concerned. This is one of the cathartic activities I have been trying to reintroduce back into my life. Other cathartic activities that need to come back: writing in my journal (this blog is pretty much that but you don't get to know everything), pastels, yoga... there are others but I haven't done them in so long I cannot remember.

After my meeting, I made my way to Ellicott City for some shopping. I had forgotten it was a Saturday and that meant other people who were there for the same thing I was: antiques, live music and atmosphere. I was really there to shop for some Fiestaware. Now that I am going to be living on my own again, I decided I would do something I always wanted to do: collect Fiestaware! I have always loved the art deco shapes and bright colors and moving in to my new apt next month makes me want to have Fiesta. So I wandered around and poked and prodded and saw a few things but nothing mind blowing. I settled for four yellow dessert plates and a soup plate for $25.

a vintage red carafe with intact cork.

I just want to live. Alone or with someone else, i just want a life.