cleaning your floor with my mind

Already I'm confusing myself with the order of priority and it hasn't even been a full week. There I was saying 2 MONTHS of rest, and I'm already not bored but thirsty to start everything. I am an Aries after all, and like to get stuck into things fast. I should use some of that well earned patience I have and take a step back. I want so much from my life, and I don't feel like each day that goes by I am missing something, but I don't feel right just sitting around. I can't really go anywhere, most places I used to inhabit now are off limits and have too many bad memories and people attached to them. Like the time when I went over to my brother's off Newhall Street the day after I had to leave my job and narrowly missed bumping into Kyle and his cunt boyfriend as I turned the corner, whilst thinking 'wouldn't it be terrible if...'. I walk round this apartment feeling so angry sometimes, I feel so angry, so taken advantage of and so at a loss. I know that I need to be working out a list of things to do really, I need to be resting yet being productive. I did find that episode finally of 3rd Rock from the Sun with the bit at the fake family reunion where Sally eats the ice cream because she feels left out, I always remembered that bit for some reason. I think I just felt really sorry for her, but when I first saw it, I didn't even realise they were all aliens, so the show didn't make a full amount of sense.

Yesterday my mum bought be a Simpsons comic (yeah, go ahead and laugh) and usually I am disappointed by them but I didn't want any of the magazines from the extensive collection that WHSmiths in Sutton Coldfield has on offer. I contemplated a gay one, what with wanting to be more 'gay' and 'fit' and all but they were top shelf and next to the porn, one of the archaic reasons why I still hate Sutton, a bit like the fat woman walking through Gracechurch wearing a t-shirt with 'YOLO' on the front. The women's magazines were boring, I only ever read the international Vogues anyway, and Hunger magazine, a bi-annual which I got last year had Jessie J on the cover, which was upsetting. The trendy magazines patronise me, I don't need to be told how to be cool, because it's not my version of cool anyway. And if I want fashion and music and films, I have the internet. A photography magazine seemed pointless as I STILL don't have my camera. I considered getting Spirit and Destiny but I don't buy that for pleasure, and seeing as I already know I'm in for 'uncomfortable family times' during July (according to my year forecast in January) and seeing as I want a nice clean break from my life as it's been, a comic seemed quite appropriate. Something to cheer me up. I have been feeling very low lately.

I used to buy Simpsons comics all the time. Mostly the sketches are crap but I read them in my head in the voices of the characters and think they are funny. In London, comics were my choice of tube reading. It was easy and relaxing, as the tube made me nervous. This month it came with Haribo sours and a sticky alien catapult. I won't open it till I've moved to my own place.

I have started writing back to Sian, but am taking my time as it's a pleasure. I have got the books I want to use for research in planning my new healthy meals and diet. I have a laptop to use to write my CV and I have joined an accommodation website to advertise myself looking for a room. I have updated everything I need to really, and I feel like I want to change. I have films I want to watch and things I want to write, a body I want to change and skin I need to clear, jobs to apply for and a place to finally go to, there are new friends to be made and men to be met, confidence to be built, connections to be created. I just need to prioritise. I feel overwhelmed, and to top it off I feel rough still. I just need to relax and calm down. These posts are so bland with no photos. But I haven't been taking any. I have the moodboard for August, which I'm hoping to post soon on FR. It's all about going back to basics and reconciling myself with normal stuff, closing in the distance I put between myself and 'normal' style, to bring myself back down to earth. But it's a way of clearing the slate in that field, so I can change properly in the future. I want to change everything about myself, but still be myself, if that makes sense. I want to be a better, happier, healthier and nicer person, it's overwhelming but I want to try now.

you manly, you

All things change for a reason. Sometimes people push the change. I'm fine with that if it's beneficial to me, to which it has been. My life has resumed a new and interesting level of normality and I am getting on with it, and with patient gusto, and with no high expectations.

Last week saw me attend to duties of my usual caring variety and a routine that I have now become fully accustomed to. A night in on Summer Solstice brought salad and croissant pudding. The evening was summery and beautiful and I made up for the loss of dancing round a tree half naked with Mark by watching 'Panic Room'.

Earlier in the day I went on an extremely disappointing date with a guy whom I had exchanged long detailed and meaningful messages with on OK Cupid, the only dating website that I have any faith in. I pretended to be going on a date with Bethan, just because, regarding past situations, it was easier to lie about who I was with and what I was doing as to not stir jealousy triggered behaviour to which I have no control over how to respond to. I could do as I've been told and just 'be honest' but where has that ever got me in this situation? Nowhere good. The irony of it is, my lies are revealed through clever social media sleuthing, introduced by myself.

The person I met was one of those whose online persona did not match the actual person. Online, the person engaged at length with me, and had opinions and interests that excited me, someone near enough my age with something decent to talk about. He was from China and grew up in New Zealand so I figured he would have a lot to tell about his childhood and family. Instead he was awkward, and one worded, never asked me anything, not even the same questions after I asked them first. At first I thought he was painfully shy, but the shyness seemed to evolve into more of a condescending smugness. I am not complaining though, I have just remembered now as I write, how much I enjoyed writing about my dates, especially the bad ones.

That's not to say that I enjoy bad situations just because I know I'll be able to write about them later. I think I was disappointed because it has simply been so long since I met someone and I was so excited. We'd been in contact for a while and I truly thought that after my current situation of the moment had passed that I would have someone to share my time with. How wrong I was. During my weekend alone a week or so ago, I was bored and wanted to go on ChatRoulette as I have an obsession with Americans. But more times than not on Chatroulette you'd just meet vile people, usually boring American female types who think everything outside the Abercrombie and Fitch rota is weird, and I wanted to talk to Americans who were male and gay so I did a search and ended up chatting on a special roulette for gay guys which had an option to just select America. I ended up meeting a guy called Galen, a violinist from North Carolina who happens to be travelling to Europe at the end of the summer. Talking to him was a comfort and made me realise how desperately I just want to get out, travel and meet people, but to especially meet guys like him. It's so frustrating knowing that it's not you that's the problem, it's the place you're in and the people who fester in it.

On Saturday I had arranged to go to Sammi's mum's birthday party and had a great time getting to finally meet more members of her family. I ended up having everything justified to myself. Sunday morning was condemnation, an awful collection of things, and unforgiving doom caught in the rain. The colour had drained out of the day and every person in it, and I experienced an emotion that I have never felt before, and for which I struggle to put my finger on.

Even though I shiver when he calls my name, still I can't reveal myself to a real sorrow. Every day I come home late and I look away, staring at a screen with plans to change tomorrow. I urge to say what he needs to know, but I can't explain, I've a loss for words.

Monday was spent thinking and sleeping. I was dreading the moving of all my life, the confrontation and the use of excess energy to move stacks of magazines and books. Luckily it was easy, and my belongings had been kindly organised for me. I felt touched by this actually, though I think maybe it was also a sign of how urgent it was to expel me. For whatever reason, I was in and out in a shot and all I need to get back now is my camera, my only prized possession, my pride and joy.

I carried on with a stressful and weirdly emotional 'first day of the rest of my life'. I went through an emotional process beginning with the new and scary emotion which I have no name for. I have since gone on from despair and anger to appreciation and love and yet anger creeps back quickly whilst I verbally confirm each detail that as embittered me. It's a way to accept something and then move on, I don't succumb to the unhealthy habit of dwelling on the unfortunate. I bought Paris and Sammi flowers and cakes and a card to say thank you for being great friends to me, for supporting me and understanding that sometimes we are all plagued. And they have caught me when I fell. One of the many things I've learnt from this experience is the importance of a friendship that is real and solid. Maybe I wasn't a good friend to some, but I have my reasons and I think deep down, no matter how much we hate to admit it, those reasons are valid.

Today however felt like the real first day. A fresh new haircut, and plans to become healthy and put on weight and develop muscle, an active and attractive lifestyle, and freedom from the shackles of my vices and addictions, and the full effort to embrace the art of moderation. Appreciation for the things that my situation has since made me forget about, and the appreciation for things that I simply over time ceased to notice, like reading and blogs, learning, and actually reading my email updates, and celebrations and seasons. I just discovered a shop near my parents that stock every possible Yankee Candle fragrance. I feel like I am in rehab, writing letters to friends, clearing out old or bad memories, making space for the new, updating the profiles, the places, the status, the way to go, changing the direction to up, and forward, indulging in whats nice and looking to what's good, involved in crafts and not taking the little things for granted, looking at the details and eating healthful food. Who knows, I might crochet a blanket. In fact, I think I will. Catching up with friends, near and far. Skyping with Galen while his music mixes with mine, watching him move and go about his room, a comfort in the form of a virtual postage stamp in the right top corner, a reassuringly blurred image. And also to write... my blogs, my stories... I think without having the freedom to write, I would go insane.

Tonight I will watch the Chinese film 'Happy Together'. After finally watching the end of Misery, a somewhat reversed role of a possible prophetic consequence I only feared in my worst nightmare, I have decided to enjoy a film that I only got to enjoy once and tonight it will signify the beginning. I shall leave you on that note, and I shall wish you a good evening. X.

remembering You / Me

I'm in the long-winded process of writing a post about the gay porn industry and certain pop cultural references of the 80s, and it's important relevance to one other and also funnily my future. However it has become an extensive essay and has taken me days to edit and fix because it's a touchy subject and I think that it's important that I put down what I want to say in the best possible way without people assuming that I am either going to run off and become a prostitute or that I am going to end up a crack addict and shoot myself in the head. I'm just thinking out loud remember.

I really want to write about my week though for the sake of writing because I have been reading a few other personal blogs that I follow and I feel suddenly inspired. The only thing missing really are things to write about that have photos to accompany. Last weekend Steve was still in hospital. Very late on the Saturday night, after I had finished cleaning and sorting out the flat for his return, I was convinced by Sammi to join her for drinking games at a friend's house on Chester Road. Monday, we had Steve return and it was great. I think he was impressed with the new arrangement of his home. Things are less cluttered and easier to clean.

I have a lot in my mind to write about, and I am really just writing this post to remind myself. I still have to edit the post I'm working on and I want to write about my plans on Steve's legacy, Steve's story and what it's like to be looking after someone with cancer. In no way do I want to turn into a cancer motivational speaker, but it's something I want to write about here, not focusing on cancer as such but just the plain fact of someone dying from a terminal illness. It has created a lot of scary conflict in my mind. Perhaps writing in here will help me. I sometimes stop and wonder what the hell I am going to do, and I really can only imagine what his mother and family, and what he himself must be looking to now. Sometimes it rouses emotions so new and unsettling I feel like I am going to be sick.

I want to write about how it might of changed me. I find myself so different, so desensitised by trivial problems that normal people suffer daily, yet I am developing a huge sympathy for loss of life, and I think it's creating a meaningful structure to my life. I don't want to turn dismissive on people's problems, but at the moment I can't relate to them. I also want to write, one day in the future, of the impending build up of responsibility, the tremendous pressure and the complexities of the situation I am in regarding caring for Steve, emotionally, morally and psychologically. I want to talk about each friend I have, and where they stand with me in my mind during this time, and how they have helped, and how I have began to understand their personality, their character through introducing them to Steve, like presenting a king with goods from afar. I want to be frank, and explicit, and I want to be honest to myself. I will write it all down during this year. I will hopefully continue to flourish the blog with more of the usual updates of what I am up to, and more photos. But I need to remember about all I want to write, and their contexts. Don't let me forget.

homework

Somewhere between hopelessness and optimism lies my life. And it seesaws up and down between confliction and confidence neurotically, never settling in the middle. Next to being addicted to any drug that is available to me, I have finally ran out of money. I still find myself haunted by the betrayal that resulted in me losing my job, and my still receiving of news both voluntarily and by chance of the leisure and happiness of my ex boyfriends and their new boyfriends, whilst my old boss, who is also a close friend, openly socialises with the the very person who pushed me out and replaced me. I often wonder, which is worse? I try to fend off cabin fever with writing my new fashion blog but find myself disheartened. And now I look at my project critically and I feel like a joke.

It's this utter contempt that I have for the world that reassures me. I may be one of a few like minded people but I never feel lonely or isolated. I used to feel like an alien on my own planet but now I just think that most people are stupid, or greedy, and always usually both.

Sometimes, I find myself staring into space, wondering what bollocks Kyle spends the new salary that was once mine on. As I scrape together copper to pay for drugs just to get me through, a walking I.O.U, I see him sitting there, a thin layer or flubber stretched over an awkward structure of faggot, pasty and unforgiving, playing some waste of life computer game wearing a bag designed for Japanese pre-schoolers. And I just want to smash my head into the wall.

 When the much anticipated and expected breakdown arrived last week, overdue and pushed forward, trying to keep my head above water became increasingly difficult when I caught glimpses of myself sweating and gurning with Kyle and that cunt Cassie stuck in my head, discreetly celebrating a victory with ugly knowing glances and twatty high-fives. If anything it's them that pushed me over the edge. And I curse them both.

However the best revenge is success and although Cassie is no match to me, she's that much of a cunt, my naturally shallow reassurance regarding Kyle is simple: he is ugly. I am not.

a group of crows is called a 'murder'

It's been a nice week for a number of reasons involving catching up with family, helping Steve's mother with shopping and going for coffee and planning the whole life rehaul thing for myself and my own mother. Things are nice here and calm and Steve and I are enjoying each day in the ways we usually do, and I have been feeling that I am a lot more of a better carer, but always first and foremost Steve's best friend, fulfilling every duty a best friend does and fending off the fake fair-weathered friends who should know better. They're old enough. 

Tuesday was a dull day and it rained, I got my act together and made a start on the last bit of stuff we're trying to flog. I have decided to not sell the Victorian clock on the mantel piece and I got to hear it chime and I found it enchanting. We watched the programs about Anne Boleyn and Thomas Cromwell and watched a really entertaining episode of Come Dine with Me. One thing I noticed about the Anne Boleyn documentary was that female historians dress really nicely and wear interesting jewellery. The female historians also took the side in the argument that she was framed for all the things she was accused of, and I wish I could have an opinion on what really happened too, but it's history and the fact is none of us were there, none of us will ever know the truth so I just can't decide when so many different scenarios could be plausible.

On Wednesday we had our delivery of Perry Barr's finest oregano, and smoked and watched The Kings Speech, a film about King George VI played by Colin Firth. The film focuses on how the king had to cope with a stammer, and sees a guy called Lionel Logue, an Australian speech therapist played by Geoffrey Rush. The men become friends as they work together, and after his brother abdicates the throne, the new King relies on Logue to help him make his first wartime radio broadcast on Britain's declaration of war to Germany. It got me thinking about how well spoken people were those days, and I love Helena Bonham Carter. I want to make more of an effort with pronunciation, and believe old fashioned etiquette, intelligence and speech are equally endearing features as an interesting outfit of clothes can be sometimes these days.

We watched a film directly after called W.E, which was interesting and at times confusing, leaving me thinking I was watching the Kings Speech still as characters from that were depicted in W.E. I found it a really strange film, ready to be disliked because it was made by Madonna. Anything Madonna post-circa 2001 is a kiss of death. The film however is I admit a good effort, I just found it just that little bit too perfect, too much. I never really found the story of Wallis Simpson historically interesting either. I didn't feel sorry for those people at all, and the film begged sympathy. I don't have sympathy for people's woes in love. I'm sorry.

Wednesday had me up early, dressed up nicely and went with Steve's mother to Sutton to get the food shopping, and to have a coffee. It's very important I get to go out like that, and also important for me to spend time alone with Steve's mother, as I will be supportive of her in the future. I let the age gap which would instinctively have you behaving differently effect how I was with her. I felt it was good to be open and honest about who I am and my life, and to someone older than my own parents, it's great to not have them disapprove or give me unwanted advice. She is just as much of a friend now than any of my others, and I have an equally good time with her than I would with say, Daisy or Paris or whoever. We went to Costa, then went to Smiths and I talked about magazines. I am not really fond of English magazines anymore.

I dropped into the House of Frazer because I came up with the idea of what to give Emma for her birthday at the end of the month. Naturally, I have been invited out for cocktails, and in a bar environment I think it's always awkward when you have to hold onto a big present or a gift bag whilst your getting drunk. So I am getting her a Chanel lipstick, a nice traditional red, which she can pop into her handbag. It's a nice touch, and there's probably someone somewhere who has quoted how every woman must have a Chanel lipstick. The colour I am getting her is called 'Gabrielle'. If she doesn't wear it, at least it will look good on a dressing table (preferably next to a bottle of Chanel No5).

On Thursday I saw my mother who is much better and she told me lots of interesting things I am not allowed to talk about. I told her that soon everything will be fine and OK and that I will eventually live with her and dad if the arrangement is suitable and if she chooses a location not completely remote. I saw my nan and grandad, my cousins and aunt and uncle. I got to talk to everyone, and was talking to Julie about Adrian and about caring, having a lot to talk about and have in common with because she cares for Adrian properly now. She said she'd come and see me, so I am looking forward to that. Everyone still talking about Florida which makes me jealous and they still go back to our old villa at Sunset Lakes. Nan told me that she has a load of gay friends over there. How is it she gets to meet gay American men and I don't? I want to save up so I can go there and not come back, marry myself off or something, but I also really want to splash out this year on a new coat for winter. I want to spend more on the one that has lasted me the past 2 years, and it cost me £300. I am thinking about spending around £900-£1000 this year. I would have to gradually save the money up each month (200 at a time) as of now, and live at home without paying rent, saving money. Or I could get a boyfriend and live at his free of charge without him realising, in the airing cupboard or something.

Thursday evening was lovely as Bethan and Arran came over for dinner and we ended up getting drunk and then we had a Tramadol sesh which involved me not being able to move properly. I renamed tramadol 'tranny doll'. It makes me feel woozy, like a bad tranny at the end of the night, wobbling and wondering whether to go to the after club or just to go home alone, like usual.