Plathological

Someone Who Works There

Mendelssohn’s piano concertos fell through my mail slot before I’d even had one sip of my sludgy tea this morning. In any case, it was before eight-thirty and my name was on the envelope in block letters. I’d been shuffling down the stairs and the package confused me. I’d completely forgotten that I’d even asked for it. And to think I’d never been a fanatic fan of Mendelssohn’s music--the idealism! The boyfriend that dared to love his scores more than the plinking brood of Chopin and the lonely Bach! Mendelssohn always a bit of an anathema for me--quite possibly because of the moments I associated with him, from the next room: “CAN YOU TURN THAT DOWN, T??? I’M TRYING TO WRITE!!” So loud, each time so loud.

& well, the music ceased to be booming and grinding to me today: andante, presto! Oh, change-o! This concerto was different and what I needed: three cups of tea, two cups of coffee and the entire first section of the paper read in Chinatown café before work. What warrants a story to be placed in the In Brief section? It breaks my heart--international death, detainment in side-bar snippets. I haven’t truly read the paper in months, no longer a subscriber, and afterward, the Whole Day a bit sad and hanging, berries on the bottom, Mendelssohn gone from my thoughts. A few words on death and autobiography at work today. And trips to meet it, or both. Tired from what I’d been reading and what I’d been writing, I did the Rodin and got some white ink on my elbow today. Placed some clear tape on my shirt to protect what I was working with. It’s good to be listening to music before bed, just as I had listened to it after firstly placing the feet down. Displacing grammar, pardon; I have this complex when it comes to articles, definite and indefinite.

I never claimed to have any practical skills.

One of the Better Ones, FOR SURE.

Oh, & just thought I’d share this with you; shall we go through its stunning attributes? I‘ve highlighted my favourite parts:

DEFINITE NON-SMOKER, non-drinker/druggie. Mature, quiet, clean habits female wanted to share 2-bedroom suite in house. Fairfield. Unfurnished room. Coin laundry. $345 + hydro. Hot water included and partial heat. May 1st.”

I’m going to call and say I’m an obsessive compulsive fruitarian who makes her own cleaning supplies in chemistry class. I will also be sure to use to word "druggie" during said telephone exchange. When the first word of your ad is a fully capitalized “DEFINITE,” it really and truly does make people want to phone and inquire about the place, I mean, seeing as you have SUCH A DEFINITE easy going nature, and all. Pleasant, all round. And good thing it’s unfurnished; I was just going to bring my yoga mat, anyway. It's really all I need.

more, more more.
how do you like it?
how do you like?

Yeah, So: Life In Victoria, Basically!

All right then. So, on Saturday, I am apparently going to be looking at a room that is for rent on a yacht. In Westbay (opposite the inner harbour), private bath, utilities included. How exciting is that? This coming from the girl who used to constantly talk about wanting to live on one of those houses that are literally on the water in Granville Island. Low rent. And also, check out the symbolism (Bulford will know what I’m talking about): it’s in Esquimalt just over the bridge! DAY TRIP TO CARO'S HOUSE! Rent is so much lower than what I’m paying right now. I really do think it meets my bent towards all things ghetto yet pleasantly oddball. It's not at all often when looking at a For Rent ad makes me happy. They usually make me want to drive a stake into my heart as they consecutively offer their oh so stunning glimpses into my future. I hate it when they're in ALL CAPS as well-- will I be shouted at in a like manner once I am renting your little box in the middle of nowhere?? HERE IS YOUR FREE HEAT AND HOT WATER!! WOULD YOU LIKE SOME MORE??????

I’m 100 percent certain my mother will approve of the possibility of me floating away at any given second. Oh yeah, she’s going to LOVE this. “I’m moving to a place by the water, mum. Great view."

ps,

oh yes, and--intense excitement: I work tomorrow! Better brush up on some obscure modernist or Greek & Roman topic so I’ll have something to rant about with employer again. The upside is, the next time some fuckhead says to me, “I just can’t keep up with you, Caroline,” I can respond grandly with, “have you met my employer??” He steals all marches. I feel like I've been injected with air after my shifts.

"This is Sex Without Touching"

The amount of cushions, pillows, and throw-rugs I currently have in my possession would seem to imply that my life is pretty fantastic right now. One day, perhaps soon, I will succeed in this triteness everyone keeps telling me I fail at, again and again. I really do see it as a stain on my reputation. Though I am becoming more comfortable in balancing. Often, this year, there were certain settings where I feared saying anything at all in the presence of others because I was wary of being perceived as too intense, which I've been told is a marked trait of mine. Or maybe that wasn’t what was happening at all. In any case, most of the time, I discovered I started to become a lot more comfortable expressing myself orally if I was drunk. That interpersonal theory originated this last summer; I was in this play that ran for a couple of weeks and I would get drunk before each show and was ecstatic about the secretive drinking process; no one could know what went into me-- dingy pubs with no wine list, or a bottle of Zinfandel or Chardonnay at home. Sometimes Riesling. I seem to recall, now, my shrink being concerned about how much I was drinking at that time and for what reasons. I'm not even sure how to describe last summer--acting and nightshifts, phone sessions with my shrink that often reached the four hour mark. This will give you an idea of how I divided my days. There was also the writer's festival, the di prima workshop in July. Substances, substances. And when I became a forty-something woman named Julie who had a degree in philosophy, specializing in Kierkegaard--I liked to garden, apparently. I also marked things down in my day timer, coffee dates among them. & the unevolved man who was actually willing to give it a shot with a twat like Julie as opposed to binding me to his side--thankfully, of course, everything worked out in my favour because he turned out to be an even greater twat than anyone. God, there are so many men out there that are cripples & so I kind of start to flutter when I see something in one of them, in a very scant once-in-a-while. You can just sense it, and dangerously, it can be in so much as a phrase. It’s like I was saying last night, and I hated to bring it up: men have the problem of either thinking too much with their dicks or too much with their heads. You can tell if a man is evolved if he thinks with a good balance and counterweight of both. The last one I was with was much too tangled in his mind. I just don’t know where his dick went to. And this analysis has nothing to do with sex drive, per say, more so with mode of operation. I should be writing letters to Molly B. every fucking day. I mean, right? What, Dear Molly, what replaces sex? I've told you mine.

Holy shit: where did this entry come from? It’s kind of making me uncomfortable. I find it offensive. Is it offensive in some way?? I've actually, or surprisingly, have never gone to class drunk and I'm really not sure why. Certainly not because I didn't want to. I had big plans for the purchase of a very specific flask, but I never went back to get it. I just found it easier, in the sense of more covert, to carry alcohol around in water or pop bottles--containers that weren’t meant for my purpose, used to be for something else, entirely.

Intent & Amused

I go through these periods where all I eat are eggs and ask people if they’ve ever broken a bone in their body: Oh, really? What bone? Oh, really? How’d you break that one?

Out of body conversations. &: WHAT THE CHRIST IS GOING ON WITH MY SKIN? I’ve treated it with nothing but cleanser, stress and methods of self medication: IT SHOULD BE FINE.

I also have a crush on someone who shares my heritage (which would really help me). He graciously remembered my name after more than two years, even though I honestly don’t ever remember giving it to him. Smiled when he said it. Always a good sign when someone beams as they confirm your name. I’ve been advised to go for it, so as not to waste my time. I actually only ever remember talking to him on one other occasion--which is, all told, a bit weird. It's the connection thing. When do these things ever work out? Like: EVER? & sorry, I just used all my intelligence in a two hour long distance phone conversation. Sorry to bring you to complaint.

Also to mention that this is actually really irritating me. I’d really prefer to know who has a crush on me. It’s always good to know. It’s always better to know. I can't hold my tongue, why can other people? What is wrong with people? I must be ugly again. Again. Foresight! God. no. I AM ugly. I have drunkenly ranted about it before & I'm fully convinced of it now, at this second. And probably tomorrow as well. I'm dropping my lime on the table; it'll probably land next to a glass.

I'm just fawning. Maybe I want sweaty palms. Or maybe I just want to do feminist readings on things as they happen. Here I come, all glow and secret thoughts, again. I had a Cajun chicken wrap at the George and Dragon with my double gin tonight; it was totally unprecedented. I also found a dog endearing. It was probably the way it got itself stuck in a fence, though. That actually says everything you'd ever need or want to know about me (except you'd probably also need to know that I'm ugly), so I will leave you and go to bed: it whimpered, on and off. Coffee will be emotionally brilliant tomorrow. Everything depends on room for cream, to be WCW about it.

I don’t know what the line breaks are; this is very much transcribed from Kicks Joy Darkness: it’s the track I have always related to the most.

"I could have done a lot worse than sit in skidrow drinking wine to know that nothing matters after all to know there’s no real difference between the rich and the poor to know that eternity is neither drunk nor sober to know it young and be a poet could’ve gone into business and ranted and believed that god was concerned could’ve gone into business and ranted and believed that god was concerned instead I squatted in lonesome alleys and nobody saw me just my bottle and what they saw of it was empty instead I squatted in lonesome alleys and nobody saw me just my bottle and what they saw of it was empty and I did it in corn fields and graveyards and I did it in corn fields and graveyards and I did it in corn fields and graveyards to know that the dead don’t make noise to know that the cornstalks talk among one another with raspy arms . . . .

sitting and drinking wine and it really hurts being divine sitting and drinking wine and it really hurts being divine sitting and drinking wine and it really hurts being divine sitting and drinking wine and it really hurts being divine . . . . .to squat in the night and know it well . . ."

Jack Kerouac.

Shifting

This Chinatown job is exactly what I wanted. I have the best possible job for who I am: as a living person.

I was aligning the collars of a pile of Buddha-tummy shirts we’d just manically printed, getting them ready for the box & tally, and employer, standing by my side, says, in a totally serious way, “you have to make them beautiful. Make them beautiful. You’re working for the Pharaoh now.” Naturally, I very nearly lost it, all the creases of the pile, since, of course: do you have any idea how heartbroken I would have been if he hadn’t had said something like that right then at that exact moment??

Talking. And I mean: the whole time, shirts riding a minute forty through the conveyer belt dryer, red ones with bottom folded up for spectrum and dye consideration, tags covered to prevent curling, and talking about water clocks in the Mediterranean, measuring hours by water level, containing time in a bowl.

“Actually, we’re perpetuating the system just by standing in this very spot, right this second,” he said, at one point. Well yes: sips of our bottled water, the scene below.

After the lot of Buddha done, it was time for a break. We went out on the roof and sat beside a towering fuchsia tulip so that I could smoke. It was a very healthy looking plant. We started talking about sources of vitamin D, of which I knew this and that about. Enough not to be interrupted.

“You have to be like a butterfly on this roof; step lightly,” he said as I stepped onto its gravel.
“Why? Is it residential down there?”
“I’m not sure. I mean. It’s human. It’s human down there.”

!

OK, someone just go ahead and try to beat that one.

Shift started off with us standing in front of one of the windows. “See how those blossoms break up the brick?” he said.
“Yes.”
“I’ve been thinking about that scene all morning. There’s something strange about it. It’s very cold.”
“In terms of white balance?”
“Yes. It’s like there’s a spectrum missing. It’s like the yellow spectrum is missing.”
“Which is strange, considering the red of the bricks. It’s like the red is playing a trick. Do you know what it reminds me of? It makes me think of seasonal intrusion--like when spring comes early. Way too early and the colours aren’t prepared for all that refraction.”
“Keep an eye out for the owner of that bike down there. See that green bike,” he asked. “Isn’t it the most spectacular green bike you’ve ever seen? With the fender over the front wheel. It's just such a great bike.”

And that’s my job. Though the bike owner never did show him, or perhaps her, self.

I will get my camera back from the pawnshop soon, some time this week. I feel like less than half a person without it.

having found it

I must repeat this from my best-list-ever below. I think this point is a key of sorts. I think I have had a motherfucking breakthrough:

--she thinks of most men ironically or, at the very least: theoretically--as theories, they are ideas that are expressed either for or to her. this, of course, makes it so much harder when one or two slice through the papertrain in her mind. The trauma alone. she must save herself the trouble.

& why the fuck do I deserve to die for those things? That list is composed of all the things that I LOVE about myself, actually. Why should I give a damn about how that's Viewed by plodding society?? These traits, I'm so fucking happy to have them and know and feel that I do. I am my own evil twin. & I love it.

INTPs generally have the following traits:

--Love theory and abstract ideas
--Truth Seekers - want to understand things by analysing underlying principles and structures
--Value knowledge and competence above all else
--Have very high standards for performance, which they apply to themselves
--Independent and original, possibly eccentric
--Work best alone, and value autonomy
--Have no desire to lead or follow
--Dislike mundane detail
--Not particularly interested in the practical application of their work
--Creative and insightful
--Future-oriented
--Usually brilliant and ingenious
--Trust their own insights and opinions above others
--Live primarily inside their own minds, and may appear to be detached and uninvolved with other people.

So yes, fuck it. I've never in my life held back before and I'm sure as hell not about to start now. I refuse to be terrorized by mundane details, lacklustre visions, & PC sentiments. Goodnight . .or . . morning. godbless everyone, so on. I smooch your very existence. you’ve truly no idea how disgustingly kind I am at all times. but I'll be very disheartened if you don't add to my list. how will I be able to trust someone that doesn't????

Hours

But for real, thank you to God for:

Bulford,
Xavier,
Mariko
Sheika.

You four have been nothing but kind to me, I feel blessed to know you I would give up my life for yours no doubt about it. You'll always have my loyalty, my heart, my understanding. I fully trust in each of your genius. Holy shit you're brilliant not for my words.

Sheika: the grace of your resolve and expression. you constantly do nothing but reach the very core of all things. it's all in the hips. you instantly communicate as I do--flash-by-flash, with me.

Bulford: & the endless song it comes from your eyes that everyone refers to they always refer to you as the boy with the eyes. My christ, your energy and LIGHT. singing in socks. no kidding Xavier loves you; you ARE a song.

Xavier: this is happening, happening, happening, happeninghappening. Song lyrics scribbled in the bathroom. The bravery of locking yourself away and the utter fluidity of your being on stage. the politeness of your strong emotions. your songs make me weep as I walk goddamn.

Mariko: I think you may have had enough of all this! I fear I'm making you blush! And the remarkable pathetic fallacy of your slipping sock. how do you do it why in lord's name are you not publishing novel upon novel how can you not SEE or at least admit to yourself how beyond excellent your writing & your very observations are???

You guys have this mystery and grace of house that you carry with you everywhere, naturally. I've never seen you without it.

I’m fully convinced that one gravitates toward people in this way for a reason. I honestly feel that I can drop anything, but anything from my lips and have it reach your ears. That’s not a small thing.

No part of me feels colonized, or terrorized, or threatened either when I’m around you or when I think of you.

haha! well then, just listen to me go on. It’s just not often that I feel safe, understood or in my element. we’re these elements. no joke for real, a pentacle by the nightstand.

----

Please fill in the following blank:

Caroline deserves to die because she ____________.

I’ll get you started, because I like to think of myself as helpful, if anything at all. I will keep adding to the list as I see fit.

Caroline deserves to die because she:

-- is socially awkward.
-- is a smoker.
-- drinks too much, too often.
-- is too sexually forward for her age and gender.
-- is too forward period.
-- doesn’t know her own limits.
-- is a terrible and useless writer.
-- she hates children. she really does.
-- can’t manage money or her own life.
-- can never be on time for anything.
-- is grotesquely fat. fat fat fat.
-- has little to no respect for authority.
-- can’t lead OR follow.
-- doesn’t internally understand or appreciate in the least the basic values and structures upon which society is built.
-- always needs to be the centre of attention.
-- hates it when people touch her.
-- isolates herself completely for disgusting periods of time.
-- is a histrionic, bi-polar, borderline personality bitch.
--actually gets pleasure out of watching water boil.
--is rather heartless, when it comes down to it.
--flies into unprovoked rages.
--(what’s love got to do with it?)
-- she can’t lie to others but constantly lies to herself.
--she either really likes you or really hates you: there’s no balance or in between in her feelings for other people.
-- she wasn't raised right.
-- she wants to live in a hotel, for obvious reasons.
-- she has learned this about herself in the past few months: she's not particularly interested in the practical application of her work.
-- also: she lives primarily inside her own mind, and may appear to be detached and uninvolved with other people. Actually: she very often is in certain situations. Just look for the glazed eyes. Dead giveaway that you bore her: to death.
--she thinks of most men ironically or, at the very least: theoretically--as theories, they are ideas that are expressed either for or to her. this, of course, makes it so much harder when one or two slice through the papertrain in her mind. The trauma alone. she must save herself the trouble.
-- is pathetic enough to have posted this.

ok: your turn.

I really don’t think anyone’s listening. What do I have to do to get you to believe me????

freezer, Something Like a Home

I have never been so scared as I was for the past few hours. I felt as if all my skin was blue. Beet blue. A really indescribable feeling, most likened to the phrase liquid anxiety. If only it were that easy--a bus stop right in front of your doorstop, five strides away from warmth, a lit interior. Instead, I ran home from the bus stop, realizing it was dark, said, “oh, hello dark,” with what air I could find--to release. Flung open my door, turned my heat up to thirty and threw myself onto some red cushions on my hardwood, weeping, screaming, and snotting, my body frozen with nothing more than cold, actual cold. I felt hypothermic. Realized I really have no one, in any direction. There’s really no one I can call and explain any of this to. Who the Fuck would understand this? Since I’m frozen solid cube-like, my body in premoulded cubes, and can’t tell how much of my hearing has returned.

I can stay in bed for three weeks from this moment on and no one would even think to look for me. I just want some fucking warmth. I feel like I'm a random but somehow necessary page everyone flips through without actually reading sentence by sentence. I don‘t know what I’m doing but I can’t do it anymore.

Everything I said today was true.

People only like me when it’s convenient, for them, of course. Otherwise, it doesn’t matter what you do with your life. When has it ever mattered?? What is all this stuff I am trying to DO and for who and for what and what the fuck in God's name does this thing want from me? Why do I keep working for it? Why am I so inept at working for it? People’s lives seem to have a more or less novelesque sequential order, whereas mine reads more like a short story collection----start anywhere, finish nowhere, re-read or skip over, so much flipping back. Too heavy a thread tying it together, thematically. I’m too horrible. I’m just too fucking horrible a person. So many unexpected things in my place have bloodstains on them. & what the hell am I supposed to do about that? I don’t know how to remove blood. I’ve never known how to remove blood.

A rather interesting way to die, of course, would be overdosing on purpose on one’s drug of choice--cocaine, for example. I’M SO FUCKING TERRIFIED.

I slept for two hours last night. I was too manic to go to sleep until four-thirty in the morning. I was jumping all over my room.

Summer Job, Last Summer (no, for real)

It’s kind of a good representation of being bi-polar, now that I re-examine it.

Wishes

I feel like sitting on a bridge tonight, with some rich wine, and a shoulder. Past dusk, clove cigarettes, dangling my feet over the side, elbows on the rail.

fantasy! In reality: I literally can’t stop eating grapes! So: I’ve stopped myself! I like that the coffee boy in the coffeeshop closest to my house knows me, without knowing me. Tall blonde in an apron--we share Atwood, our love and our rest of her.

another paperclip

That was the second time this semester someone has called my number and asked for Sylvia. It was a woman, this time. I have to stop telling them it’s the wrong number. It’s not, really.

I am very upset with my ear. I am very upset with myself. I’m glad I didn’t bring my Plath journals with me, or I’d probably spend the whole day reading them and identifying, instead of getting any actual work done.

Candy Apple, I Am Quite Serious About It, Or At Least, Serious As a Cheekkiss

amazing the things you overhear-- tense shifts, fundraising efforts. I miss that smug look on my face, drinks that wouldn’t put me to sleep, bodily positions that wouldn’t make me uncomfortably endure, Mariko (&gin), & Sheika (&gin&snow). oh, man: male bashing & disbelief 101. Pat, pat! I have a fem crew all up along and through the west all up in arms and among. These women, smarter than anyone I have the pleasure to know. Well, in anyhouse, it is important to always have things with which to make a platter: cheeses, or poppyseeded mouthfuls, cup of tea or tisane, for starters (to start with).

I would like to thank the dual boyish angels for the single teacup, holding for me the single portion of red wine, allowing me to pencil this & thats/’s on notebook text. Tho’ most of all, use of the chilly-edge of their bed and dip layered to seven, housebound. The fine colourawash film ending with giant, exploding roach for Love. N.B. I really must stop showing that card-- that child-immigrant photo of myself so randomly-- someone is bound to dash off with it, my name spelled differently on either side, letters ordered differently each time they’d flip the card. I’d be pleased for them to pocketkeep if indeed the lips'd stick with the one they couldn’t pronounce as well, but just as well, my, when is it ever. Then what will I do if I need to prove I live in this country?

To James Bonding in James Bay, saving me from my cough with drops and chamomile, and valiantly searching for an open door through which to develop my film, for actually dancing with me to in the jungle, the mighty jungle the lion sleeps tonight at the gay bar with my biotic cement limbs cementing, redyellow.

&, perhaps, proving my ability to boil water, covered. Just, too just. Nothing will change, the rate behind itself.

What does it mean that we keep seeing that red-lipped straight girl with the cutely perfect butt everywhere, aside from her living up the stairs those stairs I've never seen anyone go up, or down--stairs always vacant, save for my eyes on them--fixed (when not on the black wooden owl, bolted to the building nearly across from us all), above The Box; she’s no good to either, or any, of us. Her sex and sexuality wrongs us, collar turned up, inspiring fashion.

& so, daylight has been saved? Apparently. If't were that easy for us---an hour forward here, another back there--salvation, & after: nothing bigger than an elbow in our ear.

"your father was a drunk and your mother had eyes only for other men"

& please go to Bulford’s (updated!) site right now to download his Karen Kain song before I start prostituting myself on Douglas for ten bucks a pop out of desperate desperation and sheer lack of self control. Post haste, you magnificent punks, you. Do it to keep me from getting herpes from Swan Lake.

like The Bulford says, "it's a song about you, but really not." Word. I'm all for semi-dedication, in all senses of the text. I heart you, blondie, I really do. room-fer-cream. haha! YOU’D LET ME SWALLOW MY ALCOHOLIC TONGUE WHILE IN HALF FOETAL POSITION SLEEP FOR JEWISH-MADE SCHNITZEL. oh, man. Poem for you: upcoming.

Kosher!
Kosher!

I HAVE THE BROTHER I NEVER HAD!!!!!!!! :DDD

I send my love out to the sexiest couple on Fisgard. <3<3<3

Over a week of not updating, but living on foodbank peanut butter and frozen bread and simply, but simply not being here, but everywhere else. A week of drunken, freeforall Scrabble with Joy at the house of Lindsay in Oak bay (Thursday, 24th), being kicked out of the gay bar with a heart anxious Bulford (Friday, 25th)---falling into alcoholic coma for three to four hours after said expunging (oh, absinthe & fireball, the marriage of blackout), the launch of the student lit mag at Lucky bar (Saturday, 26), and after the launch: a night of music after music (everyone there living with the ability to make sudden song) with Mel & Bulford at the Gladstone house-behind-a-house. Strangely enough, I was serenaded, classic bluegrass style by a special guest. I think I felt slightly enraged to hear my name dropped into a song, verse after verse. The reason for that-- I am still lukewarm on. I think it had to do with familiarity; it was like having my eardrums, not to mention The Core of My Soul, raped, from across the room. Though, there was singing and strumming of Cohen’s Suzanne, and that defies genre, and quite possibly, serenade as well. I hadn’t drunk a drop all night, serenader folding a blanket over me when my eyes finally closed for the night from the pot cookie I had. Sunday the 27th was a dinner party at Joy’s: seafood pasta & garlic bread, served with a cute side order of Ben and Priscilla, Queen of the Desert. I've obviously left a hell of a lot out; feel free to spank me for omission, if there's any sort of problem, regarding. I HURT MYSELF ON THE OUTSIDE TO DEAL WITH THE PAIN ON THE INSIDE (“That’s not funny,” Bulford would say. Yes it is; look at the scars on my arm, bitch. It’s fucking gut-wrenching). So: can you hear the drums, Fernando? Help me out here. Bring the oar.

I fully realize that people who google “spank” and “help me” are now going to stumble upon this site. Stumble and leave me comments. Comments that I will somehow add to one of my short stories, with fragmented, manic glee. GLEE.

THEN ON MONDAY I CONTRACTED THE MONSTER FLU AND SPENT ALL DAY IN BED.

ON TUESDAY I RAN OUT OF POETRY WORKSHOP TO VOMIT IN THE WOMEN’S WASHROOM, AFTER WHICH, I WENT HOME DURING THE MIDDLE OF CLASS AND SLEPT FOR THE REST OF THE DAY.

ON TUESDAY NIGHT I DEVELOPED A DEBILITATING EARACHE WHICH MADE ME LOSE MY WILL TO LIVE: HOW MUCH CAN ONE WOMAN TAKE?!!!?? I CRIED. I SOMEHOW FELL ASLEEP (THREE AM) AND THE EARACHE WAS GONE IN THE MORNING, BUT I COULDN’T HEAR OUT OF THAT EAR BECAUSE IT WAS SO PLUGGED AND STUFFED AND WHATNOT.

So, after one of the best office hour meetings with a prof ever (my sublimely intelligent poetry prof gets a big checkmark of glowing approval!), I WENT TO SEE A DOCTOR. “Your ear is pretty red,” Doctor said. “You have an ear infection. I’m prescribing you an antibiotic.” I went downtown to fill my prescription, but didn’t have any money to pay for it until the next day. I was convinced I would go deaf by then, on account of my dire poverty. Insurance only paid for half the medication.

And, since glorious Thursday, I’ve been taking three antibiotic capsules a day at regularly spaced intervals like the good little authority following girl I am. In any case, the redyellow capsules have helped me discover the phrase, this isn't even cynicism, it's pure bionics, all ON MY OWN. FUCK YOU, SHAKE & BAKE.

Today was actually fantastic: I made myself the best omelette ever (and I pride myself on my ability to make omelettes), drank pot after pot of tea, listened to Chopin all day and wrote. That is the life I love. That is the life I want to lead. I have said it once and I will say it again: I never feel so balanced as I do when I spend all day on my own with plenty of time and a story in front of me. And my ear is slowly unplugging itself. I was very worried about it for a while there since it took me nearly forty-eight hours to get any sort of medication into it.

I missed Woolly Mammoth tonight, because of this illness. Someone, please make it up to me. I hurt, on the inside. With peel-off butterflies on my cabinetry. I wait for the flutter.

In other news: why am I receiving unsolicited snippets of air-fairy internet advice from people I've never met? Oh, yeah, because apparently, blogs somehow magically represent The Whole Person at all times and every moment of the day. Oh, realism, you kill me, you really do. Let me pinch your cheeks for being such a newagey irritation. NB: Fuck Off, & thanks for the dimestore. Because really: I haven’t been that offended in a long, long time. & I'm a pretty hard person to offend.