So I'm really content. I'm really happy. And not just in the few-moments-of-things-will-work-out content, either. This has been a few days of just being happy with my life, and where things are at. I'm not telling myself that things will work out in some hope that they will, I actually believe that they will.

I look over old posts on this blog and it's like someone else wrote them. She's angry, and she's hurt, and she's lashing out at those who care about her. I almost wish I could take back everything I wrote, but then I remember that those posts served a purpose. A very important purpose in my life, actually.

I'm not angry at Fin anymore. I feel like we hit rock bottom a few days ago and there's no way to go but up, and I am so happy that things are looking up. I realized something: I still care about him immensely, and it was foolish of me to try and convince myself otherwise. Things are going to work out.

oh, look, a river

Because I forgot how awesome this was:

http://www.angelfire.com/art2/antwerplettuce/hamlet.html

"when there's nothing left to burn,

you have to set yourself on fire"

Some days, I feel like my whole life is one long string of esprit d'escalier.

I'm a woman, you're a machine

"Oh, and you're almost home,
I've been waiting for you to come in.
Dancing around in your old suits,
going crazy in your room again.
I think I'll go out and embarrass myself
by getting drunk and falling down in the street.
You say I choose sadness, that it
never once has chosen me.
You may be right."

-- Rilo Kiley

Christmas last year. I was talking to Fin which turned into telling Fin everything that had been going on--crying spells, too much SI, purging. Turned into a talk about recovery, and my decision (my decision) that I may take a jaunt down to counseling services once school was back in session. Maybe he could walk down with me, if it wasn't too much trouble. I ended up throwing out the two razorblades I'd had hidden on the upper ledge in the cupboard under my bathroom sink. They'd been there for years, and Fin watched me throw them out. I went looking for them tonight and then remembered.

We're back at zero, folks. I think all of the really thorny things in my head are going to be on paper or something separate, because there are some things you really don't need to hear.

At work today, I had to carry a large amount of boxes down to our storeroom. There's an intimidating set of stairs which leads down to said storeroom--intimidating, at least, when you've got a dolly cart full of items. A stranger saw my apprehension, took the majority of the boxes down stairs for me, and it reminded me that chivalry isn't dead. At least among strangers.

your ex-lover remains dead

"I exist, that is all, and I find it nauseating." -- Jean-Paul Sartre

My flesh feels naked. I want to yell and scream and make him understand what he did but it's useless, there's no point, it's past tense. I feel sick when I think about him, like there's bile rising in my throat but it won't spill out. It just stays, reminding me that I'm the one who got myself into this mess.

And I was doing so well, too.

There's a melancholy when I'm alone, sometimes. I can't quite shake it.

Him being with her feels out of the natural order of things. I don't know whether to cry or vomit. It feels like something is wrong in the world, just with the knowledge of that existing. He told me once that once he gets into a relationship, he gets clingy. I guess I'm not worth clinging to.

Sometimes it's easier to list things.

- I had a nightmare sometime last night and woke up crying this morning. I can't remember what happened.
- Fin. I'm backsliding. My thought process is going places it shouldn't, and it's more embarrassing than anything. Fuck. I'm back to some sort of undefinable nausea in the moments when I'm alone and just existing, at least on occasion. He wants to be friends (again, according to him, although I'd argue we never were friends. He must think otherwise). I don't know what I'm going to do.
- I baked cookies with Erika today, and she was adorable. Helping me by pouring things in and stirring in her two-year-old sort of way.
- I feel prettier when I wear dresses. I've lucked out in the past few days, because the weather has been really nice.
- I think a guy in his mid-20's may have been hitting on me at work a few days ago. If I had any experience with actually dating instead of just fucking, I would probably be able to tell if he was or not. How does one know when they're being hit on?
- I re-read a Hotch/Reid series (Criminal Minds pairing) today. I forgot how good it was. Tons of smut, yes, but eloquent smut touching on psychological spousal abuse, rules. Some really nice character studies.
- Living with a toddler can be exhausting when all you want is five minutes to yourself, but I don't really think I'd change it.
- I miss Brandon. We've not spoken properly in far too long.
- I re-discovered Stars today, I forgot how awesome they were.
- I miss Lost already.

I'm talking to Fin and not ripping his head off. I forgave him and he forgave me and I told him I hope things work out with Angela and then we moved on to talking about GPAs and courses next year and majors and elusive leggings and summer jobs.

This must be the Twilight Zone.

I have spent the majority of the last two days running outside with toddlers: daisy-picking, breaking up fights, refereeing sharing, playing soccer for all of two minutes (one kicks the ball and the other throws it), various falls and the occasional tumble and tantrum. The deck in our backyard was super hot today from the sun, and so when Mom pulled out the hose to fill the pool up some, I used it on the deck to cool off the kids' feet. They thought it was the coolest thing in the history of ever, and I was cool-by-proxy. I've got that kind of tired that comes after being in the sun all day, but things are still knocking around in my head so I get them down.

There is also just something about how young children talk that makes everything they say sound adorable. Even things like "Don't sit on the popcorn!," etc.

I wonder how much of this is written for me, and how much of it is written for others. When I started this blog, it was written as an outlet until I scrounged up the courage to go to counseling on-campus. It was written as an outlet for everything I couldn't tell Fin, because it's difficult to share your problems with someone when that person is so much of the problem. Plus, when they're saying "You really need to see someone, you should really consider counseling" and then they take your going to counseling and meaning you make them your reason for anyt--

Not going down that road. I was actually going over things last night before I fell asleep (the one time I really can't avoid it), and I actually said to myself "I'm fucking sick of going over this. It was months ago. You don't matter in his life, stop letting him matter in yours." I talked about it with my mom briefly tonight, brought her up to speed on the situation--I thought she was out of town when I found out The Awful Troof, otherwise I would've called her because no one can help a broken heart quite like a mother.

My mom has met Fin for maybe all of five minutes, from that time he dropped me off and walked me to the door and met Erika and that other time he picked me up so we could babysit Cecilia. And she basically said everything it took me eight months to admit: commitment issues, something about an 18 year old dating a 14 year old is just off, and he continually goes for relationships that are "safe:" the aforementioned age difference, or being in Ontario for the summer while his girlfriend is in New Brunswick.

I suppose what I'm saying is that I'm not writing this for anybody but me, for the most part. It's a diary more than anything, really. And because sometimes, I'm not sure how to word things properly to one person in particular, so I just write as though I'm writing for nobody and then things come out right. If not right, at least not stuck in my head. More than anything, I grow tired of the same few lines running through my head: "would you stop obsessing over him?" "I had fallen in love with you last semester" "other than my mother and sister, you've been the most influential woman in my life" "I hadn't even started to test you yet" "I will break you just to see what it does to you and those around you" "Just eat something" "You've probably noticed something is wrong in our family," etc.

"hear music through air instead of water, drown your ears instead of your lungs"

I just found some fanfiction I wrote in grade 10. And I found the book where I had all my ED quotes. And I found a drabble about bathwater and sound. It's like a window into being 15 again and I don't know if I like it. It's unsettling to see how much things have changed--I was once a girl who wrote out entire paragraphs of Wasted so that I would have something to occupy my mind instead of eating. I wrote pages and pages of thinly veiled retreats into the darkest part of my life--lives consumed by self-injury, bloodlust, food weight calories numbers and Bones. Always Bones. Coming out stories and strained relationships with parents who don't get it and aren't there. Everything's scribbled and illegible and I'm not that girl anymore. I'd love to read the letter I wrote Fin in October, I'd love to read the letter I wrote Fin in February--because I know I'm not that girl anymore, just like I'm not this fifteen year old anymore. I just want to see the change.

Am I going to feel like this three years from now when I look back on this blog? Am I going to feel so completely disconnected from who I am now and who I'll be then?

"and I created economics just to fuck you up"

So. A week ago I went to go see two plays: Here Lies Henry and This Is a Play. Both written by Nova Scotian playwright Daniel MacIvor, both absolutely wonderful. The former I'd wanted to see since ninth grade, and the latter I had only heard of a few weeks prior.

It was purely by fluke that I found out about this evening of metatheatre wonder. I was walking out my English class with Emily a few weeks before the end of the year, and glanced at a poster. Advertising Here Lies Henry and some other play I had never heard of but it didn't really matter because there was Here Lies Henry and it was playing at my old high school and I just had to go.

And so I went. With two friends, Andrew and Josh, both home for the summer and both up for a day of hanging out. Outside of play-going, there was lots of Dutch Blitz and eating uptown and gallivanting around.

But the plays were wonderful. Here Lies Henry left me with a good ache in my stomach from laughter, and I'd be lying if I said I didn't feel the pinpricks of tears behind my eyes near the end. It is one man standing on a stage for 80 minutes telling you something you don't already know, and it is mesmerizing and heartbreaking and wonderful. I wish you could've all been there with me.

This Is A Play is probably the singular most hilarious piece of theatre I've ever seen. It was most definitely a play, but instead of dialogue, it had the actors thoughts. For instance, the Male Lead Actor struts in, proclaiming "I enter with conviction, thinking of Christian Bale!"

Tears of laughter all around, I can tell you that much. I would just about kill for a copy of Here Lies Henry. Actually, a few nights after the plays, I had a dream where Brandon and I were book-shopping and were somehow given free merchandise, and he ended up with a copy of it and I got something else, and I ended up convincing him to switch. I was rather disappointed when I woke up and realized it hadn't happened.

Regardless. That was my theatre experience at my old high school, and it was absolutely wonderful. Also, as per the tradition started at the Ruby Jean & the Thoughtful Bees concert I went to in January, I stole a poster. It will look fantastic on my bulletin board next fall.

Post Script--I also have two rather large bruises on my leg as a result of sliding down the marble banister at my old school and dismounting in an improper fashion. It was really more of a tumble off.

Post Post Script--One notable moment from Here Lies Henry: Henry is talking to us, as he does. And this whole time, there's been a chair marked "Reserved for Premier Shawn Graham." And he hops off stage, looks at the chair, and says "Well, this fucker ain't showin' up." Hauls the chair onstage, then says to us "Coulda been sittin' down this whole time!" It was kind of beautiful. This would have been after he makes the rounds looking for a smoke--no one had any at the Saint John show, but apparently someone had one at the Fredericton show, as evidenced.

Let's talk about Saining for a minute. She and I met in grade 10, when I transferred from Netherwood to the ever-feared public high school. I immediately thought she was super cool, most definitely cooler than me. Apparently, she also thought I was super cool. We were then at a stalemate of cool for the next two years, in which neither of us knew how to really approach the other.

And then grade 12 happened. We were in the same English class, and we were in improv together, and we re-discovered our mutual coolness. And then today, I saw her for the first time since Christmas. It was super excellent. There was coffee, awesome sandwiches (oh ma lawdy I've missed Java Moose), visiting old teachers (SQUEE. more on that later) and a thoughtful bookstore perusal. I tend to take forever and ever and ever in bookstores, and she does as well. It worked out quite nicely. I'm $50 poorer and 7 books richer, and it was so worth it. I also talked to the woman who runs the bookstore about James Joyce and Daniel MacIvor and it was awesome.

Inventory of what I bought:

As I Lay Dying, William Faulkner (0.99)
Good Omens, Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett (hardcover, $8.99)
Everything is Illuminated, Jonathan Safran Foer ($7.99)
Blankets, Craig Thompson ($12.99, a nearly-600 page graphic novel I originally read in grade 11)
Little Children, Tom Perrotta ($6.99)
'Tis, Frank McCourt ($6.99. I read Angela's Ashes in grade 12)
Dubliners, James Joyce (FREE. I mentioned off-hand how I hadn't been able to find a copy of Dubliners, and the owner was certain they had a copy. She checked the backroom and they did, and then she gave it to me on the house. This isn't the first time she's done that, actually--last summer ago or so, I brought in a whole slew of books and she gave me $75 for them. I then proceeded to buy a few books, and she ended up giving me D.H. Lawrence's Sons and Lovers for free.)

I still need to theatresquee and teachersquee. It will happen, trust me.

you're slumping in your murals

Not gonna lie, one of the best things about being in the house alone is the ability to dance around in my pajamas in a ridiculous fashion. It's pretty wonderful. Current favourite song to dance to? "Animal," Neon Trees: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qY--Yu4kzz0

I'm also listening to a lot of Share lately, which is kind of fun because I was in a wedding party with one of the members. Here's my current favourite from them, entitled "Getting Older" http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lyiUI9aNp9A

My friend Chris is doing a radio show right now (as he does every Monday from 11pm-1am in Sackville), and he is breaking his self-imposed East Coast emphasis and simply playing songs he loves. So far he's played Laura Veirs, Manfred Mann, and is currently playing German experimental techno.

I've really missed the thrill of stumbling on a new band or artist and falling in love with their songs and that heart pounding that always happens when I hear a song that just gets to me, or that calm quiet I get sometimes when it's mid-afternoon and I'm playing an album and reading and everything is as it should be. You know?

this is also nice, surprisingly

I know I probably have better things to write about (actually, I know I have better things to write about--expect a theatresquee within the next few days), but this keeps spinning around in my head in half-phrases. I think I saw him today, but each time I try and revisit that few seconds of "is that...?" and dealing with the tingle my body gets when I see lumberjack plaid (it's not a pleasant tingle, more akin to a heart attack), I realize it doesn't really matter. The logistics of the situation say it wouldn't be him, as he is hopefully en route to being 1512 km away from me, but it just starts to matter less. All I know is I saw someone who looked like him, and that someone was headed in my direction, and then turned around and headed the other way.

Avoidance has always been one of his strong suits.

I feel sad about the situation. I feel sorry for him, that he gave up on a girl who would make him pasta for breakfast at 7 in the morning when he had an exam, who would warm the bed up before he climbed in at 5 in the morning after doing homework he'd procrastinated on all weekend. I feel cheated because I feel like I did all the work and someone else gets all the benefit. I feel that the level of hope he instilled in me that anything could happen, that we could ever be anything...I feel like that was cruelty of the highest caliber. It was wonderful and light and had waltzing in the kitchen. It was shiny. But it's past tense and everything after was cruel and unnecessary and so badly handled, it's just dark and twisted and thorny in my mind. He tried to fix what wasn't broken and broke it in the process.

It's starting to matter less. I'm falling out of love.

well, this is nice

So last night, I found myself bored out of my mind, as there is only so long one can go watching movies and reading books before one starts to get restless. So during this spell of restless nothing, I get a call from my brother. We end up talking. He had called at 9:30, and by 9:40 I was taking a cab down to his place. We watched a bit of 2012 (which looks like a semi-decent movie), I learned that I don't really like the taste of gin that much, that I crave McDonald's like mad when I'm tipsy (I had my suspicions before, but it's the kind of hypothesis that needs to be tested to be certain). It was a good night. I feel like I'm pretty close with my family--not as close as some families are, and we're all wrapped up in our don't-show-any-emotion pantomime that I seem to be the only one bothered by, but we're pretty close. We've got each others backs. It's nice.

So I'm typing now because I can't sleep, and it's been like that the past few nights. I won't get tired until rather late, but then I'll wake up ridiculously early. I've tried to straighten out my sleep schedule, I even took a Clonazepam a few nights ago around 11 to help me get to sleep--I didn't get to sleep until 1, and then I woke up at 6:20 and was wide awake for the next few hours before I was able to squeeze another two hours or so of sleep in. I went to bed around midnight at Aaron's last night, woke up at 3:45 and I've been awake since. It's mildly frustrating.

So that's that. Things are good, that's one alcoholic experience with no phone calls or punching, I love my family, and I may be a little sleepy but I've got a good day ahead of me. Nothing poetic, no trip of the tongue to make it something it's not, things are just good for the moment.

In Defence of Fanfiction: An Introduction

The term "fanfiction" has a tendency to inspire a few similar ideas: horrid grammar, ridiculous plot lines, flat characters. The worst figure in all of fanfiction, the dreaded Mary-Sue, is arguably also the most well-known. For those who don't know, a Mary-Sue is typically a self-insertion by the author, taken to the extreme. She is usually gorgeous beyond all belief, has a tragic past (often orphaned by a tragic accident), every boy in the story falls in love with her, and she faces adversity at every turn but magically overcomes it because she is just. that. awesome.

Fanfiction is more than that, though. Fanfiction requires an understanding of the complexity of characterization, something made even more difficult when the characters aren't ones own. Taking another person's characters and expanding their canon lives and changing details around and constructing an entirely new world takes skill, and it takes determination, and it takes creativity. Each author leaves a certain imprint on their work, and it becomes clear just from the tone who the author is. More than that, though, fanfiction itself has a distinct tone.

I've been reading fanfiction since I was 13--I started with blink-182 fanfiction, and yes, I did write it. Other than a few drabbles and one multi-chapter fic, I haven't written much fanfiction. But I've read it for the past five years, and I've been involved in numerous fandoms--Harry Potter, Criminal Minds, The Baby-Sitter's Club. I think the last time I wrote fanfiction was in grade 10. Math class. I wrote a Criminal Minds ficlet centred around a season 2 episode.

Fanfiction has always meant something for me, and I plan to explore that. More than that, though, I'm going to collect some of the more memorable fics that have shaped my love for fanfiction. It's going to be fun.

be patient and tough, someday this pain will be useful to you

I've been having some strange dreams lately, and they all seem to involve people I actually know--since when are dreams that straightforward?

In the first dream, I somehow ended up getting back together with Robin. Even dreaming, I had this sense of what-the-hell-is-going-on-here, and feeling as though it was out of my control and now that I was back with him it was something I couldn't get out of even though I knew it was a mistake. I'll be honest, I was relieved when I woke up and realized it hadn't happened.

Second dream is a bit fuzzier, but stranger and longer. Uptown Saint John with Fin and Zara, in Scheherazade before it moved locations. Browsing through books and somehow things go from Fantastic to Awful with Fin in 60 seconds, which is how it always works with him. I'm in the dream as though I'm an outside observer for a moment, and I can see the two of us fighting and remember feeling that Zara would disapprove of me being mean to her brother, but maybe she could see a different side of him, too. For some reason I take off my shoes and socks and walk from uptown Saint John to home. It's overcast but not raining, and my feet are freezing by the end of it. Toughened by glass and gravel, coated with burgundy gummy dried blood mixed with the red wetness of new blood by the time I get home.

When I wake up, I check my feet and see that they're fine. Remember that the only contact I have with Fin is drunk dialing, and try and figure out how things got this bad when he said I was one of his best friends and I told him he was one of mine. Realize it's not worth mulling over, and go back to reading Someday This Pain Will be Useful to You.

Dear Lisa

It all works out.

Love,

Future Lisa

cold light of morning

My vice is contained in a thin sheet of metal, holding five years of lies close to me, clutched between anxious fingers. I just go from one to the other, I bleed too much and I eat too little and I eat too much and I drink not often but a lot. I want touch and sex and I like touch and sex and more than anything I want to be wanted because I don't want to be me, but at least somebody wants me. And if somebody, anybody, wants me, then I must not be this thing I think I am. I think, though, that I can only fool myself with that for so long.

I can't understand how I can content myself with being productive and cleaning and doing laundry and falling asleep in the sun when reading, and then after a relaxed and good day, everything just creeps in and before I know it, I'm stuck in it. I've always prided myself on being a little bit different from everybody else, but right now I just want to be normal.