Cab Rides and Coco Chanel

I have had to take our cat, Gambit, to the vet a few times since we got him… initial check-up and vaccinations, his booster shots and getting him fixed. Since we don’t have a car I’ve had to take the cat in his carrier in cabs. For some reason this is when I’ve had the most interesting conversations with the cab drivers.

Cabby: Cat?
Me: yes
Cabby: what name?
Me: Gambit
Cabby: Gamble ?
Me: umm, yeah
Cabby: Mr.? or Mrs?
Me: Mr. Gambit
Cabby: Mr. Gamble. Mr. Gamble work at casheno?
Me: (in my head, oh Casino..) hah, yeah…

That conversation was mostly amusing because of the guys accent. The next one was one I had sort of been waiting for but still was incredulous when it happened.

So I had just picked Gambit up from being fixed and was a little preoccupied with him. I told the cab driver what we tell all cab drivers “I’m going to the Hamilton hotel” It’s
a) the easiest way to get where we want without confusing someone who doesn’t speak english well
b) it’s only a few blocks from us and it’s usually not worth it to direct the cab up a few switch backs to get to our front door and
c) even if I knew my street name or house number (which I don’t) the cab driver couldn’t find the place anyway because their street systems makes so little sense that they are actually in the process of switching it to one that is more clear.

We start driving and I roll down the window (like I usually do in a cab) and
he says “the lello lain, chinese, very bad”
Me: blank stare
Him: Lello lain!! very bad!! *pointing out my window*
Me: oh okay
Him: Shut window!!!
Me: (oooooh, yellow rain form China) I roll up my window. It’s not even raining yet. It’s over cast- yes. Raining- no. Also your cab smells like smoke which is why I opened the window asshole, I’m pretty sure that will kill you first. (obviously I sat in silence, but thats what I was thinking).

SO, I told him ‘Hamilton hotel’ thinking I would do what I’ve done before (when I had a cab full of groceries or the last time I took Gambit home form the vet) get close to the Hamilton then tell him one more block, turn left etc… usually there isn’t much of a problem but this time, This time we’re getting close and I say ‘Actually, go one more street and turn left’ and the cabby stops the cab at the intersection, tilts the rear view mirror so he can look at me (and all I see are angry eyes from him) and starts raising his voice at me telling me I should have told him sooner and blah blah blah. As if you would know where you were going if I did sir! I was pissed! But just said “okay” in as level a voice as I could and repeated ‘Next block, turn left’.

*** I came home and started putting away my clean clothes***

Does anyone else have batches of clothes? I don’t mean that as in “I have a ton of clothes” but like, you buy things in bulk and or multiple colors. I learned this habit from my mother who in turn learned it from my grandmother who probably got the idea from Coco Chanel who was once quoted saying “If it fits, buy it in every color” and we did.

I apply this mostly when I find a cut of clothing that works particularly well for me. I then look at all the colors or washes available and either buy all of them, or only most of them. I mean if something really, flawlessly works with my body making me feel like a million bucks. So I end up with a batch of shirts, or several dresses or a few pairs of jeans or a dozen or so of the same cut of panties.

That being said, when say, a batch of tank tops, gets too worn I suddenly have a huge gap in my wardrobe. My point was….umm, oh sometimes I can get away with buying new of the same cut from the same brand, but more often than not something is slightly changed and isn’t the same awesomeness I bought before. Or sometimes they discontinue something all together (*cough Express sweaters and VS panties cough*).

I then have to search for the next awesome cut and hope they have a lot of colors and or keep making it. Ultimately I didn’t have a point to this post, but I noticed some of my tank tops are getting a little worn out and I’m already dreading when my favorite (discontinued) pantie batch dies. So…what do normal people do?

Not Sad

When I think of my divorce, I don’t think about the person I was in that relationship with. I think about the way it ended- so suddenly. I think about how I had poured more of myself than I had to give into a relationship that didn’t want to continue existing. I couldn’t see that it was over, maybe from the beginning, the thought never occurred to me. I tried so hard to keep that marriage afloat but the other person didn’t want to be on the boat at all.

What I think about most is; after I was told it was over. I had to be told. I didn’t give up, but I knew that as soon as it was said, there was no hope for the marriage to continue. So I just stopped. I stopped trying. I stopped loving that person (if what I thought was love, Was love, and I’m not so sure it was). But I also stopped living. I stopped sleeping. I stopped tasting my food. I stopped dreaming. I stopped closing my eyes.

After he told me it was over, I knew exactly How over it was. It was completely and solidly over. Aside from a few text messages or emails to get some details taken care of, I never saw him or heard his voice again. Maybe he thought it was kinder. Maybe he was scared of me and whatever wrath he assumed I’d have. (I was never angry) Maybe he was just selfish. He was always selfish.

Of all the things I thought during my months of nothingness, I never thought ‘I want to go back’ or ‘I miss him’. I only questioned myself and my flaws. What I had done wrong. My faults. All the things I must have done wrong to end a marriage. I also mourned for the life I thought I had and the family members I had lost (his family) and I missed our cats. I still miss the cats but I accept that I’ll never see them again.

I only think of him and what we failed to do (have a lasting marriage) because of the love I have now. Somehow, after all the months of false living, of not facing myself, of running away from my thoughts; one day, I started living again. It was small and slow at first, but it was completely my own life. It had been so long since I had lived for just me, that it took me a long time to relearn. But I did and just in time too, because almost the day I decided I was fine again and was happy with me just being me I found someone who was happy for me to be me too.

This man, Justin, learned me like he had a secret code book. He knew me from the first moment our souls touched. I didn’t have to explain who I was, he already knew, I didn’t have to tell him how I felt or what I wanted, he already knew, I didn’t have to tell him to be careful of my heart, he already was.

Impossibly, after I was still warm from my person fires of hell, I was met on the road of life by someone who was walking at my pace. I never dreamed that there was someone outside myself who could know me so well as Justin knows me. I never dreamed I could love someone so completely, I love Justin more than I’ve ever loved a person before. I never knew I had so much to give and still feel so full of love.

Sometimes I worry I have scars, I don’t know about, that will ruin what I hold dear to me now. I worry the past was not destructive enough and will somehow destroy me again. This time for good. I finally accepted that what ended was not because of me, was not my fault. If something happened to end the life I live with Justin now, how could I walk away faultless this time?

I try to tell those thoughts that they’re silly and a) nothing will end the love I share now with Justin and b) only the thoughts themselves are destructive and I carry nothing bad from the past forward. I only carry what I learned about myself.

I like to picture my life as stepping stones across a deep pond, each stone is needed to cross, every experience is necessary in order to reach the next step. I would not be who I am today without everything I learned (about myself and others) from my past. I would not have been ready to meet my Justin and I may not have been capable of loving him so deeply. Maybe I would have been too scared of loss and too self absorbed, but with hard lessons learned I was ready to meet him and walk forward next to him forever.

oh, it's you again clouds

I feel like I’m resisting something, very strongly. I can’t tell exactly what I’m pulling against, but I can feel the strain on my body and in my mind.

It’s a weight, it drags on me from day to day, sometimes it is lightened- mostly by good company. Mostly by my Justin. But even with his help, it still exists. It’s not his job to make me give in or win against the something I’m resisting. If I don’t even know what it is, how could anyone else?

It feels familiar too. That’s almost the worst part. Maybe I would be frightened by this sensation inside myself if I didn’t know it from before. But I’m not scared, just weary. Like clouds that have rained, cleared away for the sun to shine through and then come back with more rain; ‘oh, it’s you again clouds, I thought you’d gone for good this time’.

It’s like I’m tied to a giant box and I have to drag it behind me, uphill. I can’t see what’s inside but it’s heavy today. I was going to say it’s like being chained to something out of sight in the darkness that I’m pulling, but it’s not that ominous. It’s just heavy.

There are almost no other emotions attached to this pulling, this struggle, this resistance. Just the weary tread of someone who has pulled this box before and knows just how long the road is.

I am craving something. Deep in the very extreme center of myself I lack some vital something. If I only knew what that something was, maybe I could get it. Work towards it. I’m not afraid to work, hard or easy, long or fast. If I know what I’m heading towards I would work. But I don’t even have a direction. No compass to guide, no stars to read, no map with a hint of where to go, no breath of air with the smell of the sea, still miles away, for me to follow.

How do you find a direction to go; to find that something which you don’t know anything about- only that you need this something. Need it like sunlight and like food. Water and air can keep you alive. But you need a fire to Live.

I want a jet pack or flying car

Technology does not yet work the way I think it should work.

Don’t get me wrong, I am blown away by some things. Like when I had Skype on my computer- cool, BUT then I had video chat Skype on my cell phone!? That was a good day. Or when I saw the video quality of the ipad? amazing. The internet browsing power of the ipad? not so much.

I just want everything to work together all the time without many multiple log ins and non-compatibility issues, oh and I want all my date to be accessible from anywhere, secure, backed up constantly and searchable. How hard is that?

I think there are ways you can do what I want, mostly, but some of them are very complicated (not to mention expensive) and need a technician (or just a really techie person) to set it up (and maintain).

I don’t want to worry about lost data, ever. And I just want to watch videos in high def from Justin’s computer in the office on the TV in the living room without worrying about band width.

Just work already! It’s the future right?

P.S. what prompted this post was the fact that my smurf village (app) started over from scratch for no reason. I was at level 19 too!

Nosey Neighbors

I’m pretty sure a)our upstairs neighbor is moving and b) that I’m turning into a grumpy old lady or similar.

A) there is a truck outside that is rather larger (that’s unusual for the narrow basically one way streets in this city) and it says ‘Crown Relocation’. Since I’ve been told that our neighbor is British, the letting on the truck makes sense to me.

There have been some unanswered questions about our friend up stairs. We call him Chris (because that’s what his internet wifi is named… unless he’s ‘unicorn’ and we’ve been guessing wrong all along.) We can’t tell who or what else lives there with him. At one point I was sure I heard small feet running around, maybe the child was just visiting. And it’s hard to tell sometimes if the cries/screeches are from a child, a cat or a parrot. Also I saw two dogs on his balcony one day and heard barking for a week, but not before or after that week. Then I was outside yesterday and heard dog whines, but nothing else. Mysterious indeed. You can always hear when he’s running the water and if he closes a door or closet, but no voices or music or any other sound really come down (which is good).

My parent suggested that I go up and introduce myself, and if I needed a prompt that I should ask him if his oven burns/ fails to brown cookies (alternately) like ours does. I’m never sure when he’s home and when I DO hear him I’m usually in bed trying to sleep.

B) I’m turning into a grumpy old lady. I am that neighbor that looks out my window but doesn’t want to be seen. I’ve also thought about posting notes on our neighbors door for various reasons, but never have because I’m not That far gone.

Since the gate (that we share) to the street got fixed so now you can buzz people in without having to go out and open the gate; it’s been harder to close. You really have to slam it, it’s loud, but if you don’t it just drifts open again. I wouldn’t really care, but a small heard of old Korean women wandered into our yard today. The gate was mostly closed, but not enough to lock, and these women just pushed the gate open and walked in. I can guarantee that Chris nor myself know or invited a heard of old Korean women over. But one even came up and knocked on the door, not like ‘are you home?’ but like ‘is this thing locked?’. I wondered how much entitlement these omas had, would they really wander into a stranger house and poke around? yes, I think they might.

*Oma: old Korean woman who is not shy about anything. she will blatantly push you out of any line she thinks she should be at the head of. she will cut in line. she will touch whatever she wants to touch, even if it belongs or is on someone else. she thinks because she is old that she can do whatever, whenever she wants.

I thought about going outside and herding the ladies back out the gate, but I realized they would leave faster if they thought no one was home. So I waited until they were gone then went out and slammed the gate with more force than was really called for so they would hear the gate slam. I’m sure it didn’t shame them, but I tried.

So, to my immense irritation, about a minute after I slammed the gate at the Korean omas and went back inside- a Korean worker from the “Crown Relocation” truck came out and duct taped the gate open (there’s a post the gate rest against when it’s open). I couldn’t really go out and cut the duct tape and slam the gate again, our neighbor (essentially) opened the gate and that was just being rude. I didn’t mind slamming the gate on random people that wander into my yard but its shared property so it stays open. And I double locked my front door.

We also have two cats that basically live across the ally at a near by house. I have been trying to lure the cats into OUR yard so I can enjoy cats without having to really look after them. At first I didn’t think the cats could find a way in (high walls, iron spikes, etc). But the black and white cat has somehow found a way in and I’ve seen her twice. I left out water and Justin put out some lunch meat but she doesn’t seem interested. And the one time I tried to open the back door and call her, she bolted. But now I dream about black and white kittens. I wonder if she has a litter somewhere.

PS as I’m sitting here writing this ANOTHER PERSON I DON’T KNOW HAS RUNG THE GATE BELL (my gate bell) but Chris must have buzzed her in, or the gate wasn’t closed again (the truck is gone). She walked in to read the meters on the side of the house. My kitchen window faces a wall so I leave the blinds open most of the time, but the meters are right below my window. So I’m sitting on the couch in my PJs writing and this woman can see me. SO not happy about this.

If ONE person taps on my window (instead of knocking on the door) because they see me and it’s faster than knocking on the door or something I’m going to lose it. There are only a few things I really hate 1) people that talk to me through doors, such as bedroom, bathroom etc. If it’s closed you knock and wait until I open the door or talk to you first. It just makes the door and privacy seem so false. 2) on a similar note, knocking on windows or talking to me through a window, goes back to the privacy thing. I have to feel secure when I’m in a private room or my home. 3) people that are crewel to animals, but we’ve already been over that. Sure there are lots of other things that bother me (people that never stop talking, smokers, anyone who thinks they are more important/smarter than you, fruit IN things. I like fruit and I like things that people usually put fruit in, but I don’t like them together. etc) but there is almost nothing that puts me on the defense faster than someone invading my personal space by ignoring my privacy.

failing at social skills

It’s snow/raining here. It was sunny and actually pretty nice this past week. I was talking to my parents the other day and they asked ‘how’s the weather?’ instead of quoting them the temperature I gave a description of the way the sky looked and how you needed a jacket but only when the wind blew. but even then your hands were cold all the time no matter what. It only struck me as an odd way to respond a few hours later.

That happens to me sometimes, I’ll answer someone’s question and a couple of hours later I wonder if I actually answered the question they asked me.

The apartment is fixed. I mean, pretty completely. It was getting a little ridiculous for a while there. The landlord and workers would come over every week and do one thing or another. On the one hand I’m grateful that everything was taken care of so quickly and without me having to pester the landlord. On the other hand every time she was due to come over I felt like she was the ultimate mother-in-law coming to judge me and how clean I kept the apartment. I would always be in a fluster to clean everywhere and take all the trash out before she came over, I was never sure what part of the apartment she would want to look at next.

But in reality she never said anything about how clean or dirty things were or anything negative at all. It’s just one of those social anxiety things I guess. They are unpredictable in me and one week a situation will freak me out and the next I’m as cool as a cucumber (or visa versa).

So now the apartment is quiet during the day. Justin has been working extra hard, so he doesn’t come home quiet as easily as before. It’s fine, but it means I have to relay on myself to set and keep some kind of a schedule. At least when I was home in Texas I had to get up to feed my cat but now the only person I take care of is myself, and sadly that is the person I’m most likely to neglect.

It’s not that I actively neglect myself, but I do forget to eat lunch often. And I’m more likely to clean the kitchen than take a shower. then of course I realize Justin is due home soon and I haven’t changed out of my PJs yet and I have a rush to shower, change and make it look like I’ve done something productive that day, but few things feel productive to me when I look at them at the end of the day.

I should call the few people I know more often, I hate to think that my friends here (all two of them) think I only call them when I need something, but too often that’s how things turn out. That and whenever I make plans with one girl in particular, Kirsten, I keep accidentally being a total flake. Like, stood her up for lunch one day flake. I NEVER do that. I felt really bad about that one. Now I just don’t call her at all because I keep being flaky and I’d rather not set myself up to be that girl.

Other than failing at social skills I’m doing well. I’ve actually gotten a fair amount of writing done. It’s mostly mass that needs to be edited, but at least I have something to edit.

My new distraction (from the distraction of shopping) is walking to the mail room. It’s hella far from our house, and it gives me a small quest that gets me outside and walking around. Hmm, I actually sound pretty lame, lol, I think most people secretly are but nobody wants to admit it.

Oh! Justin and I have been cooking at home more and actually we do a pretty good job. We only had some trouble with small steaks, but we’d never cooked red meat before. It started one night because I wanted Italian food and we went out. The food was editable, but it didn’t taste anything like Italian. We actually run into that problem a lot, food doesn’t taste like what it says it is. They really just don’t have a grasp on the different seasonings. Anyway, so Justin said, we can do better than this. And we cooked some damn good Italian food.

Dogs and Cats

I’ve been thinking a lot about dogs recently, and not so recently. I have probably been thinking about having a dog of my own since I moved home from college in 2007. I lived on campus and having something that barks was unthinkable, though my roommate and I did consider having a contraband cat. We needed some type of pet and both loved cats, but we didn’t end up getting one. I pet sat a cat over one summer that I stayed at school, but I was constantly nervous that someone would find out.

When I graduated and moved home I was back in a house with my own cat and our dogs. When I moved in with a boyfriend, he had a cat that didn’t get along with other cats, so I had to leave my cat at home with my parents. But the boy and I got a kitten, so I had two cats living with me and one that was mine when I visited home. Things didn’t work out with the boy and I miss those two cats, and My cat was old and passed away in January 2010.

I rescued a new cat (in December 2009) that was all my own. He’s adorable and sweet, but he now also lives with my parents while I’m overseas with my (also adorable and sweet but in a different way) husband. We’re going to pick up said cat from my parents once we live in the united states again, but until then I find myself in a pet void.

Pets are an important member of any family (even if you’re a family of one, maybe especially then).
They are important the way eating healthy and exercise is important.
They are important the way vacations are important.
They are important the way religion (to some people) is important.
Pets are the happy, healthy embodiment of pure love. (which is why animal cruelty is a heinous offense. I even have a problem with people who gets pets without thinking and then get rid of them, not for the betterment of the pet, but because the human doesn’t feel like having an animal anymore.)

But I’ve distracted myself. It’s been a while since I’ve had this wish for a dog and I want to have dog someday. But it has to be the Right dog. It has to be the right breed, and it has to be the right personality. I have taken those online quizzes ‘Which Dog is Right for You?’, I’ve read all about different breeds and mixes, I’ve looked at pictures for hours of dogs and puppies, I’ve read and watched training information, determined to have an awesome dog. I’ve stopped people walking with a dog I think looks like a nice dog to ask about it. But the last step, the easy step, to go get a dog -has been put on hold time and time again.

Right now is actually a pretty good reason to pause, we live in south Korea and getting a dog home would be expensive. But everything else about the situation is ideal (I’m home all day, we have a small yard). The only, only thing that really makes me stop (besides a doggy plane ticket) is my cat at home. This cat, Teddy, gets along with dogs. He even loves to play with my parents toy poodle, the two of them get along very well. But I want to raise my puppy with that cat so they’ll be friendly. It’s going to be hard enough to take Teddy away from his playmate when I get home, but I would feel really bad if we had a new dog that would make Teddy feel alienated.

Am I thinking too much about the mental well being of my cat when considering a dog? No, absolutely not. How else can you have a harmonious pet life in your home unless you are careful about who and how you introduce into the mix. I expect my animals to live for 10-15+ years… that’s a long time to have fighting cats and dog (or cats and cats) if you’re not careful.

So, someday I’ll have a dog (and she’s gonna be awesome) but until then I continue to take pet ownership seriously and hope everyone else treasures the fuzzy pet in their life.