Uninspired Title

I'll function under the self-indulgent illusion that people actually read this and appologize for not posting anything for the enjoyment of others. Christmas kept me busy and my creative time has been sucked into a new computer game (SWTOR for those geeks out there). I'm not really sure what I should put here this fine evening. Something witty? Something thought provoking? Why dont you do me a favor and imagine whatever if is you wished I had written, and we'll all pretend I was freakishly was aware of it, and it was here. Much appreciated, hugs and kisses...

Perfect

I had one of those perfect moments tonight. I had a long hectic day of working a job I am truly coming to despise, a 3 hour round trip commute in the rain, and a stop at the mall to finish my Christmas shopping. Shudder. No one in their right mind goes to a mall on December 20th-25th. I got home at 530 and started making dinner. I dumped a handful of moldy cheese into the bowl full of other dinner ingredients because I was too tired to notice. After removing the moldy cheese and muttering, I got new cheese and put dinner in the oven. Then I started making four batches of peanut butter bon bons (cookies). This equals rolling about 400 peanut butter balls and then coating them in chocolate. Time consuming, yes. I do it every year for Christmas gifts. While melting the peanut butter and butter, I did the dishes, and managed to dislodge an ornament I had hung on a cabinet and it shattered on the counter. So how did this day end up perfect?
I poured myself a glass of wine and sat down at the coffee table with my little brother so I could watch TV while I rolled the cookie dough. My brother jumped in to help, and we went though the first two batches while watching Jeff Dunham Christmas Special. Once all the cookies were prepped and in the fridge, the kitchen was cleaned, and the wine mostly gone, I sat on the couch. My boyfriend was asleep in the overstuffed chair, making his cute odd noises from time to time. My brother lay on the couch with his feet on my lap and I finished drinking my wine. The Christmas tree lights were on, the cats cuddled contentedly on blankets. I sat back and enjoyed my wine, the fact that I was very in love with the sleeping giant in the chair, and I got to have my little brother for a whole 5 days before Christmas. It was perfect.

I wrote something... kinda

I found myself telling my 12 year old brother today some sage advice. I told him, "No matter what the circumstance, if a woman you care about says you were wrong, just agree. Even if you are right, just agree. She'll calm down faster, and likely appologize for snapping at you later." I am giving him this advice in the hope that he stops constantly blabbering excuses every time my mother calls him on any possible wrongdoing, and in essence, prevent a nuclear explosion of emotional vomit. Seeing as he is 12, and like all 12 year olds, completely oblivious to the world outside his daydreaming head, I think it's time to crawl into my bombshelter and enjoy another fun filled family gathering this Christmas.

musing

I have been quiet the past few days due to the usual life craziness and being sick. I really hate head colds. The world should stop when you get one. I lucked out and had someone home with me who was willing and able to wait on me hand and foot. It's easy to take things for granted. Especially in this holiday season while we are busy shopping and running around. It's easy to feel obligated and become resentful. Being sick and having someone there to care for me reminded me what the season is really about. Material things get lost, break, or are consumed, but the person who thought about you, they are the real present.

Ok, so that came out really corny and not partucularly funny, but apparently the head cold has taken over my brain and filled it with mucky stuff that turns into mushy stuff throuh a keyboard.

5 minute window

I just spent an agonizing two hours trying to find something I have written that takes 5 minutes to read. If I get the guts, I will read it tomorrow in P-town at an open mic thing I am attending with a friend. Selecting what to bring was traumatizing. I am not known for writing short things, my talents being more in the novel writing department. The few short funny pieces I have take 6 to 8 minutes to read, and I am just not up to cutting anything apart to make it shorter. I have narrowed it down to 2 selections. One is actually a poem, and I'm not sure it qualifies as the right kind of material for the open mic. The other is part of the first chapter of the novel I want to publish. I'll probably end up reading the exerpt from the novel. The poem is about one of the worst experiences of my life, and although it ends positively, I am not sure I could read it aloud withouth shaking and probably crying. I am debating posting the poem here, but I'm not sure if I will. Time will tell...

Blue Christmas

This is a Christmas piece written using the characters of a novel I just finished. It's long, but I hope anyone who decides to read it enjoys it.

Blue Christmas

            Zeus’s hands were shaking as we entered the Dancing Queens. I tangled my fingers with his while we found a quiet place in the corner. We didn’t want Sam to see us while he was performing.

            “Are you sure you want to do this?” Shane asked. I elbowed him in the ribs, doing nothing but bruising my elbow. He didn’t even grunt. I glanced up at my lover and rolled my eyes.

            “I don’t think I can go through with it, Macy,” Zeus said, his blue eyes on the stage where Sam was in full drag. I moved so that I was standing in front of him. He wasn’t monstrously tall like Shane, but he still had to look down at me.

            “Do you love Sam?” I asked.

            “Yes.”

            “Then you’re going to go through with this.”

            He nodded, his eyes on the stage. Sam had finished his act and was blowing kisses to the crowd. His eyes caught on Zeus and he nearly fell off the stage. Zeus flinched as Sam darted back out of sight as if he had been thrown.

            “He’s still so angry with me,” Zeus said. “What if he can’t forgive me?”

            “It’s Christmas Eve. And he loves you. It was a stupid fight. You two are going to be fine.” I patted his heavily tattooed arm and handed him the bag of clothing. “Now go change. We’ll make sure Sam doesn’t leave.”

            Zeus headed off to the bathroom and I leaned against the wall beside Shane. Shane pulled me against him, clasping his hands across my abdomen. He kissed my hair.

            “You’re cuddly tonight,” I said, looking up into his fawn colored eyes.

            “It’s a gay bar,” he said. “I’m not homophobic, but I’d rather not get hit on.”

            “Honey, I don’t think the men in this bar would be interested in someone like you.”

            He pushed me away from him. “What does that mean?”

            He was a six foot seven wall of muscle and bad attitude in black leather pants, skull and cross bones t-shirt, biker boots, and a black bandana covering his hair. The scar running from above his eyebrow down the side of his face to his neck made him look dangerous; which he was. But it was debatable which of us was the more dangerous.

            “The men who come here aren’t looking to pick up a biker,” I said, tugging on the metal chain that was always around his neck. “They like drag queens. They like men like Sam.”

            “Everyone likes me,” Sam said, appearing behind me. I turned and smiled at him, my head already craned upward from looking at Shane. Sam was only an inch shorter, but his body was willow slender. He made quite a woman. He was back in his jeans and pink t-shirt, his face scrubbed free of make-up. He searched the crowd.

            “Where’s Zeus?” he asked.

            “Last time he tried to talk to you, you slammed the door in his face,” I said.

            “I was still angry,” Sam said, defensively. But he sighed and searched the room. “I overreacted. I should have opened the door and let him talk. How has he been?”

            “You mean the five minutes I managed to get him to stop crying?” I asked.

            Sam bit his lip, his coffee colored eyes searching for Zeus. They caught on the stage and his mouth dropped open. I looked around him and smiled.

            Zeus stood on the stage, spotlighted. He wore black dress pants and a white button-down shirt with long sleeves to cover his tattoos. His Cookie Monster blue hair was styled into short spikes and his smile was as terrified as his overly large blue eyes. He pulled at the cuffs of the dress shirt and cleared his throat into the microphone.

            “Ah, hi,” he said. The room quieted as everyone turned to look at him. It was rare to see a man on the stage at the Dancing Queens.

            Zeus blushed, adding more appeal to his Mediterranean complexion.

            “Ah, my name is Zeus. Some of you know me.”

            “You’re Sam’s boyfriend,” someone yelled out.

            Zeus looked over at Sam. “I was. We had a fight a few days ago. I said a lot of stupid things. And,” he paused, shifting his feet. “And it’s Christmas Eve. It’s a day to be with the people you love. I’ve never really had a family. I didn’t grow up being loved, which is why it scares me. It’s why I said those stupid things, Sam. I love you so much, and I keep waiting for you to realize that you’re too good for me.”

            Sam took one step toward the stage.

            Zeus wiped at an escaped tear. “I’m sorry I tried to shut you out. I’m sorry I didn’t tell you I loved you every chance I got. Because I woke up alone this morning and all I could think about was you. My life is dark without you. You’re my light, Sam. I’ve apologized over and over, but I hope you hear me this time. Because I’m lost without you.”

            Tears stung my eyes as Zeus sang, “I’ll have a blue Christmas without you. I’ll be so blue, just thinking about you. Decorations of red, on a green Christmas tree won’t be the same dear, if you’re not here with me.”

            The lights played off of his blue hair, his unsure voice filling the room with hope. His hands were still shaking while he sang, and he never took his eyes off Sam. The entire room held its breath as the song ended.

            Sam vaulted onto the stage. He framed Zeus’s face with his hands and kissed him. The club erupted in thunderous applause. I whooped while Sam wrapped his arms around Zeus and held him as if they were the only two people in the world.

            I turned to see Shane smiling. He glanced down at me.

            “So,” I said, twining my fingers in the chain around his neck. “What grand romantic gesture do you have planned for me?”

            “Don’t hold your breath Baby,” he rolled his eyes. “Damn Zeus. Making the rest of us look bad. How the hell am I supposed to compete with that?” He indicated the stage. I had a brief image of Shane in drag and burst out laughing. He glared down at me.

            “Let’s get out of here. There’s too much blubbering and love in the air. It’s enough to make a man choke.”

            “Just my luck to be stuck with a gruff ass like you for eternity,” I muttered.

            I climbed onto the back of his motorcycle, enjoying the warmth of him while the cold wind whipped my face. We pulled up to my house and headed up the stairs to my third floor apartment.

            He slapped at by butt while we climbed the stairs, grinning like the mischievous little boy he hadn’t been in a very long time. I swatted his hands away, laughing.

            “Cut it out, Shane. I know you’re not a romantic, but you don’t need to be…” the air left my lungs as I opened my front door. The main room of my apartment was filled with hundreds of candles. The floor was covered in rose petals. The Christmas tree Shane and I had picked out the day before was lit up and shining with colorful ornaments. It was my first Christmas tree in twelve years. It was my first Christmas not alone. It was my first Christmas with Shane.

            I turned as he quietly shut the door behind himself. The candlelight played over the planes of the face I had yet to convince him was handsome. His fawn colored eyes looked into mine; speaking far more eloquently than his mouth was capable.

            “I’m not a romantic,” he said. “But I love you.”

            I was too stunned to move. He leaned down and kissed me. His hands stroked over my face, sliding around to caress the back of my neck. He rested his forehead against mine. “Besides, if I didn’t do something tonight, after Zeus’s performance, I’d never hear the end of it. I waited a century for you, Baby. I don’t intend to spend the next couple hearing remember that Christmas where Zeus sang for Sam and you did absolutely nothing?” His rough voice, permanently altered due to the scar, didn’t really manage to imitate my tone. I shoved against his chest but his arms were around me.

            “You are determined to ruin this, aren’t you?” I muttered.

            He shook his head. “It’s me, Baby. What did you expect?”

            I framed his face with my hands, surprised he let my fingers graze the scar. “I love you, Shane.”

            He smiled and reached into his pocket. The room filled with music and he slid his hand to my waist.

            “What are you doing?” I gasped.

            “I’m dancing with you,” he said as “Christmas Canon” by the Tran-Siberian Orchestra filled my small apartment.

            “You never dance,” I said as he pulled took my hand.

            “I do for you. Merry Christmas, Baby.”

            I followed his lead as we waltzed around my apartment in the flickering candlelight, our shoes crushing the rose petals and filling the air with their scent. It was the most beautiful moment of my life. He pulled me against his chest and kissed me. I wrapped my arms around him and promised that I would never let him go.

Chrismas musing

When did Christmas get so complicated? I want to weave some magic back in it. I want a Santa to come and toss a bunch of stuff under my tree, oh, and pay some of my bills while he's in town. That'd be great. I want the cookies to make themselves and hop into individual bags for everyone. And if the broom could pull a Mickey Mouse Fantasia thing, I'd be more than happy to nap instead of clean.
Still, I find myself humming Christmas music and doing my sock dance in the kitchen. I dread the craziness of driving from house to house, but can't wait to be able to see everyone I care about. I look forward to seeing my cousins and my little brother opening their presents, giggling and running around. I miss Christmas morning as a child. I miss the magic. It's more fun to believe in magic than be the one supplying it. But it's magic just the same, the idea is to trick yourself into believing too. Get carried away in the season and enjoy.

Grrrr-arg

I have spent the past hour trying to find a way to summarize 78,000 of my words into an intricate dance of intriguing prose, also known as a query letter for an agent. How is anyone supposed to cram everything that happens in 78,000 words into one paragraph? How can you really present your story when you are only supposed to mention one or two names? What about the main character's cross-dressing housemate, or the eighty-seven year old landlord wielding a wooden spoon? I can't mention the adorable blue haired werewolf or the four hundred forty year old Alpha werewolf who discovers a sense of humor thought long dead. I don't get to describe the main character's scoundrel of a boss. (short exerpt from the novel: He looked like a demented leprechaun on a two week bender.) I can't summarize the emotion of the lovers, and a query letter is too short to include enough of my witty off-colored humor and still make my point. So after an hour, I have three paragraphs without structure, no idea what to write as a hook, and a bunch of characters in my head yelling at me to get my act together and convince some agent that I am brilliant.

Procrastination will continue....

Gifts

I took my cousin (who has cerebral palsy) to a special needs dance tonight at the community college. She has recently recovered from knee surgery and was able to get out of her wheelchair and dance tonight for the first time in months. She has to hold on to me so she doesn't lose her balance and fall, but I'm so proud of her for all the hard work she's done regaining the strength in her knee. We had so much fun tonight. She looked so cute in her red shirt and Christmas vest, her head thrown back as she belted out 'Santa Clause is Coming to Town" at the top of her lungs. I love going to the dances with her and her friends. These people really know how to just have a good time. You can be as rediculuous as you want and no one notices. It's a truly refreshing experience.

Also, my friends safely welcomed their son, Alex, into the world tonight. He took his sweat time on his way out. I expect he came out holding a convaluded map with plans to conquer Europe clutched in his hand. He had to be doing something dramatic to insist on staying in his mother that long. I look forward to experiencing all of the mischief he will get himself into.

In Perspective

I was fully engrossed in a foul mood this morning. I have barely slept because of a random bout of insomnia and I had a really long day involving two jobs, a 3 hours commute, and grocery shopping, to look forward to. While trying to strangle my steering wheel to relieve some stress and drinking enough coffee to make a horse twitch, something occurred to me. What was I really upset about? I was tired. I had a really long day ahead of me. But was there really a reason to embrace rage? I had coffee and a muffin and a few decent music stations for my commute. I had people at my office job I hadn't seen in a while and enjoy talking with. I ended up having a nice quiet night at the restaurant at job two with a few truly interesting people who tipped well. But at 7 AM before the coffee had really absorbed, I wasn't able to fully realize any of that. What did strike me and allow me to relax was the fact that my best friends were having a baby. I thought about the father-to-be, my friend since high school, hovering and being the wonderful supportive husband I have seen him to be. I thought about his wife, who is one of the best mothers, and strongest women I have ever met. And I relaxed into my chair, turned the radio up and smiled. I had nothing to stress over. Soon I would get to meet baby Alex and see that look in his parents eyes. Someday I want that look to be in my eyes, but not today. Because if I had to suffer through my hellish long day and come home to two babies, then there'd really be a reason to scream.
In all seriousness, my thoughts are with my friends and their baby, who is being stubborn about coming into the world. I can't wait to meet him, so I hope he hurries up about the whole being born thing.

Cats

I stumbled across this thing I wrote last year around this time and figured it would be a nice first entry. It made me giggle, anyway.

Someone once asked me what good was a cat? While I am attempting to write this, one of my furry feline companions is draped over my lap, including my left arm, pinning it down on the desk. With the occasional overzealous flick of her gray tail she manages to click the keys on the keyboard in an attempt to make me look like I have a bad case of palsy and the spelling finesse of a four year old. It took my cat a good five minutes of circling and clawing before settling down in her precarious and obviously ill-conceived position that probably greatly contributes to my future diagnosis of carpal tunnel.

So, I guess I can see how someone may ask the question: What good is a cat? To explain why I feel my cats are essential to my wellbeing, I have to introduce them. Sylvanas, named after the banshee queen of the undead from World of Warcraft, was abandoned by her previous owner. She was about a year and a half old when she became ours and lost her unimaginative name of Patty. She is a beautiful silver gray color with a white belly, white paws and a line of white down her nose. Her eyes are green. There are darker gray stripes on her tail. The other cat is Fizgig, named after the orange ball of fur that opens into a mouth in the eighties movie the Dark Crystal. My Fizsgig is also an orange ball of fur with a white chest and belly. She has what appears to be a lions mane, and a tail that could double as a plush feather duster. Her eyes are amber.

            Sylvanas, known more commonly as Silly or Sillybear, is the more reserved of the pair. She keeps to herself until you are busy doing something then she insists on being on your lap. She is incapable of settling down without first spending five to ten minutes pacing across your lap, lacerating you with claws in a casual regal manner. She is prone to sleeping on her back with her legs sprawled at strange angles. She eats wires, preferring those connected to expensive hard to replace electronics. We keep hoping she will choose a wire that will be courteous enough to fight back and deliver a small charge, thus teaching the destructive little demon a lesson. She is un-shocked as of yet, and every small wire in my house is duct taped to the wall or floor. And yes, we tried all of those spray on products to protect the wires. They have no effect on her, although when Kyle (my long-time boyfriend) accidentally got some in his mouth, he threw up. (How he managed to accidentally get it in his mouth is another story, and one of the reasons I love him.)

            She panics when we move furniture or leave for even a day or so. Her distress obviously includes the eating of some electronic device. She exhibits one very strange behavior that has come in handy. The few times Kyle and I have argued, Sylvanas inserts herself literally between us. The first time she did, Kyle was leaning back on the counter and I was getting in his face, not yelling but having what I will call a ‘discussion’. Silly climbed up Kyle’s jeans and jumped, forcing us to catch her. Each ended up holding one end of the cat who promptly settled on our arms. She has effectively ended more than one ‘discussion’ with her loving diplomacy.

            Fizgig is known as Fizzy, Giggles, Gigglepuss, Giggles Mcgee, Gigs, Fitzgerald Von Gigginess, Squeaker, and Demon Spawn. She has taken it upon herself to defeat the evil oppression of gravity. So far she is losing the war but her struggle continues. She makes noise constantly, a variety of odd squeaks, chirps, mews, and inquiries. She runs to the door when I come home and loves being held like a baby on her back.

            Fizgig is a cat who gets her head stuck in the slats of the wooden chair backs. On a regular basis she mistakes the fact that she is orange for the false belief that she is on fire. In her panic she runs headlong through the house until a wall stops her. There is not a shelf, table, chair, or raised surface of any kind in my house that she has not fallen off of. I am not sure who determined that cats always land on their feet, but they obviously have never met Fizgig.

            One of my favorite Fizgig fail moments involved a knit blanket Kyle’s mother made us. Kyle and I were snuggled under the blanket which is the kind that has a bunch of small holes in it. Fizgig loves to curl up under blankets amongst limbs so she had settled down on my stomach to watch TV with us. But she became convinced that the small holes in the blanket were actually larger than they appeared. She stood up and jumped straight out from the couch. Needless to say the blanket did not disappear as she thought it had. Instead she fell, ending up wrapped in a pocket of blanket hanging over the floor. She began crying in confusion at the invisible blanket, and after being detangled she has yet to go near the offending fabric since.

            So back to this great question: What good is a cat? The traditional use is to kill pests, but neither of my little indoor Queens has ever left me a decapitated furry keepsake. Fizgig is too distracted seeing mystical things in the air to notice a mouse, even if said mouse were to saunter up wearing a top hat and tug on her whiskers. If a mouse ever dared approach Sylvanas, one of her truly horrifying death stares would be the end of the poor creature. I myself have had to check for a pulse after being on the receiving end of Silly’s wrathful green eyes.

            So my cats don’t kill mice. They wouldn’t alert me if there were a burglar, unless of course it was one of the many figments of Fizgig’s imagination that plague my home. Fizgig, despite being all of seven pounds, has the lungs of a gorilla. She can also throw her voice impressive disconcerting distances. Her love of hiding in cabinets coupled with her knack for voice-throwing has created many a find-the-cat evening.

            What good is a cat then if they don’t kill mice and don’t alert you to danger? They are wonderful, if small, space heaters despite the occasional discomfort of kneading claws. They are warm little balls of love and disaster.

My best answer to what good is a cat is laughter. In the three years I have owned my little pair of hellions there hasn’t been a day where they did not make me laugh. The past week alone has been exceptional. Christmas is in seven days. The tree is up, decorations glittering and swinging. Neither of my pampered Princesses has deemed it within her dignity to climb the tree, although I have turned around to see Physgig dangling from the lowest branch, possibly pretending to be a new interactive ornament. No ornaments are hung within their reach to avoid temptation, but green and amber eyes stare at them anyway. Our hopes of the wires in the house fighting back are being boosted by Sylvanas’s obsession with the lighted fake garland. So far her tastes have only run to the fake green fabric of the evergreen, but we are hopeful the wire will soon strike back for all of its fallen comrades.

            My favorite Christmas cat memory involves the grace of Fizgig and her never-ending battle to prove Newton was mistaken. There was a decorative shelf above the kitchen counter, one that I had given up placing anything but the cats on. I was making Bon Bon’s (cookies) on the counter, her amber eyes watching my every move, tail twitching. When my attention wavered for too long away from her, she began to roll on the narrow shelf. The spinning of her brain gave her the brilliant idea to try and prove to me for the millionth time that gravity was a bad joke. She rolled right off the shelf and barreled into the box of confectioner sugar that was on the counter. Disgusted at being beaten yet again by gravity, my seven pound furball dragged the box of confectioner sugar, wax paper, and cookie sheet to the floor with her. She carefully planned it out so that the entire box of confectioner sugar spilled out onto the small area rug rather than on the easily cleanable tile of the floor. She sat a moment, pouting, her orange fur liberally dusted in white. Then she was struck with another brilliant idea. She began to roll in the sugar, grinding it into the rug.

            I watched all of this from a foot away, laughing like an idiot. Rather than stop the terribly misguided feline, I retrieved my camera and took pictures. Then I picked up my sugar coated mischief maker and deposited her in my boyfriends lap.

            I thought I was done with this little bit of cat tribute, but Fizgig has given me more to depict. I had refilled the water dish in the 75 gallon aquarium that houses my tortoise, Houdini. I left the top half open so I could add more water, but forgot. I went to get a drink after I thought I had finished with my writing. A small muffled mew sound drew my attention. Fizgig had fallen into the tortoise tank and was sitting on the wood chips looking out at me with her head cocked to the side. Again, instead of helping the baffled creature I got my camera.

            On the day when the man asked me what good was a cat, I didn’t answer. I only smiled.

Thanksgiving

Does anyone ever really know what they are doing? I don't think so. I just think that some people are better at faking it. I can't be the only one bumbling along accidentally getting things right from time to time. Surely there are other mixed-up souls 'enjoying' their work when they know it's not their passion. If not, well, I'm screwed because after twenty six years I still have absolutely no clue.
I have a college degree and have struggled to work in my field for 4 years only to find it life-sucking and depressing. But I kept doing it because I felt I had to. One of the hardest things I have ever had to do was admit that I hate what I spent thousands of dollars and years 'learning' to do. On the one hand, I'm young and have plenty of time to change my mind. But on the other, I'm in my late twenties and everyone is looking at me to get married and have babies. The idea is starting to lodge in my brain with more compatability, which is frightening in itself. So what do I do?
I work with special needs and have found a real passion for it. There is nothing quite like being there for someone who really needs you. Even if they don't have filters and cant comprehend how complicated organizing their lives are, they love you absolutely, making everything worth it. But still I havent commited to that new career. I'm dragging my feet, clinging to my degree.
My true passion has always been writing, which is why I am starting this blog, I guess. I wrote my first short story when I was nine. I barely go a day without jotting something down. I recently finished my second novel and am searching for agents and publishers, but in the most embarassingly wimpy way. I just can't get myself to put my work out there. These characters are more real to me at times than my life, and once the book is finished I almost feel like crying. So I'm going to try and update this blog with funny interesting stories about anything and everything to convince myself my writing is worthwhile. If you like it, woot for me. If not, you can bite me.