The Bitch On Her Blog

Other potential titles for this post:
Blog Fodder
I'm Gonna TellTrust Issues

A friend and I got into a ... fight? Misunderstanding? Whatever you want to call it. A not-getting-along-swimmingly. That's what I want to call it. She e-mailed me saying she didn't want to be friends anymore. My whole issue with having a history of not being able to keep friends is another post. The friend and I kept talking (e-mailing). We're going to be okay. That is not the point of this post. It may be the point of another post.

The point of this post is that at one point, in talking about a third person, she said something like "I don't want to be the bitch on her blog who ..." and I responded "Just like you didn't want to be that bitch on her blog, I didn't want to be THIS bitch on her blog who ..." It made me think. It made me sad.

Are blogs really so popular now that people worry about their actions being blogged about? (Excuse me while I laugh at this irony.) I know my blog about Rique at Trader Joe's was not nice. I certainly haven't forgotten my whole family issue. I talk a lot of smack about my work people. But are we really living in a society where people's actions are hindered and thoughts they previously would have shared are muted if they know the other person they're dealing with has a blog? Should this be the way things are? Do other people who have blogs constantly think "Is this anything to blog about?" as they're having conversations? I don't. Something will happen, and I may think "I feel a blog post coming on." I may get angry at LEL for something and instead of cursing her out and losing my job because I can't just let it go, I remind myself I can vent by writing about it later. But it never occurs to me in the moment something is happening that I should see it as a blogging opportunity. I'm usually too busy doing whatever I'm doing. Perhaps I'm not the best multi-tasker. I felt sad when I read that sentence my friend wrote.

Sure, I want to write about the fight my friend and I had, so technically, yes, I plan to write about it. Except that, it's not HER I want to write about. It's how what she said made me feel and what it reminded me of, that I want to write about. Really, the only reason I will write about the fight is to explain what I'm talking about. Some may be thinking "Why not just write to her directly, instead of blogging about it? Better yet, why not call her?" Because. Because if I blog about it, there may be no response, or a "Huh, I didn't know that about you" response, or a "Hey, I've had the same thing happen in my life" response. But if I write to someone about this, I fear the "Why are you bothering to tell me this?" response. I don't want to worry that I'd get that response. This particular Someone would not say that to me, I'm sure. Even when she was angry at me she was not being mean, and that sentence is designed to hurt someone's feelings. But I've been hurt that way before, even by people who say they love me. So I have trust issues. I'm working on them, getting better at trusting people, and giving the benefit of the doubt. Still a long way to go. "And miles to go before they sleep."

Now Let's Get Out There and Sell Some Cars!

In the space of less than one hour tonight, I got phone calls from two friends. I've always felt like I was coming from further away than everyone else was. Socially. Academically. Financially. I always thought I was alone in feeling that way. Starting to realize I'm not.

COME ON Ladies! I may have low self-esteem, cry at the thought of having to get through lunch at a Greek restaurant with LEL and my bosses, hate having concentrated attention on me, and turn bright red when people comment on my looks, but that does nothing to keep me from being picky about who impresses me. I like you. Not to get all Sally on your asses, but I really, really like you. Otherwise, I wouldn't talk with you. I wouldn't encourage you to talk with me even more than you already do. You're great. Why do you not think you're great? Why do you not think you're deserving of time to talk about yourself? Why do you not think your insightful opinions are worthy of being shared? You are. They are.

I'm not a nice person. Really. I don't give insincere compliments. It's what allows me to give people like LEL compliments - I don't blow smoke up people's asses. I will compliment anyone who impresses me in any way. So, I'm telling you. You're great. You're fucking awesome. You're all that and a container of fruit-on-the-bottom yogurt. Now go let everyone else see how great you are!

*To You, who is going to tell me to consider my own advice: yeah thanks, already thinking about it.

State of My Blog Address

This is difficult to write. Actually, to be honest, ever since my blog exploded (which is how I think of when my family - CG is included in 'family' here - found out), it's been very difficult to write. For one thing, it's been difficult to continue doing something that I know hurt people I love and care about. For another, it's difficult for me to write without something about someone in my family slipping in. Quite simply, they're just such an integral part of who I am, and how I came to be, that they come up a lot in my thoughts.

It bothers me that I've felt like my writing has sucked for the last month or so. Excuse me while I blog about how much my blogging sucks lately? Yeah... no.

Another difficulty is that after fumbling around a little bit when I first started blogging, I figured out the purpose of my blog and was blogging like a woman with a purpose. The goal was to get over shit that had happened to me growing up before I turned 30. Because I don't want to be like that guy I mentioned previously, who at almost 40 had spent more time not living with his parents than living with them, yet still blamed them for every single thing in his life that wasn't perfect. That seemed like a both miserable and unfair way to be. But now I can't write about family stuff (a promise I made to them), and I feel stuck.

Feeling stuck leads me to feeling frustrated, which leads me to feeling angry, which leads me to feeling guilty. I am continuously amazed at the power of Jewish Guilt. Please let's not rehash the whole "GY, it's your life, and your blog, and you can write about whatever you want" thing, because it's not ONLY my life I was writing about. Are my "rights" more important than the feelings of people I love? And let's also not bother with the "But it's anonymous - nobody knows who you or they are" thing either, because it kind of doesn't matter. As it was pointed out to me, it's not anonymous (to a certain degree) once people who know you find it, which is exactly what happened. Also, my right isn't the only thing that matters. What also matters is that I hurt people I care about, and I'm trying to not do that anymore. I have not worked out the "But not hurting them is hurting you" issue yet. How do you look someone you purport to love and care about in the eye and say, "My wants and needs are more important to me than your feelings. If you have a problem with me fulfilling what I believe are my wants and needs, then you'll have to get over that" when that person tried to put you before them for years?

Some might say, "If you have something to say, why not just say it to your family directly?" The answer is "Because I don't need them to hear it, I just need to get it out of me." You see, I don't need to make my family feel like shit about things that went down over a decade ago. I already felt like shit when they happened, and I imagine the other people involved also did. No need for anyone to feel that way again. There's no point in calling someone up just to say "Hey. Remember when you [insert random bad thing here that made enough of an impression on me that I'm thinking of it now]? Yeah, well, even if you don't remember, I do. And it really hurt me." I don't need an apology. I don't need an explanation. We all did things we regret, and can't quite justify. We all did things we thought were best in the moment. I certainly don't want to make other people feel badly for shit they did years and years ago. I just need to get it out of me. This (blogging) was my way of letting go of the past. I wish I could be like people who just accept that what happened yesterday is over. This is the only way I've found it can be over for me - if I go over things again, now that I have distance and the wisdom I do now.

I'm really sad about abandoning my goal of being over things before turning 30. I wish I weren't, but I can't think of any other way to get over it. So I'm feeling stuck.

So. To address some things that have been asked, both in the comments and in person:

Yes, I'm going to try to keep blogging. I can't promise I'll do a good job of it, but ... you're not paying me. I don't know what direction my blog will take now. Perhaps I'll just blog-stalk Pat Stack . We'll see.

Thank you for asking how my relationship with my family is going. It's being worked on, and that's all I'll say about it on the blog.

Thank you for asking about my family's health. In respecting their privacy, I will no longer discuss that here. I appreciate the concern, I welcome any and all "healthy vibes" you feel inspired to send their way, but I can't blog about it. I will however feel free to tell you that my cold/flu thing seems to be getting better, and at last count, I only infected one person.

I don't have some other secret blog. I'm too busy agreeing with props given to oatmeal to be writing a second, secret blog.

Password-protecting - a lot of people have asked me about this. As in, why not password protect the blog, and then your family won't be able to read it. Trust me, I'm absolutely a terrible enough person that I wholeheartedly considered doing that, only to reject it. I think password-protecting is really more for people trying to use a blog as their company's intranet, and families trying to stay in touch with other family members living far away who don't want random strangers seeing pictures of Haileigh riding her very first tricycle. My blog goes in the exact opposite direction, which leads us to ...

Why don't you turn off the comments? Some people have suggested that the most hurtful thing to my family must be comments from strangers disagreeing with them, and that perhaps I should turn off the comments. I'm not going to do that. I delete spam comments, accidental double comments (just the second one), and once, a comment when somebody screwed up and included his real name (he asked me to). The comments are for me. I value and welcome the comments, even yours Steve, because you make me laugh sometimes. I grew up in such a small world, with so few people in it, with the people in it so focused on presenting a united front, that I really only had two sides of things to consider: my gut instinct, and what all the important, influential adults were telling me. Quite frankly, I think I need a more expanded view these days. And although I have more friends now than I ever had before in my life, this is a way for me to get exposed to even more people who may not have grown up with the same morals/views/ways of looking at things as I did. I haven't always thought about why I do things the way I do - sometimes it's just habit. I don't always agree when someone tells me my habits are wrong. But I welcome considering different things I haven't already thought of.

So that's where I'm at.

So Many Things

Two days ago Tuna gave me a flower when he arrived at work. For no reason.

Although initially I was very hesitant to go to the extreme, my talk with HR seems to have paid off. Since then, LEL has been nothing but smiles and sunshine to me. Except for her little digs, which I'm letting roll off my back. You know, until I go home and post about them on my blog. Like yesterday, when the Cowboy wanted to send me out to buy a bottle of wine and I got my ID out. LEL said "You sure are vain, aren't you?" Ummm.... I'm 29, still remember when I was in a position to sell alcohol but not good at telling people's ages, and thought taking ID was the right thing to do. Besides, when Nice Partner saw the bottle of wine I'd picked out for Tuna (birthday) he told Tuna to feel free to regift it to him. So STFU, LEL.

I quit therapy this week, after four sessions. I only had a total of five free ones, and figured in case I screw up over the summer, best to save that last one. Besides, none of my issues were going to be solved in that last session, and I'm back in control of my life well enough that I no longer feel the need to have a professional supervise it.

Ruby, my Walking Buddy, and I, keep trying to get together to walk, to no avail. Sickness, weather, and the ends of fiscal year keep getting in the way. Any day now...

This summer I have to move. In preparation, I have been exploring 'hoods. My categories are 8:15 am, and 8:30 am, which refer to the time I would have to leave home to get to work by 9 am. Guess living in SF is changing me while I haven't been paying attention. When first moving here, I looked at an apartment in Japantown. Aside from feeling like it was too far away from work, mine was the only white face I saw, and that made me uncomfortable. While looking at apartment listings recently I saw a good one in Japantown, it reminded me of that, and I dismissed it as not being an issue.

What depresses me is that I don't feel cool enough to live in the neighborhoods I like and think I'd be happy in, except for that fact. Really, the issue may just be that I'm not cool enough for cities. I'd do better in a place like Alma, Wisconsin (no offense to Alma). Even Chippewa Falls might be a stretch for me. It's not even like that nerdy boy thing, where your average geeky boy is all of a sudden cool within his nerdiness, because of his nerdiness. Aside from not being a boy, I'm not nerdy. Sure, I read during my lunch hour. But I'm reading British Glamour, not quantum physics.

Lastly and least importantly, what's with Madonna and her leotards lately? Does it have something to do with the rollerskating in her video? Is it an 80's thing? Which by the way, was bad enough the first time around, so why are we doing it again?

I Cannot Read Fast Enough

I just read an entire book in less than 36 hours. (Prep, by Curtis Sittenfeld, if you're wondering.)

I haven't read a book that way in years. I stayed up late reading last night, got up early to read this morning before work, took my book to read on my lunch hour, was relieved when my Walking Buddy canceled this evening so I'd have more time to read.

Growing up I used to shove a book - opened to whatever page I was up to - into my desk at school. Once a teacher got into a groove with the class, I'd slide my book out halfway and read. The idea of paying attention during school seemed silly to me. A waste of time. Everything was always way beyond me, or behind me. I almost never did homework, or if I did it, I did it wrong. Once, when my sixth grade teacher was reviewing the prior night's homework with the class, she called on me. "I didn't do it." The whole class laughed, and I looked up from my book to figure out what was going on. "We're doing it NOW." I was up to a really good part in my book. "Oh. I don't know." And she just moved on. When I'd get sent to my room as a punishment I'd be mildly upset until I got up there. But then I'd just pick up one of my books, lose myself in it, and forget my world. I won't say I spent all my free time reading growing up. But I definitely spent a LOT of free time reading.

The part of this book Prep that is still rolling around my head is where the main character talks about both wanting to be noticed and being terrified of having attention on her. That's exactly how I feel almost all the time. Sometimes I get carried away and start talking passionately about something, forgetting myself, and where I try to place myself (on the side). In the middle of speaking, I realize everyone is looking at me, and I panic, and momentarily forget what I'm saying. How I ever acted in school plays (and actually did just fine) is beyond me.

On a recommendation from a friend, I took out two other books from the library yesterday. I must be getting old, because I don't feel like I have it in me to race through the remaining books the way I raced through Prep. But I'd be lying if I said I wasn't sorta kinda hoping for rain tomorrow, to give me an excuse to stay home after work and read.

A Meal of Cryptic Messages with a Side of Review

There is more than one Farmer's Market in San Francisco, but I always go to the same one. I've learned that people are very particular about and loyal to whichever one they like, and I'm no exception.

Every weekend I go to the Farmer's Market and get a crepe for breakfast. Rain was forecasted for today, and maybe that's why the crepe people weren't there this morning. I can be flexible, so I decided to try out the Hayes Street Grill people instead. Their eggs and bacon always look so good (from one stand over), tomatoes and orange juice look fresh, they seem to cook to order, they always have a long line, what could go wrong?

The bacon was cold. The eggs were barely cooked. The bread (I suppose there are some people who like this) was all soggy from the eggy liquid on the plate (though the dry piece I ate tasted good). I'd thought they cooked to order since they have no less than half a dozen people working there and I've seen cooking impliments (you know, like frying pans and fire), but apparently they just have everything in chafing dishes (thank you) unless you want something special and fancy. Which of course, I did not.

The good news is it was only $5.50 for what I got, and that's not a bad amount of money to lose trying someplace new. (I would be writing lots more here, but ...) I ate about half of the food before deciding to take a spin around to see if anything else looked good.

Fried asparagus? That did not look good to me. At all. Sausage? Strangely (since I don't like it) looked good, but not so good that I actually wanted any. There was a stand that had pastries, called Della....Something, that looked pretty good. They even had challah. So I paid $2 for a cinnamon-sugar twist thingy. It looked like something I'd want a drink with, so I decided to bring it home instead of eating it as I walked around.

When I got home, I took a bite of it over the kitchen sink. It was hard. Not just the burnt kind of hard, but like biscotti-hard. It was not good. That's a grand total of $7.50 I spent this morning trying foods. I spent another $3 on spinach fettuccine, but I've gotten that before and know I like it.

I always feel guilty going to the Farmer's Market (yet clearly not TOO guilty, since I go every weekend) because it's so expensive. So it hurts me to waste money. Some people, who shall remain nameless, would say that it's not a waste to try new things. While I respect that point of view, and like and appreciate it greatly, I am not quite able to embrace it myself, though I will keep trying.

Sure hope the crepe people are back next weekend.

Little Green Ramblings

Haven't felt inspired to write lately, but the world has continued turning. I'm tired, and fighting being sick, so here are just the high(and low)lights.

1. Today I met up with my walking buddy after a long hiatus from walking. It was so nice to see her, and go for a long walk, and catch up. I told Ruby what's been going on with the blog issues. She said her ex-boyfriend wrote about her in his blog, and at first she was very upset. Then she realized that nobody except their friends were reading his blog, and they already knew all that he'd written about. Ruby also pointed out that it's simply startling to read about yourself, whether or not your name is used. This is true. A friend of mine wrote a very flattering blog post about a present I gave her daughter, and I was 80% flustered, 20% upset when I first read it. Upset for no real good reason after I thought about it. It was merely the element of surprise. I am not saying that the only reason people who read about themselves get upset is due to the element of surprise. I'm simply saying I think Ruby made a good point.

2. For the last three weeks I've been going to a therapist once a week. Yesterday on my way home, I thought "I'm cooked. I'm all tanked up on the therapy now." I feel more in control now, and better able to deal with life without the help of a professional. So I'm thinking of quitting. Who knows how I'll fuck up later on this year, and if I quit now, I'll still have two more free sessions left. Some might say not fucking up is within my power. I try to not fuck up. But I'm nowhere near perfect.

3. I talked to HR about LEL, whose behavior was getting increasingly worse. The last straw(s) for me was when she told me to grow up, when she cc'd everyone in the department when e-mailing me, when she e-mailed me asking me to do something she was perfectly capable of doing herself, when her request via e-mail was less of a request and more of a demand. The HR guy was very cool and promised to chat with LEL, telling her to make sure to talk to me as an equal, not to ask me to do her job, and to stop CCing everyone and their mother. Since that talk, she has been a different person. Whew. I hope it lasts! I was very against going to HR, since it felt like telling on someone, but we'd already had three talks and I'd run out of ideas. The HR guy told me I'm not the first person to have problems with her (which made me feel better).

4. I firmy believe nobody should ever cry at work. Today LEL was crying on the phone to someone (absolutely nothing to do with me). Even with how much I can't stand her, I felt bad that she was crying.

5. In the past, LEL always gave me shit for having a messy desk. Since we swapped attorneys her desk has been a wreck and mine has been clean. Hmmmm....

6. Found out today that I've been confusing two people at work. This morning new partners were announced, and I decided to look up their profiles on our intranet. Good thing I did that - otherwise I would have congratulated the wrong guy!

7. I talked with a friend recently about allowing worlds to collide. As in, mixing work friends with home friends, camp friends with school friends, etc. I've always been terrified of having my worlds collide. On Friday I will be having a dinner with a work friend and a home friend. Both are good enough friends that I am confident everything will go swimmingly. But if anyone wants to send me good vibes just in case...

8. March has always been my worst month. It's a long month, with no days off, bad weather no matter where I've lived. It's almost half over. Whew!

9. Oy to the vey. I either love or hate the phrase, but this week I'm leaning towards love.

10. I've never talked about Mr. Katrina Man before, but I will now. If I leave for work at just the right time, then at the same spot each day, I pass a man I call (in my head) Mr. Katrina Man. I call him that because on the first business day after Katrina hit, I walked past him. Here was a guy in his late 50's/early 60's, dressed in a business suit, with a folded newspaper tucked under his arm, openly crying while walking to work. He had this expression on his face like "WHY God, WHY?!!!!!" I so rarely see men cry, and to see him just crying as he walked through the street on the way to work really moved me. I wanted to hug him. Offer him a tissue. Ask him if everyone he knows was okay. Something. Ever since then I've noticed Mr. Katrina Man when we pass, and we smile at each other.

11. I'm not digging the title of this post, but can't think of anything better right now.

Not About Boobs, Despite the Name

I found a blog called Stacked. The guy who writes it is hot

Not only is he hot, but he's smart. And funny. I read his blog for three months before I e-mailed him asking if he minded if I wrote a blog post about his blog.

For some reason I'm amused that he gave up cursing for lent. I wonder though, if he gave up all cursing, or just cursing on his blog. I don't think I could do it. Good thing jews don't do lent.

Read This

This moved me and made me think

Never Tell Anyone Anything

Last night I was dreaming that both the males in my immediate family had died within a week of each other. I was scheduled to give a presentation or perform in a play or something right after the second person died. This...thing, whatever it was, had been planned for a long time, and lots of people were depending on me, so I was trying to avoid canceling. The pressure of having to act like absolutely nothing was wrong felt impossible, and like it was going to negatively impact the presentation/play.

When I started to tell the person in charge of organizing the event what had just happened, the one remaining member of my family rushed in to pull me away, and started hitting me, while screaming that it was a personal family issue, and none of anyone else's business.

Randon Ramblings

1. Weekends need to be three days:
- Day One, Saturday - relax and do nothing
- Day Two, Sunday - run around with friends (Saturday and Sunday can be switched up as schedules require)
- Day Three, Monday - do errands, go to doctors appointments
When offered a choice, you always want Monday off instead of Friday. If you don't work on Monday, Friday comes around sooner.

2. Nature is not a dirty word. Both yesterday and today I did naturey things, and not once did I get grossed out. Not even when I boldly stepped through mud. Getting out of the city was lovely, and finding out hiking is available right in the city was equally lovely. I must hike more. And explore more.

3. Today, I spent $20 on cabs and am upset about it. Once because I couldn't find a bus stop going in the direction I needed (at night, in the rain, by myself), and once because it was raining and it would have been a long walk followed by a long wait.

4. SURELY, I can't be more stupid than all the random people who seem to effortlessly use mass transit. I absolutely must find out their secret.

5. Finding a rain jacket is proving more difficult than I thought it would. Where are my personal shoppers when I need them? Ted, Kyan, Thom, Carson, Jai? Where are you guys?

Up Since 3 a.m. - Things I Could Be Doing Other Than Blogging

1. Sleeping
2. Paying bills
3. Doing my online grocery shopping
4. Finding a good (and free) template for a business plan and plugging my info into it
5. Returning e-mails
6. Folding laundry
7. Checking the weather to make sure I can still go on my day trip in six hours
8. Researching more about my day trip
9. Writing out the other (probably more interesting) blog posts rolling around my head
10. Finishing reading one of the magazines I plan to send to a friend later this morning
11. Doing research for my book idea
12. Listening to a CD (wait, I can do that *while* blogging, or, any of these other things)
13. Switching out my February Fast Pass for the March one
14. Ironing
15. My taxes

This has been inspiring. I'm going to go bang out a couple of things on my list now... or maybe I'll go back to sleep...

Greenie's Choice

It's a different world where I came from. A world that I've been slowly finding out, is considered weird by almost every single person who reads my blog and every single person I've talked with. This revelation has been building for almost six years, but I think this blog issue has blown it wide open and laid it out in all its glory (and fury). Even when I lived in Florida, I would get that telltale "Why do you think THAT?!" look from people often. When certain Old World people visited me in Florida we would talk about the difference they were noticing in the worlds. I don't know which world I live in. All these people in the new world are saying they're my friends, and that's great (so, SO VERY great), but I don't know how much I can really count on these people (sorry, I have trust issues and it's totally me and not you). I haven't pushed my luck, but it still leaves me not knowing.

I accidentally hurt a friend last year, and her forgiveness was so swift and pure that it almost knocked me over. I never EVER had anyone forgive me like that in my life. She told me she forgave me, actually interrupting me as I was apologizing to her, saying there were more important things in the world, that she knew it was an innocent mistake, and our friendship just moved on. She's never brought it up again, she's never even hinted at it. Things like that never happened in the Old World.

I feel like I'm being backed into a corner, and forced to choose between two worlds. One that helped me grow up and put up with all my shit (and there was a lot of it), and another that pretty much accepts and loves me for who I am now. How much do you owe your old world? I'm not positive I should abandon my old world; even aside from the sense of loyalty. How long are you supposed to stay loyal to the old world? Exactly how are you supposed to show that loyalty?

I kind of want to go with the world I have access to now, but am not sure that world can fulfill all the responsibilities my old world had. I'm just not positive I can count on the new world for all that. Is there a middle world somewhere that I should be moving towards instead? A world less far away from this new world, that's closer to the old world? That somehow incorporates some of the Old World Guidelines into their world?

A part of my brain is wondering how all these New World People got to the new world. Was their old world not the same as mine? Was it not as big a leap from old to new as it seems mine is? Did they completely leave their old world behind? Are they welcome to come back to it and visit? Was the old world hurt when they left? Exactly how hurt was the old world? I feel like if I embrace the New World, the Old World will be so furious and hurt that it will never ever let me back in again. I very much do not want to hurt my Old World. I love my old world, very much. I appreciate all my old world has done for me, more than I can express. Unfortunately, it turns out my old world didn't (couldn't?) give me everything I need. I found a world that ... while maybe it can't give me everything, can get me closer to what I need.

Another thing to consider is that I feel like the old world SAYS it wants me to go forth and conquer a new world, but only if I follow the Old World Guidelines. Many of those guidelines contradict the New World Ways.

The two world are so mindblowingly different, that I see no way to live in both. This is not living in Manhattan with a Hamptons summer home. This is living in the backroads of Kansas, or living in the heart of Japan. This feels like my own personal version of Sophie's Choice.