A Mermaid Tale

There once was a fairly attractive maiden who had become very dull.  She had learned to effectively turn herself off and lived rather smoothly in that eternal state of cruise control that everyone likes to pretend they aren't on.  She had the memory of something lodged in her head, some glimmer of something she thought might actually be rather nice if only she could clearly remember what it was.  She'd get a flash of it every now and then, but it was as if each flash appeared on a thin veil of smoke, it was wispy and wavy and quickly disappeared.  She had forgotten how to smile, but didn't realize it.

Then the maiden went on vacation and she remembered something.  She remembered she was beautiful and creative and magical.  She started to remember herself again, she started to smile.  But there was still a part of her that was missing, something integral to her being, but she still couldn't put her finger on it.

She came home and smiled again.  She came home and started to create, and the more she created, the more she smiled.

One day she was sitting on the beach and a quirky, yet dashing Sea Captain said to her "Morning Miss Mermaid, how are you today?"

Then she remembered.  She remembered that she had been a mermaid and it all came rushing back to her, each glorious memory of independence and failure and triumph.  Each mermaid moment of beauty and despair.  She remembered.  The Sea Captain made her remember.  She remembered she was lured to the land years ago by another Captain who had been lovely and sweet and kind.  Miss Mermaid had shed her tail to be with him.  At first she still remembered how to swim and be beautifully mermaidish, she visited the water often to float and frolic, but as time wore on she went less frequently.  Slowly she started to forget how to swim, and little by little she forgot that she was magical.

Oh how wonderful it was to be a mermaid again!  The water flowing over her body and hair never felt better.  She dove and and danced through the waves racing Mother Nature.  She sat on the rocks sunning herself and her creativity poured through her veins.  Magic!  She vowed that she would never forget again that she was a mermaid, never, ever, ever.

She was so happy, and she thanked the Sea Captain who turned out to be rather lovely and sweet and kind as well, this Sea Captain who had seen the mermaid in her.  She was amazed that he saw through it all and recognized it, and she was so proud again to be a mermaid.  She flashed her tail proudly and swam, but there seemed to be much fewer mermaids in the water this time, much less than she remembered.

As the Sea Captain turned out to be rather interesting, she found herself wanting to spend more time on land however.  He was funny, and very smart in that "interesting smart" kind of way.  He was stoic and intense and she sensed he had a soft vulnerability hidden somewhere under all of the neatly laid layers and lacquer of his being.  She was intrigued by him and though it started rather slowly, she started to spend more time on land.

One day Miss Mermaid was lounging on the land thinking about the Sea Captain, and BAM, a force of clarity hit her full on.  She realized why there were less mermaids in the water, she realized it was because of Sea Captains.  The mermaids were going on land to be with the Sea Captains and forgetting they were mermaids.  Once the mermaids began to forget they were mermaids, the Sea Captains forgot as well.  It was all rather sad.  For you see, it's usually the mermaid that joins her Captain on land, rarely does the Captain join the mermaid in the water, that's why you don't hear of many mermen.  The mermaids just slowly adapt, assuming that it's part of their nature.


Dive back in.  Dive back in.

How pissed am I?

I was supposed to be leaving for Key West tomorrow.  I was headed to Fantasy Fest on what was supposed to be an epic "girls road trip"...........well it got screwed up.  I have been successfully avoiding thinking about it but as the moment of my intended departure nears, I grow increasingly more annoyed.

I have my sexy pirate outfit, my twisted fairy outfit, and my new red corset for my red herring costume - yes that is a very clever idea!  I even was considering getting painted, or at least just wearing my pink sequined tassels as a top, but nooooooooooo, I'm stuck here. 

So I thought fine, I'm wearing my fairy costume out on Saturday - my blue corset, the tutu I made and my awesome light up fairy wings and I don't care if it's too over the top for here.  But no, the person I was supposed to go with, didn't take off Saturday night.  So how pissed am I?

The Captain was right.

So my friend, The Captain, is newly divorced and has been a great person to talk to about this journey of separation and eventual divorce.  He's been a great sounding board since none of my good female friends have been through this.  When the initial friendship started, he told me that once he finally made the decision to separate and divorce, and made it public, a lot of people he knew came to him and said that they wished they could do the same, that they weren't happy in their marriages.  As our friendship has continued we continue to discuss this, and he is ever the man ready with statistics on how truly unhappy people are in their marriages.


I chalked that up to sort of being a man thing.  I certainly believed him that people confided in him, but I didn't really think it could be that significant of an amount.  Not that I thought he was exaggerating, but in a situation like this, I figured even just a few people would seem like a lot.

Well, I'm sorry I underestimated the amount of unhappily married people out there who are willing to share once you come out and tell them first.  It's like a secret club, seriously! Now that my separation is public, so many people do indeed tell me how miserable they are.  The common theme amongst the women seems to be that they have lost themselves.  I feel like I should organize a local group to hang out and discuss the process.  Not a self help group, ewww.  An "I lost myself and am working really hard to get myself back because I really liked my old self"  kind of group, for men and women.  We could discuss our favorite things to do during "me" time, have dinner parties where no dates are allowed, go out to bars and make fun of drunk people hooking up on the dance floor, challenge each other to try new things.

We could be "The force of me," group.  When meeting new people you might casually ask "Are you a friend of me?"  If they answer yes, they can join.  And of course our motto will be "It's always me o'clock somewhere."  Guess I need to get those t-shirts printed!

Non edited ramble response to one of my BFF's about girlfriends

I miss you too.  I have been working out a lot and as I sit on the recumbent bike and decide to do 15 extra minutes I think of you at the Y being like “Come on, why aren’t you done yet.”  And every time I make a muscle I smile and think of you being like “You better stop lifting those weights.  You better not have big muscley arms for my wedding.”  Ahhhh, we were so young. 

I think that one of the things I missed the most during my marriage was not having girl time with friends.  It’s almost like that part of you ceases to exist.  Sure you grab lunch, or a drink, or do couple things, but it isn’t the same as sitting on the couch and drinking wine while you pass a journal back and forth to each other while you write things back and forth.  It’s not the same as sharing terribly deep and bad poetry with each other, because we both were so terribly deep and cool, and we thought whatever dumb “huge” issue that was weighing on us was going to pull us under.  I miss grabbing beers in sweat pants after working out at the gym and being amazed at all of the boys that would flirt with us when we looked  like crap, because just the weekend before I  took 4 hours to get ready to go out and no one really bothered with me.  I miss screaming because the hottest guy at the office kissed me at the after party and part of the joy was knowing that that skinny bitch we didn’t like, well we knew she was going to be pissed – being able to share that is so pure and amazing.  I miss listening to you recount exactly what the other hot boy at the office said to you, because you had that unspoken thing going on, and we would painstakingly try to  decipher what he meant and if he was purposely trying to be flirty or not.  I miss you getting pissed at me for something stupid I didn’t even realize that I did, and not speaking to me for a long time, because you truly are one of the best grudge holders I know.  You are also one of the best “Oh it’s been 6 months let’s just pretend that this didn’t happen” kind of people as well. I miss just doing nothing but being silly and sharing secrets.  

You get married and you become a “unit” -  you aren’t as open as you were when you were just girlfriends because part of you asks yourself where your loyalty lies and if what you really want and need to share is crossing that “couple” line.  The “I can’t share that because he would be really pissed.”  thing is out there like a great big pink elephant in the room.  Well you know what, I want to know because that loyalty you have, it should be to yourself sometimes.  Girls talk about everything, and I mean everything, and I miss that. I don't think men understand that, sometimes I would love to just look at one of the husbands and say "Yup, I know just how big it is."  Or "Oral sex is for men AND women.  I'm sorry you have "germ" issues, but if you ever want another blow job, you need to get over them."  There are few people in this world that you will ever share a true girlfriend bond with and know that you can say anything and the other person will never mention it again unless you bring it back up.  There are very few people whom you allow to ever know just how truly fucked up of a person that you are, because honestly everyone is truly a fucked up person, but that isn’t something you normally share, because, well, then people would say things like “Wow, she is so fucked up?” and they judge you.  A girlfriend knows, and still loves you, and actually respects your fucked up aspects because that makes you who you are and it makes you even cooler.  A girlfriend knows fucked up shit that even your husband doesn’t know.

Why do we have to grow up, pair off and lose all of that?  I sometimes feel as if that part of me almost died, as if it was on life support for a very long time, but it’s slowly making a recovery.  We deserve to be happy and carefree and silly sometimes.  We deserve to remember who we were, and be that again.  We deserve to want to have that, and we deserve to reclaim it.  We deserve the right to be girlfriends again.  Because when we do reclaim it, we teach our daughters how to own themselves, and be true to themselves, how to love themselves and how to love a girlfriend.  

We forgot what Gibran said about marriage “And stand together yet not too near together: For the pillars of the temple stand apart, And the oak tree and the cypress grow not in each other's shadow.”  Most of us forget that we still need to stand apart, and when we remember, sometimes it’s too late.

Bitter sweet

I love painting my room, it's so empowering, especially since it's such a bold purple.  I have been at it for the better part of this evening.  It's starting to look amazing and I love that I will have my shrine to me in front of it.  Everyone should have a shrine to themselves, but that's another post.......

I was sitting on my bed last night and the soon to be ex came in to talk to me about the principessa.  As he turned to walk out he saw the beginnings of the purple paint on my wall and he gasped.  He actually gasped!  My inner bitch took such great glee in that gasp.  It was music to my ears and I reveled in it for the rest of the night.

It's bitter sweet when I think of that gasp.  It's over between us, it has been for a log time, I certainly don't feel romantic love, passion, or desire for him any more, but for years I had been trying to get him to gasp at me, in a good gasping way.  Maybe all it would have taken was for me to paint myself purple. 

The pleasure of my company

I had forgotten how much I liked me, not the miserable me, but the old me, who is also now the new me.  I took the t.v. out of my bedroom so I would actually spend more time with me and I'm really glad I did it.  I am actually writing again, and organizing, and doing decorative paint, and generally really enjoying the pleasure of my own company.

I think that that is becoming a lost art today, enjoying the pleasure of your own company.  Really enjoying being yourself, by yourself.  I am exceptionally clever and witty, if I do say so myself, and it's a great pleasure to actually listen to myself think.  I had forgotten how much I loved "me" time, and "me" space.  I had forgotten how truly delicious it is to be absolutely selfish, not because you are being selfish towards someone else, but because there is only you.  Before I fell in love and got married to my soon to be ex, I had come to the decision that I really didn't ever want to get married.  I liked being able to do what I wanted to do, when I wanted to do it.  I liked having my own room.  I liked the fact that if I decided that I should upholster all of my furniture with zebra striped velvet, I could. 

I was concerned that being in a relationship with another person would cause me to have to sort of break up with myself, and it turned out that I did eventually diss myself.  Well me, I'm sorry, but I'm going to do my damnedest to make it up to myself now and Perfect Midnight Iris is just the beginning.  What a future do I have in store!  And I can't wait!

Perfect Midnight Iris

I have ALWAYS wanted a purple room, so I went out today and I bought myself some purple paint.  Really purple, not violet or lilac, but purple!  And do you know what, it's fucking awesome!!!!  It's called Perfect Midnight Iris, and it is perfect, and Iris is one of my favorite flowers of all time, and I am like a giddy little school girl.  I am so pleased with myself, and proud of myself, and I love it.  I hate painting with rollers, so I bought myself some real paint brushes.  I find painting therapeutic, and considering I'm exceptionally OCD and a perfectionist when it comes to painting it should only take me a month or so.  It's like meditation to me, I completely clear my head and concentrate on having the paint be perfect, and sometimes, just to test myself, I won't use painting tape, I'm that good! Go me!

Tired

I'm tired of a lot of shit.  I'm tired of not smiling, of stifling my creativity, of being told I am too ill to do things.  I'm tired of the dull and mundane life I have fallen into.  I'm tired of idiots at work.  I'm tired of stupidity, bullshit, inefficiency, and my universe full of missionary position type people.  I am tired of hearing about football, football players, football coaches, football fucking teams.  I'm tired of hearing about computers.  I don't care about what exact show this recording of The Grateful Dead is from. I'm tired of not being able to have conversations about just about anything other than the last three topics mentioned.  I'm tired that you are so fucking nice and I have become a miserable bitch.  I'm tired of people all of a sudden asking me why I am smiling.  I am smiling because I am a phoenix reborn from the ashes of monotony.  I am transitioning to the true, authentic, creative, fun self I once and never was.  I will create, I will be shameless.  I will make mistakes, and have great victories.  I will not be afraid to fail, for if I never try, I never live.  I will be a secret mermaid, and an awesome mother, and a great friend, I will join the PTO and kick some ass.  I will create and learn every single day.  I will remember my struggles and blessings, and every day I will strive to have the courage to get up and head into a future of the unknown, and instead of being afraid of it, I will be excited.  And you know what, if I offend you, I really don't care.