Janie is currently car-less and she lives a ways away so it was harder for her to make it over to clean all the things.  I spent night after night coming home from work and doing things.  So many things.  I did so many things in those weeks that there shouldn’t have been more things to do BUT THERE STILL ARE.  I could still do things if I gave a shit anymore which I don’t.  I’ve done too many things to care about doing more things.  I THINK YOU UNDERSTAND ME.  NO MORE THINGS!

One of my final THINGS before listing photos were taken was to clean up the yard.  It was still winter and cold and there was a lot of rain and snow and other reasons I didn’t want to be outside, but those things don’t matter or care about your deadlines and dreams. And by your deadlines and dreams, I mean mine.  Obviously.  I met with one of our agents after work and then set out to pull weeds, scoop poop, trim some bush (heh heh), mow the lawn, etc.  You know what I’m getting at…yard work!  It’s all the same!  The only hitch was that is was now 7pm and pitch black out.  The patio lights, though functional and bright, only illuminated the patio, not the yard beyond.  So I had to get a construction light, plug it in and carry it around with me as I scooped dog crap into a baggie and pulled weeds and cut a bush back with scissors from Ikea because WHERE THE HELL ARE THE CLIPPERS!?  Up until then I don’t think any neighbors noticed the creeper wandering the yard with a construction light but then it was time to mow.  And weed whack.  And I couldn’t do those with the light in my hand so I did them under the cloak of night.  If anyone looked out they would have seen a shadowy figure running an electric mower over the two sprigs of grass  and were probably thinking – SHE HAS FINALLY LOST HER MARBLES.  To which I say – HA!  THAT WAS SO 2010.  When I gave the condo keys to the agent the following morning so they could get in for photos, I warned him…If it looks like I weed whacked that grass in the dark it’s because YES I DID.  They only used one outdoor photo in the listing and in it was not one stitch of yard.  Whoopsie!

The good news is that after only a weekend we got an offer, and then we negotiated a counter offer because we are adults doing business.  This is exactly what I thought being an adult would feel like when I was growing up…talking with people and saying no not that BUT HOW ABOUT THIS?  And then we win and everyone gets ice cream.  I guess the only difference is that selling a home is lose-lose and I ate that ice cream out of the container while sitting in my bed and crying.  You lose your home and then you lose all your money because the market is crap and people lied when they told you that you can’t go wrong with investing in real estate!  People lie a lot more in adult real life than they did in my vision of adult life.  Also, not as much stamping papers and I don’t have a briefcase.  This is all to say that we have potentially sold our condo, and I say potentially because we need to make it through the appraisal process and an inspection.  I feel less worried about the inspection than the appraisal, not because I think it isn’t worth it, but because how can a stranger know what makes this condo worth it?  Yeah, sure, put a price on property and upgrades, on landscaping and location – but what about my heart and soul, spilled out in every room?  The tears I’ve left in that bedroom the last two years should be worth at least $10,000 to some black magic voodoo wizard.

On my last night of cleaning, I had a minor meltdown.  I was keeping Ducati locked in the back bedroom, away from our freshly and expensively cleaned carpet.  It was late and since I’d been up until two every night for a couple weeks and my foot was killing me because I have developed a case of plantar fasciitis (which is probably one of the worst things ever to have happen to you physically INCLUDING DYING) I was reduced to limping around and dragging my disabled foot behind me.  I imagine myself to have looked somewhat like a zombie, with the glazed eyes, the non-functioning limbs, the tired, mindless wandering into and out of rooms because I forgot what I was supposed to be doing.  Now that I think of it, in those weeks I was either in this slow-moving zombie-like state or else running around like a crazed squirrel, trying to do a skrillion different things and feeling o overwhelmed by the enormity of the task list that I would run from room to room half-finishing one thing before moving to another, then later coming back to do more work until everything was, not even nearly finished.  SO MANY THINGS.  But I digress.  I was keeping Ducati away from the carpet because he has a habit of throwing up on wherever is most difficult to clean.  Carpets, rugs, upholstered dining room chairs, my shoes, etc.  He doesn’t like being locked away like a ghoul, but we are all suffering, Ducati. We all have to make sacrifices.  I opened the door to get in so I could change some light-bulbs and as I did he CAME AT ME LIKE A WILD ANIMAL and purred and brushed up against my arm, and in the middle of this melee I dropped a fluorescent light-bulb that shattered all over the floor and the new area rug, leaving tiny shards of glass all over.  He ran out of the room and Gus, knowing something dangerous had happened and needing to play with his toys in the middle of it, came trotting in.  I locked them both out so I could sweep up the mess, because the vacuum was out of bags and the one I have is apparently so RARE that they don’t sell the proper replacements in the store.  FANTASTIC.  I swept up the shards and sat on the bed for a good cry.  Gus was scratching at the door and I called out to him – Please come back later! – because my dog is fully capable of comprehending my complex emotional state.  After I gathered myself and invited Ducati to come back to be locked away again, I decided that I couldn’t take another minute of consciousness so I went to sleep.  And when I woke up the next morning, feeling fresh and new and full of hope for a better day, I discovered that Ducati had thrown up all over the new rug.  ALL OVER THE NEW RUG.  I will be honest with you.  I considered, in that very moment, whether or not the roughly three-months worth of anti-depressants I had stored away for “just in case” would be enough for me to handle ALL THE FEELINGS I WAS HAVING RIGHT THEN.

While selling the condo is exactly what I’d hoped for, it’s also a really difficult experience for me.  This condo is the first place that I ever really considered my home…a place I had made my own and felt a kind of safety and belonging I didn’t ever have anywhere else.  In some ways, this condo is also a large reason for my being alive.  I know that sounds dramatic, but in the darkest days of my depression, when I couldn’t get out of bed or off the floor, when I couldn’t stop the tears from falling, when I could only tell myself I was the worlds biggest disappointment and failure as a human being, when all I felt was like there was a huge black hole in my chest sucking my life away, when I was hoarding and hiding pills to take and end it all, it was my obligation to Janie and this condo that kept me from letting go.  I didn’t want to make things harder for her by leaving before it was sold.  It was probably the only rational decision I was capable of making in that moment and so I feel grateful for the burden of this building, of the rooms and halls that housed me in that moment and the years before.  Letting go of that is scary both because I’m not sure where I go from here and because the one thing that kept me here in a time when I wanted to badly to leave isn’t going to be there to keep me from doing it again if I ever get back to that place.  It’s ridiculous, I know.  I’m not in that place anymore and I’m healthier and better able to recognize the signs before I get there. And I know there are other things and people who are aware and savvy enough to keep me from finding that place again, but there is still a certain sadness in letting go of this place.  I will miss the walls and the safety it provided for the six years I’ve lived here.  I will miss the memories, some more than others, and I will miss how much I loved having a home I owned and how proud I was to invite people into it.  Some of my life’s biggest lessons happened here and I will always be grateful for those.

If all goes well, I have to move all my belongings out by April 16h.  I don’t have a place to go yet so I’m going to put everything into my car and live on the streets.  Gus, Ducati and I are going to form an inter-species gang and if you want to join us there is a rather brutal initiation involving an ostrich, a potato and a lighter.  We don’t have an official name yet but we’re thinking about FUCK YOU THIS IS OURS or SHANK YOU.  Anyone not involved in our gang is forewarned that the area between my car’s trunk and  front bumper belong to US and any breach of our perimeter will be met with cat scratches, dog kisses and hysterical crying.  Friends will be treated to the smooth sounds of Celine Dion, a Diet Pepsi from 7-11 and a bag of Skittles.  WELCOME TO OUR GANGLAND.

]]> http://uncouthheathen.com/2012/03/27/night-mower/feed/ 2 http://uncouthheathen.com/2010/08/09/briefly-21/ http://uncouthheathen.com/2010/08/09/briefly-21/#comments Tue, 10 Aug 2010 02:23:26 +0000 heathen http://uncouthheathen.com/?p=4326 Oh, you guys. GOD DAMN. I hate painting. We’re getting the condo all ready to list and it’s paint paint paint all the time and in between we do yard work, cry because a) this is depressing or b)  one of us just had a giant glob of paint drip onto their eyeball, we move a 300 pound television down two flights of stairs and then purchase, paint and attempt to install new closet doors that end up being the wrong size and are non-returnable because we are morons.

Then we do about 8 million other things and then we paint some more.

I didn’t write a post about this because it’s another depressing situation that we’ll likely never get over, but a few weeks ago we had to take Harlow and Carson to the Humane Society so they could be found a new home.  Awful awful, awful day.  And when we got there I went inside to the office and it was filled with happy people talking and volunteers helping people find pets to adopt and take home.  Then there I was, crying, asking about where I go to drop off two cats and suddenly the volunteer who cheerfully and loudly greeted me would only speak in hushed tones.  She hunched over and pulled me aside and we sat crouched in the shadows, hiding from the happy adopters and she told me…NO NO NO…the next building is where you drop off animals.  This is for adoptions.  YOU ARE TOO SAD TO BE IN HERE.  GET OUT.  So we found the drop off site and after some paperwork, we walked out the door and drove away.  I miss those two fuckers every day.  Even Carson and the constant peeing.  I wish wish wish that they’ve found a good and happy home.  So now we have Gus and Ducati,  who keeps looking around the place and meowing.  If you listen closely you’ll hear him mumble to himself,  “What happened to all our hos? WE ARE MISSING SOME HOS.” Gus doesn’t care…it’s guys only now.  GUYS ONLY.  Guys time all the time, and that’s the best time.  GUYS GUYS GUYS. Sledgehammer!

In other news, I have contracted the plague from my sister who was selfish enough to comfort and hug me when I was crying in the middle of her yard sale a few weeks ago, therefore passing on her hideous germs and infecting me with the worst cold the world has ever known.  My good friend XUP likes to make light of my hideous affliction but she doesn’t know!  SHE DOES NOT KNOW THE HORRORS OF WHAT IS HAPPENING TO ME EVEN AS WE SPEAK.  Disgusting things.  Snot the likes of which you would not believe.  This weekend I coughed so much that I threw up in the shower.  Earlier today I coughed so hard I peed my pants.  THIS IS A SICKNESS OF THE WORST KIND. Luckily Janie and I no longer touch, so she’s safe from the horrors, but I know that if she makes me mad enough I can cough on her toothbrush while she’s at work and GOOD DAY TO YOU, LADY.

In other news, I’m thinking of getting one of these for Ducati:

Hmmm…I think that’s about all.  It’s all house bullshit all the time around here until we get this place on the market.  Keep your fingers crossed that we sell it fast and for 8 million dollars because I would enjoy having millions of dollars.

Long ago humans were of three sexes.  Those of the sun were male-male beings stuck back to back.  Those of the earth were female-female beings stuck back to back.  Those of the moon were male-female beings stuck back to back.  They each had two heads with two faces, four arms and four legs.  At one point they tried to scale the heavens and attack the gods.  The gods feared their strength and debated whether or not to kill them, but they did not want to lose the worship of the humans, so Zeus came up with another plan.  He decided to cut them down the middle to decrease their power.  After the split, the halves sought each other out and threw themselves into an embrace, longing to grow back into one but never being able to.

“And such a nature is prone to love and ready to return love, always embracing that which is akin to him. And when one of them meets with his other half, the actual half of himself, whether he be a lover of youth or a lover of another sort, the pair are lost in an amazement of love and friendship and intimacy, and one will not be out of the other’s sight, as I may say, even for a moment: these are the people who pass their whole lives together, and yet they could not explain what they desire of one another. For the intense yearning which each of them has towards the other does not appear to be the desire of lover’s intercourse, but of something else which the soul of either evidently desires and cannot tell, and of which she has only a dark and doubtful presentiment.”

Before this, human beings did not know love.  The separation of our two halves gave us both the capacity to love one another and the pain of separation and longing.

Oh, pretty.  Right?  Look, we’re all wandering the earth looking for our other half and we’ll find them and everything will be rainbows shooting out of our asses and sunshine and stars and magical magic and birds singing.  HAHA.

WRONG.

Love is a bullshit.

THE END.

1. Do not make it more complicated than it has to be.  By this I mean DO NOT MAKE IT MORE COMPLICATED.

2. When you chip out those tiles in the bathroom shower stall, don’t wait two years to fix it because when you get divorced and you have to sell your home it will only make it more stressful to deal with these kinds of repairs and by stressful, I mean expensive and by expensive, I mean it will cost more money than you have and it will MAKE THINGS WAY MORE COMPLICATED.

3. Also, save those old shower fixtures because that guy who retiled the shower will not accept the fact that you threw them away two years ago and will call you eight times at work to ask where they are and if you can please go look and find them so he can match them with a replacement.

4. Your real estate agent should never be involved in any way in your personal life.  IT WILL ONLY MAKES THINGS MORE COMPLICATED.

5. It is a BAD IDEA to scream at your ex “Well I guess you can get out of this condo when I’m dead!” Or something to that effect.  I can’t remember the exact words that crazy person used just then.  And yes.  That crazy person might have been me.  Maybe.

6. If you have been blocked from leaving your home because someone thinks you’ve gone too crazy, do not escape down the rockery in your pajamas and a pair of flip flops.  This will only makes them appear correct.  For the record, I didn’t DO IT, I only THOUGHT ABOUT IT.  So I wasn’t too crazy, I was only slightly crazy.

7. THERAPY.  YES.

8. If someone says they can’t handle one more thing, it’s probably best to believe them.  Just sayin’. If you don’t believe them, or don’t listen, be prepared to deal with the consequences.  And by consequences I mean #5 and #6 and some other select things that may include hysterical crying, yelling and all that stuff about your mom.

9. Do yourself a favor and make sure everyone else understands they don’t know the entirety of the situation and should not assume things happened for one reason or another, because they’re wrong.  No matter what they think or say, they’re wrong.  Even if only a little.  Because they can’t know.  Wrong.

10. WRONG!

11. DO NOT SLEEP TOGETHER EVER AGAIN.  See #1.

12. MEDICATION. YES.

13. CIGARETTES AND BOOZE AND CANDY. YES.

14. Just say what you need to say:  “It’s not me, it’s you.  You really are a bitch-whore.”

15. I’m just kidding.  You shouldn’t say that.  It’s okay to think it, quietly, when you’re sobbing in your bed at night, but not out loud, people.  NOT OUT LOUD.

16.  You will feel feelings you never imagined were possible.  You’ll feel them all times a million.  Then you’ll cry, breakdown, why? why? why?, you’ll admit things you shouldn’t and you will accuse people of things you shouldn’t.  You will forget to accept certain responsibility for a while, but then you’ll be able to, later on, when you’re drunk. So you can forget, but it’s still out there and they’ll probably remember unless they’re drunk, too and then it’s 50-50 and hopefully you’re both drunk enough not to remember the sex you shouldn’t have been having.  Get dressed and go to your room before she wakes up!  NOTHING HAPPENED HERE.  I don’t know what you’re talking about.  I got this hickey on my thigh from a gardening accident. WHY ARE YOU IN THIS SHOWER WITH ME?

17. Vanilla Lip Smacker will make the misery taste better.

18. Let’s just put it all out there in one big honest summary: YOU WILL BE ALONE FOREVER AND NO ONE WILL LOVE YOU BUT YOUR MOM, DAD, SISTER AND BROTHER.  AND ONLY BECAUSE THEY HAVE TO.  Oops!  Sorry.

19. That’s not actually true, but it will feel true for a very, very, very long time.

20. No, you are NOT getting back together.  No.  NO.  Maybe.  NO.

21. If your ex comes home wasted at 1100pm and throws up all over her bedroom floor it is okay a) to laugh at her b) to help her out and clean up the puddle of puke c) to let her sleep in your bed as long as you reassure her you won’t try to “put the moves on her”  and d) to cry when she says “GOOD BECAUSE I’D HAVE TO TURN YOU DOWN and why is Family Guy so funny?”

22. Family Guy is pretty fucking funny.

23. Maybe Carson peed on her comforter.  Maybe it was you.

24. I guess she’ll never really know.

25. Just keep swimming.  You’ll either find dry land or get eaten by a  shark but, either way, YAY!

First things first.  Janie and I are doing really well, all things considered.  We’re broken and sad and lost but managing to find our way through to something good.  We’re getting along.  We’re talking.  We’re managing to spend time together and make one another laugh.  We have to live together until we sell our condo so we were forced to find a way to get past the bullshit of a break up and develop a strong friendship.  It probably happened faster than most other people would have let it happen, but we didn’t have a choice because the only other option was to have World War III in our house every day and neither of us could have handled that.  We have worked really hard to talk and share our feelings and thoughts and to listen to one another; to attempt to understand what the other is dealing with.  It’s been hard, sometimes Janie has wanted to punch me in the face, but we’ve managed to settle into a comfortable place I like to call:

The only thing that’s different is that we sleep in separate rooms and everyone keeps their clothes on and we don’t touch, ever.

Things are so good with us, in fact, that I’ve got person after person asking me if we’re getting back together.  It seems logical…we manage to have fun, joke around, we love one another, we enjoy one each other’s company, we talk, we share stories, we live together, we still have a lot of the good things that made our relationship beautiful and strong.  We have each changed for the better and we continue to do so.  We developed new understandings of ourselves, our relationship, one another and what we want and need and what it is that caused us to falter and break.  But this does not make coming back together a good idea.  In fact, it is exactly why getting back together is a bad idea.  We’ve managed to get rid of all the crap that tore us apart, by being apart, and to get back together would likely bring much of that right back.  The truth is that we broke up for some very, very good reasons.  We let go of such a beautiful and massive and special thing, of an entire life, because it wasn’t possible to make it work.  It ended for very good reasons and it stays over for those same reasons.  We both know that if we tried again, as good as it may be for a few weeks or months or maybe even a year or two, things would slip away, we would still be who we are despite the changes we have made and continue to make, and we’d be right back in this place, only more broken, more hurt and likely never able to stand being around one another because it would be too much to go through all over again.  We stay apart because it is the very thing that will keep the remainder of our relationship special and beautiful and it will keep the massive amount of love we have for one another intact, though change it from a partnership to a friendship that I know will last for the rest of our lives.

Throughout the last eight years, Janie and I have said that if our relationship ended and we broke up, that was it.  There would be no break up and get back together, break up and get back together.  We had seen what it looks like, we had seen the hurt and anger it can cause and we both knew ourselves and one another well enough to see that it wasn’t something we were ever going to let happen.   Neither of us have ever believed that it should take ending our relationship to make it better, that breaking up should be the one thing that jolts either of us awake enough to change what would need to change so we could then get back together and try again.  It was never going to work that way and I do feel a certain amount of pride to see that we knew from the start that if and when this day should ever come, we’d only do it with the very firm belief that it was the best thing and that it was forever.  We knew that the only way things would end is if they were irretrievably broken and though to say that and to be it has been inexplicably hard, to know we’d never make such a decision without being certain is a comfort.  We know we’d never mess around enough with one another’s emotions to make our relationship a yo-yo, of a falling apart and coming back together; that we’d have enough respect for one another and ourselves and what we spent so long building that we’d never let go unless it was something we believed we’d never be able to save.  I am not saying this is how it should always work.  Absolutely not.  I know people save their relationships every day by falling apart and then managing to pick up the pieces, get back together and make it work.  I just know that we were never that kind of couple, and we knew from the start that should this day come, we could rest assured that it was the only decision we could make and not have to spend months and years debating whether or not we should have stayed together.  There is a certain sense of security in knowing we would never be here unless it was absolutely right and that neither of us would make a decision to end things unless we were certain it was the only possible decision we could have made.

This is also not to say that we haven’t discussed the possibilities.  We have seen many couples get back together and asked: if they can do it why can’t we?  But those questions never linger more than a few moments and we remember everything we’d always said and everything we’ve been through to now and realize that we’re in such a better place in so many ways and this is how it was meant to be.  Hard and devastating as it may be, and will continue to be, it is the best decision we could have made for ourselves and one another.

Along with the knowledge that ending our marriage is the best thing comes a lot of very difficult and painful emotional work.  There is not one day where I have not felt devastated by the idea that my entire life has crumbled to the ground and I have been left feeling completely alone.  This is the loneliest I have ever felt in my life, the saddest I have ever been, the most afraid and uncertain.  I am crippled by the vast array of emotions that I could never have anticipated.  Janie and I spoke last week about how it is absolutely impossible to come into this situation knowing how hard it will be, how many moments of despair and misery you will face.  They will come and go and come and go and when you think you’re finally getting to a good space, you’ll fall apart.  And then you’ll fall apart some more.  Most days I have a complete and total inability to focus and concentrate on anything for more than five minutes. I am unable to sleep for more than a few hours at a time (but better than the 45 minute increments of last month!).  I cry all the time and anywhere.  The bank, work, at home, at the grocery store, restaurants, coffee shops, therapy, friend’s houses, the car, etc.  I had, for a long while, stopped telling people anything about how I was doing because very often I have no idea.  So I said “I’m fine” and then I shut myself away and I fell apart and felt like I wanted to die.  People would tell me it gets better.  Things will be okay.  It was nice to hear.  Sometimes it was all I wanted to hear, but it was also impossible to see.  Every day is often the same:  sad, depressing, lonely, awful, scary and fucked up.  My sister called me last week and asked how I was doing.  “I just want to die.”  “It’ll get better,” she said.  “Every day is the same.  Every day I want to just disappear, ” I said back.  It’s complicated.  I just want to curl up so tightly that I cease to exist, that the world stops, that everything stops happening so I can make sense of something.  I want one thing to happen at a time but instead a billion things happen all at once and it is so overwhelming that it renders me incapable of moving.  I have no idea how I have made it here, two months later.  I have no idea of anything other than the realization that sometime very soon we’ll sell our place and move away from one another and I’m going to lose my shit again and it will be just as hard as it was before and, maybe, worse because I certainly don’t feel like I can handle having to fall apart even one more time.  But it will happen and I’ll just have to trust that I’ll find a way to pick up the pieces.