How to Give Your Cat a Pill

To recap my last 7 days:

1. I reclaimed my love with Blue Moon.
2. My cat (Chloe) has acne.
3. My job is on the brink of kicking my ass.
4. I locked my best friend’s 3 year old in the car requiring both the local sheriff and a fire brigade to rescue him.
5. I suffered through a mild bout of food poisoning brought about by my own cooking.

Pretty eventful, don’t you think? But poor Miss Chloe. My neighbors below have crazy animals, so I blame them for why Chlo-Chlo has fleas. I’ve treated her twice, washed all linens and clothing she’s touched or could have possibly touched, and vacuumed every single day, but she’s still infested. Dr. Lisa gave me a prescription for some good flea medication, and then she discovered that kitty has acne. Acne? On a cat? I paid $15 for animal-friendly Clearasil.

Oh, and while this is the first time I ever locked keys inside a car (and did it spectacularly by locking Little Man inside as well), it is not the first time my cooking has made me sick.

The Third Persona

Who is the third persona? There is a whole who’s on first, what’s on second kind of discourse exchange trying to answer that question. But for those who are already confused, that debate is safely tucked away in Academia, so no worries I’d expect you to untangle that now.

I ask this because I used to journal with some sort of assumed third persona in mind—the assumption that this über-personality was always both anxiously awaiting for whatever I’d write and also ready to pounce and critique. But now I realize that I’ve invested too much power into this persona. And so I return to my original question: who is this third persona?

Since I don’t know (and since I’m trying to liberate myself from trying to astonish and please this unknown entity), maybe I can just try to do what I wanted to do along: write. Articulate my thoughts. Make sense of what plagues me.

Back when I was trying to please this third persona, I’d write about my longing for a boy…over time the boy would change, but the point of my misery was always the same. I was caught up in the longing for him to love me, for me to have a chance to love him (rather that long to love him)…but I think what I longed more than love was an escape from the loneliness I constantly feel.

The problem with my writing, though, was how I tried to frame precisely how I felt through a vision of how I wanted to feel. This search for the perfect articulation led to imperfect writing. My feelings were always the same (even though I failed to realize that I was capturing them incorrectly), but when I returned to my writing at a later date (which is the point of keeping a journal), my chronicled thoughts didn’t strike me as actual reflections of those moments in time. How come I was so insistent on capturing what I wanted to feel that I failed to preserve how I felt at that moment? Isn’t that the point? I think it was because I was trying to please this phantom persona.

Let’s speed up to today. I’m still alone, I’m still not happy about it, and I’m still trying to focus on how I want to feel rather than how I feel right now. Now, I accept there is always a third persona tied to the “who” for which we write, but I’m no longer caught up in trying to please this character. So why hasn’t my writing improved? As I reflect on that, I realize that it’s because of what I’m afraid to admit: that I’ve created my misery.

I don’t think it’s unreasonable to wish for love, and I don’t think it’s out of line to seek out that which will make me happy with life. But I do think it’s important that I understand what is in my way and to reasonably assess what I can do about it.

This entire preamble is to set up the next big question for me to ponder. I’m going to take some time to think about it, but I think it’s important enough to pose for anyone else to consider as well (including that elusive third persona, although that defeats the whole figment of who the third persona is).

What will I give up in order to love someone? What will you?

Creekbend Reserve 2005

I have some funny stories that if I ever finish writing them (or if the inspiration to find the humor strikes me again) will be great stories to post. But since I’m not so humorous lately, I suppose I will use this as a ranting tool by default. I’m sure witty essays would be preferred, but my self-imposed exile from the world is about to suffocate me, so I need a creative outlet to express my great dissatisfaction with Life.

Fatigue has ravished my body and soul. Seriously. I’m so tired of being tired. When I’m not working or sleeping or passed out from it all, my overactive mind begins to wander. When I spend any time at all thinking of the state of my personal life, I get depressed. I’m not eating healthy, staying active, getting a good night’s rest, or engaging socially with others. I’ve become so comforted by my own seclusion, I’m borderline recluse. I keep my ringer off so I don’t have to hear my phone, and I rarely return missed calls. One day I will wake up from this sleepy state and realize my friends have left me behind. But knowing this can happen still doesn’t motivate me to change these isolating habits. So I try not to think about the state of my personal life as much as possible.

However, I cannot ignore the fact that my clothes have shrunk and I do not have the resources to invest in a whole new wardrobe. Therefore, I’m starting to pay attention to my nutrition (and at least consider the possibility of physical activity). I’ve adopted a new diet—the Mediterranean Diet—selected primarily because it advocates a daily allotment of wine. [Sidebar 1: I also read an article in WedMD that suggests two glasses of red wine pack 7 grams of fiber…pretty cool, eh?]

I’ve read several different articles about this diet and, while wine (in moderation) is advocated, it’s not conclusive if it’s considered a fruit. Most stipulate a one-glass-daily rule for women and up to two glasses daily for men. I’ve decided that since I weigh about the same as the average linebacker then the two glass rule applies to me. Still no consensus for red or white wine, but I’m trying to plan my diet around red since it packs the highest fiber content.

But this misery is systemic. I do my best to avoid the realization that I have a pathetic life by numbing my nerves with alcohol in the evening and throwing my self into my new job. This is necessary since (1) I still don’t know what my specific job role is, (2) there is a constant threat of head-count reduction within my division, and (3) no job = no money = homelessness is a bigger misery than I think I have now. [Sidebar 2: before the new diet, nightly alcohol intake may have been perceived as borderline alcohol abuse, but now it’s healthy and part of my daily nutrition. That’s the best thing about American medicine, I think.]

Why does my job make me miserable, you ask? Several reasons really: (1) my best friend is a manager of an adversarial division within my company, (2) my boss drives me mad, (3) my coworkers are out to get me, and (4) I could be fired any day.

But enough about this miserable mess today. The wine has finally kicked in and drowsiness is seeping into my bones…

Blind Date Humiliation (take two)

Saturday put my ego into check. I was stood up at Starbucks by a First Date. Seriously.

The events that followed: spent the next hour in mind-numbing shock that someone thought so poorly of me (or himself) to behave that way; gave myself a pep talk about the truth of his cowardice; spent the next 5 hours at work trying to hammer out spreadsheet, but instead got caught up in other distractions, such as (1) email FD about my disappointment in him (done in the name of closure, but I suppose it was more for my need to have the last word), (2) email my online-dating-partner-in-crime to announce I am never doing this again, (3) obsessively check my email account every 75 seconds to see if FD dares send me a response, and (4) tear up (tearing up is NOT crying...anyone who cannot even share 10 minutes with another person and a cup of coffee is not worth the spilling of tears). Once I surrendered to my ADD/OCD/SAD, I did manage to crank out some productive work on the spreadsheet (if I cannot find eternal bliss with dating, I can at least become The Workaholic).

So despite my pep talk (and positive reinforcement by my truest of friends), I still felt rotten. Sunday was also strange (more on that later), and that small nagging voice in the back of my mind (what’s wrong with me???) kept getting louder. So I googled "blind date humiliation" and I found a blogger who shared his blind story humiliation, thus stirring up the troubled dating pasts of those in his online community. A summary of their fantastic stories:

1. the Jewish guy set up with the Goth/Rocker Girl with pink spiky hair who ate with her hands and feet

2. the guy set up by his ex-girlfriend with the Girl Who Shouted...who declared to the world (without her inside voice) he was an excellent kisser and then mounted him at a local bar

3. the guy who brought his own chopsticks to an Indian restaurant

4. the guy who was robbed by a gang of bandits with weapons, stripped of his clothes and shoes, and then turned away from help by the girl’s family…upon returning home, he discovers 10 missed calls and a voicemail from her telling him she’s no longer interested in meeting (this story, above all, is my favorite!)

5. the woman who met a man at a restaurant who immediately excused himself to make a phone call and then never returned

6. the Jewish girl on a date with a blonde, blue-eyed white boy…while waxing poetically about her trip to Israel discovers he is part Arab and grew up outside of Jerusalem as a child

7. the woman whose JDate guy discussed his mixed feelings about his uncircumcised, um, member over vintage wine and upscale dining

8. the teenage girl who ditched her blind date at the mall leaving him without a ride only to run into him 2 years later and for him to display the scar from the knife attack he endured while walking home from the mall that day

9. the money hungry mom who brought her sons with her to the baseball game

10. Mr. Obvious from Boston who talked about that which we don’t speak of and failed to acknowledge that which we excuse ourselves from

Ahhh, and herein lies the rub…there is always someone else out there who has it worse off than you. My pithy tale of humiliation: he planned a fantastic (and creative) date for us, but I pressed for a pre-meeting to take the edge off our initial encounter which would allow us surrender ourselves to the fun of the date (hopefully). The pre-meeting at Starbucks failed to materialize because after he arrived and made eye contact, he chose to pretend he was someone else. Seriously. I called out his name and he said he was sorry, I was mistaken. I concur: he is a sorry motherfucker and, clearly, I was mistaken…although I wasn’t mistaken about the need to meet at Starbucks first.

Sadly, those of us who still feel the need for the last word will always get it because we’ll be all alone…with our words.