Monthly Archives: December 2011

The Futility of Desire, or; the Phantom of the Oprah

I have had an unprecedented amount of unrequited crushes in my life. It kind of sucks! I don’t know what’s wrong with me that I keep picking such unattainable women to fall for. I often wonder if it’s because subconsciously I don’t feel deserving of a mutually loving relationship. There’s got to be something going on! Sometimes I wish I had a real counselor and not just a psych nurse.

I was doing alright for girlfriends between the ages of 19 to 23, then it all kind of petered out and I ended up falling in love with women who became friends and nothing further over and over. I’ve had an unrequited crush for four years at a time sometimes. That’s a long time to be romantically preoccupied with someone who doesn’t even want to have sex with me! Oh man.

So you can understand why I feel like desire is totally futile.

I wonder what will happen to me the day it ISN’T futile anymore? Will I have a really hard time adjusting to being with someone who really wants me as much as I want them? Will I get all scared because it hasn’t happened for years and run away as fast as I can? Will I get all jerky and crabby to drive them away? Will I get stressed out because I am in love and go insane? It’s worrisome.

But not as worrisome as the alternative, which is that I spend the rest of my life alone continuing to get unrequited crushes and feeling depressed like the Phantom of the Opera, which I almost spelled Oprah. Yes, the Phantom of the Oprah.

Here’s something to make you cry, it’s from Post Secret about sad love.

I am tired of sad love. Well anyway, enough of this blogging for now, now I am off to keep slowly moving all of my bedroom things upstairs to my new bedroom. I will think of a good New Year’s Eve blog to end the year with!

New Years Re(s/v)olutions

I am doing my annual hunt for worthy New Years Resolutions. For the first time in years, quitting smoking isn’t on my list, because I already HAVE quit and I just have to stick to it. It’s been over three weeks now, and I am doing much better. I did dream again last night about smoking, but I just brushed it aside when I woke up and it hasn’t bothered me.

So OTHER resolutions. Well, I do still want to exercise more. My mom and I are planning on going to the leisure centres to do Aqua Boxercise this year. I hope we do it, it would be so fun! I only did it once last year, pretty silly since I had a leisure card.

I should commit to doing my laundry more often, it would make me look a lot less shabby. Shabby lady! I am going to otherwise care for my grooming more. Like not walking around with bed head all day anymore. And being sure to brush my teeth twice a day. And flossing, which I was going to try and do last year but I forgot.

Intellectually, I think I need to commit more time to reading. I need to read a variety of things too. I don’t know what kind of goal to set around reading. A book every two weeks sounds about right. I will need to get my library card ship shape then, because I have really bad fines on it. UGH!

Creatively I am going to stick to my goal of making two videos a year. I will be done this Super 8 film in the next couple of weeks, and then I have my butch video I will hopefully get a grant for. I am also going to be applying this year for production funds to make Bunnyhug. I hope I get some cash! I really want to do my feature and it’s not like Telefilm is going to give me any money before I have made a feature. It’s so complicated. You must produce a feature to be eligible to get money to produce a feature. ??????

And I am going to keep trying to get into good writing habits of writing everyday, even a little bit. Not necessarily always in this blog, but writing anything, bits of my novel, a short story, a poem, a grant application, whatever. I must increase my output!

My big challenge this year though is to accomplish 6 sober weeks from that thing I love. After 6 weeks I am going to re-evaluate how I am doing from where I began and decide if I am going to stay clean. I have meant to do this for a really long time. If it turns out I am doing way better, then I think I will try to hang on to my clearness. I’m also very curious about how it will impact my creativity, since that is my most important aspect of my life being an artist and writer. And if it will allow me to be more productive, which is also important. It’s all an experiment. But it’s exciting.

The thing I have worried about is how irritable I know I will get and wondering when I can expect it to end. I don’t want to be a bitch forever. And I don’t want to fuck up relationships (not Relationships cause I don’t have one) with friends and family because I’m withdrawing from weed and am all crabby and jerky. I wish I could write a big disclaimer and stick in on my forehead, some kind of apology in advance. It’s probably what I am worried about the most.

Quitting smoking has made me think it’s more possible to quit weed for a while anyway. I’m still obviously ambivalent about giving it up forever, but at the same time I know I would save a lot of money and probably feel way better. Who knows, maybe even the amount of psych meds I am on would go down. Maybe I could even go off Risperidone. That might be nice, then I could do mushrooms again. Ha ha, I’m kidding. Am I? O.o

You can find magic mushrooms on lawns in Surrey!

Aw, I still remember that time I did mushrooms and they worked. That was so fun. Oh man. That was that magical winter before I went crazy and everything went to hell. Damn.

I’m going to be busy this year. I’ll be in Germany for a month this summer if all goes as planned. I will also be in Australia at some point for a couple of weeks. And then when I get home I will find out if I got my production grant for Bunnyhug. AAAAARG! I hate that, it’ll be the third summer in a row where I run out of cash just before finding out if I have a grant. HOWEVER, if I work really hard at advertising and doing sales calls, I might have enough clients for my business that I can earn a living on my own. And then I won’t have to worry, because I will already be booked up for work in August. That’s the only way to save myself! I have to plan for this way in advance, because the last two summers have been shitty for being broke ass Thirza in August when all the fun events happen in Saskatoon like the Fringe and the Exhibition and Folk Fest. And I don’t want to have to stay home again.

All of this, of course, means that I absolutely must not have a manic psychosis this year. Or at least wait until September to have one. Ha ha, no, none at all! Nyet!

If all goes according to plan then fall 2012 will be spent auditioning and location scouting and so forth, and then I will be shooting my feature just before the Solstice. When the WORLD ENDS AND THE ALIENS LAND!

And then I will apply for post production funding, and end up waiting until August for the fourth year in a row.

Oh man!

I am coming up with new coping mechanisms for holiday stress!

This Christmas was different for me because while I drank, I actually didn’t drink that much. I had two drinks on Christmas Eve and maybe four drinks on Christmas Day, spread out over several hours. I felt a lot better. I was clearer and I dunno, it was just nicer.

I also avoided smoking even though all my cousins were smoking all around me. I have cut back on my nicotine lozenge intake too, which is good, I am just forgetting to take the odd one now and then. It’s just happening really naturally. I’m not even thinking hard about cutting down on them.

Oh Jeez I just stopped the wiener dogs from attacking Beatrix Kitty! Poor Beatrix Kitty! :O

But it worked out better this year. Except for my alcoholic roommate problems. My cousin got spectacularly drunk on Christmas Eve and it pissed me right the fuck off. I am just getting sick of dealing with this shit in my own home. Once he’s gone I think we should make a commitment to only live with other females. Without drinking problems! Oh man. I never grew up with alcoholics in my daily life, and I’ve been fortunate enough that my roommates while I was an adult didn’t have drinking problems. So this is all new to me. And it’s just going on and on and I don’t see him ever getting sober, to be honest. And I am now worried it is impacting my stability, because I need a stable home life to maintain my sanity! And I really don’t want to end up in the hospital again. Twice was quite enough!

Damn.

I hate this.

If he doesn’t quit or leave I might have to move out. Something has to majorly change, it can’t keep going on like this.

So that’s what I was thinking about all of Christmas day, and I looked on Kijiji for pet friendly housing and the rent was like 850 in this different places and up. Shitty. Right now I pay 500. And for the next six months I am only making 1000 a month. So I don’t know what I am going to do.

And Mister needs a backyard where ever we go, and very few carpets.

It’s a mess. I know Steven needs a good place his son can come and visit, but I also need a stable house without some drunk bothering me every five minutes and drinking all my booze because he doesn’t know when to stop.

Once when I got screened for drug and alcohol problems, the results said while I had problems with marijuana, alcohol use wasn’t a big issue in my life at all. And alcohol abuse and being a pothead are two very different things, I have discovered. Potheads just get laidback and sleepy and hungry, but alcoholics turn into different people. SUCH different people. It’s like Dr. Jekyll Mr. Hyde kind of stuff. It’s weird!

That’s why I don’t like it.

Addiction is weird.

Well anyway. Today I am going for coffee and doing some knitting with my friend Daniel. I have gotten really into knitting, and I have finally knit enough that I feel like maybe I will have a scarf by February. Plus I will have someone to talk to about this terrible home situation

Stressed to the Max! UGH!

I can see why so many people kill themselves this time of year. UGH! It is majorly stressful. And it is like this every year. I want to celebrate Christmas away from the larger family. There are too many of them and they get in my space. My Uncle, Auntie, and two cousins are spending Christmas in Jamaica. I think they have the right idea.

The problem is I just don’t know why we do Christmas. It’s supposed to be a big family thing but it’s just all messed up and so much has to be done. And I don’t like doing the work of entertaining large groups of people and being subjected to family judgement. Blah! Fuck that! I am so sick of Christmas. 33 of them is quite enough.

And there are too many invitations to things, and I am not going to be able to see every one, and I am already pretty much booked up for social events until the 27th. I am also stressed out by the sheer cost of Christmas. It worries me. I am going to be glad when my Christmas is just me and two other people or something like that. All day. No hordes. No family drama. No people bitching at me like I am bitching to you about how stressful it is.

I still haven’t smoked! 😀 I am feeling good about that. I love not smoking! I had a dream I had cigarettes last night. I didn’t smoke them, but I looked at them and longed for them. It was a weird dream. BUT I refused to let myself smoke them, even though I was totally subject to the whims of my subconscious. It’s been 2 weeks, 2 days, 8 hours and 3 mins since I quit smoking. 😀

I have hated Christmas for a long time. Not the actual holiday, just all the expectations that surround it.

And this Christmas we are doing renovations. It’s really rough. So much going on in our house.

And Sky will be home, which is always a lot of work because she is special needs. I just don’t understand why the family expects mom to do so much work to entertain them at Christmas when she also has to look after Sky.

It’s always been like that too. They’re going to stress her and me out so much we have heart attacks. In fact I should just rent defibrillators every Christmas from now on.

Aaaaaaaah! I want to run away!

I will find some Christmas cheer after another beer. I am just going to drink myself through the holidays. Like regular folk do when they are stressed out.

Mind like a hamster wheel *squeak squeak squeak*

I have awoken from a HORRIBLE sleep! I forgot to take my night meds at first and by the time 2:30 rolled around and I was still up, I went upstairs and took them. I fell asleep half an hour later, but then mum woke me up to look at Maeshowe at solstice (I slept a little more so I actually missed it) and then I missed out on getting a full eight hours.

So I am going to be crabby today.

I think I am finally falling out of love, which is GOOD! I’m tired of being treated badly and I’m tired of her attitude about me. She’s got these weird ideas of who I am that don’t match up with how I see myself. Or I didn’t see myself that way for a long time, and then it kind of leeched into my soul and tarnished my vision of self. I don’t think it’s good to love someone who doesn’t think you can do anything. It’s much better to love someone who thinks you can do amazing things.

So I still don’t know who I will fall in love with next, and it doesn’t really matter. I can be a whole person without a girlfriend. My psychic says I will end up with someone for the rest of my life, so that is good to hear. It just troubles me, this fear that I will end up with someone emotionally abusive again. Or any kind of abusive really. Because that kind of shit sneaks up on you. I have this theory that you can tell a lot about a potential mate by how they treat people in the customer service industry. If I’m on a date with someone and they yell at some customer service rep, I’m out. Not interested at all!

Steven seems to have gone back to his partner. I don’t know if he is still living with us or what, but we have to rent out the basement when it is finished. I hope he doesn’t go back just to get kicked out again after we’ve gotten a new tenant. I don’t know where he would go.

This Christmas we are having a ham! I love ham, I am so excited, we hardly ever get ham. And turkey is kind of lame, it dries out so fast and there are too many leftovers. At least with leftover ham you can cut off a slice and fry it up. What can you do to reheat turkey and make it taste good? Mum always puts turkey on bread with gravy, but I’ve never been a fan of that combo.

Last night I dyed my hair Hot Hot Pink by Manic Panic! I’m so happy, pink hair, pink hair! I wanted to dye it earlier but my horoscope said not to make changes to my appearance until after the 13th. And it was good to wait, because I found out I am getting income assistance and don’t have to worry about a job job.

I really want my business to take off. I had to crack the whip on the logo designer because I’ve been waiting for it for months and I really need it so I can get business cards made. It’s kind of fucking me up actually.

My cousin Sharlene is spending Christmas eve and Christmas morning with us. I’m kind of excited to have her here, should be fun! We’ll watch Auntie Mame on Christmas Eve and then go to bed and wake up for presents, stockings, and mimosas, and then cap it off with a great big brunch with blueberry pancakes and bacon and pork sausages! I love Christmas morning because it’s when my little family does our thing, without the whole big family being around.

Well, what else? I am crabby. I should get over it, but sleep deprivation doesn’t make me a very happy person, it kind of fucks with my moods actually. Sucks! 🙁

Life Under The Harper Government just before Christmas

The basement is so close to being finished! And after Christmas I get to move up to the ground floor and have a bedroom with giant windows. WINDOWS!!!

Christmas is less than a week away! Sunday! OMG! I still have to get my cousin something, although I am dubious about whether he will get me anything. I know what I am getting him, but my Mom called me an enabler so I might get him something else. Depending on how much it is. He didn’t come home last night. I don’t know where he is.

Beatrix Kitty likes laying on her back. She’s doing it right now, all flopped out beside me purring. She’s a cute cat, I like her. She went through a terrible phase when she was a kitten, but all kittens are terrors.

Today in three hours it will be two weeks without a cigarette! 😀 But today is really rough. 🙁 I am having terrible thoughts of going out and getting a butt to smoke, which is ridiculous because there aren’t even any butts or cigarettes in the house, that’s why Steven left last night. The temptation is really bothering me, especially since I read COPD screening questions at the clinic the other day and noticed I had two of the warning signs, coughing up phlegm and shortness of breathe. But my breathing is actually pretty good, and I think I am just coughing up phlegm because my lungs are cleaning themselves out. At least, that is what I am hoping.

Either way I know if I keep smoking I am on the path to getting COPD and it terrifies me. I don’t want to be all gibbled because of a dumb addiction that made me feel guilty for years. I just hope it’s not too late for me. And I hope these urges to smoke go away. For most of my quit I have had a pretty good time of it, except for a handful of days when I really thought about having a cigarette. It was funny, I would feel really vulnerable to a relapse for about a day and then the next day I would be on top of the world, looking down on creation! So I know these rough days pass. But damn it is hard. Still, every time I feel the trigger to smoke and I don’t give in, I am deprogramming myself. And that feels good. They say quitting smoking is a process, not an event. Much like coming out of the closet I guess.

Speaking of coming out of the closet, I have realized it is a lifelong process. I come out a lot, but sometimes I just forget until it gets really awkward. It makes me realize I could go back in the closet just because of someones heterosexist mindset. I wanted to just make an announcement and be done with it and have everybody know. But no, I have to keep asserting it. Imagine being heterosexual and having people you meet constantly think you are queer, it gets annoying! Being presumed heterosexual is so bizarre. And it’s especially awkward when I have to shrug off sexual attention from clueless straight men, because they have that whole idea that lesbians are doing it just to turn them on. UGH!

There’s my rant for the day. That will be five cents.

No, there is more I want to write about I am sure.

I am a bit concerned by how many people I am supposed to buy Christmas presents for now. I really liked it when I just bought for my mom and my sister, and now people are telling me to buy for a whole bunch of people and I just can’t afford it. Next year I am going back to my rule of only buying for my mom and Sky. I don’t really care about a big Christmas. And I’m not even Christian! I should celebrate the solstice. The earth is tilting back towards the sun and the days will get longer again, that’s reason enough to celebrate.

It’s been unseasonably warm this fall/early winter. And there is hardly any snow. And I am being governed by a corrupt government which denies the very real fact of global warming, even though it is fucking with our arctic. Just because they can get some money out of the tarsands, which by the way uses more oil to produce a barrel of oil. SIGH! And I also disagree with fracking, I think it will increase earthquake prone regions. Even the US Military gave up fracking because they knew it was causing earthquakes.

Canada is going to shit. And we have four more years of this, and the NDP is being so damned quiet since Jack Layton died. We’re the opposition, we should be doing more, it seems. We need someone who’s brave enough to stand up to the bullies in our government. And we can’t even call it the Canadian Government anymore, now it’s the Harper Government. So fucked up.

I’ve really gotten into knitting these days. It’s a skill for the apocalypse! LOL! We’re days away from 2012, and there are still people I know who think something big will happen. I don’t know what I think. I definitely think things are coming to a head. I can see civil unrest happening in Canada with this government that doesn’t listen to it’s people. And I know aboriginal people in Canada are really getting fed up with the racism and racist policies directed towards us. Racism is abuse. It’s not funny and it’s not merely an opinion, not when it is entrenched within government through things like the Indian Act. And it keeps me from reading the comments section. It seems like everyone in Canada is a racist if you just read the comments section.

Stayin’ In on a Saturday Night

Knitting is awesome! 😀 I got tips last night from my friend Daniel and now I can do stitches a lot faster and easier and my tension is much better. I doesn’t take as long to do a row now, which is making my tiny scarf finally progress. I am taking a break now to look at facebook. But I am going to knit again after I finish this post.

I don’t have a knitting bag, so I am keeping everything in a liquor store bag. I hope I don’t get mugged when I am walking around with it. I’m sure someone would be really disappointed to get unfinished knitting instead of booze.

I heard it is cool to knit, is that true? I wasn’t trying to be cool. My grandma and mum knitted, and I kind of always wanted to learn but thought it would be terribly complicated. Plus I really need a scarf. I need a hat too actually, maybe I will make one after this scarf is finished.

It’s really relaxing to knit. It’s kind of addictive.

It’s way better than smoking anyway, I wanted to do something else with my hands after I quit.

I have still quit! Not a single puff! It’s been really positive. Some days are hard, but I have gotten through them. When I had a dream about smoking I had a bit of a rough day, but I still didn’t smoke.

My psych nurse told me that the addiction workers who run the dual diagnosis group here are really good at helping people resolve ambivalence about sobriety. I am kind of curious to talk to them about it. My ambivalence is legendary!

I’m so tired! I can’t believe I woke up and stayed up all day. I was fretting in my head since the drama of Thursday, but I have figured out how to deal with it in the future. So that’s good.

Tonight we went shopping for christmas stocking stuffers and presents. I know what dvd I am getting because I picked it up and said “OMG!” It’s Disney’s The Sword In The Stone, which is REALLY good! And I have never seen a copy of it since we last rented it at the video store when I was a kid. Maybe Kristjan will like it.

I’m staying home tonight, last night I went out and got really drunk and now I just want to sit at home knitting or in front of the computer while either drinking a pepsi or sucking on a mini nicotine lozenge. As I have gotten older, nights in are beginning to look more appealing. It’s saving me money, that’s for sure. Plus I am a little better at bedtime and night meds when I stay in. Sometimes I forget to take my night meds when I have been out, and usually my bedtime is way later too. But also some nights when I stay in I write until 2am.

I’m so tired! I think tonight will be an early night. The basement is getting renovated for Steven to move down there, and we have to paint it this weekend. I am in charge of painting all the trim, as in baseboards. And I also have to go through each board first pulling out the nails with a pair of pliers. I’m dreading the nail removal rather than the actual painting. Painting is kind of fun. Pliering is kind of suck ass. And I think I just made that word up.

I have no money coming in until January. I think I am going to take a break from my favorite thing just for financial reasons. I can’t afford to go into debt over my stupid addiction. Although weed at Christmas would be really nice. Or am I using it medically? I don’t really know. A break wouldn’t hurt me though. I might get crabby but that’s about the worst thing that would happen. Hopefully I don’t get too crabby. Apologies in advance!

I really need a shower. And to brush my teeth. And to have a pee. And to put on deoderant. Tomorrow we put up Santa window clings and the tree with Kristjan! We have been saving it for when he comes over. I love our atheist Christmas tree. It’s all santas and fruit!

Speaking of Christmas, both Mum and I want to change how we celebrate, or not celebrate it. It costs way too much money. And it is really stressful. I think it will be much more modest as the years go by. This year she is only giving me a stocking, but she gets really good stuff for our stockings. And I don’t really need a present too.

Hmm, maybe I should go shower and generally clean myself up and then make a hot apple drink and knit for a while. That sounds really nice actually. YAY for staying in on a saturday night! I LOVE staying in on Saturdays!

I MUST MAKE SOMETHING EPIC!!!!!!

I got funded from Saskatoon Tribal Council!!!!! 😀 I am getting six months of income support while I work full time on my business. I have to write a report in three months and then another report at the end of the six months. And go in every month to sign a paper for expenses so I can get paid.

I’m pretty happy. I found out on Tuesday and today I finally got to sign my paper for January’s money, so I called my worker this afternoon and cancelled welfare. YAY! I am not on WELFARE ANYMORE!!! I can make money and not be sneaky! Whew, that’s good because I got four hundred bucks from a screening this month! I love when random artist fees come in.

In a few weeks, like maybe three weeks, I should know if I got my Sask Arts Board grant. I hope I did, otherwise I have to rearrange my whole residency in Hamburg. But so far I have had some money luck, so I hope it continues.

Grandpa and I were in the backseat of the car and he started singing “Meewasin, meewasin, meewasin soniyas!” and taking out some money to give to Mum for Sunday dinner. In English that would be “Beautiful, beautiful, beautiful money!”

I think I am going to sing that song next time I get money!

I’ve been thinking seriously about making an extremely low budget feature film from my screenplay Bunnyhug. I think I still look young enough that I could play the lead role, which would cut down on actors fees. I think I could do a bare bones version with minimal video equipment and spending most of the budget on actors and crew. It’s a film about extremely poor people too, so locationwise it shouldn’t be too difficult to find a set. I’m not needing a mansion, that’s for sure! I think that is what my next grant application at Canada Council will be for. And if I did a feature with Canada Council money and it was moderately successful (as in finished) I could go on to Telefilm money for bigger projects in the future.

I just think I really want to make narrative feature films, and I may as well start now. I have a whole blueprint for a movie, and it entertains me when I read it. It’s a love story but really it’s about insanity. I think it’s important. And funny. Funny is good. And I know how to use my camera and I can edit and I can direct and act (actually I am a decent actor). Who knows, maybe I can even rent my mom’s basement apartment for a couple weeks to shoot in.

It’s ambitious, but I think I can do it. And I’ve been thinking about this project since 2003, I’ve planned all kinds of things about it. I know how I want lines delivered and what I want the set to look like and props I will have to collect. I know all their interior motivations and I’ve plotted how the edits will go.

Plus I need a big project to work on. I made a documentary feature, but I really want to get into drama. And who knows, maybe it will set the stage for me getting Telefilm money for Mars: The Maiden Voyage.

So that is what I am thinking about.

Monday I will get my footage back from the lab. That reminds me, I have to call and book the projector for Tuesday! And my video camera still needs to be cleaned, dammit! I will have to rent a mini dv video camera from PAVED for a day. I should have done that volunteer work, then I could have gotten production credits.

Tis a crazy life, to be a presently sane filmmaker.

My mom and grandparents went to my Uncle Doug’s company lunch today. It was nice, I was sitting across from his cameraman and we got to talk shop.

Oh and I have to buy some sharpies.

I think it’s gonna be a good little film.

There was some drama in my house the other day, my cousin’s ex/still sort of girlfriend yelled at my mom, in her own house, the nerve! It pissed me off. I like having a happy home and I really resent people bringing negativity into the house. And verbal abuse is not to be tolerated. UGH! It brings me back to being concerned about who I end up with for a partner. I don’t want someone who makes me feel bad.

Then Mom pointed out that someone I like makes me feel little and small. And I thought about it and I was like “Holy shit, you’re right!” It irked me. I don’t like feeling little and small, because I am not. I have a decent career, even if I have not made a million dollars off the back end of a five minute short. And I am doing things all the time.

But the other concerning thing about the verbally abusive episode in my house yesterday is that I don’t want someone elses bad attitude to negatively impact my stability which I have worked SO FUCKING HARD ON for years! I’m not interested in being some unstable person’s punching bag, or for my mother to be the punching bag either. It really upsets me. Stress isn’t good for people with bipolar disorder, and it has precipitated my episodes in the past. So after living with mom for over a year and falling into a decent living arrangement, I don’t want everything to get fucked up and higgledy piggledy! Aw fuck I think I spelled that wrong, oh well.

I saw my psychiatric nurse a couple of days ago. She wants me to approach the Partnership through the Schizophrenia Society to do public speaking with my mom about my recovery from bipolar disorder. I think I am going to do it. I could do like, five talks a year or something. I could do more, but I am going to start off reasonably.

She also told me she thought I was very gracious when I was all overmedicated and in a group home for months. She thinks that I might never have another big episode if I stay on my meds, and continue to do other things that aid my little brain, like getting proper sleep and eating right and stuff.

I really hope so. I don’t think I could handle another manic episode, I would feel like my whole life was unraveling all over again.

Hey hey hey it has been ten days since I had a smoke! 😀 I am doing good! I’m really committed to not smoking this time, yesterday I sort of hit a wall and kept thinking about smokes, but I persevered!

Dream a little dream of you

Tomorrow at 2:30pm Saskatchewan time (which isn’t on daylight savings time so it always switches between being Central and Mountain and I never remember which is which) it will have been SEVEN DAYS since I quit smoking! My first whole week smoke free! It feels pretty good. I have one nicotine mint when I wake up and then my coffee and lunch and another nicotine mint and then a drink of pop and then another mint a couple hours later. It’s going well. I’ve been feeling pretty positive about it and my self esteem is even improving, which is nice. I feel like shit about myself when I am a smoker. Because I know I shouldn’t do it and most of the time didn’t even want to do it but I had to do it. Smoking, yuck! What a terrible addiction!

My sense of smell is coming back, and hot apple drink tastes SUPER yummy these days. But I think the biggest change I have noticed is I don’t have cold hands and feet anymore. My circulation has improved immensely. It’s nice to have something substantial like that to appreciate about smoking cessation.

So aside from that, I am still waiting to hear from STC. I helped put up the christmas lights today. I saw my sister tonight at her group home and she fell asleep while I was hugging her. Last night I read almost all of the articles on Quit Smoking at About.com. I had a crazy weekend but it was fun and positive.

Rejection sucks ass, but I am feeling better about myself these days. I harbour hope that one day I will have a totally healthy life long relationship with someone. I don’t know when it will happen. But I don’t mind being single. I’ve had some flirtatious action in the last few years at least, so it’s not like those other years of NOTHING! They just fizzle out like dud firecrackers though, my little flirtations. It’s been a weird pattern but maybe I should be relieved, like it is keeping me from being in relationships that wouldn’t make me happy.

Still I do worry that my relationship skills are totally out of practice. And my parents split when I was two so I never grew up around a relationship, like the day to day aspects of a relationship. I feel like I am kind of making it up as I go along. If I was still living across from a Chapters I would probably go sit in there and read the self help section on communication in relationships and stuff.

Maybe I am also thinking of this because of my cousin’s relationship, which I have been observing ever since he moved in with us. It’s not a good scene. It makes me think about my past relationships and how long I would try to withstand cruel behaviour just before it all unraveled. I think to myself “Oh if only I had had a backbone and would just have confronted them as soon as they starting saying mean things!” I think, from what I have noticed, people sometimes (well, often) gauge how badly they can treat their partner before their partner won’t take it anymore, and if they can get away with treating them like garbage then they WILL!

Oh man, that is really pessimistic.

My first real girlfriend lived in Toronto while I was in Vancouver, and only talked to me on the phone once every two weeks. Even if I would call her wanting to talk a week later because something came up, she would keep it to every two weeks. And that went on for a year and a month! Now I look back on it and think “Oh gawd, how controlling!”

So I get crushes and then later on they kind of fizzle out after I start noticing weird behaviour or other indications of possible relationship drama. And I’m not talking mental illness, I could date another person with a mental illness, enough of my own friends are really nutters anyway, one more nut wouldn’t wreck my world. I just mean people who like making people jealous and that kind of weird gamey behaviour. That’s what I can’t stand.

Red Flags is what I’m talking about!

I am wary.

Because I don’t need a girl to make me feel like a loser! I can feel like a loser all by myself. But BLAH! Who wants to feel like a loser, nobody, that’s who!

I am very highly suspicious of people who want their partners to change fundamental aspects of who they are. I think you should love someone for who they are, not for what you want them to become. People’s growth and change comes from a core within themselves, they have to want it for themselves. They can’t do it for other people. Even if EVERYBODY wants them to change! I don’t believe in interventions either.

Well, I think I am going to get away from this confessional blog and go make myself some Hot Apple Drink to take to bed with me, where I will finish reading about butch and femme and maybe jot some totally embarrassing feelings about a certain someone who will remain nameless in my journal. Which is almost ALL WRITTEN IN! I started it in April 2008 when I moved into the coop! Hundreds of pages and many deep dark secrets later I am almost DONE! I have eight pages left. I am going to have to go diary hunting this december. Either that or write in that cute Marlene Dietrich book I got, but I don’t feel as secure about the binding of it for a long term document like a journal. I am very fussy about my journals.

Party Hardy, withOUT ciggies!

It’s now been well over three days that I have been smoke free. It’s going well, but right now I am partying and there are cigarettes around and I have already been offered some but I am holding fast to my obligations not to smoke. I quit with the beer a few hours ago and am just drinking water now, but the partying continues and with it so do the urges to smoke.

What it really is is that this is the first time in a long time that I have partied without smoking. I have to learn how to do it without reaching for a cigarette.

My Super 8 made it to the lab and should be here in time for Christmas. So I will have lots of time to draw all over it. Yay!

I’m feeling positive about my life. I think I’m going to be okay. I just need a little more direction. I have some shows coming up and I am producing again and my creativity is reviving.

Being diagnosed bipolar really kicked my career in the ass. It took a long time to learn how to live with it. And it always takes a while to recover. From those BIG episodes. Sheesh. It fucks me over for about a year.

But it’s been since 2007 that I had a big episode, so I am glad. I value my mental health.