Category: gloomy gus

Thinking Happy Thoughts

I am so tired lately. I say this a lot. I say this enough that my RRHB gets a bit annoyed but he never says so. He’s a good man, that one. And I was chatting with a friend via email about how little I’m writing these days for myself and had to catch the tears before they actually fell. I think I’m still overwhelmed by what happened this fall. A little overworked. A lot exhausted. And I’m not sure how to fix it now that the snow is trampling down any thoughts of fall. So instead of wallowing in another “gloomy gus” post, I’m going to write up a “happy thoughts” top 10:

1. Remembering Paris. What a wonderful trip. And if I keep thinking about how much I love it there, the food, the architecture, the city, the food, the food, the food, that can carry me through a day of eating dumpy food court and 9-t0-5.

2. Reading the Classics. This week I haven’t been able to put down Evelyn Waugh’s Brideshead Revisited. Last night I stopped watching television just so I could go to bed early and read more of it. I am totally behind in my work reading because of my various challenge books but they’re so good that I’m actually not all that bothered. And I didn’t even know there was a MOVIE version I could watch too.

3. Being a “Wooo” Girl. The episode of How I Met Your Mother where Lily and Robin were discussing the merits of being a “whoo” girl cracked me up. I am totally a “whoo” girl, so much so that it’s even a little embarrassing at various rock shows after 1.5 beers.

4. Our House. Even though it’s a little frustrating that the house isn’t finished after four years, there’s a light at the end of the tunnel. We now have our financing straightened out and will be able to put a big push on it over the next few months. That’s a relief. Having the renovations be over would be a very good thing.

5. The Holidays. Despite feeling as though a vacation (an extended vacation!) would be a very good thing, I am really looking forward to the holidays. My father and stepmother will be “officially” tying the knot. We’ll get to see all of our beloved family. We’ll get to watch The Shawshank Redemption. We’ll watch movies until all hours on New Year’s Eve. I love that we have our own traditions now in this, our 10th anniversary month (December!)

6. My Friends. They’ll go see bad movies with me. They’ll take me out for lunch and/or dinner. They’ll knit me slippers. They’ll buy me sweet presents.

7. Twitter. I can’t help it. I’m obsessed. Life in 140 characters = awesome.

8. Meeting Authors. It’s always inspiring. Yesterday I had the pure pleasure of spending about an hour with Lawrence Hill. He’s amazingly kind, well spoken and utterly lovely.

9. Losing Weight. The 18-pound challenge is going exceptionally well. I’m totally off the meds and the pounds are dropping off (just as we suspected they would). I’m down 1.5 dress sizes (all of my clothes are too big) and it’s great. I wish I could say that I notice a difference but I don’t really except for the fact that all my pants fall down without a belt. Yippee!

10. Deep Breaths. Restorative yoga on Friday nights has been a little oasis in my week. I’ve got a work event this week so I’ll miss out but six weeks for $100 — amazing.

See, it’s not that bad when you take it half-full instead of half-empty, right?

Page A Day?

Now that I’m in between assignments, I’m thinking I’ll get back to my page-a-day work schedule that made up the bulk of the first draft of the manuscript. I’m also going to have to get back into the habit of writing on my own stuff instead of a) wasting time blogging and b) wasting time putting myself into an internet coma. Even if I stretch out a few sentences before failing myself in front of the television I’ll at least get back in the habit of working on the book. Next to my family and my RRHB, writing is the most important part of my life. It’s strange how the time slips away around it and I just can’t get there these days.

Deep breaths, right?

Too Early On A Sunday

Over the past few days I’ve been finding it harder and harder to sleep. I’m averaging about five hours a night, which is better than nothing but still means I’m not getting any better in terms of the cold that seems to be hanging on for dear life. I’ve now been sick since the week my mother died and it’s like trying to live through a constant, pressing hard wind. The more I push myself forward, the more it presses against me. The cough rattles through like turbulence and it shakes me around in its wake at all hours. The wakefulness is one thing: I know what to do with it. But my body seems unable to rest no matter how many hours I spend at home.

Last night, after spending the afternoon with my husband’s family for our niece’s third birthday (and what fun that was despite the above), I came home, did some work, and then settled down to watch HBO’s Recount. The film stars Kevin Spacey, Denis Leary and a whole host of other people, and dramatizes the events surrounding the Florida voting fiasco from the 2000 presidential election. Knowing now what a complete and utter mess W.’s made of it, the film almost feels a bit self-congratulatory in a way, as it’s told from the point of view of the Democrats (who obviously lost the court battle to finish the Florida recount), who have the advantage of the moral high ground. Regardless, like so much of modern history, the truth will consistently be bifurcated by the teller (sue me; I’m still a post-modernist!), but that sure makes for solid entertainment even if the film feels more like a Michael Moore picture than a feature film (again, I’m not saying that’s a bad thing). And the performances were stellar (Denis Leary, Tom Wilkinson, Laura Dern in particular). All in all watching Recount was a perfectly good way to spend a lonely Saturday night coughing and crumpled up on the couch.

A Quote from Goldengrove

Just finished up a meeting with my writer’s group, and it was delightful as always. I am consistently impressed with the talent of my two friends. The deathly illness continues to cloud my overall cheery outlook. If I could only stop coughing, life could finally return to normal. I miss normal. I miss the everyday. I miss September. I miss my mother.

But I was talking about inspiration, so here’s a particularly lovely quote from the beginning of Francine Prose’s Goldengrove:

My father used to say that he and I always wanted to know what everything meant, but that my mother and Margaret only cared about how it sounded.

Delicious, right? One short sentence that sets up an entire family dynamic. Reminds me of the time I stood beside my RRHB at a Tricky Woo show and told him that I loved music that went up and down and not back and forth, and he just understood what I meant.

Good GRIEF

I had perhaps a little TOO much to drink tonight. There’s a reason why I never do that, I think, but I can’t really remember.

But, on the whole, I feel better. I can’t see to type my name, but drunk blogging is way better than drunk anything else, right? I feel a little bit more like myself. Maybe just a touch.

I also feel like things are going to be okay. Everything might be shit right now but it won’t always be that way. People love me. I love people. The rest is inconsequential.

My RRHB is in Fredericton tonight. Fingers crossed he has a rocking show.

OH, and the peeps at the table next to us were speaking Czech. That’s cool. And (this is for Tina) when I said kif-kif to the cab driver he told me I must know someone Arabic. And then he called me sister. A lot. A proper ending to a very fitting evening.

Now, I must watch the rest of The Office.

You Don’t Know How It Feels

I’m listening to a playlist on iTunes that I just call “Favourite Songs” as I pack for my cousin’s wedding in Vancouver. Right now, it’s Tom Petty’s “You Don’t Know How It Feels,” the next song is Neko Case’s “In California,” and at least I’m not listening to The Raconteurs again.

My dress that I ordered online hasn’t shown up yet and I’m afraid it won’t get here before I have to leave on Friday. And I’m not sleeping again. The week I had the drugs was good but I’m always so stoned in the mornings, which makes it even harder to get through the already hard days that I decided I’d stop taking them until I really needed them again.

I wish I knew when I’d feel better. I wish I knew where the end of it all would be. I guess that’s how it goes, right? I do feel more myself. But my heart’s not in a lot of things. I turned in a manuscript that wasn’t great — no that needs a lot of work — and I haven’t looked at the novel in weeks.

September just disappeared. Whoosh and then it’s fall and colder and I have no fresh vegetables and nothing growing and my stomach won’t settle and I miss so many different pieces of my life that I don’t even know where to start putting them all back together again.

I think I’ll start tagging these posts “gloomy gus” and maybe I’ll start trying to find things a little more inspiring to talk about. Wait, I’ve got one — there will be dancing at the wedding. I love dancing.