We have but two eyebrows, so if you fuck one up, you've always got a spare and worthy of mention, are mine.

They look fabulous.

I made a rash decision to neaten 'em up at, ooh, around midnight? Saturday night, that by rights, being rash and at midnight and all, should've been a disaster-but it wasn't!

I guess we can thank fuck for that, can't we?

an etc

We have one life and so many choices, but we don't need to choose only one.

Sometimes though, maybe it's a matter of refining the choice you have made.

Maybe you chose something because you liked the idea of it. Only by doing it though, can you know that maybe you don't like the doing of it.

To know that, you had to experience it, so it wasn't a wrong choice at all. It was the right choice, a choice that as helped you refine your path.

Nothing is cast in stone. If there was to be an answer to the question of what you want to be or do, the answer lies in the journey itself.

There is no fail, there is but refinement.

I made that up myself.

Deep, innit?

I guess none of this applies when it comes to parenthood though.

Hmm.

random title goes here

Coming home today, this dumbfuck flashed his headlights at me. wtf? You drive right up my goddamn arse and you don't pay attention so buddy, when I indicate (you know, 'indicate'. From the latin 'to use that stick thing hanging off the side of your steering wheel' Yeah, that. Moron. ) to let you know I'm turning left in four, three, two, one seconds, it's not my frikkin fault you're picking your nose, whistling dixie and missing my cues.

Goddamn but I hate people on my road.

Yesterday I was that person I hate when I wandered through the car park and in front of a car. Sorry dude. Though as sure as eggs are eggs, the guy driving has pissed me off at some point in my life, or is certain to do so if he hasn't already (he's breathing, nuff said) so if I see him again, I'm jusst going to slash his tyres, and then we'll be even. What say?

Moving right along.

I should've written yesterday, when I had just got back from the reproductive unit and was all tra la! I'm still all tra la, so I guess it doesn't matter. Hmm.

Going scientific kind of goes against what I believe about our bodies and our minds and that connection and bla bla bla, and how we create our own reality. Going scientific I thought was forcing something that maybe should evolve. No, I'm not stoned. What I am is running out of time, what with being an old crone and all, so rather than wait for my body and mind to evolve enough become fecund and delightful, which may take til I'm dead, I'm going to force this fertility issue. So I went along yesterday thinking I'd have to leave my universe loving flower child self at the door. (as an aside, this place is really nice. There's a waterfall in the reception area and new magazines in the waiting area. Joy! And I've been bar coded. All I need do when I arrive in future is scan my card and voila!)

So yesterday I went in at 9.20am to get my day four bloods drawn and my ultrasound. I generously donated a vial of my finest and then hobbled down the hallway with Jo for my scan. She noticed my leg and said, quite simply "Oh, it's your right leg...' and I knew. (da dum) (See, holistically speaking, our bodies reflect our emotions. Right side is the physical side, leg is moving forward, so this right leg o'mine may be because I'm scared of the future I have the power to create. If it was my left leg, I'd say fear of going forward emotionally. There's a good book but dammit, Jo reminded me of the name yesterday and I forgot. Bugger. :mad: ) I knew she was like minded, and she was.

We talked for a good twenty minutes or so, me with my legs in stirrups, Jo at my feet and flourishing the magic wand for emphasis, me with the breeze ruffling up my nether regions. Despite that, it was comforting to know I'd not stepped so far away from my heart. We spoke of the universe, our personal power, and infertility and how we both believe we have the power to switch it on and off ourselves. Both Jo's children were born via IVF and she wondered about that. As much as she loves her children, she said the time wasn't right. Her marriage has since broken up and she believes now that she had trouble conceiving because the relationship didn't support family-ness and that science allowed her a family that maybe wasn't meant to be.

I got to thinking about that.

IVF isn't foolproof, it does have a failure rate, so why does it work sometimes and others not? None of us infertiles wants to be so, not consciously, but we both agreed that infertility was our inner self saying we weren't ready yet. Maybe science isn't forcing something that's not meant to be but rather, allowing something that would be, if our inner self wasn't freaking the fuck out and getting in the way?

Then that got me pondering the concept of success and failure. I tried writing about it here but it sounded totally flaky, and while I'm fun! and stuff! my thoughts aren't generally flaky. Jo and I spoke of it before I left (the success v failure thing, not the me being flaky thing) and if someone so ensconced in scientifically assisted reproduction agrees with me, then maybe my thoughts aren't so flaky after all.

Science doesn't give us possibilities. Science gives us logical solutions to universal problems. Logic though, does it not impede possibility if science cannot give us the answer? Because sometimes what doesn't seem logically possible, is.

As an aside, I find it interesting that we go about this world thinking who we are is, well, who we are, when in fact we learn who we are from other people's reaction to us. Our perception of self is drawn from others' perception of us, so who we are is not who we think we are, it's who someone else thinks we are. Who we are is that person in this moment, unmarred by fears of the future or regrets of the past.

Still not stoned, in case you were wondering....

Onto the scan! It wasn't bad, not at all-and way better than the olden days when you had to drink the liquid equivilant of your own body weight then have that scanny thing run over your gelled up stomach, toes wiggling while trying not to pee on the talbe. This was transvaginal so I got to pee beforehand, which is always good, and call me a freak but it was a piece of cake. There was a screen in front of me so Jo I got to see my uterus (I waved) and my ovaries (they waved back). Both ovaries had black spots all over them, which she immediately explained as immature follicles waiting to get the chemical message to mature and release an egg. I made some comment about worrying, hence my questions, and she poiinted out, quite rightly too, that I didn't sound worried, I sounded like I wanted to be learn. Damn, but I'm glad I met her. Upshot is my ovaries are on the right track and so far, everything looks good. I'll get the official results in four and a bit weeks and, shoot, then what? (wouldn't it be a gas if I was a total fertile Myrtle and it was Guido's swimmers? Those little guys are probably too stoned to find their way)

The woman who took my blood, Sharon, mentioned that I may have to do something called a tracking cycle, where they take blood every day or so to get a good look at what your hormones are doing from go to whoa.

You know, I'm already worrying about having a capricorn baby because, ick. Like I'm going to get pregnant right away....and no, I'm not stoned. A child's starsign might not maketh the child, but I don't want to take any chances so maybe I'll wait til May or October, cuz I want a water sign child, not demon spawn.

I messaged Guido when I got home to ask if he was interested in how I went to day and of course, he messaged back some crap about being interested but also being too busy. Like fuck off. If I expected to talk to him stat, I'd have called, not messaged, so I gave him the sms equivilant of what I just said, and you know what? He called and said he'd made himself unbusy and how did it go. See? It's not that hard to be thoughful, and I think he is, once he gets past his initial panic. Now remember, this is the guy I've been sleeping with for years who I do NOT want to have a child with who does NOT want me to have his child. I think Guido is a good man at heart. I can't rely on him for support, or at least, freely offered support. I think he proved yesterday that when given the opportunity to be supportive, he can be, but he lacks the ability to see how he can be on his own, mostly because he is pretty (read: totally) self focussed. Which isn't a bad thing, it's just how it is.

The other day I realised there's a whole side to me he's never seen. The fun, romantic, funny and affectionate side I show to my (very few) friends because he's so freaked about ever being seen to be my boyfriend. I told him a few months back that it's his problem, deal with it because I'm done monitoring my behaviour to make him feel safe, because I've done that and he's still scared. Thing is, I'm left with old habits and I'm not in the habit of being affectionate with him like I am with my (few) other friends. Our relationship is really hard to explain btw.

Mum called last night and said not a word about my decision to seek fertility treatment. Eh, at least there are no surprises with her. She rambled on about herself and bitched about nanna and grumbled about how ill she is, and lo! she has another new doctor who she hopes will find the key to what ails her. The key however, is inside her and is within her reach. Nothing will fix mum, because to be fixed one must be willing to heal, and her life is about being unwell and not in her control. Oh, she controls her life, but she's familiar with feeling she's been forced to hand the remote to someone else. First it was dad's fault her life was not her own, now it's nanna's. She, as we all do, has created her reality because there is nothing organically wrong with her, not that anyone can find, but she's not well, so she keeps moving and trying to find someone to 'fix' her.

That's not to say she's not unwell. She is. At least I think she is. I believe she does haves all these symptoms and that these symptoms are real. Although...she seemed okay when she was her and wehn I was there three or so years ago...hmm...anyway, I think she creates unwellness, not imagines it, because it is real, but it's symptom of her mind more than it is her body.

She went on to say the same old shit about nanna, and everything she finds odious in nanna is things she does. I don't tell her that though, cuz I'm a saint, ahem, and anyway, what would be the point?

Mum is full of anger and resentment so I sit and make agreeable noises while she free associates. I try to tune out but it does get to me and I do still feel angsty with a touch of the 'what about me?'s. And guilt? Oh the guilt...

Mum is comfortable being ill. I realised that yet again last night. Funny how you 'get' things, but get and reget them several times til you really get it. I probably still haven't reached the peak of gettiness yet either. Last night she wah wahed about how she's never lived the life she wants to live, when really, she's led a good life. How she perceives though, is what counts. Dad's been dead twelve years and yes, it is sad, but she can't hang her hat on that anymore, not credibly, so she keeps finding other resasons to be unwell. Now it's nanna. She openly blames nanna for her unwellness. It's easier to blame someone else for your life. First it was dad, now nanna. This victim's life is the life she's most comfortable with. Now before you all boo me for being so mean, you have no idea of the time I've given to counselling her over the phone. She thinks I'm brilliant on the one hand, then dismisses me pretty darn readily on the other. Usually when I've had something contstructive to say, ahem. Add to that the anorexia I've had so badly for so many years. Bit of background: Shortly after I succumbed, my parents moved to Italy and left me here, and in effect left me here to die, and I've been alone ever since. I don't know if I'm bitter as much as I can't understand how a parent could abandon a child like that. I'm angry still I think. Maybe. I don't know what I am really, so when mum wah wahs about never having the life she wanted, I think, well, you had a life, and I was condemned to not having one at all, so really, I win. Neener.

I still do everything pretty much alone because it's what I'm used to and how I feel safe.

I swear mum has a version of Munchaussens By Proxy (whatever). When I was a kid, she dragged me from doctor to doctor til she found one to prescribe me serapax and then another who gave me sinequin. She was the depressed one though, and I was only twelve.

My brother still doesn't talk to me, and while my experience of it all is totally subjective, while I agree I was difficult, I was also sick. They acted with all their own faculties intact and I hadn't even been sick for a year when they gave up on me.

So you see, when she comes over all Poor Me, I zone out. And then I feel mean and then I feel sad for her. :(

Eh, I'm done with her. At least, I am for today.

And that guilt I mentioned? This is when I feel it, when I talk about her. All the time I wrote the above, I felt guilty. I don't mean to paint a bad picture of her, but the things I say, even without the benefit of my running, bitter commentary, make her sound like a bad mother, cuz truth is, she probably was one.

sigh.

ps

I forgot to mention the rest of the twilight zone moments surrounding my leg, didn't I?

Well, when I saw my doctor, the films taken last Friday at the hospital were meant to be sent to him, but he never received them because they got lost in transit somewhere between the lab and his rooms, which is...wait for it....the exact same thing that happened thirty years ago! Consequently I've decided to revisit my scientific theory that this is some kind of lesson from some weird arsed higher power (which I'm not too sure I believe in, but anyway) about Processing the Emotions Attached To My Shitty Parents because...wait for it....the films got lost then too, exactly thirty years ago!!)

(I said that already, but it bears repeating and with additional punctuation)

So anyway, I'm still limping.

Dammit.

My doctor suspects I may yet have a stress fracture (spiral, upper fib, which makes sense cuz I think I did this changing direction while running shuttles) that the x-ray didn't reveal, so more radiation in two weeks thankyou very much, as the healing fracture may show up where the new fracture don't. His alternative theory is that I've bruised my peroneal nerve. I blinked when he said that too, but no silly, not my perineum (sheesh) my peroneal nerve, what dun do supply my peroneal muscles what done go down the front of my leg.  He also (and this floored me) gives credit to my theory that this could be not getting better because of thirty years ago. Yeah, I know. I'll be dipped in shit too.

I also forgot to mention the jokes he told me too, which I won't repeat, ever, because they were all pretty darned politically incorrect.

Bwah!

That man cracks me up.

drumroll please

I got my period today (and wtf is up with that? Three times within six weeks? Do I have to give up coffee completely?!) so my infertility slash donor insemination treatment is about to begin. It's Australia Day today so the clinic is closed, but ordinarily the procedure is to call on day one to book an ultrasound for sometime between day three and five. I'll call tomorrow and hopefully get it done on Friday. I went through all the paperwork today, dotting the i's and crossing the t's as it were, and I do feel like I'm doing something big. I didn't think it would start feeling official so soon.

btw, I've mastered the art of the frequent yet mini period...although...hmm...is more often for less days better than less often for more? *thoughful face*

And, yay. Because I went through the paperwork (and in effect, read the damn instructions) I'm eligible for the program because I've been going at it for over two years without a hint of pregnancy, which makes me officially infertile, and being infertile trumps being single.

Eh. I've probably got it all wrong and any slapper can wander in off the street and buy a bottle of someone's finest but so what? I read the instructions, which is a first. Do I really need to understand them too?

I have this pain, just a squeak to right of the midline and really low in my pelvis. Obviously I had a surprise ovulation thing going on at some point, shagged in a timely fashion, either pre or post this miraculous egg popping event, and any previous bleeding was implantation bleeding or some such and today's bleed is due to my ruptured ectopic pregnancy, and of course, that means I'm going to bleed out. The end.

Failing that, on day twenty one I get bloods drawn to check my E2 and progesterone levels, and check for if I ovulate something. Only two hormones are being looked at though, so I don't think it's real important what my own hormones are doing. These guys are probably gonna pump me full of theirs anyway, which could have been a moral dilemma if I wasn't so sure that putting up with a concoction of synthetic stuff that will no doubt make me loopy, fat and fat is merely a drop in the ocean of the rest of my life. Good thing I"m sure, huh? I'm thinking this month I need to go without my (natural) progesterone cream and (natural) pregnenelone capsuless. I'll ask when I call tomorrow. By coincidence I'm seeing my kineseologist on the fifteenth, and a lab is located at the same practice, and since I'm into the doo doo do doo stuff, that augers well.

This is it kids. The beginning.

Where's the marching band?

ps I'm more than vaguely satisfied mum didn't surprise me by going over all gooey and supportive at my news. I'm glad she didin't disappont my neglectful madonna image I have. I suppose vaguely satisfied is good. It seems an odd emotion, but at least it's not distressing. With or without her, I'll finance this. (I should beat my chest with my fist when I say that) With her most likely (she says hopefully) though it'd be nice to not need her. I probably don't even need her per se, but to not worry about money as much as I would if I didn't get some help from her is tempting. On someone else's cash, I can glow and gestate and spend my own on bon bons and trashy magazines.

Money is a worry though, even when I have it. Money equals survival, and I've been worrying about surviving for a long time, ergo, I worry about money.

Worry, worry, worry.

disjointed thoughts (or 'why I should write a little bit each day instead of....')

I'm gonna take this opportunity to ramble on about something totally unrelated. It may seem disjointed but hang in there with me, please?

It's been sinking in lately how truly alone I am. The lack of social contacts and friends? Culpa mia, but it's the family thing that's really, really sinking in.

I take my time processing facts

I've never not wanted children, and I've not had a burning desire to have kids, but I knew I wanted to be a mother on day. I haven't used contraception for over two years and I don't even know if I ovulate. Then again, I'd say if I was ovulating, I'd know about it. Like, don't all women know? Anyway, it's safe to say I'm infertile. And at thirty nine, single and infertile, it looks like I'm never going to have kids, ever. And that hurts, one helluva lot.

I don't think it's about reproducing myself, or filling a void or making the family I never had yadda yadda yadda. I think this is about biology or chemistry or hormones or whatever, and my dna is telling me to reproduce it because after all, that's the only reason we're here, to make more of ourselves, not for some social reason, but because of a primal need to perpetuate our species. We think we're above primal urges because we're sentient but imo, we're not and imo, we're guided by them and all this stuff we've achieved *gesturing toward the entire world* doesn't mean anything really, not in the big picture. What matters is trees and flowers and fluffy bunnies and making more and more of it all. We're driven by a need to not become obselete because if we became obselete, what we think matters *gesturing again to the entire world* would have so little value in the big picture that it would crumble away to dust, and no one would even notice.

Anyway, have I argued against this 'aibee wants to reproduce because she's filling a void' idea enough?

So, last November when mum was here, she made the comment that she's sad she's never gonna be a grandmother (complete with requisite tragic woe is me expression. Um, hello? It's not always all about you mum. I'm sad at never being a mother. Fortunately her predictabilty is no longer such a source of distress) and that she'd finance any ventures I took into motherhood. So I thought about it and accepted, and told her that my acupuncture and TCM friend (aka Peter Prickles) has had great success with his clients and would she help me out if I chose that modality? You guessed it. No. (as an aside, if you're gonna offer a cash incentive for an outcome, do you really have a say in how that outcome is recieved? she obviously has no idea how traumatic reproductive medicine is to the person's body and psyche)

Fast forward.

Legislation is, or was, that to be eligible for reproductive assistance, you must be in a committed relastionship, which rules me out, but I've been so torn by this that I called a place called Repromed last week.

I'm seeing a reproductive endocronologist next month, February 28, about donor insemination. I mentioned that I'm not ovulating but dealing with that is but one step in the process of getting knocked up.

I'm not scared, but I'm aware that by deciding to go ahead with this, I've made a choice that, no matter what the outcome, is going to make my lifevery, very hard.

If I succeed, hard. It I fail, hard.

But at least I will have tried.

The timing isn't right as I've not yet got my shit together and made my place in this world, but time isn't on my side, and you know? The things I've chosen to do career wise can be worked around motherhood. ironic, huh?

I feel like I'm playing grownups.

I tried talking to someone else, a parent (and doh! bad choice of support person anna) about this and the response was 'I'm too fertile, how awful is that?!'. I kinda felt like crawling away and dying after that. I don't expect the right or wrong anwers from anyone, I don't expect answers at all. It'd be nice to be heard, is all.

I told Stef over the weekend. He reckons I'll be a good mother (though who would tell you to your face that you're gonna be a bad one?) He's almost acting like I'm asking him to be involved involved, but really, I told him so he can decide now what he wants to do because I want to know NOW if he's gonna be supportive or not. I think not, but it'll be too hard to deal with the consequences of this decision and deal with him flouncing all at the same time. The ball is already rolling, dude, and no matter what happens, it's gonna be hard. I could make the decision for him, seeings as how I know what it's going to be, but...but, but....okay, okay, I admit it. I'm a chicken shit and yes, I want him to completely reinvent his fine self and become someone who willingly says noble things like 'When's your appointment? I'm coming with you'. Not in a 'my woman, my baby' *thumps chest* type way. In an entirely friendly way. A patting me on the hand when he says it way.

Evidently I've been inhaling too deeply while using cleaning products again.

This totally no family thing I'm slowly coming to grips with? Not the major part of this entry but something worth a little eyerolling....I told mum about the appointment, not for support cuz yeah, right, but because she's the one with the bucks, yo. She was all 'I'll call you back darling' (I fucking gag when she calls me that because she hasn't got a loving maternal bone in her body -whoa, bitter much? maybe I'm not as advanced as I think I am).....that was a week ago.

If I ever have a kid, I don't want her anywhere near it, but I need her money to finance this experiment.

So really, I'm still fucked (and yet despite being constantly and metaphorically fucked, am still curiously and stubbornly unknocked up. My thoughts? My body won't perpetuate this nihilistic and destructive gene pool. You think I'm kidding? I'm not)

Moving right along.

I hired a life coach last week, and yesterday she fired me.

*blink*

wtf?

Nah, it's not that bad, she just thinks she's not experienced enough for my special brand of fucked up.

You know, the old 'it's not you it's me' routine.

Whatever.

See, I have all this shit worked out but because I've been on survival mode for so long, I've forgotten how to live. That's my take. I live in my head and forget (read: ignore) my emotions.

Next.

I fucked up my leg in class two fucking weeks ago. I'm Miss Limpy McLimpy and it's driving me crazy. I finally caved and went for x-rays and nope, no stress fracture (see, if a fit person pulls a muscle they're more likely to pull away a bit of bone with the muscle because of the relative strenght of the muscle compared to that of an unfit person) so then I had an ultrasound to rule out a deep vein thrombosis (risk factors: smoking, the pill and inactivity. Negative, negative, negative. I'd say Dr Griffin wasn't ruling out a DVT but ratheer, covering his medical arse, which is a fair thing imo) and no signs of muscle tearing. Nothing is showing up and yet, my leg hurts like fuck.

The interesting thing the x-ray did show was a defect in my lower fibula, attributable to a pervious, early fracture and lo! I did fracture (read: smash into smithereens) my right leg thirty years ago. In fact, exactly thirty years ago. Exactly. Now, when I fractured (read: smashed) my leg, we were on a family holiday interstate so mum and dad didn't take me to hospital for seven hours when I finally convinced them (coughhimcough) I heard the crack and I knew it was broken. And, uh, I'd been saying this for seven hours. Oy. Anyway, we stayed on holiday, my leg was set so incorrectly that when we returned home a week or so later, our orthpopedic neighbour friend freaked out and reset it immediately. Apparently the cast I had on was pulling the fractured (read: smashed) bones apart instead of making them knit, so for an entire week and a bit while on holiday (from my perspective, I use that term loosely) I was in intense pain and kept my mouth shut because I was that kind off kid. Because I'm a froot loop (I typed froot poop first. LOL!) I'm wondering about whether I'm processing some old emotional trauma attached to the experience?

Ramble ramble ramble

random thought: more important than knowing what you want is knowing what you don't want.

another random thought: how do we know we don't want it if we haven't experienced it yet?

decisions, decisions.

This right choices thing? I don't think we ever go out of our way to fuck ourselves over.

We make choices that are right for the time and for the knowledge we had at the time.

Oh maybe something didn't end up as we thought it should, or we can see a different choice could have led us to a more desirable outcome, but we can only ever see that with the benefit of hindsight. Every choice we make leads to greater knowledge-and how can something that teaches us be 'wrong'? And it's only with the greater knowledge afforded to us by this so-called 'wrong choice' that we can look back and say it was a wrong choice. (huh?)

So the choices we've made in the past are rarely errors of judgement. They were considered decicions based on what we knew then. It's only after we experience the consequences of our choices do we learn enough to think there could have been a 'better' way-but we think that with the knowledge gained from that experience and those consequences.

In a nutshell? Hindsight is a bitch.

And the concept of not fucking ourselves over deliberately? We don't.

There's the choices we make, the decisions we mull over that appear to be the 'wrong' choice because they DID fuck us over. Maybe we're habituated to things being 'wrong' or 'difficult' or 'not going our way' so we CREATE that reality by making decisions that will ensure we're fucked over. We manufacture opportunities to get the result we want.

So again, wrong choice? Nope. right choice to for the desired result.

No matter what, we ARE in charge of our own destiny, whatever the outcome, be it high flying business magnates or kicked into the kerb and homeless. We're not victims of our environment even if circumstance seems to be perinally kicking us in the arse. We create our reality, and if in our reality we're ineffective and a failure and waah waah waah, then our reality will be that.

The irony is that it takes as much personal power to create that reality, and in creating that reality, we're NOT ineffective at all because we've created it.

Oh, circular arguments, how I do love thee-and wouldn't the martyrs of the world be pissed off to realise how much power they actually have.

I mentioned this not having kids bla di bla di bla thing to some friends. Good friends they are too, solid, you know? One told me she understands because she's 'at the opposite end of the spectrum' and she only 'has to look at a man to fall pregnant'.

I can't understand that, the concept of being that fertile, or even being fertile at all.

That's why I'm sad.

For this reason, and for your enjoyment, I present the 'what not to say to your infertile friends' files.

rambling

Never in my life have I not wanted a child. I always knew I'd grow up, get married, have children.

Throughout the years of anorexia, my life, like my fertilty, was more surreal than real. I experienced very little during that time that affected *me*, so no experiences helped refine my concept of the future. Usually our plans for the future change according to what we experience in our present, but my plans remained static, in suspended animation if you like, because *I* remained static.

(da dum!)

I simply wasn't there for any of it, so my knowledge of one day having children never faltered because it was never challenged, because if I wasn't there, my future wasn't in jeopardy.

Or something.

My fertility, even before that time, has always been questionable. From the time I first bled at age 13, til when I stopped bleeding at all, my cycle never developed any predictability. At 21, the anorexia squished my already questionable cycle into the ground in the same way one would a spent cigarette. (she says, waxing lyrical) Yet there I was, with this 'knowing' about my future, unchallenged.

Now at 38, I'm finally developing some semblence of regularity, which is ironic as I'm also, unfortunately, getting a grasp of my new reality.

I'm never going to have kids.

Ever.

I don't feel I have a right to mourn my fertilty, or lack thereof, for reasons I don't even know. They're probably the same reasons I keep any sadness feel hidden, even from myself, because I have to keep pretending I'm okay in order to *be* okay.

I'm not okay. I'm rarely okay, fwiw, I just look like I am.

I've been entertaining the fantasy that One Of Those Things might happen. The one in a million shot ('shot'? LOL!*ahem* yeah, yeah, I'm five...) , you know? One Of Those Things where you try and avoid it but you end up pregnant anyway? Yeah well, I've deliberately been lax on the 'avoiding' part of the equation for over two years, and my fantasy world is (finally) looking a little blurry around the edges.

I'd rather go to bed and never get up, but I'll probably get up (like I always fucking do) and just keep going.

I know that life will only become what we want it to be if we make it so. I know it ain't all gonna be wine and roses if I don't do things today that will make it so tomorrow, and thats why I *do* keep going. I want the wine and I want the roses. I can't see them yet, but I'll never see them if I don't keep going. This though, this is something that, no matter what I do, I can't make it *be*.

Maybe I will go to bed after all.....

testing

one

two

three

bold

italic

underline

According to this post's preview, I just taught myself code, kinda, yay verrily.

lemme try linking....

Next, the world the Universe!

Jeebus gawd, I'm brilliant-and way too easily amused.

not exactly an etc

That last post? I know it was riveting but, the end.

Now, where was I? Oh yeah. I've been wondering how bloggers find their material and wondering where I can find mine. Like, they must all have such interesting lives to find such interesting things to write about, or they're so interesting themselves that they can blog about anything and they make it interesting. Once upon a time, I was interesting. It didn't matter if the things I did were interesting or not, cuz I *was* interesting. I'm not sure I'm interesting anymore.

Poo.

Eh, we shall see.

I bought a book today...

Two actually.

I'm so excited I could pee.

They're sitting in my knapsack still, hidden and non threatening. They'll be taken out, the second hand covers adoringly fondled, then I'll put the somehwere else where I'll beat myself up for not reading them. I used to have a libraries worth of books but I lent them here and there and people are shits and I never saw any of them again.

But weee! I am now, once again, a book owner. A two book owner even.

Thing is, I haven't read a book in eight years.

*hanging head in shame*

I was once an avid reader. My nanna used to say I'd read a bus ticket if I didn't have a book to read-and I would too. I read the back of bus tickets and knew all the dandy little sayings and quotes that were printed on the back of our bus tickets, way back in the day. That was back in the day when it cost five cents to get from school into town, and five cents to get from town to home. Not bad for a trip that took two hours. No, I don't mean tra la, what a wonderful trip! *scattering rose petals and skipping merrily*, I meant economically, ten cents to travel for two hours? Not bad. As far as trips of the tra la! variety went, it sucked. In those days, only one bus left an hour to go to the Medical Centre, where I alighted (alit?) to walk the six minutes it took to get home. One. An hour. Cripes. Now of course, it's a major terminus, and I am less averse to a twenty or so minute walk, which is how long it would've taken me from the train station if I'd chosen to NOT wait another fucking hour for the bus and taken the train instead. Ah, the folly of youth. These days I make myself walk twenty or so minutes because It's Good For me to do so. re that taking the train instead the bus. I still would have got home hours after I'd left school, but at least I would have been in transit the whole time. I liked the train too. In those days, we could kill ourselves if we wanted to, with no governemt bureaurocracy making it not possible to do so. The trains back then were called 'red hens' cuz they were red and...nope, no idea about the poultry reference...anyway, they had sliding doors that we'd leave open as we sped along the tracks, the wind in our hair and blowing the cigarette smoke out of our eyes, because of course, we were allowed to smoke in public in those days and any pussy who complained of second hand smoke damaging his pussy lungs, pah!

eek, I'm late!

so deep you'll need your floaties.

You know what? Shit happens. There is no reason for it, it just happens in the same way life happens, and to quote John Lennon, life happens when you're busy making other plans. It also happens when you're widdling your thumbs and wondering wtf it's all about. You don't need to plan for it for it to happen. Whatever it is you're doing, whatever that is, is the answer to the meaning of life.

Live it kids. Breathe in and out. Repeat.

I really don't think there is any meaning that's deeper than just living it. Unlike others though, I find that simplicity as liberating as it is impressive, and as impressive sas it is comforting. We don't need to do anything or be anyone other than who we are, doing what we do, to be a part of the Big Picture and involved in the Grand Scheme. I mean, how cool is that? Whatever we do we're a part of something bigger than ourselves, and that bigger thing only exists because of ourselves.

If one of you hadn't been born, or none of you, or me even, for that matter, the universe would be different. Because you exist, you have impact on this world. Because you decided to turn right today, instead of left, you changed the world. You changed the world simply because you exist.

Our lives are never inconsequential because we are never inconsequential. Every single one of us makes up the whole that is the Big Picture. It there wasn't us, there wouldn't be it.

And that's your meaning.

case in point...

exhibit a: comparison drivers.

You know the ones, the ones who have no idea what a speedometer is for, so they sit in the lane next to me and drive at the exact same speed I drive, which is fine unless I want to get past them or if there's someone behind us trying to get though. If I try and drive ahead, they speed up. If I try and drop behind, they slow down. They're always sitting in the right hand lane and whistling dixie. Excuse me but you're driving a moving vehicle and your brain is where? Criminy.

exhibit b, and worse still, is when I'm that poor bastard trying to get through. Now, I'm no Ayrton Senna (no, of course I'm not because I'm not dead, ahem) but I do take umbridge at being forced to drive at your pace because you're an idiot and I'm not. God.

thinking....

I hate other drivers. I'd probably hate you too, if you were driving.

the beginning...

Whenever I think of the tsunami, I cry, so I've been crying a lot these past several days.

The lost lives, the hopelessness, the fear, the loss...its magnitude is as hard to conceive of as it is the size of the universe. How big is it? It's never ending, it never stops, and this is the same.

Incomprehensible.

On tv last night, I saw a woman going from morgue to morgue, from body bag to body bag, looking for her brother. When she was asked where she found her strength, she replied 'I don't know, you just do what you have to do'. I understand that. That understanding is what makes me impatient with people who sob and cry and claim they can't deal with whatever it is life has handed over, cuz fact is, they CAN, so quit yer whining.

This though...this is different.

I'm not so harsh about this.

There are women on the beaches, waiting for their children to come home from the sea. At what point will they give up hope, when hope is all that's keeping them alive right now? And with hope gone, how will they live? That's where human nature excels though, because they will live on, despite their grief.

What confuses me is how this has brought up shit years gone by. I cried about my sisters last week, and did it again last night. For the first time ever, I went to their grave site, number 122B, Catholic section E, and there's nothing there to show they once lived. A small plaque marks the plot, but it doesn't mark *them*. It's sad.

And apparently I'm on a roll because then I cried for my long ago cat, Coby. I felt so bad for...I don't know why I felt bad. For leaving her? I don't get it though. That was ten years ago and I cried like it was yesterday.

I don't understand grief.