Zombie Apocalypse and changes

The weekend zoomed by.  In truth, it was boringly normal!  I spent Friday night shopping and then cooked homemade pizza.  The smell of it wafted throughout the laneway out back.  Yes, it tasted as good as it smelled and went well with red wine and a couple of television series that I never miss – Vikings and then Suits.

Wine.  Hmmm  It was my night off...  A night off from dieting since I’ve now hit 5.7 kilos for the year and am feeling pretty good; and a night off from thinking; since I’d worked all day and attended a million meetings followed by a 3 hour gig in the board room (which means keeping on my toes).

So Friday night was relaxing.  Saturday was housework followed by a girlfriend arriving in time to sit and eat left over pizza and with a bottle of champagne.  Then it was slinking off to the Flying Saucer Club to watch Russell Morris belt out old hits while keeping one eye on the weird relationships that show up at those places.  This it gave me a strange combination of emotions.  Firstly, it made me miss my own relationship that wasn’t nearly as weird has half of those in the room; then be glad I was single.  All in all, it was a great night.  At the end of the gig we trammed up Glen Huntly road and then walked home.  

This morning it was up to cook bacon and eggs – with champagne  J and coffee before my friend trekked off home and I had an hour to myself to do a walk, given my food intake this weekend.  By late afternoon, my kids had all arrived and we went off to a rooftop bar for dinner…

Boy 3 left to go home and now I’m left with Boy 1 – catching up on The Walking Dead.  Sheesh.  I’m basically submerged in the Zombie Apocalypse!   And all the while, Boy 1 keeps talking about what he would do… mostly it finishes with ‘I’d get a bazooka!’ 

Some things never change.  That part I like.  

Things with my Dad changed and that part I didn't like.  That continues to come out of left field and hit me like a freight train.  How I miss him.  The world; life... Doesn't seem the same without him in it.

What's that smell..?

This is the first weekend since splitting with the ex, that I have been completely alone.   Up until now, there had been a million things that needed doing.  Hell, there are still a million things that need doing; the difference is that these things will wait.  Dad dying wasn’t going to wait.

How did I fare..?  It was a long day.  I was up at 7 awaiting the air conditioner guy who took one look, at how high the first story window was before shaking his head and saying he would have to come back.   After that, I did some cleaning before deciding to investigate what the smell was coming out of my pantry.  The girl had said last week "It's the spices!"  I wasn't so sure.  I’ve been cooking with black rice of late and when I noticed it spilled across the white shelving, I wondered how I’d done that without noticing and cleaning it up.  Then I noticed it was everywhere… and that it wasn’t black rice.  I have mice!!!!!  And the smell is furry rodent smell!

So it was off out to buy bait which I’ve strewn about the place.  Strewn… Ha!  It’s lucky I don’t have a pet because I’ve spread four packets of the stuff around!  Then it was remove everything.  Throw what was gnawed or even remotely suspect.  Wash with mint oil and hot soapy water.  Put anything not touched into large plastic tubs before vacuuming and washing the floor and bottom of the pantry.

I even went so far as to change the vacuum cleaner bag to try to get rid of that awful smell!  The box said it could take DAYS to kill them.   I saw the mouse this morning.  The mess it left made it seem like a dog sized rat had rampaged through my pantry.  In truth, it was a tiny grey field mouse.  I still want it gone; now.  I’m thinking about going to get another type as well to strategically position that. 

After the mouse/clean I looked around and wondered what I would do then.  This is the moment when loneliness strikes.  I can only imagine how my Mum is coping now that she has lost her husband of 59 years.  They eloped when my mother was seventeen.  How do you get over that...?

The girl was out for the weekend and so I sat, holed up in my house; alone with a mouse and a glass of wine.  It made me feel much lonelier than I have up until now.  It also made me feel stronger; because I can do this.  I am woman, hear me roar!  I had a moment of self-pity that I eliminated with a power walk followed by a book in the bath.  I was in bed with my book by 9pm and I suspect out like a light by ten!

The Pendulum Swings

Okay; after re reading yesterday’s post, I realise I may have been a tad ambitious in my thoughts on ‘this is easy!!!  I’m over that relationship already!’

It has been easier than I figured it would be.  This is mainly due to the fact that I am experiencing the death of a relationship, there has to be a grieving process.   I’m pretty certain that most of my grieving occurred during the relationship; even if I wasn’t aware that was the case.

Maybe 'not aware' is grasping at straws.  Perhaps 'head in the sand' would have been a better turn of phrase.  Seriously, did I really think it wasn’t always going to end here..?  The answer to that is simply that I didn’t know and wanted to give it a shot. 

If you read back through the years of blogs you will see that nothing really changed.  All the issues that were there from the start remained up until the day that I left.  On that score alone, you would think that it was pretty clear that the relationship wouldn’t last.  You may only be surprised that it took so long to end.

Then the pendulum swings.

Opposing that theory is the reality that I like him as a friend and a person.  We get along.  Have similar interests.  I could see a great life when we were old; filled with music and writing and laughter.

I’m doing pretty good really.  I do miss him.  But I do not miss that life or house or sly child or psychotic ex-wife and her ridiculous demands.

In the wash up, I realise that it doesn’t matter how much you love someone.  Love isn’t a cloak of invisibility.  You can't just toss it about your shoulders and believe you have the protection of it forever. It doesn’t mean you can treat people as you like and still, that person who loves you, will love you forever.

If your needs are never quite met… If your wants are always put last; love dies.

Suddenly Curious and Questioning

I only just realised today that I am curious; wondering why I stayed so long in a house with a manipulative kid and a delusional partner who was incapable of admitting the truth of that kid.

I’m not saying I don’t get it.  I do.  It’s bloody hard to admit your child has serious personality issues.  It’s so much easier to just deny it and hope it rectifies itself. Of course the reality is that it can’t rectify itself.  That kid isn’t going to wake up tomorrow and have a string of friends knocking on his door to see if he wants to go hang.  Let's face it; he is not a likable child and his lack of hygiene will have serious impacts on any dating prospects.

But it wasn’t just about the kid. The ex-Squeeze was the least romantic person on the face of the planet.  An emotional cripple if you will.  This was never more obvious than when he failed to even send me a text message on the day I buried my father.  Were our roles reversed, I would have crawled across broken glass to be at his side and offer support.

Hell; I’m not even saying I don’t get that.  That was too hard and he isn’t capable of putting himself in difficult positions.  Let alone a position that is full of emotion; would require him to feel.

Why I’m suddenly curious and questioning is that as I have spent weeks/months holding a hand to my brow in a near swoon at the injustice of the world…  He doesn’t love me; he didn’t want a life with me.  Woe is me.  What am I going to do now..?

I have beaten my head against a wall for years…  And for what I ask?  Because I’m starting to realise that maybe I wasn’t in love with him either.  If I was, how can I be fine?  And not just fine; but absolutely fine?  Maybe it was the friendship that I loved - and if I'm not angry or even that hurt; why couldn't I have the friendship back?  Well after are period of time that is!

What I am going to do now is pick myself up, dust myself off, finish my house and then find myself an emotionally free guy to date!

A First Kiss

I stumbled across a story about a filmmaker named Tatia Pilieva who paired up with a film studio to bring 20 strangers together for an on-camera kissing session.

My interest peaked at the concept so I slipped on my head phones and decided to tune in.

It started off with a very good looking couple who were obviously confident in their skin, if not a little nervous but then quickly skittered through what I consider to be “real life”; in that many of the couples seemed mismatched.

The combinations she had captured were so interesting to watch. Lesbians; an older woman with a younger man; gay guys (who seemed awkward, or maybe there was just zero spark there); very tall with short, unattractive with attractive.

Strangers; meeting for the first time in a studio with a crew filming and cameras… Hard to imagine you could get into the kiss; and yet some did.

Watching it made me look forward to meeting someone that I want to lean in to kiss.

If you want to take a moment out of your day to feel young and alive, you can find “First Kiss” here.

Hitting Acceptance

Yesterday, I received a text from the Squeeze to say he was dropping over my outdoor heater and collecting some of his stuff. This threw me into a bit of a spin.  Frankly, I prefer to stick to not having to see or deal with him. I mean it’s going to be uncomfortable right? How can it not be? One minute you are sleeping with someone, joking with them, eating with them.  The next; you're just not... You realise that they have been living a lie. What can you say after that..?  Pretend to be friends?  To care?  Far better to just avoid them altogether.

The final “swap” of stuff up until now, has been done when I’m at work.  I leave whatever he has emailed me about in a box at the back door and come home to find his stuff magically gone and my stuff in its place.  No words, other than written, are exchanged.

This may or may not be the most grown up way to address it; but I have enough to deal with at the moment.  I don’t need a constant reminder that I woke up in 2014 and found my life trashed.

As it worked out, it wasn't such a bad thing that I saw him.  He came in for coffee.  We even discussed my Dad’s funeral and the 2 BR box he is renting with the toad.  We even had a few laughs.

The outcome for me, was an understanding that he was right.  At least to some degree.  Our wants, needs and lives are on two totally separate paths.  I hated the sound of the the unit he has signed up for and already know that the stench from the toad will waft through those tiny rooms like a grass fire.  He was right.  I don't want to live as he does.  I never wanted it.

With no Toad or Harridan constantly in the picture, we could have had a good life with plenty of writing, music and laughs.  With them in it, it was never going to be anything but Hell for me.

Guess that means I've hit 'acceptance' in one part of my world.

Stupid Grief

I knew I couldn’t expect it to be easy getting over Dad’s death, but I’m heartily sick of the roller coaster that is ‘grief’.

I think I’m doing pretty good; feel like I’m creeping up the next grief roller coaster hill into acceptance, only to find myself whizzing down the next dip in the tracks back to heartbroken.   And I must say that I seriously hate heartbroken.  It sucks; full of tears and woe and red puffy eyes.  Worse, I know that the next stage is anger.

I’ve done it so often now that I’m pretty sure I’m not even holding on to the bars to keep me in the seat.

When does it stop!

Year of Change

I spent most of last year walking around muttering ‘2014 will be the year of change!’

Dad dying and me being single again were not exactly the changes I was thinking of, however; life tosses stuff at you and its deal or no deal.

The only way to cope with ugly stuff is to look at the positives.  Positives in my Dad dying aren’t exactly lying thick on the ground but I am focusing on the fact that I was lucky enough to get a brilliant Dad; and he was a brilliant Dad to me for fifty one years.   If it was a lottery; I won first prize. 

Re being single…  I’m not even thinking about dating again for a while.  There needs to be some sort of ‘repair phase’ before I go down that path.  I’m in no hurry.  Instead, I’m concentrating on changing back to the person I was prior to fitting into the Squeeze’s life.  I liked that person.  I didn't like the person I was when I was forced to deal with the toad  - and I was always wrong; it made me feel like a liar.

This week, it has been well after 9 pm before the television was even turned on.  That is the biggest thing I missed while in a relationship; that blessed silence or music crashing over you as you unwind from work and just cook.

I still have a fair amount to do to finish off the house and some of that will require utes and manly tools but let’s face it, I was always the manly tool person anyhow!  

I’m In Love…

In love with my new place.

It felt like home from the first time I walked through it.  Glen Waverley was lacking in character.  It was big; it was new… but it was slapped together to be sold quickly and it lacked the quality and style that an older, art deco place has.   That isn’t even taking into consideration that a ‘man’ designed it – and not very well.  I mean what type of house doesn’t have a linen press..?  And lighting over the bench you are preparing meals at; as opposed to behind it so that you are cutting in the shadow.

It just never felt like home and as the ex-Squeeze stated on our last catch up; we have opposing views on what ‘home’ should look, feel and smell like.  

I can’t describe how bad Glen Waverley smelled.  No amount of air freshener could dispel it.  There was an old movie with Charlton Heston in it called “The Ten Commandments”.   When the pharaoh refuses to set Moses’s people free, Moses sends a green fog that seeps through the city.  I think it killed the first born male child of each house however, the vision of that is what the stench from the bedroom the toad was existing in, smelt and felt like.  I could almost see it drift down the stairs to seep that hideous stench throughout the rest of the house.  During the holidays, prior to me leaving, it took three boxes of bicarb of soda to dull that disgusting odour; although I could not eradicate it. 

I can only imagine what it the stench is like now…

So here in Ormond, I have had about five day’s straight since coming home from my parents after my Dad’s funeral.  It is now clean and things are finding their correct place; my personality is beginning to stamp on this home.   The ex-Squeeze was right.  My home has always been about me; about finding a balance between ‘spotlessly clean’ and yet keeping a vibrant, welcoming feeling. 

This home has it. 

Couples Life - Single Life

When you are suddenly single again, you realise just how much ‘couples’ life got in the way of ‘my’ life.  I hardly practiced the piano; I stopped writing; my plants all basically died.  Life got in the way.

When the Squeeze and I first started dating, I remember him being shocked that during February, I hadn’t watched television as yet that year.  Commercial television that is; if I wanted to see something, I’d download or DVD it.  There just always seemed other things to do – less boring things.  Even if you’re on your own, there are a million things you find to entertain far better than the non-stop television cycle.

Since moving, my natural preferences once again, come to the fore.  I haven’t even worked out the aerial as yet so there isn’t much in the way of television watching.  Today, I cleaned and pottered around the kitchen cooking Italian and listening to opera.  Even better, I traipsed upstairs to my balcony and picked fresh rosemary and basil to cook with.  Suddenly I have a downstairs garden of potted plants that are once again thriving; and a balcony full of herbs and a cute metal dog named Eddie.

I only have a television upstairs so it’s music or silence when downstairs.  Frankly, I’m okay with silence also.

I took my son to the airport for a flight to Queensland at 6am and then spent the day on my own; rattling around my house - cleaning, cooking and thinking.

Out of nowhere, life throws you a loopy.  Suddenly you’re alone when you didn’t expect to be.  Still, today has made me remember the small things in life that I love that have fallen by the wayside and I realise that perhaps being single isn’t such a bad thing.

Other than the fact that I miss my Dad, today was a good day.

The Reasons

Before my Dad died, I had caught up with the ex-Squeeze once.  He had bought some stuff over to my place and we were going to go grab a coffee.   As we were walking, I told him that I didn’t quite get how we had moved from one life/decision to another.  Generally, I find that there has to be some sort of catalyst for such a dramatic change and yet I couldn’t see one.

We had discussed how our new relationship could work including my proviso that the first weekend he kicked me to the kerb for the toad, we were done.  I mean I had already had to take a back seat; without weekends, we didn’t have a relationship as far as I could see.   I don’t do “swan in when you feel like it to hump me” phase.

I knew as soon as I was out of the door, the toad, using his inherited mummy art of manipulation and lying, would be working on him for weekends.  There was no doubt in my mind.  Throw in a few of the Harridan's “you are just like your father!” and he would cave like a cheap tent.  Fold like a cheap suit!

Still, I figured that it would take a month or two for him to roll over and pee down his leg.  I didn’t plan on it being the very first weekend I had moved.

So I put it to him; did he instigate it.  Push me?

He didn’t say that he had outright, but he did mention it couldn’t have worked anyhow.  The house in Glen Waverley was all about me and what I liked; how I liked to live.  Then there was the added nail in the coffin; I didn’t like listening to Jazz.

Kidding right..?  I actually laughed initially until I realised he was serious.  WTF?  So because I don’t want to listen to Miles Davis we are done?  Hell, I never listened to Cold Play when he was around as he doesn’t like them.  I reserved that for in my car music!

Although I can concede that he is correct in some regards.  The house was about me and how I like to live.  When I went to pick up something a couple of weeks after I had left, I paused to take a few happy snaps of the difference in our desired life styles…  

I was on the move so some are a little blurry, but I’m sure you get the general look, feel and smell.

Yeah.  Good luck with that.

If it wasn't so damned bizarre, it would be hilarious!

Dead. To. Me.

No one on the planet does dead to me like I do.

When it is over; it’s over.  I don’t hunt them down.  I don’t stalk them or do late night calls or texts.  They simply cease to exist.  Ever.  That is just my way; and it works.  It means there is no long drawn out pain – it’s like lancing a boil.

The Squeeze is in dead to me zone.   His behaviour over the last month has been mystifying.  Shocking really.  I just can’t fathom what it is that I missed; and I obviously missed something.  Still, I guess it doesn’t matter what I missed now.

It still makes me shake my head that this emotional cripple is treating me like I killed his dog or burned his house down.  

I sent his last couple of emails to my best friend who replied to say “what the …?  How cold and emotionless!  There is something not quite right there….”

I’ve always thought that hideous nose picking child of his has “Asperger’s”; definitely some form of personality disorder.  Now I am certain that he does.

Just a pity he inherited it from his father.

I'm not titanium...

My dad died last week.

Mostly, I feel as though I’ve barely been hanging on.    

Much of the time I’m not hanging on.

Together with my younger brother and sister, we played 'Titanium' hundreds of times in an attempt to toughen up and not break while doing our speech at the funeral.  I heard my voice crack once; but I sucked it back; dragged it in and got it together.   We each held strong until the end; but there was no way the flood gates weren’t going to open when the lone piper came into the chapel and followed my dad’s coffin out.

My dad is a retired policeman.  The turnout of retired ‘blue’ was impressive, considering his send-off was 25 years ago or so.  The retired police association spoke and his coffin was draped in the Australian flag with an officer’s cap atop.

They say there are five stages of grief.  When I research it, this is applicable to the end of a relationship also; so I guess I’m experiencing a double whammy.    I believe I’m hovering on “anger”.   This is backed up by the fact that I wanted to pull over, grab my samurai sword from the boot and take someone’s head off when they cut me off the other day. 

You may be wondering if me driving around with a sword is a weird little uniqueness in my personality…   It’s not.  My dad knew me well; better than most.  He left guns for the boys; but a beautiful samurai sword for me.  No girly shit coming my way! 

When anger dips away, I just feel alone.   I’d feel alone if I was standing in a room of people.’  Let’s face it…  I am alone.

The funeral is supposed to help with acceptance.   It hasn’t.  I feel as though I'll see him tomorrow; could pick up the phone and ask his advice in a heartbeat.

I have three ex-husbands.  One attended the funeral; the other two sent messages; even the one who I basically wish a pox on (he treated my two oldest children so badly.)  I didn’t get anything from the Moodle;  I didn’t get one text message from him or one member of his family or any of his friends. 

We didn’t end badly, we just ended – and yet such blatant rudeness and lack of care only manages to drive home the differences between him and his; and me and mine.