Friday March 7th

I got a message from my cousin Walsh. "You watching the show?"

Me-:"No, Mavis is here."

Walsh-:"What do you mean Mavis is there?"

Me-:"I mean, Mavis is here. Driving me nutballs."

Walsh-:"How is Mavis there? She's suppose to be at our older sisters for the weekend."

Me-:"Daffiny walked her over couple hours ago."

Walsh-:"What for?"

Me-:"Your older sister had to work and she didn't want to stay with Daffiny and her boyfriend."

Walsh-:"Huh. I'll talk to her about that. Are they picking her up tomorrow?"

Me-:"Yeah. After your older sister gets off of work. So what was it you were wanting to begin with?"

Walsh-:"Nothing. Bored, everyone's busy. I knew you'd be home."

Me-:"Rub it in."
 

Young love

Rule of thumb, the second you get comfortable with things, they fall apart at the seams. All I'm seeing on the fashion site are one of two things, wedding planning or break-ups.  Everyone is creating by their heart. It's a sea of teenaged tears and lacy dresses.

Cosmic joke hits home.

Foolish Heart. Well, it's true, what you're interested in the most, good or bad is what you will find in abundance. So very fitting that I'm seeing the happy and the sad of relationships everywhere.

Speaking of fashionable situations...I wonder why Dimmer hasn't been on wrestling the last while? I must blog about that...(this would be me blogging about that)

Back to the original topic...sort of... I've mentioned a few times over the years that I don't have the bride gene. While all these girls are planning their weddings, like Norman Bates recruits collecting shower curtains, I've never seen the point.

And you're thinking "what? Wait! All this talk of finding the one right perfect guy to be your husband and you're not a bridezilla?"

I believe in marriage, not really weddings. Marriage is the whole point not the white dress, the commitment not the credit card maxed out. I've always said when I find the one right man, the perfect guy for me, my soulmate, the dude just a little crazy enough to want to spend the rest of his life with me; I'm good with a drive-thru wedding bells chapel in Niagara Falls (Canadian side of course) with an Elvis Impersonator as the minister.

Which brings me to something my aunt said to me earlier. What happens when I finally meet the man of my dreams and what if it ends up he's American?  I've never actually considered that part.
I guess we'd move to a border town that was half in Canada half in America, or something.  Here I've always worried about things like when I find the right guy how will our religions mix? Will I have to become a carnivore again or will he be a vegetarian?  Will we agree on our favourite wrestler or come pay-per-views will we be cheering for opposite guys?  You know, the stuff of every day, the little things that make a relationship work. Never thought about something as big as a country.

Well, here's hoping love really does conquer all.

Post-it note March 5th 2014

Dear Herman:

I'm sitting here this morning, the song "Perfect Drug" stuck in my head, not sure why? Listening to the chick who was living with the downstairs neighbour as she and two others are moving her out. I guess she's finally had enough of the abuse and cheating.
This got me thinking this morning about things, people, life. The parts that are good, that most people don't even notice till they're gone. The things that can be taken for granted.
I know, I've stopped writing these to you, technically, because I felt on my end they were not giving me what I was wanting. I have no idea what you got out of them on your end? I took for granted these were/are just me sharing moments in my day. I had it pointed out to me by someone who's much braver and smarter then I am, that if you're reading these then you're sharing moments of your day. And considering I believe you to be a very busy international wrestling superstar... a few moments of your day are gold.

So Mr. Scratchy; Herman, I imagine you checking in right now, having just come back from an early session at the gym, maybe getting packed for the airport. I think you're standing there right now, a coffee in hand, bagel hanging out of your mouth, searching for your missing toque, I think it's grey with a dark stripe through it, wondering if you should add music to your favourite playlist, while you quickly read this.
I think you missed me.

Smile, bagels are yummy.

Missed calls

Door bell rang about twenty minutes ago, my cousin Walsh was standing there cigarette hanging out of his mouth, talking to one of the neighbours from the next building. "What? You not talking to me or something?"

Me-:"What?"

Walsh-:"Last night, I messaged, you didn't answer. You always answer. Everything alright?"

Me-:"I didn't get any messages. Everything's fine. Why?"

Walsh-:"You just didn't answer. I messaged right after your guy's match. Did you see the show?"

Me-:"Yeah, did actually. Didn't see that little twist in the plotline with Rebel without a Cause. Thought they'd pull something like that with Werewolf King."

Walsh-:"So, why didn't you answer?"

Me-:"I didn't get any messages, I just said that. None."

Walsh-:"So you didn't have a hot date or anything?"  he grinned as he tossed the cigarette butt. "Cause wife bet me that you did." he stretched.

Me-:"No, not hot date, no cold one either. What on earth would make you think I would have a date?"

He shrugged checking his cell phone, scrolling through it and showed me the messages that he swore he sent. "Oooppss." he gave a small giggle. "Okay, you're right I'm wrong. I sent the text to my sister."

Me-:"Told you I didn't get any messages. Why would you think I would have a date?"

Walsh-:"I don't know? Wife was the one who thought you did. She seemed to think that you're dating someone."

Me-:"And she got this idea how?"

Walsh-:"I'd know? We were sitting there watching wrestling, I messaged you, you never replied, she said you were on a date. I thought maybe she saw you out with someone or something. I said I didn't think so because you'd blog about it and you hadn't so..." he shrugged.

Me-:"Now who's jumping to conclusions?" 

His phone buzzed, it was the kids asking if they could stay longer at their friend's place, but he told them no, he was on his way to get them because they had piano lessons after supper. Nodding he got into the truck and just sat there for a moment before leaning out the window. "I'm suppose to tell you that one of my wife's co-workers is single. But I'm not going to tell you this because he is divorced and hates wrestling. So there's no point in telling you that one of my wife's co-workers is single. Right?" he grinned as he pulled out of the parking lot.

Enough crazy to go around

When I was leaving mom's earlier, the cops were there. I was told by a very large police officer to go back into my apartment. Okay, not going to argue, went back into mom's for another half hour till we saw the cop cars leaving.
Just got a call from mom, she said that G-Babbs had knocked on her door few minutes ago, filling her in on the situation, cause she had seen me being told to go back inside the apartment.  Seeing the cops in our neighbourhood has become such a common event lately, that half the time we don't even bother to ask what happened anymore.  Well, I was just informed that the lady who lives in apartment 110 in my mom's building, stabbed her husband then tried to blind the guy across the hall from them when he called the cops and medics.

What the hell? Now, I have to say that's a first. Mom said G-Babbs told her the woman was screaming that she "knew about what they had gotten up to on the weekend with the two girls!"

I'm sitting here in my apartment, and in the last two hours, all I've heard from my downstairs neighbours has been furniture breaking and doors slamming. While I was on the phone with mom, the chick who's now dating the downstairs neighour, stormed up the stairs screaming that "they weren't her underwear so who's the f*** were they?"  Where upon, the guy screamed that it didn't matter because he was just going to do it again.  More doors being slammed and what sounded like someone being thrown down the stairs.

I'm hiding quietly in my apartment. I give it a half hour before the police get called again here. They've been here twice in the last month already.

Look me in the eye and tell me like it is

I was on my way home about a half hour ago, and passed by these two teenagers who were standing at the corner waiting for the lights to change. One was complaining that whenever she's with her boyfriend, he never listens to her because he's too obsessed with her chest.  The second girl agreed, saying how much she hates it when guys never look her in the eye when they talk to her.

This brought me back to a conversation a group of us had back in college. Same topic. This was twenty years ago, but I still remember how the whole situation made me feel.  There were seven of us sitting around the table on break between classes, and two girls walked past, causing all three of the guys to have whiplash. This angered one of the pretty girls sitting at the table, and she ripped them all a new one. Complaining that it was disrespectful of them, and how would they feel if when they were talking to someone they never had eye contact?
I responded to her saying the opposite, how would they - the pretty girls in the group of which there were three- feel always having a guy never breaking eye contact?
That stopped the one girl cold and planted an idea in her head.  She had all the guys at the table close their eyes and describe what each of us were wearing, our hair and eye colour.  None of the guys at the table got the hair or eye colour right of the other three girls. All three got my eye colour right. All of them did manage to get some part of the outfits the pretty girls were wearing right, but not one single one of them got mine even close.
Which, sadly proved my point.

Hearing those two teenagers today, really hit a nerve with me. I know they say certain situations that happen to us when we're young stick with us for the remainder of our lives, even when we think we've gotten over it.  Twenty years ago, it was all I could do to get up from the table and leave the room before the tears started.
Sitting here now writing about it, I just can't help but wonder, when do we stop being what others see?

Notice that he noticed that I think I noticed

"You wrote!" my cousin Walsh was leaving my mom's building this morning as I was getting there. He was picking up Mavis, and I was struggling with bags of groceries. Which he just stood there and let me continue to struggle with.

Me-:"What? Oh the fairy tale. I did."

Walsh-:"I told you."

Mavis-:"Is this the same one I'm not allowed to see? Did you buy me anything?"

Me-:"Same one, and no, I didn't buy you anything."

Mavis-:"That's okay this time, but next time I expect you to have cookies! And granola bars, I like granola bars specially when they have icing on them, but not the chocolate chip ones cause I hate chocolate."

Walsh-:"Since when do you hate chocolate?"

Mavis-:"Since always."

Walsh-:"See, I told you that you'd get over your writer's block. Cause Mad Hatter..."

Me-:"Not really over the writer's block. That took like two days to get just that little bit, like two paragraphs." I put the groceries down, since it was obvious my cousin wasn't going to help. "But I noticed something. I don't know how I missed it before?" he looked at me, this smug look on his face. "Rebel without a Cause is reading the fairy tale."

Walsh-:"Um, that's news?"

Me-:"No, it's more like conformation. In a really backwards way. Anyways, he said something as the interview was being cut off, and I remembered hearing him say the same thing a few times over the course of their promos in the last few months..."

Walsh-:"What did he say?"  Mavis was digging through the grocery bags at this point.

Me-:"Alpha."

Walsh stood there for a second then nodded the light bulb flickering in his brain. "Right cause of the characters in the...gotcha."

Me-:"You have no clue why that's important do you?"  He shook his head shrugging, Mavis tugging on his sleeve wanting to go. "It means, very possibly he likes my work."

Walsh-:"But he's not Mr. Scratchy."

Me-:"I never said he was. I said it means he most likely likes my writing. That matters to me. The idea that someone...actually reads me because they like my work not just because they want to see if they made the blog that day, means a lot."

Walsh-:"I don't get it. You already know these guys read you. So what's saying a random word got to do with anything?"

Me-:"People copy other people's actions and speech when they respect them, conscious or unconscious. Something as simple as an inside joke even...like the fact both of them in that interview ended up sitting in the same position, unconsciously copying each other."  I picked up the groceries and continued on to mom's apartment, as Walsh was being dragged out the door by his little sister.

Walsh-:"You feeling better about this whole thing now?"

Me-:"Sort of."

Walsh-:"See, I knew everything would work out for the best."

Me-:"That was one segment. One! That took me like two days to write. Not like Mr. Scratchy opened up and started to talk to me."

Walsh told Mavis to behave and give him a minute. "He will. I still think you've just missed it. There have been major clues and hints and stuff, you're just in denial on Mad Hatter."

Me-:"Well, he's got 21 days to open up and say something. Whomever Mr. Scratchy is. Then...well another decade older."  

Walsh finally had to give in to his sister and left.