Wednesday, June 11th, 2003 - Withdrawal Y'all are the best ether friends EVER! I whine pathetically and beg you all to post, and you do! And you make me feel better, some of you even making me laugh out loud, causing co-workers to look at me suspiciously and say, "What? What?" It doesn't bring Tim back from Taos, but it does take a little of the sting out of the lonely, and I really appreciate it. So, I don't know if this is cheating or rewarding you guys for posting so much in my forum, but I'm going to use your posts as fodder for this journal entry. I hope this works out ok and I don't embarrass anyone. First off, Jon and Chris are having a mock "cat-fight". I like cats. I used to be a cat person. I don't know if I can still call myself one, since i haven't been able to have a cat for six years now (stupid landlady and her precious cheap plastic carpets). Cats still come up to me on the street to say hello, and I still greet them with a friendly "mrriaow", but I'm losing my accent, as I don't have a cat living with me to keep it up. I think my life would be even better with a cat in it. When we move, I'm determined to get a place that allows cats, preferably two kittens, which I will obtain from an abandoned litter at the local humane society. I like toms better than queens, so I'm hoping for brothers. I feel slightly guilty about the whole kitten thing, as I know there's lots of wonderful older cats who need homes too, but I haven't had a kitten in something like 10 years and I think I deserve a little playfulness after not having a cat for so long. Nick is suspicious of my updating daily this week, since I'm notoriously sporadic about it these past couple of years. Well, Tim asked me to. Ok, suggested it. And I might have let laziness take over, especially since I'm not all that interesting, but then I found out he's writing me a looooong letter while he's at Rio Hondo (it's already over 10 pages) so, you know, my guilt is your tool for procrastination at work! (I must admit, though, that I'm pleased Nick noticed, since every time I see him in rl, he manages to tease me about it -- "Oh, you have a journal?"). Dan hits upon something I was thinking about last night. The metaphor I came up with was addiction, though he puts is more elegantly than I'm going to. Basically, I am addicted to Tim. I'm used to relying on him in my life -- when I'm stressed after work (and yesterday was especially awful), he'll sing me goofy songs until I start singing along (or crank at him; either way, I get a release, though we both prefer the sing-along); when I'm feeling ugly and fat, he'll tell me how beautiful I am (and usually I don't even feel that way because every last thing he does shows me how lovely he thinks I am; it's a wonderful feature of my pook). These past few days? No Tim. So, I'm stressed and feeling very very fat and ugly and insecure and just plain awful. My coping mechanism is gone, having a great time on vacation in Taos without me. It's a terribly lonely feeling, and it's a lot like withdrawal. I've got the shakes right now, and I'm not really looking forward to the vomiting. Anyway. Some mean ol' editor (is that you, Jasper?) has taken Mr. van Eekhout to task for being strange. I like strange. Mean ol' editor! Dayle, Vera and Kristin give some moral support about the honeysuckle. Seems I'm not the only one horrified by plant murder. I still feel a bit responsible about the honeysuckle's demise -- if I'd been on the ball and trimmed the dead undergrowth, mean ol' landlady wouldn't have had an excuse to hurt it in the first place. Not that it would have stopped her. Dayle also offers to hook me up with some Oregon people and passes along nice things from Jay Lake, which makes me very happy :-) I like daydreaming about all things Oregon. Jenn, Gwenda and Vera all have this thing for Pride and Prejudice and/ or Colin Frith. Thing about a 6 hour movie is that, much to my bewildered dismay, I seem to have *less* time than I usually do when Tim's around. Maybe this is due to the fact that I'm in a fog from not sleeping enough because I'm missing Tim. It all goes back to this withdrawal thing. I'm not able to do hardly anything, because I'm in withdrawal. I need my fix. How will I wait until Sunday for my fix?? More than one of you has assured me the fix after abstaining for so long is worth it. I can't wait. Jenn has offered to IM with me. Yay! I hope I take her up on this, as Jenn is fun to hang out with. Gwenda lives in a wonderful world where infants can cook gourmet meals and imaginary cabana boys are at her beck and call. I want to live in her world. My imaginary cabana boy is named Hitachi, and he's sleeping in my bed this week instead of under it. Hitachi is very very happy right now. Ahem. Rachel relates to the being apart thing (many of you do, and it does really help to hear I'm not the only one who feels so alone!). She talks about poor phone connections to Russia. The phone in Tim's suite is so awful that I can barely hear him, and she's right, it is almost worse than no contact at all. I'm also depressed because every time I talk to him, he's surrounded by other people, so he won't get all sweet and mushy the way he does when we're alone. He'll say he loves me, and make a few kissy sounds, but there's a lot missing from what we usually say to each other, and not being able to talk to him in private is a horrible, alienating experience. He feels so, so far away . . . and he's starting to feel so different. Of course, we're in differerent places right now, both physically and emotionally. He's all chipper and having fun and I'm miserable and stressed. I want to talk to him for hours, and he wants off the phone after 20 minutes so he can go have fun with all his new friends. I want to shout, "NO! NO! Stay and talk to meeeee, i miiiiiiss you!" but of course, I don't. But I'm jealous as all hell, both of him having a great time and of all those writers who get to spend all this time with him. They don't appreciate him like I do, dammit. And, finally, Mr. van Eekhout. I hope he doesn't mind me cutting-n-pasting his post in my entry (if you do, Greg, email me and I'll take it down toots-sweet :-). This made me laugh so hard, and I think it's a wonderful way to end this somewhat-mopey journal entry: When Lisa goes out of town I eat pbj's. Then I smear been dip on my chest. Then I shave my eyebrows. After a few days, I make a big ball of tape and draw a face on it and call it Lisa. Then, me and Tape Lisa start going out. People talk, but we don't care. I love Tape Lisa. I love Real Lisa. I wish they could learn to love each other. Thanks for all the posts, guys! No, I'm not telling you whether I have a Tape Tim by now or not.

Exercise Log: Tonight, probably. Writing log: Meh! Current Publications: "Famishing" in Strange Horizons. My first pro sale! "Wetting the Bed" and a collab with Tim Pratt, "A Serious Case of Fairies" in Floodwater Currently Reading: Everyone in Silico by Jim Munroe Donate money to my teeth, our moving fund, our wedding fund, or our writerly projects (Floodwater and Flytrap!). Every little bit helps!

Previous | Next List of Entries for this Month | Journal Index | Cafe Rambleflower The Nid