Reconciling Saints

Hi...
I just remembered that Indie 103.1 does stream! WOW! hahahaa... you'd think I'd have remembered that. It's really one of the best radio stations that I've heard in a LONG time! In fact, it's home of a late beloved radio station known as MARS FM... which used to have an industrial hour... or whatever it was... they had a show for industrial music and that was pretty neat.
This was back in the days when I swore I'd end up with Ogre of Skinny Puppy... or someone like him :) Now I've just my boyo... and he's pretty neat too (cyberpunk and all... I mean...come on! Da5id from Snow Crash!?)

I miss new music so I decided I'd tune back in to indie 103 for my fix. I cannot, nay must not become stagnant...

Speaking of new music... whilst looking sort of half-heartedly for a deep plum almost black color of lipstick for Kat on the 'net I found a video by... shoot.... oh yeah... Laydon.. or something... Landon! that's it...I'll post the link here in case you want to see for yourself. I know... I know... it's sorter promoting isn't it? She's still an artist and you can decide for yourself. So, yes, Landon... the music is catchy and jumpy... but... ok here's my problem. The bio read that this was trent reznor and shirley manson in one.
...
yeah, I don't think so.
Why is it that any chick that people say is "in your face" is equated with Ms. Manson and Mr. Reznor? If anything, give me Lesley Rankine of Ruby or give me Res! I just... sorry...haha... I'm not sure that I agree with the profile in that, I just don't see it! If you throw out those names, I'll take a listen to it... but if you fall short... I can't help but feel jiped (is there an actual spelling for this word? gypd? Jypd? gipped? giped? jipped?)

I mean... it's not bad music, but I just don't find it to be what's advertised.

Nothing makes me happier than good music! I went looking for a couple that I'd heard on Indie (which is what had me going back to the broadcast today) on Wednesday and I found them!

Tegan and Sara's "Where does the good go"
BroadDaylight's "Tonight with me"

which at first took me to the long forgotten Gabriel Rios' "Broad Day Light" that I hadn't heard in...4 years or so.

ahhhhh.....!!!!
*jumps about like a 15 year old*

Today my sister and her new husband brought over all we needed to make caprihinas. Dad provided tequila for shots. Me? I made empanadas.
So what do we end up doing? Listening to Mariachi music and playing around with the little magnet of the mariachi guy and my dad's tequila bottle.








*giggles like a maniac and runs away*

So I was reading Contrariwise Ramblings ... you know, like you do, and I saw this post on the Million Blog List. This is an experiment to see how long it takes to list 1,000,000 on this site.
So I figured... why not!?

If you'd like to add your blog, here's what you do:
- Go to the section containing the last of the listed numbers
- At the top of that section, click on the edit button.
- this will take you to a screen containing HTML code. At the end of the list type in the next number and something like this
:1073 [http://reconcilingsaints.blogspot.com/ Reconciling Saints] The (sometimes)Funny, (generally) Surreal and (always) Adventurous life of Ceci.
which is what I wrote... so basically, your website address, the name your listing it as and a description of your website.

yep...

I've a new idea for a tattoo.
I want 3 boxes, rectangular boxes, the first containing an 'X'

The way I see it... I have one major strike against me. If I get to 3... I'm in HUGE trouble.
I don't think I'll get to three... but I would like a reminder.

I'll have to talk to Stephen about this...

You know, I was watching Northern Exposure tonight. I used to love this show... LOVED loved loved it! It was medicine for my soul. If ever there was anything wrong, this could cure it, this provided... somehow... some sort of answer. I don't know if it was just the quirky writing, or that they were doing something different, but it always left me... better.

My Strike has me in a weird world and I'm re-evaluating everything. I want to change everything - how I look, how I dress, how I do things, how I see things, how I live. This has my mind working at all times of the day and night to the point where I don't really get much sleep. I feel like there's always something I'm analyzing, something I'm always taking a step back to look at and wonder... is that what I wanted?

So I almost changed it 'cause it was one of the later episodes. In fact, it's the one where they finally tell Joel that he's free to go and that they have a check for him. Still, I watched to see if I remembered it... and I sorter did... but that's not the point. In the end, Joel gets all his stuff back that Maggie had saved for him and he says that he made a list of his favorite things, and he burned them.
...
Brilliant! Or... at least for me it is...
It would be truly freeing to not have anything attached to me. That is to say, it would be oh so nice to not have anything weighing me down, nothing that I cared about but Da5id, my friends, my family and ... life. I don't think I could do it 'cause there are things like books and CDs and LPs that I don't think I can live without. That's more of a muse thing, though and less of a material thing. It's how those artists make money and earn a living and it's what feeds my brain. So I don't think I could burn those. I'd also have a huge problem with burning my dolls and such since they've always been real to me. You can blame the velveteen rabbit for that one...

Still, the meaning behind what the burning means... it hits home. I don't care about money, or what I have, or the right job, I just want to be happy and remember the most important things to me.

If I had to make a list of what's important to me, it might look something like this:
Da5id
my friends/ family (some are one in the same)
my writing
the world
art (spoken, writen, sung, played or viewed)
living

I mean, I know it's important to be able to live... and it's not like I'm going to shun money, but I don't think it's important like I used to. I think that it's a distraction if anything. In fact, that's a big factor in why I left my job. I didn't want to be tied to it because it paid well if it made me unhappy, and I didn't really need all that much to be happy anyway.

Maybe I'll start an imaginary bonfire and "burn" all those things I don't need...

Leigh says that I look like I'm in the morgue (but in a cute way) in this picture

...

I kinda like that imagery. I'm happily dead to the world... and listening to music (those strings there are my beloved Bang & Olufsen headphones). In a way, that's me being a ghost, not really existing in this world, and not anywhere else. I'd like to think that if people want to think of me, they can think of me like this- somewhere outside of this world where no one can find me listening to music.

For the past 2 weeks I've been working on a story that deals with this... Not very succesfully, however. Mainly I'm just feeling out the character. I've been trying to put what it feels like (and not what I'm going through) into this, however, it's hard not to color it with outside happenings and feelings.

I'm very acutely aware of life under these circumstances at this moment, and it is this feeling that I'm trying to play with. Today's Calvin and Hobbes (ok so I'm on a big Calvin and Hobbes kick, sue... never mind) came up with this:


© Watterson 1991 (click the pic to make it go... poof!)

Ok... let me try to explain as best I can:

I feel like in that square... there's a tiny tiny crack that I've found and have slipped through in order to recover, to heal, to learn, and to see what is to pass next. It's as though, in that crack, time cannot move and I take that time to observe, listen, take notes and learn. It's as though I'm in a coma, but an actual living one; my body, mind and soul need to recover from the trauma and have therefore been placed in this space that's not part of life. I like the idea that, like the light in the picture, it's all a soft glow of blue. I also like to imagine that I have a comfortable sleeping place, my favorite music, books, my computer and journals for writing, and exercise. Yes, exercise. Why? Well I love that feeling of strength I get and of a nice weakness - a building of muscle weakness - and the good stretch that I get after I've been for a run or spin class or just worked with weights.

I also like to imagine that I view the world as though looking out one of the windows of the house. Things are distant and the noise is muted. From my vantage point, I can't quite here what's being said, but I like the way that all sound comes in soft, muted. I can stare out the window and smile and think... one day I'll re-emerge... but not now.

That part sounds nice...

It's the part of the real world that scares me. It's very noisy out there and I don't know when or how I'm going to re-enter it. In the meantime... I sit... and wait.

I'm sorry if this is so confusing... I'm only trying to convey the feeling I get... the "coma" sense of it. This is more of an exercise in trying to use my words, one might say.

I'm just trying to give one a glimpse of life in the morgue... and it's sick that I like it.

I do so love my friends... I do I do I do...

© Watterson 1992

So, ok… I can talk about this now.

… this, of course, being Juno.

When I first saw it I was on a plane and Da5id was asleep and there was no one to talk to.

I dunno how you felt about it… but it really struck me and there was so much I wanted to say about it. Yet, I felt like I couldn’t say anything about it, was sorter glad that I was on a plane because I was able to role it around in my mouth and really get the taste of it.

Tonight I watched Juno again. It came out on DVD today and my mom and I watched it. It was… a little difficult to watch with my mom. I think she saw what I saw in it in that she started talking about how I was in high school and she started talking about Brian.

For those of you new to the show, Brian was my first love. He was the boy who sat behind me in religion class (for the record, I went to a catholic high school) and drew me funny pictures and passed notes to me. He was the first person that made me realize that love can leave you breathless and dazed, that it could make the stars shine as bright as when you’re looking at them through tears.

I was like Juno before. Not half as witty, I don’t think, nor by any means as forward with my parents. I lived in secret, was me in secret… but I thought like she did, as I’m sure any girl whom, at that age falls in love for the first time and learns that life can be heartbreaking for the first time.

It’s funny seeing it now that I’m older. It used to break my heart to think that all these things that life was showing me, the heartbreaking reality of it all, was actually reality. I fought against it! I shouted at the night against the unfairness of it all! If I knew then that I would be sitting here years later agreeing with these things, it would have broken my heart.

Life and love were wondrous things… and they were special and magical and … and anything could be overcome if you loved hard enough, fought hard enough and believed hard enough.

…

That partly makes me sad. It makes me sad that there’s something in that that I lost and that, I think I would have been a disappointment to myself…

… but that’s not what I wanted to focus on right now…

I wanted to focus on love… and heartbreak… and growing up before you know how.

The scene that got me was the one, and if you haven’t seen it stop here!

…

ok… the one where she’s dancing with Jason Bateman and he starts talking about leaving his wife. For him at… let’s say my age now… she’s a fresh face with ideals he once held and that still somehow resound strongly in there somewhere… and he remembers how to be… himself. Everyone talks about how icky it is, but at 16, girls, you’ve got to remember that you were pretty smart and just coming into your own and learning SO much. I had millions of conversations with my older cousins’ friends. I remember a friend of my cousin Carlos once telling me, “When you’re older, you’re going to be a knock out, you’re going to be something else.”

I know it sounds creepy, but it wasn’t. He just seemed impressed at our conversation and that was it. There was no… you know… weirdness… I think I just said thank you.

Again, my point…

So I think he just… you know, forgot who she was and her age and he remembered what it was like back when he was truly himself. When we lose ourselves, it’s all so very appealing to stay with what reminds us of who we were, who we are.

I can see the story here in 2 ways.

One is me at 16 where I agree with Juno… and I wonder about how fucked up things are… about how I want to believe that people can stay in love forever, or that one always knows what that is! I can see and feel the disappointment in everything I once thought... just… was.

The other is me now, seeing that I used to think like that. I could see from the point of view of all the adults in the movie. The realization that that’s what I thought until I had to experience it all, until I’d been through break ups, pregnancy scares, abortions, divorces, marriage…s…

heh…

One year later would find me starting to learn the lesson that Juno learns with the pregnancy, with the threat of divorce, and with figuring out how she feels herself.

Unlike Bleeker, Brian didn’t know how to handle the pregnancy. The boy who did things against his nature because they were things I loved, started folding back into himself. We did what we both thought was right because neither one of us wanted to tell our parents.

I had an abortion and it broke my heart. Brian… well maybe it broke his too… but he couldn’t look at me the same again, he didn’t open up to me the same again and… we broke up a month or so later. He couldn’t even hold my hand anymore.

My mom, in the middle of the movie, starts talking about how Lauren, Brian’s little sister who was a friend of my sister’s, used to tell Monica that she was afraid I was going to get pregnant. I think I froze right when she said that. I mean, she’s gotta know! If not… how did she hear this and wonder if I wasn’t having sex?

So here I am, 31, and still wondering, do I let her know now that it’s safe? Is it safe? I almost expected her to turn to me and tell me that she knew. She made it sound like she did… but she still seemed to end it with a question.

…

One of the first questions I think about is, how in the world is my world so different than hers? … That’s another story, though… and perhaps will be told another time, once I learn to tell it.

Mainly, I wonder about how we learn… and how heartbreak and joy shape who we are and allow us to grow up. How, we get into situations that are so above our heads and realize too late that the game we’re playing has higher stakes than we could have ever imagined.

…

and all we’re left to do… all we can do… is go through with them, and hope that in the end, we still come out whole…

…not old… just… wise… not, worried.

But definitely shaken… and never the same.

I'm still here...

sometimes I have to remember that. I'm trying very hard to keep strong and keep positive.

SO!
*claps hands and rubs them*

enough of that.

Let's just say that things have gotten a bit difficult, and if you don't know the story, well, maybe one day I'll tell you. Right now, however, I cannot.

So, my current little... adventure, let's call it... has me with lots of time. It also has me as a virtual recluse. Two things I'm getting a lot of time to do are
a) go to the gym
b) write

I was talking to London about this and I said it would be funny if this little exile finds me only able to write for a living... and I'm going to add to that keeping fit.
I kinda like that. I think that's a good thing to come out of this whole mess.

During the day... one of the first things I do when I wake up in the morning is have a little something to eat, then go to the gym. It helps me refocus. It also makes me feel stronger and... cleansed, as though with each mile I run, I gain some strength and prove to myself that I am strong. The more I sweat, the more I feel as though I'm being cleansed, letting out all the bad things; in a sense, shedding my skin.

It really makes me want a make-over because... well, because I feel that after this exile, I'm going to come out a bit changed. I think I'm going to come out stronger, wiser, ...hopefully only a little jaded, and ... better.

What would I do? Well, mostly I'm thinking of my hair... I want it blue again... and I want it short... and shaved under (that could be the freakin' heat wave we've had here coming out!). It might also be that my hair is going through an... I dunno... identity crisis??? Something, but it's very frizzy and unruly and there's no getting it to do what I want it to do.

I'd also get a new wardrobe... however, that's something I've been working on doing since October. I'd like clothes that are more me... and some that I can wear in hot weather, 'cause I don't really have any of those. A lot of that comes from the fact that I hide my body a lot, I've realized.

I also would like to stay stronger... keep up the running and the spin class 'cause of how it helps me feel. I think that will help me out with the clothing situation as well. Go fig! I want to be able to run when I have to, to be strong when I have to... to really feel my muscles moving.

Something right now feels very zen to me. They say that trials and tribulations are thrown our way to make us stop and think, to re-examine what our life is like. From my current perspective, which is living on the outside looking in, I can see that I need to slow down and really take a look at everything and what is important to me and who my friends are... not to mention that I never knew that my family supports me... truly supports me. I don't think I ever gave anyone enough credit, or rather, didn't think that when it came right down to it, I wouldn't be pushed away. For this, I'm sorry and I was mistaken.

Thank you all who light a candle in the dark for me. It means... so much.

As for what I do, I write... mostly by night, and whenever I can. Right now, Lights in the Attic by the Static Age provides a soundtrack as I sit in this room in a house that no one knows of. I sit in a comfy bed with a bedside table light on and the fan blowing coolly on me while I write. This, for me right now, is heaven... and I couldn't be happier here. Yet, when I think of the future and this holding pattern I'm in, it's all so unstable and unknown that it makes me panic just a little. The butterflies start to flutter in my tummy and I feel as one feels when a wound is touched - as though my thoughts were actually connected to the nerve endings in my body.

I have to think that, whatever the future brings, I can do this. I am strong enough.