January 17, 2022

Midnight ramblings

It really sucks that none of my family have the same political beliefs as me. Not one. They’re all “rah-rah America”/“blue lives matter” assholes. I’ve only ever felt like I do not belong in my family and this only makes it worse. I’ve said it time and time again, but here is one more: when my mother dies I’m going to not have anything to do with my family. We don’t talk. We don’t do anything. They don’t invite me to anything. There is no reason for my presence to exist in any of their spaces.

I just feel so alone. I really wish my parents had had more than just one fucking kid. I could have someone to help me with all of this bullshit, instead of it AAAAAAAAALL resting on my shoulders. And what makes it worse is I DO NOT WANT TO DO IT. And what do I do when I have absolutely zero desire? I procrastinate.

Then to add insult to injury every fucking time I try to knock something off my list, every task is then preceded by all this other fucking bullshit. Every goddamn time. I just want to scream.

The one person I would or could rely on to help me is dying and can’t do shit. And instead of helping I have to help him. I just don’t know what to do. That‘a a lie. I know what I have to do. I have to do all of this shit. Alone. It’s just when will it get done.

January 14, 2022

The Soundtrack of My Life – 2 – Plans

I couldn’t begin this year long musical journey without starting first with this album. I am someone who has too many favorites, which defeats the purpose of the title “favorite,” but in this specific case it is true. Of all the albums in my collection this is the one I can listen to on repeat for hours and no matter where I’m at with my thoughts and feelings, this is always appropriate.

The first time I heard of Death Cab for Cutie was from my husband. He had heard their name on a Sirius radio show one night while working. He immediately thought to himself that they sounded like someone I would love. This was during my “emo” phase, when I deliberately did obscure things to seem “cool” and “niche.”

At first, I was hesitant because I wasn’t big on discovering new music. I had my then favorites, and there wasn’t any room for anything more at the time.

My husband bought this album and I reluctantly listened to it but from the first song I was in love.

This album, much like it’s collection of songs, represents a time of transition for me. It was that unstable time where my husband and I were still working on our relationship, after he had discovered I had been cheating. We were trying to make it work. We would have good moments but sometimes they were just sad. It’s just the natural ebb and flow of trust-building.

I was also moving from my “punk rock” wannabe phase into my more contemporary mellow, coffee house vibe.

The one thing it does bring to my mind is my time working at Border’s bookstore. It felt like I worked there for years but in reality, it was only a few months. I did not gel well with the store manager. She was the worst version of a businesswoman. The kind who thinks you have to act like the worst part of men to get ahead. She was genuinely horrible and was the main catalyst for me seeking employment at an office job. If it were not for her being such a tyrant, I wouldn’t have gotten the job that put me on the road to where I am now.

Apart from her, Border’s was such a chill experience. I unboxed product and got to shelve books. My favorite section was always metaphysical. I would peruse the pages held there more than any other.

At the time I worked in inventory, I would play “Plans” in the warehouse and on my breaks. One of my shift managers was this total hipster, who was rail thin and had hair akin to a young Justin Bieber. He was in a band, and without him telling you about it every second, could tell immediately. This dude loved Death Cab too and we would talk about them whenever we were in the other’s orbit. It was our only common thread of communication. One time, he made this off-hand comment that has stuck with me since. He said that the album was like a novel, and you couldn’t skip over a song or risk losing a part of the story. It was so “profound” to me at the time, but even to this day I couldn’t agree more. I think of that line each time I listen to it.

One of my more vivid memories from that time was when I was returning from my break. The audiobooks were next to the CD section on the way to the back warehouse. As I made my way there, I saw a married couple perusing the selection. She was this frail blonde woman, standing next to and caring for her husband in a wheelchair. The sight of them sent a twinge of sadness in my heart, and when I got to the back I couldn’t help but feel sorry for her. She was giving up her life to basically care for her wheelchair bound husband. “What kind of life is that?” I thought to myself. I knew I couldn’t do that.

It’s amazing what experience provides for perspective. I know now she did it because she loved him. Love is the most powerful force. It drives you to do things you never thought you could. Like, caring exclusively for another person. In hindsight, I find this whole miniscule moment strange. How could I remember that so vividly? It was almost as if I was foreshadowing my life.

If you have no interest in listening to the album, may I suggest three songs. For whatever reason, they mean the most to me. The first being “I Will Follow You Into the Dark” (my husband’s ringtone btw), “What Sarah Said,” and “Brothers on a Hotel Bed.”

There is a single line in “What Sarah Said” that makes me breakdown every time I hear it. And try as I may, I cannot stop the flood of tears. So, if even those three are too much, listen to that one. You’ll know what line it is when you hear it. Trust me.

January 5, 2022

The Soundtrack of My Life – 1 – Announcing a Goal

Music is truly magical for me. It can unlock my deepest emotions and bring to mind memories I had long forgotten. It’s incredible. I don’t know if many have that ability, but I do. Which is why sometimes I go through phases where I cannot bear to even listen to any music. I’m so overwhelmed with my current reality that all I am willing to listen to is spoken word (ie comedy albums, podcasts, audiobooks.) But sometimes even those can come accompanied with a euphoric recall. (Except for the book on tape “Rock your Revisions,” that just brings out agonizing anxiety.)

Like any writer worth their digital ink, I wanted to write throughout 2022. Specifically so I can hone my craft but also because I need to do things that are just for me. I need a hobby. I have to have something to alleviate the pressure inside my head. (The space in which I reside the most, by the way.)

Wanting this, I began to run through the parameters for myself. I considered writing everyday… But that is an unrealistic expectation. Life inevitably gets in the way. Especially mine. Which is why I have scaled it back to a more manageable and achievable goal, and in the end that’s how you want to do something. Therefore I thought once a week is good. In the end I will write 52 blog posts and have succeeded in completing my task.

While weekly is a more than manageable goal, the next obstacle is: what do I write about? The only thing I know more than my own imagined fantasies is my own life. I am also SUPER obsessed with myself. I mean… how could I not be? (P.S. I am kidding… Sort of.) There is nothing I love to talk about more than myself. And the topic I enjoy even more is sifting through memories.

The one thing that trauma and emotional distress has shown me is that it loves to take away my memory. My brain used to be sharp as an obsidian arrowhead but since the death of my father, my mother’s Alzheimer’s diagnosis, my husbands terminal diagnosis, and fucking covid, what super brain-power I use to have has fallen by the wayside. Instead I am lucky if I can hold onto short-term tasks. It sucks. Therefore… music.

Trauma may have taken my active memory recall, as in if I try to specifically remember something specific I cannot, however music remains powerful. So, I am going to pick a song, an album, or even a mundane tune, I’ve heard over the course of my life that has attached itself to my memory and write about it. Hopefully these posts won’t be as longwinded as these last two sentences. (Good lawd.) And even on an off-day, when I can barely hold onto my sanity, I’ll use a new diddy to write about something equally undiscovered. The best part of all this: I get to share some music with you. And more than the love I have for talking about myself, and even more than reminiscing about the past, I am excited/elated/ecstatic to share a song with someone. It’s one of my weird love languages. If I send a song to you, it means it unlocked apart of me that thought of you and that will live with me forever. It can and never will be replaced/erased. It belongs to you.

December 16, 2021

Narcissistic Tendency Abounds

It’s weird how at times I can speak things into existence and then other times I kill them. I had wanted to write every day for the month of December and… Well, that petered out real quick. Get high a couple nights and that consumed any want or desire to fulfill my goal.

I had intended to not say anything. In the past making such proclamations had had similar results. So, I hesitated to do it. However, the one night I forced myself to write “something” while I was shitfaced on edibles, I made the mistake of “outing” myself and thus ended my effort. (But, that could be my own self-fulfilling prophecy.)

The one thing about attempting to do such writing feats is that you need a back-up idea to write about if one is just not feeling it that particular night. Since I was practicing this technique, I have had two post rolling around in my mind to jot down. One is about the song “All Too Well” and my visceral reaction to a particular verse and the other is a post about losing an ex-boyfriend/friend abruptly to cancer. Today, I feel nostalgic and I am going to go with the second.

I dated Travis when I was on the brink of turning 18. He was 23, a piercer, punk rock, and an absolute nerd. He is one of two people I have attempted to watch the Matrix with only to end up “dickstracted.” (I have yet to watch it completely through.) I met him online, in a chat room. The same one I would then meet my husband but before I ever met Charlie, I dated Travis.

Like I said, I was really into him. He was mysterious and cool, covered in tattoos and piercings, and I thought he was dangerous and tough. That was all an illusion. He was just a scared little boy, just like me.

For a moment in my life I use to have this weird sixth sense about the men I dated. I knew within the first few days of “dating” how it would end. With Travis I saw the number 2 and that he would dump me. Two months together, to the day, he did exactly that. He did it in such a weird way. Travis didn’t speak to me all day even going as far to turn off his phone. He had broken his radio silence and called me over to his place. I got there, sat on the end of his bed and waited for the CD he had been listening to to finish and then he ended it.

I have to say, I have the utmost respect that he did it in person. He could have just done it in text, but he chose to be an adult. Only now do I feel that way. At the time I fucking hated him, yet I wanted him back. He really broke my heart. I really, really liked him.

Previously, a nasty habit I had was that I would take on characteristics and personality traits of the boys who had dumped me. After some self-reflection I know now that it was a way to make myself “more attractive” to those that had “done the deed.” It was my fucked up way of trying to win them back. It’s stupid, I know, but because of that these men would have a drastic influence on my life.

Travis was no exception. He was “punk rock” and I wanted to be too. His taste in music consumed mine. Finch, HIM, Alkaline Trio… To this day I can’t listen to Alkaline Trio without thinking of him. They’re 1,000% linked in my brain.

I thought of all the tattoos and piercings I was going to get when I turned 18. (When I did turn 18 he was the one who gave my first and only piercing. My husband took me to the shop to get it.) After our break-up I started smoking the cigarettes he did, Camel Turkish Gold. I became obsessed with drinking and getting drunk. (At that time, Travis had been a raging alcoholic and I had never once had a drop of liquor.) And the most fucked up of all, he is the reason I even met up with my now husband.

He is also the second reason I came out, again, to my mom. (Yeah, I came out twice.)

For someone who only existed in my life as a significant player for such a short time, he had the most effect.

On November 3rd, the day before my birthday, he passed. I only learned, in a roundabout way, from a friend I had made on a cruise (who bizarrely knew him too). This friend told me he reached out to his sister to discover it had been from stage 4 cancer. No one had a clue.

Travis and I didn’t really speak much these past years. I was trying to distance myself because I was still hurt by the break-up (18 fucking years later.) I still considered him a friend, like he had said he wanted when it ended. You better believe, I’m always good for a “like” on an Instagram post. God, he was so hot. Check him out @kubdumpster on twitter and instagram.