grrr

i may add joaquin phoenix to my list

warning - bit of a pity party about to occur

so i went to see a counsellor today. if you know me at all well, you know how absolutely out of character this is. i don't talk to people about my problems, or my feelings. i keep 'em inside.. i try and hide my discomfort by laughing - make jokes at my own expense about my feelings, downplay them. buuuttt.. i'm at a point where i'm going through so much that i just can't quite cope on my own anymore. the combination of money, and work, and mr married, and homelife - it's just too much (ok anonymous - i know i know, it serves me right with the mr. married thing. simmer down).

i don't know how helpful this will be. he asked me what i wanted from it, or how i defined how i thought i should feel. i don't actually know the answer to this. i think that i just want some tools to cope, you know? i have come a long way since the end of the "relationship" with psychojeremy, but i know that i have some lingering problems. i still have his voice in my head telling me i'm not good enough, that no one will ever want me. one thing he said to me will reverberate in my brain forever: "every day i meet women who are better looking than you, smarter than you, more successful than you, and all of them want the fairy tale. you just have to realize that you aren't ever going to get it - that's not what you are. you are just a fuck. accept it." he's so charismatic - so convincing. and he was such a powerful force in my life - my esteem, my character, my personality were defined by him for 3.5 years. i only existed in his eyes - i only had as much value as he allowed me to have. it's a rough thing to break away from.

the fellow i went to see today told me i should be very proud for getting out. victims of emotional abuse escape their situations less often than victims of physical abuse (he said), because physical abuse can be identified by outsiders. with emotional abuse the wounds are all on the inside, so it's not as easy for friends and loved ones to step in and help. and i am proud of myself - i'm very proud for staying away, cause for so long i thought i'd be caught in his cycle forever. but part of me can't help but wonder if maybe he was right. he's in a relationship with an attractive, successful woman - she's probably looking for the fairy tale. i'm still by myself, technically - the ugly stepsister.

ok i think i'm done writing about this for the evening anyway. thanks for bearing with me. i'll try and be funnier tomorrow....

questions from ljd

1) If you could only have one of your five senses (taste, sight, hearing, smell, touch) which would it be and why?

i think taste. i'm really food-o-centric. my world revolves around it. it is my joy and the bane of my existence. i don't think i could live without it.

2) Coffee or tea?

ooo tough one. i love love love to love coffee, but i'm an upstanding daughter of the british empire - i fed my kiddo tea in his bottle to help with tummy upsets... so torn... i think coffee would have to be the winner

3) If you and (fill in the BLANK) washed up on a deserted island together, with no immediate way off, who would that be and why?

the kiddo. he's the light of my life, even if he is doing his best to break my heart right now. he is seriously good conversation, and cracks me up regularly. i'd definately pick him

4) Which TV/cartoon family best describes yours?

calvin and hobbes, probably. though with a single mom, not a nuclear family. but i get to be the mom and the dad rolled into one (cooking unidentifiable healthy vegetable substances and telling fantastical falsified stories of how babies are made and what happens to the kids who get sucked down the bathtub drain)

5) Instigator or conflict resolutionist?

conflict revolutionary

firemind

1. Thinking about your name I have to wonder...have you ever worn raspberries? Under what circumstances would you?

yes, in that i'm a bit of a spillypants. i tend to wear anything i eat at least once.

2. Is chocolate a necessity?

of course. next question?

3. You wrote: "this very blog entry has been driven by anonymous commenting...". How much of your writing is influenced by comments and questions? / 4. Do you consider your journal to be a weblog or diary? Are links necessary or just aids to expressing ideas?

hmm interesting questions. i think i shall answer both at once. the previous post sort of expresses some of my ideas regarding the interaction between text and context. i think that i can't help but be influenced by comments - just as i can't help but be influenced by the images and ideas which stream past me in the "real" world every day. i fully believe that, in such an interactive medium, the writer and the reader exist symbiotically. i censor myself (to a certain extent) because i know or am afraid that people read it. but, at the same time, when i have stuff that i want to hear other opinions on, i post away. sometimes i write just 'cause it's in my head and i want to get it down somewhere. so i guess it's a diary and a web log, depending on the mood i am in at the time.

5. If you could live in any foreign city where would you live?

malaga, or barcelona. maybe dublin but it rains lots.

oops i forgot

it has occurred to me that i only answered part of ms opinionated's question. what she asked was: who would i be and *why*?

i picked zelda fitzgerald, after meeting scott but before going crackers. why zelda, you ask?

i'm really attracted to the characters who make up 'scenes' or 'movements'. i like social history - i love reading about the jazz age; the fin de siecle; greenwich village in the 20s. i love reading about the lives of the beats - the way that they incorporate their lives into their writing and their writing into their lives is so, so, wonderfully magical to me. i can't even describe it. i almost like the tales of the city, if you will, more than i enjoy the fiction or poetry generated at the time. they go hand in hand for me, for sure.

(as an aside, one of my favourites is memoirs of montparnasse by john glassco. it's actually fiction - he passed it off as a biography, but it later came out that he'd made most of it up. one of the greatest hoaxes in canadian literary history. also, it really neatly illuminates my theory surrounding the blending of fact and fiction. but i digress)

scott and zelda were the wild couple.. they were fun and talented. but they drank too much. and zelda went a little nutty. but until then she epitomized all that was cool about the jazz age... i think anyhoo.

mike b!

1. if you could be any colour what would it be.

pink

2. why?

isn't it obvious? seriously - it's fun.. it's light and girly and pretty and no one takes it seriously...

3. what is the food you're allegic too but miss the most?

eggs. hands down

4. who was your first crush ever?

this blonde kid named carter in my grade one class. i had another one that lasted from grade 4-fourth year university, but i'll tell you his name in person

5. ever had internet sex?

yes

et maktaaq et ma belle citron aussi!

maktaaq:

1. How was labour?

disturbingly easy. i was watching a chinese cooking show. it ended at 8pm. i stood up to feed the cat, and my water broke. the kiddo was borne 65 minutes later. i'm fairly sure the cat did not get fed.

2. What was the scariest moment of your life?

leaving my child in the psych ward of the hospital...hearing the door click locked behind me,knowing that he was on one side of it and i was on the other and nothing i could do would change that at that moment in time

3. If, by some weird quirk of physics, you suddenly found yourself in Stalinist Russia, what would you do?

learn how to brew vodka in my bathtub, and write literature of dissent

4. If you knew you would be reborn in the past and you were given a choice, would you choose to be reborn as a future witch torturer or as the future tortured witch?

tortured witch. and man oh man would the irish curses be flying!

5. If you were forced to eat only one thing for the rest of your life and nothing else, what would you eat?

miso soup with those little bits of green onion, seaweed and tofu in it. that's gotta cover most food groups / nutrients, doesn't it?

lemon
1. whats the biggest suprise you found in your first year of parenting?

that it doesn't come naturally. i sort of figured that there was stuff you just *knew* once you had a kid - some kind of universal knowledge or something. there isn't, sadly

2. whats your favorite spice? / flavour?

spice - cinnamon / flavour - dark chocolate

3. what $5.00 you spent had the biggest impact on your life

i found "meat is murder" by the smiths in a $5 bin at a record store when i was 14yrs old.. i'm pretty sure it changed me forever

4. what is your favourite part of your personality at this point in your life?

the way i seem to keep bouncing back from the weird stuff going on in my life right now, and get up smiling most mornings

5. what question were you really hoping someone would ask you about? or what question would help me know you better that i havent thought of?

oooo i don't know. i didn't have any preconceived notions - i just wanted to see what people were interested in, you know?

*phew!*

ok so i was a little worried that no one would want to play with me.... fortunately ms. opinionated invited me to the sand box!


1. What is the craziest thing you've done in the name of love or lust?

hmm crazy bad or crazy good? crazy bad, i guess, would be giving up my best friend cause psychojeremy couldn't handle the relationship. crazy good? i took psychojeremy on a 'holiday' in town - set up a little treasure hunt for him, gave him a beautiful evening in a hotel.. spent a small fortune (like $1000) on the evening...

2. What's in/on your nightstand table right now?

my nightstand is a long sofa table that is at the head of my bed. on it is a stack of books in various stages of completion, an alarm clock, my cellphone charger, my glasses, and a big bouquet of flowers (which i purchased for myself, by the way..)

3. If you could live one day in someone else's shoes (famous or not, dead or alive), who would it be and why?

zelda fitzgerald after she met scott but before she went crackers

4. What is the last unnecessary thing you've purchased for yourself (like a fun, splurge item)?

the blue pottery mug to add to my collection

5. What is the quickest that you've ever fallen "in love"?

i think that the shortest period of time at which point i actually thought to myself "i *love* this person" is probably a month or so. but i've thought "uh oh.. this could definately be starting something" after a couple of weeks...

Weee! that was fun!

yes i would jump if my friends were

ok so i want to play!

ask me five questions and leave your website/email addres. i'll answer them, then ask you five of your own... how fun is this?

dragonflyism

so the other day, maktaaq, mike b and i went to this outdoor art festival thingy out in white rock... i was sorry that i hadn't invited my mama - while i enjoy pottery and handcrafted jewelry as much as the next urban sundae girl, those sorts of things are just her cup of tea.

so i scooped, for myself, a really pretty matte blue pottery mug from one of the artisans, but my attention had been caught very early on by the work of cory judge at epiphany designs. in particular, i loved loved loved her stained glass dragonflies and a dragonfly pendant that i had spotted.  i was being frugal (i'm looking at impending moving costs) but the lovely mike b purchased it for me anyhoo.

provided for the interested shopper was a flyer with some need facts about the symbiology of dragonflies. i have always been attracted to them - one of the first things i ever thought i'd get tattooed to my body (and the one that i am building towards) is a dragonfly. this passage, in particular, caught my eye, so i'm going to plagarize shamelessly:

Dragonflies symbolize illusion. Their radiant iridescence exemplifies the complexity of light and colour inspiring and reminding us that we also are conduits of light, with the ability to shape our own spectrum. We can use this knowledge to pierce the illusions we create for ourselves that may limit our physical or mental existence. Dragonflies are also symbolic of the essence of change which brings wisdom and enlightenment. This transformation encompasses the dragonfly's metamorphosis from larvae to dragonfly, and our passionate journey to maturity and mental clarity. With this change comes growth. Dragonfly magic thus empowers us with a strong sense of self, having challenged our inner limitations thus achieving balance. Ultimately the dragonfly is a reminder that we each have the ability to gracefully dart, glide and shimmer through our changes with the inherent wisdom that we have the power to become our dreams.

so i just wanted to send a little dragonfly magic to all the friends and family and random strangers who cross into my little world for a short time. k that's enough with the mushy stuff. go break something.

weeeee!

he phoned me he phoned me he phoned me
 
to tell me he missed me.. and was thinking about me...
 
now i can't stop smiling (how's that for excited, newly?)

do me a favour?

well, two, actually. asked a friend...
 
okey dokey, i replied.
 

1. Never blame yourself for the actions of others.
 
2. Get a bit excited. Just a bit.
 
 

sad sundae

i told mr. married that, starting this morning, he had to go away for a bit and come back to me with a decision - that this confusion was not for me. it's not fair - not to him or to me or to anyone else involved in the situation. i'm operating under the theory that he's going to think about it and decide to make things work with his wife "for the children". he's got a very strong sense of what a "good man" should do - and it's all wrapped up in being there for his kids. he's trying to decide if he's willing to settle for unhappiness with his partner in order to be a full time dad.
 
i have some strong thoughts on this, which have been corroborated by people i know who's parents did this, but my opinion doesn't matter at this juncture. i think that's the hardest part for me to face right now - i have no say in this. it seriously impacts my life, but the decision is not mine to make.  so i feel a lot helpless, and a little out of control, and quite a bit sad.
 
i know some anonymous poster or another is going to be tempted to hit me with a "you deserve to feel crappy" kind of comment - please don't bother. i've explored all these avenues of thought all on my own. i've beaten myself up over this situation left right and center. trust me - there is nothing you can say to me or about me that hasn't already been thought by me, and even expressed by me about myself. been there, done that, in other words. save your breath.
 
so i've got some days to sit and think about this, and to worry, and to be excited, cause even though i'm operating under the assumption that he's going to make the quote-unquote "right" decision, i still kind of hope he will pick me...

oopys daisy

i actually wanted to mark the day when i ended up over 5000 hits, but completely missed it. my bad.
 
so there is a great deal of stuff to talk about - if you haven't flipped through the comments of the last few, do so. if you haven't read mike b's discussion of the emails he sent the other day, and the crazy place he's been in, do so... but i think i have to go away and actually write it on paper before i post it, just so i know that i can get all the thoughts out of my head and down without inadvertantly hurting feelings or saying things that come from a place of emotion rather than well thought out reason.

stuff i've been thinking about

so mr. married is freaking out 'cause i stayed out all night on saturday. he, of course, spent the night at home with his wife. i've been wracking my brain trying to ascertain the source of his consternation - he knew i liked to go out and play when he met me. indeed, one of the sources of his attraction to me is the fact that i am sort of wild and free - i do things like stay out all night and meet new people and make friends at the drop of a hat.

at first i thought it was a control thing - that is, he wants me for himself, even though he doesn't really *have* me and he is, of course, married to the kind of woman who does stay home every night.

he targets some of his issues with the... um, er, party favours that i indulged in - which i do every once in a while. not the best thing for me, but i'm a resonsible adult and i make educated decisions and am very safe when i do so. he doesn't approve of anything developed in a laboratory, and i respect that. however, this is *also* something he's known about me since we started being friends, so i don't think that theory holds much water.

my take on the situation is this: i represent something akin to freedom. he is attracted to that freedom, but at the same time repelled by it. he wants to be rid of the mundane reality of his quotidian, but simultaneously revels in the vast amounts of security contained within it. ergo, when i do things that symbolize the fact that i am, for the most part, entirely liberated, it scares the crap out of him but fascinates him. kind of like a car wreck at the side of the road, i guess....

relationship advice from my sister:

"stay away from hungarian men. they are crazy-weird".

quizday night in canada

thank god for this woman for helping me see the light.

You Don't Have a Boyfriend Because You are Too Shy When a guy gets to know you, he finds a great catch Problem is... you're too shy for most guys to get to know. From meeting someone to dating, you usually have your guard up. And while you're just holding back, it makes you seem like you've got something to hide. Why Don't You Have a Boyfriend Take This Quiz :-)

can you see up my loincloth while i'm swinging between trees?

Tarzan!


What movie Do you Belong in?(many different outcomes!)
brought to you by Quizilla

todae's horoscope:

"The people right in front of your face fail to hold your interest, but you fall in love with a dozen new celebrities every time you open a magazine. Why is it that you only want what you can't have?"

funny, huh?

the lovely ms u

i'd like to point out that it is 6.20 on a sunday evening and i haven't gone to bed yet from the day before. *and* i'm still sort of functioning normally. i can't promise that any decisions made will be that great - i'm probably not prepared to make the best choices, at this point in time, but i'm still awake and on speaking terms with the people around me. and that's the important thing. not bad for an old grrl like me.

"why ms. raspby!" you may be saying to yourselves. "do tell!" hmm let's see, shall we?

last evening the divine ms u and i went out to see mark farina and kaskade at the commodore. what fun. the music was amazing, the venue superb, and the crowd was a wonderful mix of laid back and freaky - exactly what you could hope for. we danced our respective booties off, and met up with some fun folks. at the end of the night, we headed off to an afterparty, which i finally scraped myself out of at close to 6.30 this morning. i came home and couldn't fall asleep for the life of me, then had to head out to go shopping for that damn baby shower. i'm heading off to a *baby* shower, thinking to myself "self, can you believe it? six hours ago, we were doing something that is so completely opposite from this wholesome family values type activity that our poor brain is having trouble processing the info."

more, i think, on all this later. there's some stuff that i need to process before i committ it to paper...

as a side note: i ate turkey for dinner tonight. it was delicious. now we shall just see how it stays down...

take that

at the thrift store this afternoon i picked up (for $1.50, i might add) a hard-cover copy of "jane brody's good food book". why did i do this? well, i do love a good cookbook. however, and more importantly, the subtitle is living the high-carbohydrate way

fuck you dr. atkins.

rainy saturdae part deux

today, i would like to go walking in the trees, preferably on the north shore. i need a boy to accompany me, and a rain coat, and a ball cap. also a warm sweater of some sort, and a cozy destination for soup/tea afterwards. i realize that this is not the best plan for getting over my awful summer cold (Body Snot Index is still high, hack factor off the map) but it's what i want to do today, thank you very much.

tomorrow i have to go to a baby shower. i have never been to a stag/stagette, a wedding shower, or a baby shower. even my own, by the way. so i'm breaking my perfect record. and this is for a colleague, not even someone i'm very close to. and why, you may ask? well because i was swept along in the tide. at my work, i am sort of the party organizer, the cake buyer, the candy bowl filler. i'm the chick who walks around in bunny ears at easter, who gives out candy hearts at valentine's, and who always, always dresses up if there is an opportunity. so it was mostly just *assumed* that i would be going, and so i became (with my cohort, my partner in crime) the girl getting the gift. no getting out of it now. damn.

in another window, i am having an interesting conversation with the divine stacylicious. see, i realized the other night (as i sat on the side of the road by the ferry terminal at about 3am) that i am now so used to not getting the things i want out of life that i have just stopped wanting anything. i am caught up in my own pattern. it's like a maze that just keeps coming back to the same center place. i keep thinking i'm trying a different path and end up at the same bench in the middle of the hedges. sl things i should just break through the walls, and make my own path. but my particular hedge is made up of blackberry bushes - entirely prickly, and every once in a while they bear something sweet - not very conducive to leaving them, you know? i talk lots about breaking free, but i'm still really afraid to leave my comfort zone. it's taken me a long time to rebuild my *own* place of security - it used to be so tied up in psychojeremy - that now i am really reluctant to leave it, you know?

i don't know. i have no answers - for myself or for anyone else. i am just putting one foot in front of the other, trying to get through my day. but i think that's half the problem, you know?

todae's quiz

from possession

"Much later, he came out of a half-sleep, imagined he heard the sea, which was just possible from there, and then was aware that she was weeping silently beside him. He put out an arm, and she pushed her face into his neck, a little awkwardly, not clinging, but pushing blindly to lose herself.
'What is it? My dear?'
'Ah, how can we bear it?'
'Bear what?'
'This. For so short a time. How can we sleep this time away?'
'We can be quiet together, and pretend - since it is only the beginning - that we have all the time in the world.'
'And every day we shall have less. And then none.'
'Would you rather, therefore, have had nothing at all?'
'No. This is where I have always been coming to. Since my time began. And when I go away from here, this will be the mid-point, to which everything ran, before, and from which everything will run. But now, my love we are here, we are now, and those other times are running elsewhere.'
'Poetic, but not comfortable doctrine.'
'You know, as I know, that good poetry is not comfortable, however. Let me hold you, this is our night, and only the first and therefore the nearest infinite.'

He felt her face, hard and wet on his shoulder, and imagined the living skull, living bone, fed with threads and fine tubes of blue blood and inaccessible thoughts, running in her hidden cavities.

'You are safe with me.'
' I am not at all safe, with you. But I have no desire to be elsewhere.'

is it hot in here?

Man oh man, is Britney Spears a hot mama.

i mean, how can the average man stand it?

thanks, stereogum

an open letter to the demon which possessed my alarm clock last night:

dear sir/madame;

while your attempts to scare the living daylights out of me did not go unrewarded, i must admit i found your efforts a touch juvenile and a little uncreative. the rapid passage of time (first in the 'zero' hour, then through all 24) did, briefly, cause me to ponder the brevity of my existence upon this mortal coil. as i watched time fly past, i did stop to think about whether or not i am living my life to it's fullest, or if i am merely "passing time", as it were.

however, this was just a momentary lapse: after a few heart-in-the-throat moments, i simply unplugged the clock, chucked it in the trash, and headed to london drugs to buy a new one. better luck next time.

yours in perpetuity,
raspberry sundae.

i don't wanna grow up, i'm a toys r us kid...

so tomorrow i head back to work. i must admit that the prospects fill me with dread. "don't worry," a friend said to me this evening. "after ten minutes, it'll be like you had never left." this would be what i am afraid of.

i had an amazing weekend. lemon came for a visit, and to celebrate mike b's 31st birthday. we had a bbq last night, and drank copious amounts of vodka. i must admit that, at first, i was very reluctant to go. i'm fighting a killer sinus cold, and was just exhausted after battling us fourth of july traffic on my way to seattle and back for the second time in a week. however, mr. married assigned lemon the dubious duty of making sure that i had a good time, and she took her responsiblities to heart. a grandly successful venture, my sweet. today, though, was better than last night - we all headed off to provence for chocolate croissants (ok that was just me. they actually ate healthy food. though mike had steak, which befuddles me). then we toddled off to granville island to spend the afternoon poking around.

part of the melancholy i have been feeling stems from the fact that most of the people i know are in these totally solid partnerships. i went for dinner with ms stacylicious and her lovely fiancee on friday to celebrate their engagement; my sister and i drove to seattle to pick up her long-term boyfriend; i spend a wonderful evening and a day with a friend and her partner... i was noticing these feelings again today as i wandered around granville island. so much of the way that i express love is with food. surrounded by all those beautiful ingredients, all i could think about was selecting delicacies and taking them home to prepare, while sitting and talking with someone and drinking a glass of wine in a sunny kitchen. i have this great mental picture, but just don't have the ability to bring it about, you know?