The truth of the moment

I’ve reached the State of Equilibrium. It borders on the State of Hysterical Inertia – a territory with a thousand highways criss-crossing flat, changeless land only to arrive back where they began. It is always exactly 5:00 p.m. in Hysterical Inertia – neither day nor proper night. You start having impulses to get out of the car and dye your hair blue-black, or shave it off, or move your bed into the bathroom. Anything to get off those roads. I imagine it’s like Alberta, without borders or mountains.

I’m not sure what’s beyond the metaphorical gazebo I’m sitting in now. The thing about Equilibrium is that it doesn’t particularly matter what’s out there. I’m counting crows and seagulls. A three crow morning today, matter of fact. And that’s about the only fact worth knowing. I’m pretty much happy with breathing as my primary activity.

You do have time to think here, though. And I realized today (with no sense of alarm or disappointment) that when people (okay, male people) hail you on an internet site, it is merely a reflexive action - a man passing by rotates his cranial unit and seeing apparatus in your direction. Rather like a nervous tick. A flicker that sputters out in the time it takes to send an automated compliment. I’ve stopped answering the flickers.

In November, I decided that a period of celibacy was in order. I cut the last thread with my used-to-be, who took it in a spirit of bad grace, foul temper and threw in a couple cutting remarks. No one else was in view, so it was pretty much a done deal. And I was happy with the decision for a week.

The fretting began soon afterwards. I was celibate for over seven years once. By the end, it was neither a happy nor a healthy experience. I began to dwell on that. Began to ponder years, possibly all the rest of them (because I-am-no-spring-chicken, as they say) alone. Alone except for the cliché of a cat. Woman and cat. How long, I wondered, until I was dressing the cat or making little hats for him and then taking pictures. Ohmygod posting them. Here.

I moved from Fretting to Hysterical Inertia over a period of weeks.

And here’s the thing – I have no idea how I got to Equilibrium. One minute I was considering packing a duffel bag and running for my life – to anywhere else. And the next, I was in the gazebo not even remotely considering haute couture for the cat.

And feeling like my life was…pretty much okay. Maybe it was the hours of making mandalas – or just plain old divine intervention. At any rate. I’m manless. The cat is hatless. And there was just one crow on the way home. No seagulls.

Pox girl and the Phobic

Okay, he's truly, clinically phobic about germs, the new boyfriend. Nobody is perfect, right?
I tell myself I don't need to take this on. I really don't. Not my problem.

But he's phoned twice trying to make it up. The second call, I'm virally teary, offended and depressed and ask in a somewhat hysterical, quavering voice, what other phobias might be looming - homophobia? racism? Because those are real deal breakers I tell him. He assures me he is not a Nazi or harboring either of those peculiarities.

He asks if he can see me after I go to the doctor tomorrow. "After all," he argues, "I'm not going to get over the phobia sitting here alone." And he's proud that he's already made it past the discovery of a tattoo on my upper left arm - tattoos apparently being related to the germ-thing. He's thinking maybe he can conquer fear of germs and viruses next. "That's what you need alrighty, a tattooed, virus-ridden girlfriend for therapeutic purposes." He agrees enthusiastically. As if he can tell that I see his point and seem to be moving him out of potential ex-new-boyfriend to probationary-new-boyfriend status.

What can I tell you? What passes for my love life is, at least, not boring. And did anyone see "Aviator?" Because Howard Hughes was a pretty interesting guy before he went completely off his rocker. Okay. Never mind. Fire at will.

oozing through the weekend

The swoosh-hiss of cars on wet pavement. In my studio, the fan hums, turning its satellite head back and forth, issuing a tiny arthritic click each time it stretches to its farthest point. It jerks gracelessly along in its preset path – front to side, side to front, and back. It’s rather how I imagine I’d look in an advanced aerobics class.

It's an underwater day. Like looking at the world from just beneath the surface of a lake. The sky is diluted Payne’s grey, cloud and mist. The music of rain.

The grass is patching up green. The Red Maples behind my building – always competing with Forsythia to be first in bloom or leaf – have a peach fuzz growth of leaves. An aura of leaves.

I am happy. The story arc is kind of a gently waving line, really. Wake up, sit down in studio wearing only my bedraggled over sized blue T-shirt. Pick up a needle and thread it. Pick up a bead, and another and then repeat for ten hours – less the time to stuff myself into clothes, shop for food and flowers and have lunch with Weedy. I leave the radio off. I don’t talk on the phone. I don’t check email. I am happy. I even like the weather – below normal temperatures, rain, fog. It’s all watercolor lovely and hushed.

Happy begins yesterday. The Scorpio is visiting in the morning. “Ten, ten thirty,” he says. At 8:30, I’ve had time enough to clear the debris from the coffee table, dump the dishes into the dishpan to soak. I've just barely stepped out of the shower when he arrives. “I had to come early,” he said. Uh-huh. And here I am with Hair By Showercap, clutching a towel around me and dripping on the rug. This is more chagrined, sopping woman than sexy, I assure you. “Take your time,” he says, with a big magnanimous grin, thoroughly entertained by my discomfort.

What the hell, I wasn’t going to be dressed for long anyway.

****Interval****Shot of Scorpio putting jacket on****Shot of hands moving on clock****

I slide into the afternoon – where the story “arc” begins to flat line. I pop in a DVD of Running with Scissors and watch it. Twice in a row. And I loll, boneless and lazy. I loll eating ginger snaps. And then I loll drinking wine. I loll right up to bedtime.

I reflect on the week of not complaining. The one big challenge – a three hour, no coffee break meeting, followed by training to change computer tables. Mute squirming on my part through the usual overextended, rambling off-topic blah blah. I note that while I am not complaining, one woman is. I perk up. Oh good – someone to study. She starts by making a relevant point, but it swiftly descends into a pinched thin monologue about how much work she does and how much is still left and how really, it isn’t even worth it to take two days off when you have to face that when you come back. I’m absolutely fascinated listening to her. I sit up straight in my seat and pay close attention. I know it’s exactly how I sound when I complain. And it’s horrible. We are on item 3 of a 16 item agenda, and we’re an hour into the meeting and she is not clamming up.

I decide to extend the not-complaining experiment for life.

Talking to Weedy on the phone, I say, “It isn’t that hard. I don’t complain as much as I thought I did.”

“That,” she replies, “is because we don’t care about much anymore.” And it’s true. At least it’s true of the bullshit things I used to think were important and worth worrying about. There’s something to be said for telling yourself, when your thoughts start to shove you front to side to front, that you might only have a day, a year, a decade left.

It is enormously cheering and makes complaining seem a little ludicrous.