So I didn't blog from Orlando. Go figure. It was too exhausting and too time consuming to do anything but sleep or eat when I did get a minute to myself. Honestly, it was a really good trip. The girls and I know each other a lot better than we did last year so it was definitely easier. They're older too so that helps in a way. Not so much in Delaney's case though. She gets tougher as she gets older. I got a little upset a few times, not at the kids, but at their dad. It's difficult to deal with someone that you know so well and have seen change in their behavior towards you. Two years and things don't get any easier to stomach.
Anyway, today I'm going to work out and then hopefully buy a new pair of boots for my trip to Chicago. I'm excited about it, but I'm also nervous about how different it's going to be from last year. I don't like how I've been being flooded by memories lately. I just need to learn how to let shit go. In general, entirely and that's it.

In Brighter News

I'll be leaving to Orlando tomorrow and I'm really excited about it. We're staying at an incredibly nice hotel and visiting all the parks. I always look forward to spending time with my extended family. First stop tomorrow will be Sea World, probably have lunch or dinner at the Shark-tank restaurant and then eventually head back to the hotel for check in. At night time, we were talking about possibly going to Hollywood Studios or Magic Kingdom. Like always, we play these trips by ear and just enjoy the time together. The last time we all went together was August of 2009 after a falling out this past April. I'm bringing my laptop with me so hopefully I'll be updating from our hotel.

anise ain't nice

Don't force yourself to forget or forsake
that I once clawed at your eyes,
incessant and unforgiving,
leaving only a bloody line of broken tan skin.

Dont force yourself to forget or forsake
that I once punched at your face after soaking in anise
for hours on end (was there a point when i was nice?),
leaving only a gash through a memory of what i once was.

Don't force yourself to forget or forsake
that i remember recalling your past or
staring silently and naked at the mustard colored walls in the
old town house, two opposites too alike
wishing we were something we could never even grow to be.

Don't think I don't try to forget or forsake,
pushing you, without pausing, out the car
or turning timidly around to see you standing stoic,
careful, waiting for anyone but me.
waiting for only me.

Self Respect

I spent the last hour and a half sitting inside my bathtub. I used scalding water but let the last few inches fill up with the opposite. I stepped in and let the heat permeate throughout my bones. I could feel my cheeks turn red as goosebumps climbed from my feet. I read a few short stories and finished a POM glass full of gin and grapefruit. I never thought I'd willingly drink grapefruit after my last bout with it, but when necessity outweighs preference you sometimes have to jump the gun. The fifth one doesn't taste so bad.
Joan Didion has always been in the back of my mind and her short story "Self Respect" forced me to think. I finished it and I sat there, in the tub, letting myself sink to the point where my eyes were the only thing peering out. And I thought. She says: "The tricks that work well on others count for nothing in that very well-lit back alley where one keeps assignations within oneself: no winning smiles will do here, no list of good intentions."
Try as you might it's impossible to keep a catalogue of all the lies we tell ourselves just to get by. There's always an illumination, a slight glimmer, of the truth somewhere between the darkness of a lie regardless of who's telling it.
I cooked my first successful steak today and drank half a bottle of wine in honor of all the Bukowski poetry I've been reading when my insomnia reaches its peak. His way with women is somehow charming, but only in the sense that I can understand where he's coming from. He's repugnant, but I don't hate him. Pigeonhole me like all the women he writes about.
Back to Joan though and Self Respect. As I mentioned in my last entry being lost isn't as bad as we let on to be if it means saving our sanity, "there's the glass you broke in anger, there's the hurt on X's face; watch now this next scene, the night Y came back from Houston, see how you muff this one" because if you look too hard what you find may really be "nothing".

Amantes Sunt Amentes

The best place to start is from the beginning but I haven't seen the start of anything in a long time. All I've seen is winding roads and intangible ideas that seem farther and farther away the longer I stare at myself in the mirror. My hands are always shaking and my memory always fails me. I've seen a lot of endings and false starts. I've seen things go backwards and fall back into place. Being lost isn't so bad when you think about being found and hating what's under your skin.