like sands through the hour glass..

So in the flurry that was cleaning up and moving house, I found an old diary. I had many. My diary keeping went on for years. And most of those I never lost and have reread to my amusement a hundred times. But this one somehow fell by the wayside and instead of doing homework just now, which I did genuinely mean to do but was a struggle because am feeling physically flat as a tack, I read it cover to cover after a pensive day of virtually complete solitude. Interesting times.

It is truly bizarre...what time does. What stays with us and what doesn't. The fleeting things I mentioned thinking in Two Thousand And One that turned out to be my cornerstones of belief now, and the things I thought I'd go to the ends of the earth for then that I shudder at now. Odd. Plus there's lots to be said for the whole documenting memories thing, even when you think at the time it's so important that you'll remember... you so rarely do. Ninety percent of this diary I had no recollection of writing or of the events occurring until I read about them and it came flooding back. And then there's the perspective. The adult perspective that points out that things you thought you deserved, said by certain spoilt private school bratty boys, weren't actually your fault and the boys were jerks. Such things were clearly agonised over for weeks, pulled apart, 'why would they think that? argh.' .. such wasted time. Who cares what they think, Years-Ago-Theresa? The perspective that points out that the 'perfect' boy you 'loved' was only perfect in the sense that he reminded you of the main characters from the books and movies you were flooded with at the time, blonde, buff, popular...and boring. Looking back on it now, he really was. And having stayed in touch..I've seen his life turn out exactly how I knew it would and become a life I very briefly thought I wanted but quickly realised I didn't. 

The entry about having met the random boy who became The Long Term Relationship of six plus years cracked me up because it was so insignificant. "We're going to be amazing friends. He's incredible." was all I'd written before moving on to more important things. 

So much of this diary, unlike the ones before it and the ones that followed, really does revolve around boys, as I wandered into the world where 'early nights' were two am and I drank too much and listened to Creed

Thankfully my music tastes changed. As did my taste in the lads. The quiet, slightly strange, smart boy who sported soft cardigans and who made ridiculously large romantic gestures towards me while I was busy blindly following Blondie , was determinedly pushed into the Friend category against his will for the entire thing, and it's only in hindsight that I know in a sequel years down the track after being close friends, logic clicked inside me and things crossed over, but he had a girlfriend. THAT I remember. And then remember him leaving her. And things becoming messy. And had I heard from some futuristic robot , back in the diary days, that out of all those people he was the one I would let things get messy for, I wouldn't have believed it. 

There is the friend I thought I would never lose, and did. To a cult. There is the friend who became gay, and my description of things that now seem obvious hints but at the time I clearly failed to register.

And then there are the things that didn't change. My thoughts on books, on the world, all so similar to now. I wonder what I'll think looking back on current diaries? Will I laugh at what I thought now? Probably. Because there's definitely room to get wiser. 

Should I be lonely..?

Because I'm not. My only qualm about living solo is that it doesn't bother me much. That bothers me.

Sure, there are moments where I want to be curled up next to Damir at night, but I suspect that reflects missing him not missing company. And there are moments where company would be benificial, it's true, but they don't outnumber the glad seconds where I'm alone.  I've lived alone before, and I hated it. I liked the fact that nobody critisized what I did, but I hated the rest of it . Perhaps that's age for you? I don't know. I can't even explain what I like about it. How is it so appealing to go for twenty four hours now and then without hearing your own voice once? I have a suspicion it's the thoughts. I've missed my thoughts, in months gone by. They've been pushed out by conversations and uni and more often than not, fear. But now that the fear is fading, my own thoughts are setting up camp and living alone gives them room to build a whole damn city. 

Perhaps that's not good. I'm not saying it is. But it's interesting. I'm less bored alone than I am with other people, half the time. Alone I get to read what I want , google strange things, lie on my bed thinking, stare out the window doing nothing, create meals and build a sanctuary out of stuff that i like and stuff that is mine. What could be better? If I were in forced isolation..that would be a horse of a different colour. But I can pick up the phone or leave the house when I want to. So it's a win. Except that in the last few days.. I haven't done that often. Should I be concerned? Concerned that it's not just cold weather or a love of being able to eat dinner in underwear over the sink or playing bad music too loud that has me staying in? 

I guess not. Things seem to come in phases. Perhaps this is just the mental backlash that follows having to surround yourself with people, albeit it a select few people, to try and make it through the day. Perhaps this is me loving a return to independance. Perhaps this is me just loving learning about pointless things while I get behind on uni work. Perhaps this is just me. The solitary yin to the yang that is my love of good conversation and good friends. But it's something I didn't know and, along with how to change lightbulbs or thaw out beef, is something i've learned in just my first week solo in Rathdowne. 

xxxx

sit-athon 09

Conversation with a me of several days ago:

So who doesn't love a good 'sit down and a biscuit' , right? right.

And who doesn't love sitting on their comfy behind for twenty four hours straight? *raises hand*

Well don't knock it til you try it.

For years, I've interspersed study or video nights with wandering around, be it an epic stroll into the city or just a trip to ye olde Sev Elevs to restock the sugar high. I've exercised daily because it helped me stay sane, because it felt good, because I couldn't sit still with out it. 

But yesterday I sat down. And I didn't get up. I completed two whole assignments. Then I read. Then I ate delectable cookies. Then played scrabble. Then did more homework. Then stood briefly to make pasta. Got into bed at five thirty pm, about thirty cms away from the dent on the floor where my bum had been all day. And sat there to continue studying, pick at delicious dinner, and fall asleep at nine thirty only to stay in dream land til my alarm went off at quarter to seven. Impressive, no? Granted I did plan on going out to join perfect boyfriend when I'd finished assignment but he didn't hear phone so I didn't get dressed / leave / stand . 

This morning I woke up feeling rested for a change and planned on jogging to the park and back, but realised something. What I actually wanted to do on this sunday morning was eat the remainder of the pastry, stay in bed even longer and write this/study/be warm and lazy. It's seven am. There's piles of time for leaving house, for standing, for being normal. For now my cave is my heaven. And it truly truly is. 

In other news, anxiety levels have gone through the roof since last bread-ening. The night before last my heart quite literally raced until about three am. I got lots done, but still, it wasn't ideal. And the appetite has vanished. I've gone through a pile of chocolate simply because it's small and you don't notice it going in. Last night's effort at wholesome pasta took me two hours to force down. The cheese had well and truly coagulated by the time the last bits were finished. Such shame. It is not ok , to morph closer and closer to a stegosaurus with spines poking out my back. It is not ok, to waste the last of the pasta. No. So today.. today I will run, I will venture outside and work up an appetite and eat good meals, and most importantly, I will kick the strange creeping anxiety out of my muscles, stomach and mind and get on with things because I'm just a tad over it. 

End of serious post. I'll probably be back in five to post another. It's deliciously wet outside. Zero reason to move. Absolutely zero :D 

NB: Damir is at work, last week I showed up unannounced and am really tempted to do the same today but I'll refrain. I can't believe I still get excited to see him. That's really something :) 

pointless pasting of pompous paragraphs

I just read a few of my other entries and am shocked at their ability to stay on theme and not wander down too many darkly lit tangents. That's about to temporarily change. A more-nonsensical-than-usual stream of consciousness entry is to follow. Because I don't really know what I want to say but I want to say things. :I

Let me start off...with Canada. Which hypnotised me when I went there, and is doing so increasingly recently for some mysterious reason. You know those places that just feel like home right away? Yup. That's Canada. Is it because they speak French annnnd English? Because so many of the Canadians I know have such a healthy culture of vegetarianism, eco-friendliness and just all around good values? The homeland of Charlotte Diamond, Feist and a plentiful sack of super songters? the scenery? elks? What's not to love. 

Another thing that is impossible not to love is a boys with dark hair and dark eyes and sweet thoughts . One in particular, though. Who I can't believe has stuck around through such an annoying chunk of my life. Not only is he one of the most incredibly brilliant , interesting, hardworking, honest and quite often very silly, people I've been honoured to know, but he's also the most patient person I've ever met. Ever. When I first met him and my mind was in tangles over prior events, he waited. While I was curled in a car seat as my stomach tore in half, he waited. While I made indecisive choices at the supermarket, he waited. While I've pissed him off with countless apologies for the above, he's waited. While I've been sorting out this bizarre section of time, he's waited. Not waited tapping a foot and reminding me how great he is for doing so, but waiting with a giant warm Apple smile, wisdom and the greatest arms in the world. It sounds mushy, and this truly has amazed me. It's also kind of cool that he gets that things he's waiting through are temporary. It's like.. he.. knows me. And knows who I'm 'meant', for want of a better word, to be. How did he do that at the start when he didn't know me? :o

I simply didn't know such a person existed. And that this person also happened to be a person I happily spend most of my time with, who listens to so much of what I listen to and reads great books and is destined to leave one-of-a-kind mark on the world. I could write pages and pages about the various traits he has and the fantastical things he says and does, and you know what? I probably will, as days go by, but the point of this morsel of post was that last night I was amazed all over again as I backtracked momentarily to where I'd been a few months ago and he didn't up and leave, but stayed and , in fact, made what I wrote of as a bad night , a lovely one. Not many people can do that and I hope that he finds I do that for him some of the time. 

Next random input. <- see? i told you. snippets and illegible rants and pointless phrases. 

Orbs is having a baby. Yes, orbs. Orbs with no job, a huge alcohol problem, a girlfriend of about a month, no ability to resist flying into violent rages. Orbs. Why? How? I'm not saying that the child won't be adorable and he won't be a good father, I'm just saying... I think it's really poorly thought out and there is a substantial chance that the former will be how it is.  And yes, I know, these things happen and aren't always thought out and sometimes even turn out brilliantly,  but truly.. if there was someone less ready for parenthood.. I'd be amazed. Or is my borderline-arrogant disbelief just fueled by the fact that I personally envisage raising children who have what they need financially, who have a solid family to be there for them, who have a balanced lifestyle and who's parents aren't alcoholics? Have I just got too many older friends who happen to have just had children and are feeding them wholesome food in a comfy Carlton home, taking them to PMP and watching them grow into happy, well adjusted kiddies , and have begun to think that this is the norm, when I know it's actually not? Or .. have I just seen too many of the people close to me struggle successfully, but struggle none the less, to overcome growing up in situations like that?  I don't know. But the news made my jaw drop, that's for sure. And I'll be fascinated to see who this mini-orbs becomes.

I.. oh this really is a terrible post. I love this blog. I love that posts CAN be terrible.

And I feel like baking :I How's THAT for a pointless sentence . 

I have to do uni work, actually. So I'll need to come back. To say the many random things I want to say. Heck, there's even bunches to say about the uni work. Bother bother. The urge to do this and play scrabble and download music is so strong... but luckily, so is aforementioned desire to be in paid full time society-beneficial employment so better get to it. 

Stupid question though.. why can I only post one picture , and only post them along the top? and I wonder how I link songs... oh the fascination that is the cyberworld..

tactile treasures

it's far too nice a day for computer screens and homework. this is one of those occasions where I don't love the convenience of so much coursework being online and my writing being abismal enough to warrant typing all text. I just stood on the balcony for a delicious ten minutes, and it's so .. grounding, despite being wonderfully high off the ground:P

It's all about the senses. Did you know that the fragrance of flowers actually alters brain chemistry and boosts serotonin etc? Myeah. But I think just the noting, of these sensual things.. wakes up important parts of me.

The grit on the pavement beneath my bare feet, breeze in hair, snippets of sunshine on skin, smell of the street and the sky. Nice.

It's important in this online homework era to just BE outside, not walking anywhere or doing anything, for a while each day. Since I've started doing that I've just felt better all round. I sat in the park yesterday for three hours and just felt, watched, smelled and heard things. So much going on. Yet nothing. But. Sadly, the fact that I'm badly craving full time post grad work at this point means I want to finish uni which translates into screen time aplenty, particularly right now. So I'll go do a chunk of assignment. Then go outside. Then come back, Blog. Because you and I, we have catching up to do. 

i am cheese and wine

As in.. aged . 

And for the first time, I can feel it. 

Normally birthdays leave me feeling secretly too young. which is very different to the 'young at heart' I will always want to be.

No, being secretly too young requires recoiling in horror at bank forms you don't understand, despising heeled shoes, being hideously insecure about who you are and what you want, getting too drunk too often, the list of undesirable traits for someone now into their twenties is endless and pretty descriptive of my last decades. 

This year, however, this birthday has come just in time. September Fourteen landed on me mid-transition from the above to actual adult. And the key to this, has been realising that more than one kind of adult exists. My reluctance to become my parents got a bit confused there with reluctance to become a grown up, as it seems to with everyone. But the more 'adults' I meet and admire, the more I can happily morph into one. Adults who don't have permed ridiculous hair, who aren't dressed entirely by Myers For Women, who love their intriguing brilliant partners, who love the job they skip to where they make a real difference,  who go to gallery openings and cafes and earn money and spend money and travel and read things other than Woman's Day, who haven't accepted where they are as where they'll always be and who aren't tired and worn down by the grind of a life they hate, but instead increasingly alive thanks to the doors continually opening for them and the life they're living the way they want- something you don't get to do at any earlier age. 

Yes, similar to the prepubescent dreams of teenagerdom with  it's overflowing opportunities and cool, I'm now having the similar sensations about being in my thirties. It's quite odd. 

Like my coffee snobbery and inability to bother trekking long distances, I blame it all on the inner city. For the last few years, instead of seeing Soccer Moms trying to stay 'youthful looking' and  crying into wine about boredom and botox somewhere in Camberwell, I'm tripping over adorable toddlers who are attached to lecturers with dyed hair and Genki coats,  or being asked my opinions on a book I'm  reading in a cafe by someone twenty years older but reading the same book, or watching very organised but completely unbored couples gathering what they need at the market for nights ahead with equally unbored friends. These people are me, but smarter, more financially secure and with more exciting life experiences behind them and, key point that is often overlooked, ahead of them.

It's not the end. I'm not dead. I'm just getting started. And it's a little bit exciting. 

Know what else is? Some of this guy's stuff . 

Every few pictures there's something that jumps down my throat. I like. Also love some of the captions. "Later he told me the lawn chair only tasted ok." ..

the best laid plans of mice and men..

yup. today's plans went astray. Not unlike my intention to post a feminist rant of some discription re: the rage that had hold of me all yesterday over body image and such, rekindled by that Miller girl's 'plus sized' feature in Glamour, or whatever it was. I'm sure it'll get posted. Half of it saved as a draft before I disappeared to do things in the real world. But for now..

Today was going to be stupidly lazy. Last night I taped a swarm of semi-trash, and documentaries as well, on Damir's foxtel contraption, to get me through what was a Saturday with no plans and the anticipation of very little study motivation. The plan was to vegetate and stare at them, escape into that happy little world that such shows promote until forced out. 

Instead, I slept a solid ten hours in a nest of pillows, after reading comfortably for the first time in months as opposed to at an odd angle in my plastic chair, until my eyes burned despite the cosy gentleness of the lamp being used. Don't know whether it was the comfortableness, the tiredness, or simply the air-of-the-boyfriend that remained in the house even when he'd gone, but it was a very very peaceful eve. Woke up refreshed and in studious slow mo. In no hurry to move, so studied some and became enthralled by tales of archeology and arks, religions and relics, countries and countryside , thanks to the History channel. Someone who struggles to lie in bed even after just five hours sleep, stayed put until nearly noon, completely absorbed and relaxed. Grand. Incidently, another thing that was grand , was being allowed to stay at all :D But more about that later. More about the actual docos later, I suspect. When the ability to form sentences, better sentences, has woken up a bit more and when I've done more work etc.

Spent another chunk of the day reading in the sunshine outside, talking to the neighbour and her dog, and just generally soaking in the world. Much better than escapist tv, I must say. But rain and curiousity about things only the internet could inform me of , following on from things read and seen during the morning, forced me back inside. No hardship considering aforementioned warm light is now on again and the whole room feels like home. Spacious enough to not be cramped. Cosy enough to not be lost. I like it.

And I like Baillie St. Sitting on the steps out the front of the house and seeing skeletal trees stretching either side of me,similar houses with their little individualities, strange cloud patterns above me, people and pooches passing , the works. love. 

anyway..will come back, fix this up, write things , but for now... burning to learn more. see more. do more. 

xxx