one more time, for the sweet souvenir

My parents were in Europe and I had the house to myself for a while, aside from the plumbers, contractor, painting people, cabinet people, architect, substitute housekeeper, two dogs, sick cat, and Jacob.

I drove to Seattle to pick Jacob up and then brought him here after two nights of being sorely depressed. There was nobody to complain to or distract me from myself. Those nights were bad. Then Jacob came up and things were much better, although I swear to god I'm lousy company and anybody who attempts a conversation with me these days deserves a fucking medal. That sort of thing.

We held down the fort. I drove frantically away a few times for classes, appointments, Judah's first birthday party, but then returned to watch Holmes on Homes, which was weirdly satisfying and able to convince me utterly that by watching a man assess and repair shoddy construction I was almost constructing something myself, almost moving the kitchen renovation along by sheer force of will.

One night we did laundry in the basement laundry room, lately a temporary kitchen, minus fridge and microwave - which were moved upstairs to accommodate me, if you can believe it, and frustratingly installed in the so-called "breakfast nook", also known to the dogs and cat as "pleasing area in which to shit" - which is normally haunting but in this case became downright homey. I've always found laundry comforting and we made tea and Jacob wore borrowed plaid pajama pants while we washed his hole-y (probably also holy) jeans. I folded shirts and did a damn fine job, worthy of Holmes (as in, Holmes, my man, lay one on me, etc) on Homes, if he did things like fold shirts.

There were other fun things as well. My mind is fizzling out right now because I'm reacting to a sedative or two. Just not in the right way, obviously. Tomorrow I have two places to be, both at the same time, and I haven't decided which one to skip, which person(s) to piss off. It pains me. Imagine if I actually made plans with friends, how bad I could fuck it up with only a day calender and the very best intentions.

But back to Jacob's visit. There was a day when we went downtown with Brandon and Marian and discovered H-Mart, a brand-new-florescent-Asian-import-second-story-grocery-store, which I got really excited about at first. Then I looked around and started to feel like I was killing whales, just being there. But being me (hypocritical to the last) I bought some stuff anyway, including strawberry popsicles that turned out to be not that at all, but instead some sort of wax-coated freezies shaped like Coca Cola bottles.

Another day we sat and drew in Starbucks, of all places. There I dutifully attempted to fill that big, blank sketchbook I mentioned in an earlier post. I have no idea what the point of filling it might be, since people rarely see the insides of my sketchbooks and I hate them as soon as they're "completed" and always resolve not to look at them again until I break down after a couple of years and do, and then I want all sorts of bad things to happen because they're so awful. They inspire me to great feats of inwardly raging at myself. Much like this blog.

I can't shake the feeling lately that doodling in sketchbooks and occasionally sweating out a story to meet my deadlines isn't cutting it anymore. All around me (I chatter to myself constantly) people are picking up momentum, getting things done and making things happen. It's like some godawful movie from the 80's or early 90's, something I might have watched when I was a little kid, home sick in bed, when nothing good was ever on television. I still feel like that invalid kid a lot of the time. Or a gross parody of her, I mean.

But that's the hour talking. I should be asleep or distracting myself in some healthier way. Some way unrelated to the internet. I don't want to have to read this tomorrow.

There were other events. I can't remember. Even if it isn't true and I just feel this way, very much, almost everything lately is low down and rotten to the core.