Every now and then, through the fog of sleepiness and in-flight movies, I remember what I’m doing. It catches me off guard and I can suddenly hear my heart pounding loudly, feel a thin sheen of sweat coat my hands.
“Holy fuck”, I think, “I’m going to England.”
I’m not really nervous about meeting these people, because I already know them. But knowing someone and living up close and personal with them are two totally different things. I’ve never technically been anyone’s “houseguest” before and I feel slightly overwhelmed over all the trouble they’re going to for me.
I’m not really nervous about flying, because I’ve flown a dozen times before. But sitting in a terminal alone, and sober I might add, is a slight shock to the system. I’ve always had my sister there to watch my bag while I go to the bathroom or to exchange raised eyebrows with over some crazy looking passenger. I missed her terribly, just for a moment, when I saw an Asian man that looked exactly like Wayne Newton. Until, of course, I realized she probably has no idea who Wayne Newton is.
I’m not really nervous about going to a foreign country, because seeing the world is one of the few things I’m truly passionate about. But having only been to Europe once, with a tour group, at the age of 15...I’m slightly anxious about going through customs alone. It looks rather intimidating in the movies and, try as I might, I can’t remember much about what it was like all those years ago.
When the captain announces our descent into London, I very nearly press my nose to the window. But I needn’t bother, there’s nothing to see but fog and my first glimpse of England consists of tarmac whizzing by under the plane as we land.
I already have my cell phone out, ready just as they announce I can use it again. I text my family and tell them I’ve landed safely and then I text Nathan. It’s a new method of communication for us and it surprises me how much I enjoy it. It seems silly, but it makes me feel less like the internet friend.
He’s picking me up from the airport alone and I’m glad. Not just because having everyone meet me all at once might be a bit overwhelming, but also because it feels like that’s the way it’s supposed to be. He was the first of the four that I connected with and has remained the one I relate to most, which often amuses me because you couldn’t find two paths more different than ours.
The queue for customs is long, winding and full of Americans traveling in groups. I’m still texting Nathan so it isn’t until I’m almost to the front of the line that I notice they’re all holding an important looking piece of paper that I don’t have.
“Excuse me”, I say to the couple behind me. “Everyone seems to have that little slip of paper and I’m wondering if I missed something.”
They explain that I’m supposed to have it filled out and ready to hand to the customs agent in the booth, along with my passport. There is, apparently, a stack of them on a table...way in the back of the line. Everyone in the row adjacent to ours, separated only by the rope barrier, has been listening to our exchange and I feel a stab of embarrassment mixed with panic. I shuffle my feet and wonder what to do.
“Stay right there”, says a smartly dressed blonde woman with an English accent. She starts dipping under the ropes, heading toward the table full of papers, but is apparently given one before she’s halfway there. It seems everyone, down to the last in line, is aware of my blunder. I thank her profusely when she returns and hands it over.
“It’s no problem”, she replies. “Wouldn’t want to hold up the queue.”
I quickly fill out the form and manage to have everything together just as I’m called up to a booth. The agent glances at my information and begins asking me a rapid series of questions, first about myself and then about the people I’m visiting.
“How long are you staying?”
“Nine days.”
“Whose address is this?”
“Nathan and Kelly’s.”
“How do you know them?”
“...Through a writing forum.”
She glances up from the papers and gives me an odd look. “You mean the internet? Have you ever met them before?”
“Not in person, no.” I feel dozens of eyes on my back and I’m beginning to panic again. I want to lie about it all, just so she stops looking at me like I’m a complete lunatic, but I’m too terrified of what might happen if I do.
“Are they meeting you here at the airport?”
“He is, yes.”
“What happens if you decide you don’t want to stay with them? What will you do?”
“Um, get a hotel?”
“What do you do for a living? How much money did you bring with you? When is your return flight? I’d like to see your bank account information and your itinerary.”
I’m completely flustered as I try to comply with all her requests. I’m prepared for all sorts of scenarios, but this isn’t one of them. I tell her what’s in my bank account, which, for me, is the equivalent to dropping my pants and pressing my bare ass to her little window. It’s absolutely unseemly.
I show her my itinerary and finally, finally, she stamps my passport and waves me on.
I gratefully follow the signs to baggage claim, walking quickly and texting Nathan that I’m nearly there. My giant suitcase is already sitting on the floor, to the left of the carousel, dwarfing all the others around it. I feel another wave of gratitude – one of my biggest fears was that they would lose it and I’d be without makeup for the entire trip. I wrestle the difficult handle up and begin dragging my belongings toward the exit.
As I walk through the open double doors, I immediately spot him standing behind a white rail to my right. He’s grinning and holding a small white sign that says “#bannisterfest”, which is a play on my last name and what the four of them have decided to call this holiday. I can’t stop the laugh that bursts out as I make my way past the rail; I hadn’t expected the sign.
We meet at the end of the barrier and hug. It’s lovely and surreal and I’m afraid my face may crack. He’s so tall and so exuberant that from the moment I walked through the doors, I didn’t notice anyone else. From his writing, you would think that Nathan blends in with a crowd, sitting amongst them and recording their movements, but that isn’t the case. He’s the sort of person people notice, the sort I think they’d want to write about.
I walk alongside him through the terminal, grinning and chatting as though it were continuation instead of first. He tells me Kelly was late to work this morning because she insisted I must have the sign. I feel a tiny burning behind my eyes and I have to will myself to keep the tears at bay.
It’s a bit embarrassing; being so happy you might cry, but it’s certainly better than the sort of embarrassment the customs agent stirred up. Which, I’m happy to say, disappeared the moment I finally hugged my friend and realized that, now, it definitely doesn’t matter what any of them think.
Showing posts with label Mr. London Street. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Mr. London Street. Show all posts
Wednesday, May 16, 2012
Monday, May 14, 2012
Abroad
My life has been peppered with instances where I’ve felt out of place, even in the midst of my own family. It can be difficult, sharing a home with people that don’t completely understand me, that find the things I feel passionate about laughable or weird. Confiding in them is rare because I hate being mocked or used as a humorous anecdote for their friends – “Look at my daughter, the sensitive blogger, writing in her secret notebook!” It takes something out of me, each time I hedge around the truth to save being heckled or keep a piece of writing I’m proud of hidden because it would make me too vulnerable.
But with each passing year, seven to be precise, I’ve met more and more people that “get” me and I’ve formed a different sort of family. It’s the beauty, and the curse, of the Internet. It says, “Look, here are all these people that you can connect with on every level you’ve been missing! But, oh...they live 4,000 miles away, across an ocean.
You laugh, you write, you talk, you care, but you can’t hug or sit down at a table and look each other in the face. These are real people, flesh and blood and bone, but in most cases they’ll only ever be a friendly voice on the other end of a phone line or a “how are you” email.
In most cases, but no longer in mine. Because two weeks ago I boarded a plane to England and set out to meet, and stay with, four people I already knew but hadn’t set eyes on. Two weeks ago I traveled alone, to a country I’d never been to before, and had the sort of adventure most people will never get to experience.
But with each passing year, seven to be precise, I’ve met more and more people that “get” me and I’ve formed a different sort of family. It’s the beauty, and the curse, of the Internet. It says, “Look, here are all these people that you can connect with on every level you’ve been missing! But, oh...they live 4,000 miles away, across an ocean.
You laugh, you write, you talk, you care, but you can’t hug or sit down at a table and look each other in the face. These are real people, flesh and blood and bone, but in most cases they’ll only ever be a friendly voice on the other end of a phone line or a “how are you” email.
In most cases, but no longer in mine. Because two weeks ago I boarded a plane to England and set out to meet, and stay with, four people I already knew but hadn’t set eyes on. Two weeks ago I traveled alone, to a country I’d never been to before, and had the sort of adventure most people will never get to experience.
Tuesday, October 19, 2010
The Interview
I'm always interested when I see that a blogger is being interviewed - both for the types of questions that are asked and the answers to those questions. The thing is, though, that most of those interviews are actually just questionnaires. There isn't any real interaction between the question asker and the person that's answering, the questions aren't usually tailored to that specific person, and let's be honest - it seems to be the same gig over and over.
So, I asked someone to help me put a spin on the blog interview process. Rather than just emailing me a list of standard questions, I asked that he email only one and wait for my answer before deciding what to ask next. I also chose someone that I thought would ask unique and difficult questions...and he didn't disappoint. Some were so hard to answer that I might have even stamped my foot once or twice.
My interviewer is Mr. London Street - a fantastic writer and a good friend. His contributions are in bold.
I'm always struck by the idea of boundaries; how some bloggers will tell you about everything and anything (especially their sex lives) whether you want them to or not whereas other bloggers barely talk about anything above the mundane. What, if any, are your no-go areas?
Wow. Starting off with a bang, aren't we?
Obviously I don't care much for boundaries where blogging is concerned. This is the age of "too much information" and I enjoy participating in it. Being honest, over sharing, ignoring boundaries others wouldn't dare - it’s an addictive, heady feeling. I think part of the reason I feel that way is that I had a real problem being honest when I was younger.
My old issues aside - There are always going to be people that dislike what I have to say and I will always be crossing someone's boundaries. Fact is, I like being shocking...and as far as the topic of sex is concerned, its full steam ahead.
If I have any no-go areas, I haven't yet run across them. Maybe one day, if I'm ever married or in a serious committed relationship, that will change. Then again, maybe they'll be boundary pushers too and shrug as I type away about their bedroom preferences, et al.
How important do you think the social element of blogging is? Do you mainly see it as a medium to write and get your writing read by other people, and how much of it is about other people's writing and getting to know them?
I've enjoyed reading the blogs of the friends I've made and I've enjoyed getting to know them, but yes, this is largely a medium to write and have my writing read.
I think of blogland as being split into three sections - 1) bloggers that blog, 2) writers that blog, and 3) readers that do neither. It is much easier for me to connect with writers that blog because, like me, they tend to be more selfish and understand when I say things like "I just spent an entire day reading my own archives". We take this blogging gig far more seriously than others and we're always trying to improve, because we want more. This isn't just a hobby - it’s a stepping stone. Or rather, we hope it is.
I think the social element of blogging is very important, which is funny because obviously I would rather write than socialize. People respond more to bloggers that reach out and connect with their audience outside of the comment section. However, regardless of how much I enjoy my blogroll, I don't add new blogs to my reader often and I will always prefer to write rather than read. It is, as they say, "all about me".
That sounded terribly bitchy, didn't it? A third of you won't think so.
I'm impressed to see such an honest answer. Some bloggers can get away with that and get really huge without ever replying to a single comment or giving a single award; the rest of us have to toil away knowing we'll never find it that easy. Whose success do you envy?
Yes, that's true. And speaking of awards, I wish there were more out there without all the bloody stipulations. I don't participate as much as I used to and that's mainly because all of them require the same thing - Answer these 7 questions and tag 7 people! I love receiving them because it means I'm liked, and lord knows I love talking about myself, but you can only answer the same question so many times. There are a few out there that come with no strings attached, that are simply there to acknowledge a great bit of writing, but there ought to be more. (Hint, hint.) I'd make one myself, but I'm not nearly popular enough to pull it off.
Whose success do I envy? Anyone that's been able to use blogging to propel them into the writing arena of their choice. I generally stay away from the "famous" blogger's sites though because I've never found one that didn't irritate me. They're so full of ads and propaganda. Where's the damn writing? I'll probably never be one of them because I refuse to ever put an ad on my blog...turning it into, basically, a stat counter with pretty pictures and a few paltry sentences.
You know what I envy more than success? Talent.
Okay. We might come back to that in a while. In a meantime, imagine that eventually they make the movie of your life. I'm not going to ask you who'd play you, that's far too boring and obvious a question. Instead, I want you to describe to me the opening scene, which has no dialogue at all. What does it show you doing? What does it look like? And what's the song playing to kick off the soundtrack?
The first scene starts with a completely black screen. There are faint murmurs, a cough. With a loud pop a spotlight comes on and wavers a moment before highlighting a lone figure on a stage.
The figure squints, her round face pale, teeth clenched in a grimace that intentionally fails to be a smile. Beads of sweat appear above the thin red line of her upper lip and she blows the bangs of her frizzy, white blonde hair up with a single quick puff of air before clenching her teeth again. A black and gold spandex outfit hugs her too large frame and the sequins around the elastic cuffs squeeze notable indentations into the exposed flesh on her thighs and arms.
Another pop fills the silence, then the hiss of an old sound system coming to life. Just as the first strains of Crystal Water's song "100% Pure Love" begin, and the girl's wide hips reluctantly start to swish back and forth, a loud laugh echoes across the space.
The girl gallops and scuffles through her routine, her steps pounding along just a bit off from the beat. As she breathlessly hits her finishing stance she raises her jazz hands high overhead and let's her middle fingers detach from the rest, flicking toward the politely applauding crowd.
Brilliant. I want to watch what happens next now. What do you think would surprise people who read your writing most, were they to meet you in person?
I suppose that all depends. I've never asked my readers what, if any, preconceived notions they have about me. They could be surprised to know that I have a loud, obnoxious laugh or that my feet are enormous and I trip over them constantly. Little things that aren't really of any consequence.
But probably they'd be more surprised by how awkward I am. I'm far more comfortable with writing than I am speaking. I'm not an unintelligent woman and I believe that, for a person of my age and limited education, I have quite an extensive vocabulary. However, I suppose in person that could be misconstrued - partially because of my southern accent and shortening of most words in the English language, and partially because of my undeniable urge to use swear words in every other sentence.
I make friends relatively well, but I'm always very nervous when I meet a new person. Sometimes I stumble over my words and ramble a bit in the beginning. It takes me awhile to get settled.
Since I haven't yet had an opportunity to meet another blogger, who has gotten to know me already through my writing, I don't know if it will be the same. I'm hoping that it will be less awkward than meeting a relative stranger. You'll have to let me know how I do.
I wonder whether that's true of a lot of bloggers. I suspect there's often an element of constructing a persona which more closely reflects who we'd like to be, like Second Life avatars. What's your biggest disappointment in writing so far? And which of your posts are you most disappointed that people didn't love? Be honest, we've all got at least one.
I think maybe my biggest disappointment is that I can't seem to make it all come together. I write blog post after blog post, but when I've tried to sit down and think of, or write, something on a larger scale I become overwhelmed and I panic.
It happens with some of my longer posts - I get paranoid about how lengthy they become and I end up essentially cutting my story off at the knees and sewing the pieces back together, minus a few inches. Conclusions are something I often struggle with anyway, because I get so caught up in writing the meat of a story that I forget what the main ingredient was supposed to be. I may have had a point to make in the beginning, but let me start concentrating on the little details and it all falls to shit.
A more specific and recent disappointment, one that's really been eating me, is a post I attempted to write and never finished. It's about my mother. I have two pages of material and it just isn't right - it's too hard. There are so many layers to our relationship and I'm afraid I can never peel them all back sufficiently enough to make people see the whole picture. And having them only see part of the picture is out of the question. So, it sits mocking me in my documents folder and I've almost started to hate it.
Which of my posts am I most disappointed people didn't love? That's hard. I think I've been pretty lucky because the posts I'm proud of have gotten a decent amount of praise. I don't get many "that was total shit" comments and on the occasion that I have, my readers rally like a mob of villagers with torches. It's awesome.
But there is one that is a secret favorite of mine; one I wish everyone would have oohed and ahhed over more (though I never would have admitted it before).
I wrote it in about 20 minutes or less. It's full of run-on sentences and things that would normally drive me (and a lot of writers) crazy, but I love it. It's a lot like how I am with my friends - random, eccentric, always trying to make people laugh even when the joke is on me. And, at the risk of crawling even further up my own ass, it kind of reminds me of a Vince Vaughn monologue. It's this one: “Does it feel hot in here to you? Must be me. Do do CHHH!” Great title, right?
One thing I'm really struck by about your blog is that it doesn't say a lot about where you live. Tell me a bit about your home town, what you like and don't like about it. If someone visited you for 24 hours where would you take them, what would you show them and what would you do?
What can I say about small town America that hasn't been said before? Everyone knows your name, your medical history, and how much you deposit in your bank account every other Friday evening. It's a living, breathing Norman Rockwell painting. I alternately love and hate it.
I'm the sort of person that craves culture and new experiences yet, because of where I live, rarely have the opportunity to go after them. I often feel smothered by my lack of options. There aren't any fantastic art museums or ancient ruins. There aren't any chic boutiques or glamorous restaurants. If you want to go to a movie, go bowling, do much of anything really...you have to go into the city almost an hour away.
However, there are almost just as many days when I can't imagine living anywhere else. It is a very beautiful place.
The town itself is tiny; there's only one stoplight. Main Street is lined on one side with old buildings - some painted, some left to their original brick, and one renegade furniture store paneled with dark wood. They are all smashed together, some with roofs shaped as you'd see them in an old western. The drugstore still has its original sign and you can still buy an ice cream cone inside from the old fashioned counter.
On the other side of the street there's a small gas station, a Laundromat, and row of shops. The shop on the end would be almost invisible if its far wall that meets the end of the sidewalk wasn't covered in an enormous mural of rolling green hills, sheep, and a cartoon man in lederhosen. It’s a German restaurant that's almost never open, run by an eccentric German woman that chain smokes and shows everyone pictures of her passel of German Shepherds. She wears bright red lipstick and complains loudly, and in a thick accent, about the lack of appreciation for German cuisine. She only takes reservations when she feels like it and there's never a menu - you eat what she fixes or you don't eat at all.
The town square is immediately past the restaurant and contains a small parking lot and a very large old clock. Directly behind the clock is a white gazebo surrounded by grass and flowers - it's where the old ladies sit during every parade, whispering behind their fans and watching their husbands nearby. On one side of the square are a hardware store and a steakhouse made to look like a stable, but with two stained glass windows on either side of the bright red doors. On the other side the buildings, a salon and an antique store, are fronted in huge glass panes; a derelict looking dry cleaners seems stuck on as an afterthought, when in fact it's been there forever.
If you continue down Main Street things spread out a bit. You'd run into two banks, a crumbling brick apartment building, the old elementary school that now serves as a police station, a few churches, a baseball field, and "the walking track" where the high school kids park on Friday and Saturday nights. With nothing else to do but eat and shop, walking around a pavement oval and sitting on tailgates in the adjacent parking lot is what passes for entertainment.
My house is about 15 to 20 minutes outside of town - 10 when I'm feeling reckless. Houses, trees, churches, and a lone country gas station are about all there is to see between point A and point B, but it's a lovely drive none the less. As I've said before, I live by the lake so I feel I'm lucky there. I've never been much on nature, but watching the sun set over the water still has the ability to make my throat feel tight.
So, obviously, 24 hours would be plenty of time to show someone everything there is to see. I'd take them on a boat ride and show them the marina, maybe browse through the antique store and have dinner at the pizza parlor. Then, if they were really lucky, I'd take them to an authentic country party...outside...at a barn. We'd play beer pong, discuss the merits of light vs. dark beer, and argue over who likes Johnny Cash the most.
Have you ever travelled outside the States? If not, where's on your wish list?
Yes, I took a two week trip to Spain when I was in high school. It wasn't a school sponsored trip, but rather a tour group open to anyone that wanted to go and put together by our Spanish teacher every other year. We toured the whole country, hitting a lot of the major cities, and took a day trip to Morocco. It was the most fantastic thing I've ever done.
I had a wish list of destinations before I went to Spain, but it's since multiplied. Ireland, England, France, Peru, Australia, Switzerland, and that's just the tip of the iceberg. I want to see and experience them all...and I will.
What's the appeal of Switzerland? I'm genuinely interested in how people outside Europe might see it, because believe me, in England it's known for chocolate, neutrality, Nazi gold and euthanasia clinics. Are you a big Sound Of Music fan or something?
Yes I am. I adore the Sound of Music. What of it?
I suppose the majority of the appeal is in the scenery. And of course the fact that it isn't here. Besides, I love chocolate.
But...euthanasia clinics for what, exactly?
Well, euthanasia clinics are for euthanasia (what do you mean "for what?" honestly). It's not legal in England so people fly off to Switzerland to die with dignity in a special clinic. Or they just go somewhere like Croydon for a weekend and find that the will to live soon ups and leaves.
Here's a question for you. Why didn't you have an abortion? Was it a difficult or an easy decision to have your daughter?
I worked for a vet's office for two years so when I hear euthanasia, I automatically think about animals. I've never heard of a euthanasia clinic for people - that's what I meant.
I had an abortion when I was 17 so when I got pregnant again a year later, I was afraid to tell my mother that "oops, I know we spent all that money fixing my life once already, but we're going to have to do it again".
I never wanted to have children and when I found out I was pregnant again, by someone that had told me that was impossible (yes, I was naive), I immediately planned to have another abortion without telling my family. He said he would help me with the money for the procedure, and then promptly disappeared.
Then I did what I do best and procrastinated. I ignored what was going on with my body because I was too terrified to do anything else. So the decision to have her was more like indecision turned inevitable action. I put it off so long that I had no other option.
It was my decision to keep her, not have her, that was the difficult part. I seriously considered adoption for awhile, but ultimately my family swayed my vote. My mother wanted me to keep her and she promised to help me raise her. And she has.
When she was born (I never thought it through before the fact...not really) I realized that nothing would ever be the same, that my life would never be easy again. But she's been, and will always be, worth every single sacrifice.
Which things about your writing would you least like your mother to read? What about, one day, your daughter?
Well, funny you should mention that. Sometimes, when I haven't quite finished a post, I'll print them out to read over and edit later. Recently my mother came across two of them. The first was “Love is blind, friendship tries not to notice” and she said, "You really are a good writer. You get that from your mother." The second, "Safe Words (Alternate title: No pain, no gain)", was met with considerably less enthusiasm. "You really shouldn't leave these lying around where anyone could read them. Disgusting!"
Truthfully, if I didn't live with her, she could read my blog all she likes. But since I currently do its best if she doesn't. We fight often enough already and if I were to mention her, unfavorably or not, it would just spark another argument. She became aware that I was writing a blog at the beginning of this year, though she isn't privy to the address of course, and has said many times since, "You'd better not be putting shit about me on there!" She's very sensitive.
Though it would make me a tad uncomfortable for her to know so much about my sex life, which I write about quite frequently, I could get over it.
As for my daughter...I'm not ashamed of anything I write. When she's old enough, she's more than welcome to read all of my archives. I've been systematically printing them out and putting them in a binder so maybe one day she'll read them all and say, "God, my mother was embarrassing...but funny." Who knows, maybe they'll go a long way in helping with her inevitable therapy sessions.
What's your favourite item of clothing that you've ever owned? Tell me what it looked like and, more importantly, what it meant to you.
I was never a very stylish person. My school years were riddled with embarrassing clothing choices; I honestly can't believe anyone would be seen speaking to me. Being a large girl didn't help either - for some reason the people that make plus size clothing for girls and women seem to think you shouldn't dress mutton as lamb, and they chose the most horrendous cuts and patterns. Between my mother's love of all things frilly, my own misguided choices, and the (as my Papa used to say) seamstresses at the local tent and awning store...I developed an unhealthy hate for clothing in general.
But over the past few years I've gotten a lot better. I've become more adept at picking items that flatter me and I think it's safe to say that I've finally formed my own sort of style.
Rather than just one item of clothing, I have a favorite outfit. It's so simple, but it gave me a confidence I hadn't felt before. Three (or was it four?) years ago I bought a pair of tight, dark blue jean capris that you could cuff if you wanted; unrolled they reached about mid-calf and I preferred them that way. I'd had them for awhile before I went on vacation to Oklahoma to visit my dad. While I was there I went shopping with my stepsister and stepbrother, looking for an outfit to go out clubbing. I ended up picking out a plain white V-neck t-shirt, a plain black button up vest, a black trilby hat, and a pair of red and black Kenneth Cole strappy high heels.
When I went out that that night, I knew I was hot. I danced on a stage, something that would usually take a large amount of alcohol for me to even consider, and I walked around in those shoes like I owned the place. I've played at that sort of thing before, but that was the first time I actually felt that sort of confidence. In the past it was "fake it till you drink enough". And even though by the time the sun came up I was hobbling (and sneaking) barefoot from a cab to the front door, bruised and looking a lot worse for wear, that night and that outfit were the start of a beautiful relationship between me, myself, and I. I still have bad days, like every other woman, but most people are surprised when they realize just how healthy my ego really is.
The sad part is I only got to wear the outfit that launched my vanity once more. A few months after its second debut, it was packed in an overnight bag and left in my (accidentally) unlocked car downtown while I went out drinking with my best friend. When we stumbled out of the bar a few hours later, we realized that someone had taken the bag full of clothes. I still have the shoes, as I was wearing them at the time, and my hat which I'd left at home, but the rest was gone. Now every time I'm downtown I stare at the bums that wander by, wondering if they're the ones that took my clothes...and if they're wearing my underwear.
One last question: what question were you most dreading that I'd ask?
I wouldn't really say I was dreading a specific question, but I hoped you wouldn't ask any that I would have to decline to answer.
I wanted to be completely candid for this interview and that wouldn't have worked well had you asked me something that would betray someone's confidence (someone that reads this, obviously) or like, oh, "how many people have you slept with". Because there's no way in hell I'd answer that publicly. (So, back to your first question, apparently there is a no-go.) Unless, of course, I'd stand to make a large sum of money from sharing such information. It happens, you know - just look at Chelsea Handler.
So, I asked someone to help me put a spin on the blog interview process. Rather than just emailing me a list of standard questions, I asked that he email only one and wait for my answer before deciding what to ask next. I also chose someone that I thought would ask unique and difficult questions...and he didn't disappoint. Some were so hard to answer that I might have even stamped my foot once or twice.
My interviewer is Mr. London Street - a fantastic writer and a good friend. His contributions are in bold.
**********
I'm always struck by the idea of boundaries; how some bloggers will tell you about everything and anything (especially their sex lives) whether you want them to or not whereas other bloggers barely talk about anything above the mundane. What, if any, are your no-go areas?
Wow. Starting off with a bang, aren't we?
Obviously I don't care much for boundaries where blogging is concerned. This is the age of "too much information" and I enjoy participating in it. Being honest, over sharing, ignoring boundaries others wouldn't dare - it’s an addictive, heady feeling. I think part of the reason I feel that way is that I had a real problem being honest when I was younger.
My old issues aside - There are always going to be people that dislike what I have to say and I will always be crossing someone's boundaries. Fact is, I like being shocking...and as far as the topic of sex is concerned, its full steam ahead.
If I have any no-go areas, I haven't yet run across them. Maybe one day, if I'm ever married or in a serious committed relationship, that will change. Then again, maybe they'll be boundary pushers too and shrug as I type away about their bedroom preferences, et al.
How important do you think the social element of blogging is? Do you mainly see it as a medium to write and get your writing read by other people, and how much of it is about other people's writing and getting to know them?
I've enjoyed reading the blogs of the friends I've made and I've enjoyed getting to know them, but yes, this is largely a medium to write and have my writing read.
I think of blogland as being split into three sections - 1) bloggers that blog, 2) writers that blog, and 3) readers that do neither. It is much easier for me to connect with writers that blog because, like me, they tend to be more selfish and understand when I say things like "I just spent an entire day reading my own archives". We take this blogging gig far more seriously than others and we're always trying to improve, because we want more. This isn't just a hobby - it’s a stepping stone. Or rather, we hope it is.
I think the social element of blogging is very important, which is funny because obviously I would rather write than socialize. People respond more to bloggers that reach out and connect with their audience outside of the comment section. However, regardless of how much I enjoy my blogroll, I don't add new blogs to my reader often and I will always prefer to write rather than read. It is, as they say, "all about me".
That sounded terribly bitchy, didn't it? A third of you won't think so.
I'm impressed to see such an honest answer. Some bloggers can get away with that and get really huge without ever replying to a single comment or giving a single award; the rest of us have to toil away knowing we'll never find it that easy. Whose success do you envy?
Yes, that's true. And speaking of awards, I wish there were more out there without all the bloody stipulations. I don't participate as much as I used to and that's mainly because all of them require the same thing - Answer these 7 questions and tag 7 people! I love receiving them because it means I'm liked, and lord knows I love talking about myself, but you can only answer the same question so many times. There are a few out there that come with no strings attached, that are simply there to acknowledge a great bit of writing, but there ought to be more. (Hint, hint.) I'd make one myself, but I'm not nearly popular enough to pull it off.
Whose success do I envy? Anyone that's been able to use blogging to propel them into the writing arena of their choice. I generally stay away from the "famous" blogger's sites though because I've never found one that didn't irritate me. They're so full of ads and propaganda. Where's the damn writing? I'll probably never be one of them because I refuse to ever put an ad on my blog...turning it into, basically, a stat counter with pretty pictures and a few paltry sentences.
You know what I envy more than success? Talent.
Okay. We might come back to that in a while. In a meantime, imagine that eventually they make the movie of your life. I'm not going to ask you who'd play you, that's far too boring and obvious a question. Instead, I want you to describe to me the opening scene, which has no dialogue at all. What does it show you doing? What does it look like? And what's the song playing to kick off the soundtrack?
The first scene starts with a completely black screen. There are faint murmurs, a cough. With a loud pop a spotlight comes on and wavers a moment before highlighting a lone figure on a stage.
The figure squints, her round face pale, teeth clenched in a grimace that intentionally fails to be a smile. Beads of sweat appear above the thin red line of her upper lip and she blows the bangs of her frizzy, white blonde hair up with a single quick puff of air before clenching her teeth again. A black and gold spandex outfit hugs her too large frame and the sequins around the elastic cuffs squeeze notable indentations into the exposed flesh on her thighs and arms.
Another pop fills the silence, then the hiss of an old sound system coming to life. Just as the first strains of Crystal Water's song "100% Pure Love" begin, and the girl's wide hips reluctantly start to swish back and forth, a loud laugh echoes across the space.
The girl gallops and scuffles through her routine, her steps pounding along just a bit off from the beat. As she breathlessly hits her finishing stance she raises her jazz hands high overhead and let's her middle fingers detach from the rest, flicking toward the politely applauding crowd.
Brilliant. I want to watch what happens next now. What do you think would surprise people who read your writing most, were they to meet you in person?
I suppose that all depends. I've never asked my readers what, if any, preconceived notions they have about me. They could be surprised to know that I have a loud, obnoxious laugh or that my feet are enormous and I trip over them constantly. Little things that aren't really of any consequence.
But probably they'd be more surprised by how awkward I am. I'm far more comfortable with writing than I am speaking. I'm not an unintelligent woman and I believe that, for a person of my age and limited education, I have quite an extensive vocabulary. However, I suppose in person that could be misconstrued - partially because of my southern accent and shortening of most words in the English language, and partially because of my undeniable urge to use swear words in every other sentence.
I make friends relatively well, but I'm always very nervous when I meet a new person. Sometimes I stumble over my words and ramble a bit in the beginning. It takes me awhile to get settled.
Since I haven't yet had an opportunity to meet another blogger, who has gotten to know me already through my writing, I don't know if it will be the same. I'm hoping that it will be less awkward than meeting a relative stranger. You'll have to let me know how I do.
I wonder whether that's true of a lot of bloggers. I suspect there's often an element of constructing a persona which more closely reflects who we'd like to be, like Second Life avatars. What's your biggest disappointment in writing so far? And which of your posts are you most disappointed that people didn't love? Be honest, we've all got at least one.
I think maybe my biggest disappointment is that I can't seem to make it all come together. I write blog post after blog post, but when I've tried to sit down and think of, or write, something on a larger scale I become overwhelmed and I panic.
It happens with some of my longer posts - I get paranoid about how lengthy they become and I end up essentially cutting my story off at the knees and sewing the pieces back together, minus a few inches. Conclusions are something I often struggle with anyway, because I get so caught up in writing the meat of a story that I forget what the main ingredient was supposed to be. I may have had a point to make in the beginning, but let me start concentrating on the little details and it all falls to shit.
A more specific and recent disappointment, one that's really been eating me, is a post I attempted to write and never finished. It's about my mother. I have two pages of material and it just isn't right - it's too hard. There are so many layers to our relationship and I'm afraid I can never peel them all back sufficiently enough to make people see the whole picture. And having them only see part of the picture is out of the question. So, it sits mocking me in my documents folder and I've almost started to hate it.
Which of my posts am I most disappointed people didn't love? That's hard. I think I've been pretty lucky because the posts I'm proud of have gotten a decent amount of praise. I don't get many "that was total shit" comments and on the occasion that I have, my readers rally like a mob of villagers with torches. It's awesome.
But there is one that is a secret favorite of mine; one I wish everyone would have oohed and ahhed over more (though I never would have admitted it before).
I wrote it in about 20 minutes or less. It's full of run-on sentences and things that would normally drive me (and a lot of writers) crazy, but I love it. It's a lot like how I am with my friends - random, eccentric, always trying to make people laugh even when the joke is on me. And, at the risk of crawling even further up my own ass, it kind of reminds me of a Vince Vaughn monologue. It's this one: “Does it feel hot in here to you? Must be me. Do do CHHH!” Great title, right?
One thing I'm really struck by about your blog is that it doesn't say a lot about where you live. Tell me a bit about your home town, what you like and don't like about it. If someone visited you for 24 hours where would you take them, what would you show them and what would you do?
What can I say about small town America that hasn't been said before? Everyone knows your name, your medical history, and how much you deposit in your bank account every other Friday evening. It's a living, breathing Norman Rockwell painting. I alternately love and hate it.
I'm the sort of person that craves culture and new experiences yet, because of where I live, rarely have the opportunity to go after them. I often feel smothered by my lack of options. There aren't any fantastic art museums or ancient ruins. There aren't any chic boutiques or glamorous restaurants. If you want to go to a movie, go bowling, do much of anything really...you have to go into the city almost an hour away.
However, there are almost just as many days when I can't imagine living anywhere else. It is a very beautiful place.
The town itself is tiny; there's only one stoplight. Main Street is lined on one side with old buildings - some painted, some left to their original brick, and one renegade furniture store paneled with dark wood. They are all smashed together, some with roofs shaped as you'd see them in an old western. The drugstore still has its original sign and you can still buy an ice cream cone inside from the old fashioned counter.
On the other side of the street there's a small gas station, a Laundromat, and row of shops. The shop on the end would be almost invisible if its far wall that meets the end of the sidewalk wasn't covered in an enormous mural of rolling green hills, sheep, and a cartoon man in lederhosen. It’s a German restaurant that's almost never open, run by an eccentric German woman that chain smokes and shows everyone pictures of her passel of German Shepherds. She wears bright red lipstick and complains loudly, and in a thick accent, about the lack of appreciation for German cuisine. She only takes reservations when she feels like it and there's never a menu - you eat what she fixes or you don't eat at all.
The town square is immediately past the restaurant and contains a small parking lot and a very large old clock. Directly behind the clock is a white gazebo surrounded by grass and flowers - it's where the old ladies sit during every parade, whispering behind their fans and watching their husbands nearby. On one side of the square are a hardware store and a steakhouse made to look like a stable, but with two stained glass windows on either side of the bright red doors. On the other side the buildings, a salon and an antique store, are fronted in huge glass panes; a derelict looking dry cleaners seems stuck on as an afterthought, when in fact it's been there forever.
If you continue down Main Street things spread out a bit. You'd run into two banks, a crumbling brick apartment building, the old elementary school that now serves as a police station, a few churches, a baseball field, and "the walking track" where the high school kids park on Friday and Saturday nights. With nothing else to do but eat and shop, walking around a pavement oval and sitting on tailgates in the adjacent parking lot is what passes for entertainment.
My house is about 15 to 20 minutes outside of town - 10 when I'm feeling reckless. Houses, trees, churches, and a lone country gas station are about all there is to see between point A and point B, but it's a lovely drive none the less. As I've said before, I live by the lake so I feel I'm lucky there. I've never been much on nature, but watching the sun set over the water still has the ability to make my throat feel tight.
So, obviously, 24 hours would be plenty of time to show someone everything there is to see. I'd take them on a boat ride and show them the marina, maybe browse through the antique store and have dinner at the pizza parlor. Then, if they were really lucky, I'd take them to an authentic country party...outside...at a barn. We'd play beer pong, discuss the merits of light vs. dark beer, and argue over who likes Johnny Cash the most.
Have you ever travelled outside the States? If not, where's on your wish list?
Yes, I took a two week trip to Spain when I was in high school. It wasn't a school sponsored trip, but rather a tour group open to anyone that wanted to go and put together by our Spanish teacher every other year. We toured the whole country, hitting a lot of the major cities, and took a day trip to Morocco. It was the most fantastic thing I've ever done.
I had a wish list of destinations before I went to Spain, but it's since multiplied. Ireland, England, France, Peru, Australia, Switzerland, and that's just the tip of the iceberg. I want to see and experience them all...and I will.
What's the appeal of Switzerland? I'm genuinely interested in how people outside Europe might see it, because believe me, in England it's known for chocolate, neutrality, Nazi gold and euthanasia clinics. Are you a big Sound Of Music fan or something?
Yes I am. I adore the Sound of Music. What of it?
I suppose the majority of the appeal is in the scenery. And of course the fact that it isn't here. Besides, I love chocolate.
But...euthanasia clinics for what, exactly?
Well, euthanasia clinics are for euthanasia (what do you mean "for what?" honestly). It's not legal in England so people fly off to Switzerland to die with dignity in a special clinic. Or they just go somewhere like Croydon for a weekend and find that the will to live soon ups and leaves.
Here's a question for you. Why didn't you have an abortion? Was it a difficult or an easy decision to have your daughter?
I worked for a vet's office for two years so when I hear euthanasia, I automatically think about animals. I've never heard of a euthanasia clinic for people - that's what I meant.
I had an abortion when I was 17 so when I got pregnant again a year later, I was afraid to tell my mother that "oops, I know we spent all that money fixing my life once already, but we're going to have to do it again".
I never wanted to have children and when I found out I was pregnant again, by someone that had told me that was impossible (yes, I was naive), I immediately planned to have another abortion without telling my family. He said he would help me with the money for the procedure, and then promptly disappeared.
Then I did what I do best and procrastinated. I ignored what was going on with my body because I was too terrified to do anything else. So the decision to have her was more like indecision turned inevitable action. I put it off so long that I had no other option.
It was my decision to keep her, not have her, that was the difficult part. I seriously considered adoption for awhile, but ultimately my family swayed my vote. My mother wanted me to keep her and she promised to help me raise her. And she has.
When she was born (I never thought it through before the fact...not really) I realized that nothing would ever be the same, that my life would never be easy again. But she's been, and will always be, worth every single sacrifice.
Which things about your writing would you least like your mother to read? What about, one day, your daughter?
Well, funny you should mention that. Sometimes, when I haven't quite finished a post, I'll print them out to read over and edit later. Recently my mother came across two of them. The first was “Love is blind, friendship tries not to notice” and she said, "You really are a good writer. You get that from your mother." The second, "Safe Words (Alternate title: No pain, no gain)", was met with considerably less enthusiasm. "You really shouldn't leave these lying around where anyone could read them. Disgusting!"
Truthfully, if I didn't live with her, she could read my blog all she likes. But since I currently do its best if she doesn't. We fight often enough already and if I were to mention her, unfavorably or not, it would just spark another argument. She became aware that I was writing a blog at the beginning of this year, though she isn't privy to the address of course, and has said many times since, "You'd better not be putting shit about me on there!" She's very sensitive.
Though it would make me a tad uncomfortable for her to know so much about my sex life, which I write about quite frequently, I could get over it.
As for my daughter...I'm not ashamed of anything I write. When she's old enough, she's more than welcome to read all of my archives. I've been systematically printing them out and putting them in a binder so maybe one day she'll read them all and say, "God, my mother was embarrassing...but funny." Who knows, maybe they'll go a long way in helping with her inevitable therapy sessions.
What's your favourite item of clothing that you've ever owned? Tell me what it looked like and, more importantly, what it meant to you.
I was never a very stylish person. My school years were riddled with embarrassing clothing choices; I honestly can't believe anyone would be seen speaking to me. Being a large girl didn't help either - for some reason the people that make plus size clothing for girls and women seem to think you shouldn't dress mutton as lamb, and they chose the most horrendous cuts and patterns. Between my mother's love of all things frilly, my own misguided choices, and the (as my Papa used to say) seamstresses at the local tent and awning store...I developed an unhealthy hate for clothing in general.
But over the past few years I've gotten a lot better. I've become more adept at picking items that flatter me and I think it's safe to say that I've finally formed my own sort of style.
Rather than just one item of clothing, I have a favorite outfit. It's so simple, but it gave me a confidence I hadn't felt before. Three (or was it four?) years ago I bought a pair of tight, dark blue jean capris that you could cuff if you wanted; unrolled they reached about mid-calf and I preferred them that way. I'd had them for awhile before I went on vacation to Oklahoma to visit my dad. While I was there I went shopping with my stepsister and stepbrother, looking for an outfit to go out clubbing. I ended up picking out a plain white V-neck t-shirt, a plain black button up vest, a black trilby hat, and a pair of red and black Kenneth Cole strappy high heels.
When I went out that that night, I knew I was hot. I danced on a stage, something that would usually take a large amount of alcohol for me to even consider, and I walked around in those shoes like I owned the place. I've played at that sort of thing before, but that was the first time I actually felt that sort of confidence. In the past it was "fake it till you drink enough". And even though by the time the sun came up I was hobbling (and sneaking) barefoot from a cab to the front door, bruised and looking a lot worse for wear, that night and that outfit were the start of a beautiful relationship between me, myself, and I. I still have bad days, like every other woman, but most people are surprised when they realize just how healthy my ego really is.
The sad part is I only got to wear the outfit that launched my vanity once more. A few months after its second debut, it was packed in an overnight bag and left in my (accidentally) unlocked car downtown while I went out drinking with my best friend. When we stumbled out of the bar a few hours later, we realized that someone had taken the bag full of clothes. I still have the shoes, as I was wearing them at the time, and my hat which I'd left at home, but the rest was gone. Now every time I'm downtown I stare at the bums that wander by, wondering if they're the ones that took my clothes...and if they're wearing my underwear.
One last question: what question were you most dreading that I'd ask?
I wouldn't really say I was dreading a specific question, but I hoped you wouldn't ask any that I would have to decline to answer.
I wanted to be completely candid for this interview and that wouldn't have worked well had you asked me something that would betray someone's confidence (someone that reads this, obviously) or like, oh, "how many people have you slept with". Because there's no way in hell I'd answer that publicly. (So, back to your first question, apparently there is a no-go.) Unless, of course, I'd stand to make a large sum of money from sharing such information. It happens, you know - just look at Chelsea Handler.
Monday, October 11, 2010
Skin deep
Were we the same age, we’d be almost identical.
Our noses are the same – pointy with a funny dip on the tip. Eyes shaped the same, though hers are a shade darker than my greenish brown. Our top lips are thin, chins rounded, and hair a curly mess.
People have always drawn attention to our physical similarities. I’ve been not just her sister, but her twin on countless occasions.
Shock often follows the revelation that I’m her daughter...
Then we look at each other, her smile meeting my smirk – our unspoken code that says more than we ever could aloud.
My friend Mr. London Street started this lovely blog tradition: 100 word posts. He often invites others to give it a try - so I thought I would. You should check out his previous efforts, the latest of which is about Zombies. He's always taking suggestions for new topics...so pop on over, recommend a subject or two, and tell him what you think of his idea.
It is a lot harder than I thought to write only 100 words about a subject. I'm typically an overwriter, so this was particularly challenging. But I liked it, so I might just do it again.
Our noses are the same – pointy with a funny dip on the tip. Eyes shaped the same, though hers are a shade darker than my greenish brown. Our top lips are thin, chins rounded, and hair a curly mess.
People have always drawn attention to our physical similarities. I’ve been not just her sister, but her twin on countless occasions.
Shock often follows the revelation that I’m her daughter...
Then we look at each other, her smile meeting my smirk – our unspoken code that says more than we ever could aloud.
**********
My friend Mr. London Street started this lovely blog tradition: 100 word posts. He often invites others to give it a try - so I thought I would. You should check out his previous efforts, the latest of which is about Zombies. He's always taking suggestions for new topics...so pop on over, recommend a subject or two, and tell him what you think of his idea.
It is a lot harder than I thought to write only 100 words about a subject. I'm typically an overwriter, so this was particularly challenging. But I liked it, so I might just do it again.
**********
Just a quick, somewhat unrelated note: I'd like to thank all of the "lurkers" that have come out of hiding recently. I've been terribly lax about responding to comments lately, but I want you all to know that there's nothing better than receiving a comment from someone you didn't know was reading. And of course, new readers - thanks to you too. :)
If you're wondering what's coming up here, I'll give you a sneak peak: There's a rather risque blog post in the works (that I mentioned briefly on Twitter) and perhaps a new take on the art of blogger interviewing.
Wednesday, November 04, 2009
Guest Posting day 3: The "devastatingly handsome" MLS
The guest today truly needs no introduction, but I’ll give him one all the same.
He has been one of my top favorites since I began reading his blog months ago. Humorous and reflective, with a talent for the descriptive that I would sell virtually anything to possess, Mr. London Street’s entries are never dull. He doesn’t shrink away from the controversial and I admire his opinionated nature. I hesitate to make his head any larger than it already is, but I suppose there’s no help for it. I’m honored, even without his having mentioned it (and he did), to be the first recipient of a guest post from him. Actually, it was more like an air-fist pumping HA! So without further ado....
Many years ago I met my friend Kirsty for lunch on an anonymous summer day. On the face of it, this was no different from the dozens of other days we had met for lunch, with one exception - this time Kirsty brought her along. We clicked instantly. We spent the whole lunchtime talking as if we’d known each other far longer than we had – far longer, in fact, than I had known Kirsty.
At the end, I went back to my desk to uselessly move work around from one part of an org chart to another in the name of productivity and efficiency. And that afternoon, my email pinged with a message from Kirsty. “She thinks you’re dishy!” it excitedly said. I didn’t think anybody under the age of 50 ever used the word dishy.
Over time, I came to realise that this was exactly the sort of thing she would say.
The emails between us began. Several emails a day – long, chatty emails about everything and nothing. When you first meet someone it’s all there, off in the distance, waiting to be discovered. All those tiny facts that you absolutely have to know when you really like someone – where they went to school, their childhood embarrassments, their favourite bands. What their mother’s like. What they like to eat. What they’re scared of. And then there is that bizarre feeling you get if you‘re really lucky, when you begin to realise that somebody you really like might want to know all those things about you. We have all been there. Those early stages are wonderful, where everything about that person fascinates you, and you want to know it all, piece by piece. All that potential.
The early stages of what though? My jealous, miserable and controlling girlfriend made the answer to that problematic.
The mistakes were all lurking out there, waiting to be made.
Back then I used to escape the house early each morning and hide from everything in Costa Coffee. I had a large coffee and a copy of the Mirror in front of me, along with four cigarettes and once I had finished them all I was almost ready to face my colleagues. It was time to myself to spend not thinking about how my life was going wrong, but then she started joining me. The coffee and the cigarettes still got finished, but the newspaper soon became surplus to requirements.
I never socialised with her outside work, I knew that was against the rules. My girlfriend was busy alienating all the women I was already friends with, initially through conventional means such as extreme chilliness. Later on, she developed more imaginative methods like sending them offensive texts from my phone late at night while pissed, pretending to be me.
So over those months, my life turned into a negative of most people’s lives. My days at work were full of colour, life and ideas and I didn’t want them to end. When I reluctantly shut down my computer I would head back to the house to a greyscale existence of rows and bickering. It felt an awful lot like falling asleep. The only things that were vivid at night were the daydreams and the sadness. The former led inevitably to the latter.
The exception was her leaving do. She was leaving Reading to go study a long way away and we had some drinks in a pub next to a gloriously hideous multi-story car park. Despite the build up, all the action happened elsewhere as my friend Ivor ended up dry humping Kirsty against the side of a transit van in a state of total inebriation. By contrast, she and I seemed like the grown-up chaperones, but none the less in a quiet moment she finally made explicit what had been crackling unspoken between us all summer.
“Something for you to think about when I’m in the frozen North” she said.
Out that back of the Purple Turtle at two in the morning she made a more tangible offer. By this stage we were both quite drunk. She talked about me moving to Newcastle with her, I had absolutely no idea whether she meant it. She invited me to walk her home. I was pretty sure she meant that, and I knew what it really meant.
There was only one problem: I couldn’t be that person.
I had spent that summer wanting to be that person, daydreaming about being that person. But when it came to it, it was beyond me. So I sat there at the bus stop and watched her walking off into the distance, leaving me with only my shortcomings for company. They made for very lousy company.
My girlfriend found out and was furious. She punished me not for what I did but for what I could have done, and I began a protracted stretch living in the worst of all possible worlds. Meanwhile my correspondence with her limped on for a few months but it wasn’t the same. Now she knew this one thing about me, she seemed far less fascinated by everything else. And one day she contacted me from university and told me that our friendship couldn’t continue. It was too painful, she said. I could hardly blame her, since I felt it was no more than I deserved.
If I had liked myself better back then, things would have been very different. For that matter, my whole life could have been very different. But it took somebody else - on another summer’s day, flowing with gin and chemistry - to start to teach me to do that. And this, whatever it is, is not that story.
Life moved on and some time later I got an email from her. “I was looking through some old mails” she told me “and I thought ‘I can’t delete him’.” So we caught up. She filled me in on her news and I told her mine, that I had left that girlfriend and got married to someone I had known for seven months. I decided not to labour the point about the gin and the chemistry. The fact that I had one day done what I couldn’t do back then was in the background of our conversation like static on a phone line, but it was never discussed. I thought it would be okay.
She came down to visit. Kelly liked her and we all got along famously. I had a feeling that something had been mended, that we would be friends now and I was proud of that. Since conversations were no longer forbidden we used to have epic chats on the phone. I usually had to put aside time for them, block out a Saturday afternoon. And then when Kelly and I bought our first place I invited her to the housewarming party. Everyone liked her. My friends liked her. The two guys she picked up in the After Dark and brought back to my living room at 2 in the morning liked her. Even the floor held her in a warm embrace as she drunkenly toppled from her chair, after we had invited her new friends to leave.
And then I ended up sat in my doorstep with her at four in the morning feebly attempting to comfort her as she cried onto my shoulder.
“I always thought it would be me in the end after you split up with Cheryl. I always thought you were my boy.”
What could I tell her? I had always thought that too, but we had both been dead wrong.
The sun was coming up, and she didn’t want me to walk her home. So as before I watched her totter off into the distance but, this time, I went back upstairs to my life.
A curious detail of this saga is that many of the protagonists got back together with their exes. My jealous girlfriend got back together with her ex and now they live in Wolverhampton with a child and presumably a large collection of personality disorders. The man Kelly left for me got back together with his ex. He was decent about it all and I hope he’s happy. And she got back together with her ex too, the ex she was getting over when I first met her many years ago. I think they want children, something I would never have countenanced. I suppose these things have a habit of working themselves out.
The last time I saw her was a few years back on a chilly December night between Christmas and New Year’s Eve when people who wouldn’t normally set foot in Reading, like her, come back to spend time with their family. We went to the Purple Turtle and sat again in that back garden doing what we always did best, talking for hours about everything and nothing. Mended at last, perhaps.
In that setting, with those drinks, I thought it was inescapable that we would get round to discussing the only other time we were in the Purple Turtle together, many years ago. And, at about two in the morning, leaning against a fence and watching the revellers stagger past - younger than us, all their mistakes waiting to be made - we did precisely that.
“I just would have slept with you, you know that?” she said “It wouldn’t have been a relationship.”
I smiled inwardly.
“I know.”
He has been one of my top favorites since I began reading his blog months ago. Humorous and reflective, with a talent for the descriptive that I would sell virtually anything to possess, Mr. London Street’s entries are never dull. He doesn’t shrink away from the controversial and I admire his opinionated nature. I hesitate to make his head any larger than it already is, but I suppose there’s no help for it. I’m honored, even without his having mentioned it (and he did), to be the first recipient of a guest post from him. Actually, it was more like an air-fist pumping HA! So without further ado....
Two nights in the Purple Turtle
Many years ago I met my friend Kirsty for lunch on an anonymous summer day. On the face of it, this was no different from the dozens of other days we had met for lunch, with one exception - this time Kirsty brought her along. We clicked instantly. We spent the whole lunchtime talking as if we’d known each other far longer than we had – far longer, in fact, than I had known Kirsty.
At the end, I went back to my desk to uselessly move work around from one part of an org chart to another in the name of productivity and efficiency. And that afternoon, my email pinged with a message from Kirsty. “She thinks you’re dishy!” it excitedly said. I didn’t think anybody under the age of 50 ever used the word dishy.
Over time, I came to realise that this was exactly the sort of thing she would say.
The emails between us began. Several emails a day – long, chatty emails about everything and nothing. When you first meet someone it’s all there, off in the distance, waiting to be discovered. All those tiny facts that you absolutely have to know when you really like someone – where they went to school, their childhood embarrassments, their favourite bands. What their mother’s like. What they like to eat. What they’re scared of. And then there is that bizarre feeling you get if you‘re really lucky, when you begin to realise that somebody you really like might want to know all those things about you. We have all been there. Those early stages are wonderful, where everything about that person fascinates you, and you want to know it all, piece by piece. All that potential.
The early stages of what though? My jealous, miserable and controlling girlfriend made the answer to that problematic.
The mistakes were all lurking out there, waiting to be made.
Back then I used to escape the house early each morning and hide from everything in Costa Coffee. I had a large coffee and a copy of the Mirror in front of me, along with four cigarettes and once I had finished them all I was almost ready to face my colleagues. It was time to myself to spend not thinking about how my life was going wrong, but then she started joining me. The coffee and the cigarettes still got finished, but the newspaper soon became surplus to requirements.
I never socialised with her outside work, I knew that was against the rules. My girlfriend was busy alienating all the women I was already friends with, initially through conventional means such as extreme chilliness. Later on, she developed more imaginative methods like sending them offensive texts from my phone late at night while pissed, pretending to be me.
So over those months, my life turned into a negative of most people’s lives. My days at work were full of colour, life and ideas and I didn’t want them to end. When I reluctantly shut down my computer I would head back to the house to a greyscale existence of rows and bickering. It felt an awful lot like falling asleep. The only things that were vivid at night were the daydreams and the sadness. The former led inevitably to the latter.
The exception was her leaving do. She was leaving Reading to go study a long way away and we had some drinks in a pub next to a gloriously hideous multi-story car park. Despite the build up, all the action happened elsewhere as my friend Ivor ended up dry humping Kirsty against the side of a transit van in a state of total inebriation. By contrast, she and I seemed like the grown-up chaperones, but none the less in a quiet moment she finally made explicit what had been crackling unspoken between us all summer.
“Something for you to think about when I’m in the frozen North” she said.
Out that back of the Purple Turtle at two in the morning she made a more tangible offer. By this stage we were both quite drunk. She talked about me moving to Newcastle with her, I had absolutely no idea whether she meant it. She invited me to walk her home. I was pretty sure she meant that, and I knew what it really meant.
There was only one problem: I couldn’t be that person.
I had spent that summer wanting to be that person, daydreaming about being that person. But when it came to it, it was beyond me. So I sat there at the bus stop and watched her walking off into the distance, leaving me with only my shortcomings for company. They made for very lousy company.
My girlfriend found out and was furious. She punished me not for what I did but for what I could have done, and I began a protracted stretch living in the worst of all possible worlds. Meanwhile my correspondence with her limped on for a few months but it wasn’t the same. Now she knew this one thing about me, she seemed far less fascinated by everything else. And one day she contacted me from university and told me that our friendship couldn’t continue. It was too painful, she said. I could hardly blame her, since I felt it was no more than I deserved.
If I had liked myself better back then, things would have been very different. For that matter, my whole life could have been very different. But it took somebody else - on another summer’s day, flowing with gin and chemistry - to start to teach me to do that. And this, whatever it is, is not that story.
Life moved on and some time later I got an email from her. “I was looking through some old mails” she told me “and I thought ‘I can’t delete him’.” So we caught up. She filled me in on her news and I told her mine, that I had left that girlfriend and got married to someone I had known for seven months. I decided not to labour the point about the gin and the chemistry. The fact that I had one day done what I couldn’t do back then was in the background of our conversation like static on a phone line, but it was never discussed. I thought it would be okay.
She came down to visit. Kelly liked her and we all got along famously. I had a feeling that something had been mended, that we would be friends now and I was proud of that. Since conversations were no longer forbidden we used to have epic chats on the phone. I usually had to put aside time for them, block out a Saturday afternoon. And then when Kelly and I bought our first place I invited her to the housewarming party. Everyone liked her. My friends liked her. The two guys she picked up in the After Dark and brought back to my living room at 2 in the morning liked her. Even the floor held her in a warm embrace as she drunkenly toppled from her chair, after we had invited her new friends to leave.
And then I ended up sat in my doorstep with her at four in the morning feebly attempting to comfort her as she cried onto my shoulder.
“I always thought it would be me in the end after you split up with Cheryl. I always thought you were my boy.”
What could I tell her? I had always thought that too, but we had both been dead wrong.
The sun was coming up, and she didn’t want me to walk her home. So as before I watched her totter off into the distance but, this time, I went back upstairs to my life.
A curious detail of this saga is that many of the protagonists got back together with their exes. My jealous girlfriend got back together with her ex and now they live in Wolverhampton with a child and presumably a large collection of personality disorders. The man Kelly left for me got back together with his ex. He was decent about it all and I hope he’s happy. And she got back together with her ex too, the ex she was getting over when I first met her many years ago. I think they want children, something I would never have countenanced. I suppose these things have a habit of working themselves out.
The last time I saw her was a few years back on a chilly December night between Christmas and New Year’s Eve when people who wouldn’t normally set foot in Reading, like her, come back to spend time with their family. We went to the Purple Turtle and sat again in that back garden doing what we always did best, talking for hours about everything and nothing. Mended at last, perhaps.
In that setting, with those drinks, I thought it was inescapable that we would get round to discussing the only other time we were in the Purple Turtle together, many years ago. And, at about two in the morning, leaning against a fence and watching the revellers stagger past - younger than us, all their mistakes waiting to be made - we did precisely that.
“I just would have slept with you, you know that?” she said “It wouldn’t have been a relationship.”
I smiled inwardly.
“I know.”
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
