Stories

The other night, my cousin Meems and I went to a party to see a friend of me-and-Rbf's (remember, it's an entity), play with his band. Afterward, we were talking to him about Rbf, and he pretty much made my week.

First: He demonstrated some classic ReBF dance mooovz. OMFG. I have no idea how Jason could channel Rbf so well, but I stood laughing and in shock. *Thanks to Melynda V for the actual pics of him dancing!

Second: He told Sleepytime-Rbf stories. These are the best because for Rbf, all time was sleepytime. He once fell asleep at a Metallica concert. In six cumulative years of dating, we never once made it through a movie without him snoring. And we can't forget that time he asked if I'd marry him, then when I said yes, he promptly fell asleep, satisfied.

Hearing a truck driver talk about trying to move an awkwardly-slumped, 190-lb sleeping Rbf, is hilarious. "I was trying to move him because he fell asleep with his chin shoved into his chest. But I couldn't because he kept TICKLING me. He reached out and grabbing all over my stomach. And he was calling me Kirsten. Then he would just fall back asleep."

I pictured them in the back of the sleeper, two motocross truck drivers just trying not to look gay. I'm guessing the saying "Kirsten" part made Jason feel much better when being inappropriately fondled.

I miss sleepytime-Rbf. Aside from the rare sightings of needy-Rbf, nothing was ever much cuter.

On the way home, Meems said that ReBF should be here for this stuff. I love how she's not afraid to say that. She's one of the few people who are excited to hear stories, not afraid to remember. I've lost some of the most important things in my life. What I have left is memories. The stories keep me going. Please, never hesitate to share your own. And if there are two hundred, I'd love to hear them all.

He came, he worked, he played and he loved. Then he left. And we are left with his stories. Please, never stop sharing them.

9999 and the sound of silence

Every time I listen to my voicemail, I delete my way through the nonsense until I get to "saved messages." I listen to the first few words of each and re-save them just to know they're safe for another week or so.

"Hey girlfriend...I was just thinking about..." [BEEP] (Pressed "9" to save some steamy vm Rbf left on a long haul drive when I was sleeping).

"Kir, call me back right away...please..." [BEEP] (saved: Rbf needing me to be a Creamie girl at a golf tournament)

"Hi Kir, it's Jos." [BEEP] (Rbf's sister and 2 year old nephew singing happy birthday is mine for one more week)

"Happy birthday to...." [BEEP] (Jordan's sweet wife and kids singing happy birthday to me, plus cha-cha-cha at the end).

I hang up my phone, and the screen reads the last four numbers I pushed, all nines for "SaveSaveSaveSave." It's becoming a common sight.

I remember coming home and uneasily telling Rbf, "The only thing in my life that isn't perfect is me."

I was a little unorganized and didn't exercise, so I realized I was the only thing in my life I wanted to improve. I had the perfect job. The perfect man. I had the coolest living arrangement a girl could ask for. I had enough money. I was good friends with my ex-husband. I had time to do the things I wanted. I fit into my favorite jeans and work wasn't stressful. Life was sweet and fun. I realized this was that thing everyone was always buying self-help books and flat-screen TVs just to feel. It was happiness.

I worried it was too much good, and that it was about to be taken away. My ears were ringing with the unfamiliar quietude in life some people might call "peace."

In the four months since then, I've endured a missing persons search, followed by a triple funeral. I wrote and paid for an obituary. I moved. Again. I wrote 33 blog entries comprising about 45,000 words. I created and delivered personalized benefit summaries to tens of thousands of people. I made hand-pressed personal letterhead. I drove three hours each way just to lay tokens on graves in Idaho. I sent letters and family photos to Civil Air Patrol for finding the plane, to the Malheur County Sheriff's office for getting the bodies back to us, and to the Funeral Director who was so gentle with me. I survived Halloween. I made framed gifts for Jed's best friends here. I turned 28. I overnighted some of Rbf's personal affects to his out-of-state friends, so they could have a piece of him. I bought a headstone. Survived Thanksgiving. Spent 150 hours and 6,000 miles and $1,000 in gas just commuting. Experienced my first "fail" in safety & emissions. Had to get new wiper blades. Had to get new windshield. Had to get a tire repaired. Jobs that used to be his. I submitted an offer on a townhome. Had my first "Our good people are getting laid off and it could be any one of you" meeting in corporate America (officially a grown up). Pulled the offer on the townhome. Went to West Yellowstone with the Dumkes. Went to Midway with the blog girls. Went to Jackson Hole with the quilt girls. I joined a widow's forum. I made 100 scotcheroos. Got an engraved memorial plate frame for my car. Hit The Anger Stage and dropped my very first online f-bomb in five years of blogging. And in about seven hours, I will have officially survived Christmas - the anniversary of our first kiss of The ReAwesome Era, and the biggest and loudest reminder that I'm alone.

Somehow throughout all this, I kept my car insurance current.

But I am now exhausted. And now, I have to let it all quiet down again, back to the silence that yielded peace four months ago.

I'm so scared of what silence will sound like now.

My guess is that it will be something bittersweet. Like the brief moment of silence my mom and two sisters had last night over the Christmas Eve clam chowder tradition our family has enjoyed for probably 20 years. Rbf and I showed up for last year's, and he had a bowl before he left for his parents' house. He raved about it for my mom. She makes it from scratch, after all. When he returned to the house the day after Christmas, mom insisted on taking our picture before we drove home. It was our first picture together in Round 2 (a nicer word for "post divorce"). I posted it on here a year ago, so giddy and excited to have him back. I didn't really expect it to mean so much later.

Last night, one of my sisters commented, "Last year's was better." They all fell silent over the table, and had a stretch of that blaring, unignorable quietude in his memory. Oh, the courage that takes.

The quiet snow tells us to hush. It stretches in a big, wide blanket from my home to his and lies over my sweet boyfriend now as he sleeps in heavenly peace.

Merry Christmas to all - and I'm so glad it's over.

A rant of sorts

So, on the widow forum I'm on, everyone's always posting their DGI's of the day ("Doesn't Get It") and stories of "widdabrain" (which is the result of the emergency brain chemical cortisol released in excess - shrinking your hippocampus and making it hard to lay down new memories and access existing ones...thanks DJ Maj!).

We all get them - always from a well-meaning friend. My DGI experiences were belated - or I was too bombed on widdabrain to notice for the first few months. One widow on the board was told "at least he didn't suffer" when she explained that her husband died of cancer after fighting for 6 months. Others just hate holiday cards handwritten with "I hope you have the best Christmas ever!" Shelley, Jordan's wife, was asked by a female friend if she wanted to go to a singles dance together, two months after he and Rbf died.

My DGI issue was brought to life when some douche in Jackson (a complete stranger who had asked my situation) felt the need to Dr. Phil me and explain life to me. It seemed like he was saying that this was supposed to happen so I could find the RIGHT guy. I wanted to say "Die, bitch. I hate your face." Instead, I walked away in the middle of his asinine sentence.

This same dumbass ran into me the next day at the fundraiser. I gave him my best stupid-cow blank stare and pictured Rbf beating him down in a dark alley, and didn't stop walking. It was in the middle of another sentence of his. This "sentence" was about how he'd love to trespass over the border to violate the fair state of Utah just to come take me dancing...

"I just won't take a plane!" he laughed.

Which is a cryin' shame, because I hear that they sometimes fall out of the sky and I don't see your face anymore. Isn't that how it goes? Can I request this?

First mistake: trying to be The Sensitive Guy to earn my trust, then sit down next to me, uninvited, and wax sensitive in a terribly-disguised attempt at getting my guard down. He thought he was being so cute. Like after that whole conversation ending in him getting blown off, that somehow my dead boyfriend was our little inside joke. Why didn't he just go up onstage and get the auctioneer to go "Vrrroooommmmmm BRRSSCHHHT!" and make a plane motion with his hand, and make it crash in the ground and then twinkle his fingers like jazz hands to imitate the miles of scattering. It would have been just as funny, asswad.

I asked God once more why he took three perfect men and left us with these pieces of shit in their stead. Way to give me a vivid reminder of what the difference is between sainted-dead-Rbf and the male scum that just won't go away. I don't care if he just got nervous with girls and suffered from severe social palsy. He's proof that evolution was just a theory, and that life just isn't fair.

At any rate, it's safe to say I had finally been initiated into DGI awareness mode.

Suddenly, I was acutely suspicious of men's motives. I've always presumed guys' comments to be platonic unless stated otherwise, but suddenly, comments I'd never notice before now seemed like come-ons. The charismatic tone of a salesman's voice might not be him trying to make a sale, it MIGHT be him flirting. And because of my cortisol brainbath, I don't know the difference. Jiffy Lube guys giving me the promo discount without a coupon? I say thank you and hope my reaction is not being a.) overly grateful, or b.) completely ungrateful. It's innocent, because they don't know my story. I'm just a girl trying to pass safety & emissions. Unsuccessfully.

But if I meet someone who learns my story and still seems to have his sights set on anything other than polite friendship, I will be incensed. It seems like I've had run-ins with this and I can't believe how mad it makes me.

Because it has been four short (albeit excruciating) months since Reboyfriend's funeral. What kind of dick is already thinking about who's next in line for what's left of his regirlfriancee...even if they throw in the requisite social disclaimer that it "probably won't be for awhile....but when that time comes..."? It's not like I'm a trust fund he's left behind, where it actually makes sense to start thinking about who gets it now. I remember when he died, decisions would need to be made pretty quickly about *who got his stuff. It started instantly. But it was normal, because it wasn't about the things. It was about having one last piece of this person everyone loved.

This is different. I am not Jed's gun, or his dirtbike, or his snowboard or his fucking truck. I am his partner, and he did not designate a beneficiary. If I ever wake up one day and decide differently, I'll make it clear.

In reality, I don't really believe this is going to be all that much of a problem. Crying publicly and forcing myself not to park my cart and slump down on the floor in the Walmart aisle in my loafers and rolled-up too-long jeans, isn't the purring mating call it sounds like. It feels wrong and bitchy to be preemptively mad and insulted at something that should flatter me.

But here's the thing: Any budding of a "relationship" I could possibly have with someone else would only be good for them (if that, if we're being honest). Any "date" or "hangout" I got myself into would be a reminder that I am not with the person I want. It would only serve to exacerbate my loneliness. If dating me would not be for my benefit, then pray tell: whose would it be for? It's an arrangement that would work well for him and would not me. Please explain to me how that's "sweet?"

An open statement to future men everywhere, especially Jackson Hole: I am somebody's girlfriend. Please respect that. And because I love him, my expectation is that you please respect his memory as well.

/bitchfest off/

I have pictures of our Jackson Hole trip that show what an amazing experience it really was this year...this wank can't undermine Fireball 2009!!! Stay tuned.

*Ironically, we had this discussion Wednesday night, less than two days before he was killed. We each assigned the entirety of our stuff to the other. Obviously, I did not fly off my bed and type it up before demanding his signature. I just never thought it would be necessary to actually have to tell anyone that before the wedding. And really, would they believe me or think it was appropriate? I knew it was his wish to leave everything to me, but it didn't work out that way. And it's just stuff. I got what I wanted, and let the rest go.

She's a GRUMPY regirlfriend!

(You have to read that in the tone of "He's an ANGRY elf!").

I got an email from Urbana on 11th today. It's one of those "We are unique! Just like everyone else!" shots in the dark. I was thisclose to writing back with something sweet like:

"Congratulations. You are one of the 7,000 properties in the valley competing for the 400 households that can make enough money to afford them. Good luck, because 300 of them already own homes."

But I didn't. Although, it reminds me of going to college and dating in Utah. It was the dating scene that should have been called "A whole lotta '5's, waiting around for '10's."

Even though I work for a wonderfully stable, large company, nobody is safe in this economy. Everyone is nervous. And I look around and think "The stupid housing market did this to us." I'm bitter.

Then I have a memory of Rbf that makes me want to cry. For a sec my heart melts, then I just get more bitter. I can't hold on to that fleeting meltage moment. Trust me, I try. I realize that my pain is fermenting into anger...finally. 

I remember that, at least twice a day, he would pick an innoportune time to smack me in the butt, and I would simultaneously make a suggestive little Betty Boop-ish playboy bunny sound. If you knew me well in person, you'd know that this is done in jest. Very much in jest. I'm not very Betty Boop. Maybe that's why he thought it was so funny. He was always trying to catch me off guard, especially in public. Or like, pumping up the bike. Walking into the model home. Showing me how to operate the riding mower. In Walmart. At his cousin's wedding. Anywhere I'd expect it least, or where I'd be too socially aware (etiquette-wise) to make my risque little noise. If I didn't do the sound, he won. If I hesitated, he got points. So I brought my A-game to the ass-tapping. I'd do the whimper when and where I got the smack-dat. The more I called his bluff, the funnier it became to him. The less I hesitated--the better. His usual victory cry: "I love making you squirm!"

And I mean it about the hilarity thing. When I defied social norms with my pornstar sound, Rbf laughed like a 5 year old rewinding on a funny part in a movie ten times and laughing just as hard each time. He seriously thought it was the funniest damned thing I did. And he never got sick of it. I never got it. I just didn't get it. But I had a 100% success rate. Go figure.

The time that has passed since our fun times together, is getting longer and longer. And I am finding less and less strength to be cheerful. I miss him so profoundly much, that I have no more ways to describe it. It is just raw, and it is unbridled and merciless. I wake up in the morning and think "I can't do this again." I can not do this every day.

But I do. A massive part of me died with him that day, but I get up and do it all over again every day. I do. I hate it, and it's not rewarding. But I do. It's what I feel him telling me to do every time I consider anything else. Dammit, Jed, you dirty trucker. Boy, do I love you.

A few of Reboyfriend's favorite things:

Healthy food like blueberries, brown rice and raw honey

Peterbilts

Kenworths, but only if there isn't a Peterbilt instead

Hard, hard work

Flying

45 minute showers (not with me)

(Well, probably with me, but that wasn't my point. He just took everything so seriously when washing up)

Brazil, Brazilians, Portugese, all things Brazil

Conspiracy theories, like 9.11 and maybe us not walking on the moon (I was kind of rude about this...how sweet was he to shrug and let it go? I will never meet another person like this again, I do realize that)

Stuff from the 90's

Blue Moon

Being late for everything

Me speaking French (it would make him laugh like the butt smacking thing, and he'd say "say it again")

My Hudson jeans

Snowboarding until you break something on you

Wakeboarding until you break something on you

Me doing his Excel spreadsheets

When the bed was made

Me driving the semis

Me bringing us toast and coffee to bed every single morning

Me

Indy, oh how he loved Indy...and Indy loved him

His grandpa Floyd, and the hope that I might agree to name our child after him

Dirtbikes and riding

Anything I ever wrote him

Jake's kids

Freedom

I just realized I could keep writing that list until it bumped all the other posts into archives. Reboyfriend loved so many things. He loved life. He loved health and vitality. He loved learning new words with me. I loved that little pause he always gave before he tried out a new 5 dollar word on me for the first time. He tried to be sly, but it happened so often I could tell instantly when he was about to work one out. He would look at me intently, waiting for me to tell him if it was used right. He loved it. He loved me, and it was glorious.

I think of this hideous pain, and I understand that, by its nature, it will have to be as powerful as the bond we shared. My future is gone and my present is crippled, but it was worth it. He died so incredibly happy, I am certain of this. I would not trade my unlimited pain for his last nine months of happiness.

The last month of his life, something changed about his intensity. Even under some of the heaviest work, family & economic stresses of his life, he was finally happy again. He explained to me that everything in his personal life had finally become exactly what he wanted, and how blessed he felt. Imagine what that means to me.

Because somewhere, at some point, Someone pulled me aside and said I would have a chance to be the reason someone died with a full heart, in love, at the top, and at peace. I would have power to be the difference, but it would come at a dear price, a monumental, immeasurable price. At the price of my heart breaking, my body weakening, my future disappearing and a piece of me dying inside. And I must have been asked, would you do this for someone you loved? And this pain, this story, I guess it tells us what my answer was. And if asked again, I would say it without hesitation, like the little noise I made when he spanked me in the bookstore. Without thinking, without batting an eye.

I love that truck driving, ass-smacking, astronaut-doubting, baby hungry Reboyfriend of mine. I just love him.

Sorry for all the sap...sometimes it takes over, but I'm still my grumpy self. Don't worry. The end.

Get in the car, loser, we're going slopping.

The last week was hell. There was a traffic jam of epic proportions DAILY. I was supersick through Monday with some sinus malady that made my previous colds seem like a woodstock orgy. And by sinus malady, we all know that means ear/nose/throat equilibrium clusterf**k that ends (as all good things do) in some inner-ear freak show. My ear is still ringing. When I blow my nose, it sounds like those phone calls with people who have toted their cell phones into horizontal 70-mph wind. Like there is a boat in my head, and its canvas sail is flapping about.

And Anaga, did you do a word count on that last graf? I believe it was like 750 words of me talking about an ear infection in the spazziest way I could think of.

Oh, back to the traffic thing!!! You were almost off the hook. Tuesday morning I grew some stones and decided to go to work and infect my office. Karma took note of this and made certain it took almost 2.5 hours to get there. Karma then told some pilot to crash his small personal airplane on my offramp, right before I was getting ready to leave, so that I might have the opportunity to be cornered in a traffic jam, with a plane crash to behold for 20 minutes while the NTSB pranced around measuring shit. They're thinking the same thing as me: This is a crash landing. Actual plane crashes look very, very different than this. If you don't believe me, I have some pictures for you. But whatever. The universe was such a dick this week. *Fortunately, my coworkers are NOT dicks, and gave me warning that some plane just COULDN'T get its crashing overwith before it got to my exit, and certainly couldn't pick one of the open fields everywhere out there...so it was perfectly aimed at the Highland/Alpine SB offramp. I was able to kill time in the valley while they removed the little plane, so *I didn't have to see it.

By Friday night, I wanted to scream. Driving daily to and from Utah county has called into serious question the intelligence of our friends in the southerly county. I've had six different commutes since I've worked at my office. Not one of these routes is as prone to constant car accidents and rubbernecking as this route - NB I-15 mornings, SB I-15 afternoons. It's like, a sociological marvel. I don't want to call these people morons...so let's just call them special. If that's condescending, sorry. I'll stop being a prick when these people find a way to repay me the 46 hours of my life they owe me back. It's not just the accidents they like to get in all the time. It's the general, overall waiting behind their asses in traffic while they crawl past point of the mountain, pointing out shapes in the clouds, and/or otherwise pretending that they are in a parade and their car is a float. For no effing reason. (Other than 3 days earlier it was snowy).

When I started blogging five years ago, my blog was up and running solely for my bitching and moaning pleasure. It evolved into general merriment of mocking obnoxious liberals, then became about how seriously so blessed I was, then mocked obnoxious conservatives, then got really empty all of a sudden. Next thing I knew, I was getting divorced. And it became about that. And then....well, you've read it. It is a sad blog now. I have a sad life, one that I sometimes wish I could have someone else come live for me for just a couple days while I got my spirit back to health.

And now, we see that it has come full circle. It is, true to its roots, now a forum for my bitching and negativity. So something is finally right in the world.

**Not to make light of this poor guy's situation. He crashed his Beech and only barely survived. I was vicariously relieved for his family. I hope they know how blessed they are.

Because I did promise you, after all.

Ok - I'm a little short on obnoxious baby animal pictures to contradict my last post (soorrry), but could I interest you in a picture of me and *COBRA Commander holding our New Moon tickets?

For the past two seasons, we've taken a trip to Jackson, WY with the quilting platoon and various friends. We use up Kelly's timeshares and go to the annual FireBall (post later), and it always seems like some Twilight movie is getting released while we're there.

Jackson Hole, in the off-season, is a magical place, because the tourists go away and you can see who the locals are.

The interesting thing about their locals, is the lack of Twilight-obsessed women that live there. Their movie theater at 4:15 p.m. the opening day of New Moon, had no line. We bought ghetto red raffle tickets from a guy with a calculator, and walked right in. We laughed like last year, at the cheesy dialogue, but were duly humbled when that Lautner kid took his shirt off, and we were more respectful then.

So, instead of kitten pictures, here's one better:

COBRA Commander and her trusty sidekick Destro (should be my nightlife alterego). Notice the tickets were already ripped in half for us when we got them. I really think they were running low on tickets and ripped them in half, like those days you see the sacrament pieces in the size of peas. Usually when there are an extra hundred people at church for a baby blessing everyone forgot about.

By the time we got out of the theater, their teenage population had showed up. So there's us being trampled by people who were, unfortunately, not dressed up in the theme of casts and prom dresses.

So that's Heather, Liz, Kylie, Me, and The Commander in front. I never was "team" anything when it came to that Twilight crap...I figured I would be considered team Edward because my Twilighter friends called Rbf my Jedward because of our embarrassingly hot-n-heavy, zero-to-sixty relationship...that or because I used to wake up to Rbf gazing at me while I slept. Just kidding. Edward would get embarrassed and shifty and ran away. Rbf would just get excited that I was finally awake. So they're really not the same.

But after seeing that movie, I suppose I'd have to pick Team Jacob because of his pec muscles. That's all.

The real post about Jackson is still coming. Sorry to keep you waiting. I'm sure you're on pins and frickin needles. Love you guys.

*COBRA Commander is her nickname at work...and since I'm her COBRA sidekick, they call me Destro. I believe the creators of G.I. Joe were going for some form of the word "destroy" when they came up with the sidekick's name. I say it's fitting. At work, CC dominates the COBRA admin arena, and as I was brought in to manage some of the programming for her projects, I have destroyed many things for her. I've been of immense value to the team.

Paul, ID Cemetery

I went to visit my reboyfriend, his brother and their dad.

You could say it was bittersweet. My love for him made everything endearing to me. The little stamp in the grass (no headstones yet)...the square mat of sod that they draped back over the dirt...all of it is cute. Everything about him, I adore it. I pitched paper planes on pickets into the ground, with love notes written inside.

Rbf and his brother are side by side, at their dad's feet. His family's burial plots were in pairs - except for his. Rbf lies alone at the end of the line, with nobody beside him. I couldn't get that image from my mind as I drove home alone.

But I made it there.

And I was a little less pouty than the last time I was there.

Sorry, that's not really funny. It was just a funny face. I really didn't look like that the whole time. Really. Catatonic zombies don't pout.

As is my standard, I'll swing over to my next post on an extremist pendulum. Given the depressing-o-meter rating of this one, it looks like you're in for some kittens wearing tutus nestled in ice-cream scoops.

The one about the JFD

I remember a time, last year - a year ago to be exact...when I made history with this little charmer (http://bussio.blogspot.com/2009/01/best-of.html)

and told this little story (http://itotallyforgotyougohere.blogspot.com/2009/01/quote-board-me-unfortunately.html)

Buy yourself something pretty.

[So here's an old post I never posted; it's pretty much about being a failure and a loser, in which it becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy because I was apparently too bored with myself and discouraged from everything, to actually publish the stupid post. It's about me on a Friday night all alone. This is gonna be so hot. Good thing you all got up and checked your RSS feeds for this baby.]

This was nothing special - just a regular autumny Friday night, where I had invitations from nice friends to go out and play in the SLC nightlife with them, like old times, you know, when I was Kirsten. The old Kirsten kicked so much ass but the new me? Only kicks minimal ass. If any ass at all.

Instead of being old me, I be Kirsten 2.0, where I obsessively look at my big long to-do list. You know, the spreadsheet that ruins the enjoyability of anything that is not on it? It is not unlike homework in college. It's not like you could ever be done with it, no matter how much you studied. That it the point - really, it's what you REALLY learn in college: that to-do lists are never complete. It prepares us for careers in project management, like mine. So your brain punishes itself for doing anything else. And my to-do list is how I ended up running errands tonight. But loser errands. Make no mistake about that part.

Errand on Friday night that is to IKEA: -1 points
Errand on Friday night that is to Walmart for photo prints: -1 points
Having Walmart ninja status (i.e. knowing on my own what time the photo counter at Walmart closes so I can work my IKEA time around that): -3 points.

(And according to the intercom announcement, we all needed to make it snappy with our side-swiveling carts as IKEA was closing early for some stupid party. You read it right. Even IKEA had plans tonight.)

IKEA as if it were a person, actually being cooler than me: -4 points
Picture order supposed to take an hour, ME only needing 20 minutes to round up Grape Amp and Scentsy knockoffs, so I return 40 minutes early to annoyed photo counter man: -2 points (just from reading his facial expression)
Chinese food for dinner that I take back to the empty house: -1 points
It's not even real Chinese takeout, it's Panda Express: -2 points
Friends on DVD and stack of magazines: -1 points
Magazines are from 2008: -1 points
Magazines were retrieved from Meems' discard pile when I came to stay here: -3 points
Host family comes home with sleeping baby, and I smoothly attempt to use remote control to turn down volume while they put her in bed, and WAY fail at it: -1 points
Aforementioned fail involved spastic thumb hitting CHANNEL down, not VOLUME down, and therefore switched my Friends DVD to Dr. Phil (and why wouldn't it?), so it looked like THAT is what I was watching on Friday night with my face in lo mein: -17 points

Actually ate the Chinese food: +10 points. Probably would have been better if any of it included vegetables, but food intake is food intake. Judge rules? Positive point count.

Crossed off a couple things on that motherloving list: +100 points.

I am win. To-do lists can eat me! Tomorrow's to-do list at work? I'm looking at you. (Clients rejoice).

You wish you were moi.

So if you know me in person, you may have seen me moping around or bursting into tears about my upcoming birthday. Oh, and when they say the holidays are sad for new widows (oh wait, we weren't married, it doesn't count), they don't really mean Halloween. Except Halloween was sad. Not spending my birthday (and Thanksgiving) with Rbf is taking this intense emotional toll on me. We already know I'll probably need to be institutionalized on Christmas. But you'd think these other holidays wouldn't render so much dread in me.

The worst part is, I can't decide whether I'm turning 28 or 58. On my way home today, I had to physically restrain myself from getting off the freeway to get myself another pound of See's candy, since I polished my last one off in about 2 days. I had the box of chocolates open on my desk at work the entire time. My coworkers watched in horror as the count of bon-bons diminished rapidly. If only my to-do list did the same thing.

I have been listening to nothing but Nat King Cole's Christmas album (aside from my usual dose of Swimmers) alone in the car, or when there are chewing noises in the office. It's a secret, because so many people become enraged at the early onset of Christmas joy. They don't know that it isn't so much joy, as it is comfort. There is comfort in this old guy's voice. Is there not?

I check my PO Box. There is quite a stack in there. Roughly 90% of it is from PETA and its sister organizations. When you receive mail from me, it will feature my new return address labels, complete with turtles and bunnies holding things in their mouths (photoshopped, of course, as They Are Not Ours To Gag). I am that lady that gets all her mail from something with a sad kitten on the front.

We did our Kris Kringle drawing for the office (our inter-departmental Secret Santa extravaganza). They give you a little slip of paper to fill out. I handed mine back in and requested that it not be posted publicly. The "no can do" response I got made me regret putting down interests like "Franklin Covey stuff, Scentsy stuff, Aviation themes, Architectural and Home magazines" and my "least favorites" listed as sports and romantic stuff like the Twilight series. Thank God I refrained from saying I'm not into iTunes. I'd come out to my tires slashed in the parking lot.

I am still thinking I made a mistake in not stopping at See's, because it would be so nice as I read my Tori Spelling book. There's nothing like curling up in some sweats with your nasal spray and celebrity tell-all after a long day in your cubicle.

Then today I got home and decided, for whatever reason, to download screensavers of different puppies because I don't want to get sick of the pictures on my hard drive.

PuPpIeS!!!!!

If it makes anyone pity me less, I did pass on the ones wearing sunglasses.

Bacon fest

And get your cop jokes out of the way now, because this is actually about bacon.

Bacon woven - as if from a loom - into a blanket of oozing pork, enveloping sausage and baked in loglike formations. Then sliced and eaten on flaky biscuits.

Oink.

In order to fully appreciate The Baconator, a close cousin to heavensent manna, you must go to a special place in West Yellowstone where bears and the Dumke family dominate the land. You must partake of this trunk-o-meat only in a cabin with close friends who get up at 5 to start the cooking.

Shit goes down in life and you find out who your real friends are. If they bring baconized sausage, you know.

Zeke and Anaga - aside from offering their jaw dropping guest suite as my unofficial home away from home - hauled my mopey ass up to one of their cabins on Hebgen Lake in West Yellowstone. It was pretty soon after the accident for me, so I'm surprised they took on the challenge. The drive is five-ish hours. Given the fact that, at that time, I have to bring my laptop to work everyday so I could play Friends dvds on my front seat while I drove, so I didn't have a loneliness breakdown...this drive was not about to happen solo. Sadly my first thought was "I can't do this drive. Maybe I'll get Jed to fly me up therrr.......aw dammit." STUpid MEMory LAPSES are such stupid hookers, I effing hate them. MEEEEAN.

So since my mind stuck its foot in its mouth AG-AINNN, God took hasty action to ease the awkward moment in my head, where my mental Department of Problem-Solving had an unfortunate slip in front of the Department of Healing.

My Brain's Department of Problem-Solving: Oh, geez. I'm sorry. I was just trying to help...

My Brain's Department of Healing: Don't worry about it. It happens all the time. With you.

DoPS: Seriously, I mean, is there any way you can take this issue and make something good out of it and utilize it for your healing, like remembering the good times in the plane and Reboyfriend's passion for it?

DoH: Don't sweat it. And no, there's not really a silver lining in that one.

My Brain's Department of Judging Everything: ProblemSolver, get a grip. Healing? Get over it.

God: Shhhh, little voices in Kir's's head. Calm thyselves. She doesn't have to drive alone. I'll just get Jacob to ride up with her.

Meet Jacob!

This is the guy whose office and apartment are both on Wall Street (the real Wall Street), sports $600 jeans and has like seven thousand law degrees from at least three different continents, but talks me into detouring our road trip to stop at Smith & Edwards. At this point I had known him for about an hour.

Never mind that I'm old enough to have babysat, at some point, this child who'd have said "no tomOTToes please" on a sandwich. Three, two, one, and I'm hooked on this kid. We browsed through Wranglers in the denim area, clutching Pez to our chests. Before we hit Idaho, we were planning my life as superwoman at all the grad schools around the globe he thought I'd like.

He was in town today for an elk hunt and we went to Rico's for lunch, when he reminded me that I had this whole post drafted and never uploaded. So here I am.

When I said God suggested I ride up with Jacob, I meant Anaga. She said "you'll love him." She also said I'd love the acai antioxidant at Jamba and their steel cut oats (now addicted, thanks Anaga) as well as Glee. She is constantly hucking delightful things at me left and right and each of them is successful in cheering me up. Her baby brother was no different. We discovered used rocket launcher things and garden gnomes during our detour to the country boy store. And when I thought, "I wonder if they have a big fiberglass case filled with little collecter pins in the image of vintage airplanes," well there they were. Sorted by year. I went to 1949, and looked for the Navion. It was there, and I got their only one for four dollars.

At the cabin, Anaga put me up in the front room looking right over the lake. Cuz she's like that. When I went in to set down my bags, I almost melted. She had turned the heater on to warm it up and it was like heaven. We all hung out on Friday, but almost all of Saturday I stayed in that room and journaled my heart out. And I cried. And I napped. And I woke up and looked out at the lake, and then took another nap. They only knocked on the door to bring me out for dinner. I hope they didn't think I was a douche. If they only knew how peaceful it was, how necessary it was.

It was only a few weeks after I lost Rbf, so it would be an understatement to say that I was raw and depressed. They were OK with that. They let me be sad, which I needed. They made me laugh anyway, which I also needed. They made smores out of Raspberry-filled Ghirardelli chocolate squares and real raspberries. Who DOESN'T need that? And who the hell finds these ideas? The same people who find the Baconator, that's who.

They're smartasses. I need that too. They're the classiest people you ever met, but you show up to their cabin and they're wearing Wolf Pack T-shirts and merrily unearthing old sex novels from the sixties that they found in the family cabin. Sex novels from the sixties are fantastically hilarious. Zeke's a pretty sophisticated guy, a lawyer and such. But at the circus a few weeks after our trip, he decided that we should start measuring the backs of fat ladies' arms in actual cup sizes. Then he pointed out a double-D. This is why I love this family.

I remember the first night at the cabin, being so exhausted by the end of that day. I ate a smore and dozed off to the sound of all their voices. It was the advent of It All Sinking In, the brutal and horrific stage I've been in. But it was a peaceful experience. I really needed it. Thanks, Wolf Pack.

In The Mid-Autumn Breeze

Quote board:

Me: Hi internet.
Internet: Sup, gangsta.
Me: So that goat blog, it was to soften you up.
Internet: Why. Did you move out of that house you shared with three hot truckers? Are you going to write about it or something and bum my ass out?
Me: Yeah.
Internet: Will you at least share your plane-widow-tic-tacs? Sorry, that's their street name. I meant xanax. Just kidding, I'm the internet. I can't pop pills. Did you know I feature a video on YouTube of this gross couple dry-humping on a really crowded beach? And it's like seven minutes long? I am the technology responsible for everyone having A.D.D. You should put my text in the color of poop.
Me: Anyway. Moving day was Saturday. Hardest thing I've ever done. It stabbed my soul. Internet, please do something about my sad, stabbed soul. I don't live at reboyfriend's anymore. It's not our home. I liked it being our house. And I like being grammatically incorrect when describing it. Like as in Kir, where is my rashguard? Oh, it's at me and Reboyfriend's. And There are five pounds of blueberries at me and Reboyfriend's. You know what, it's not grammatically incorrect because "Me And Reboyfriend" was its own entity. The rashguard was at [entity]'s. There was always a blueberry stash at [entity]'s.
Internet: You talk too much. I miss that goat story.
Me: I put the sheets in a special box.
Internet: Of course you did.
Me: And the bridal magazine.
Internet: I'm sorry, Kir. I will furnish about four hundred supportive, pithy, amazing comments from the people who read this blog.
Me: I know. That's why I'm here.

I remember a time Rbf was trying to get me to move in with him but I was dripping with too much awesomeness to do such a thing. I was skidding around life, with my music on shuffle. A Great Lake Swimmers song came up (I Will Never See The Sun). It was the first time I'd ever heard it. And this freak-of-nature daydream painted itself into my mind in about four seconds. It was like a daydream you spend five commutes designing, but I hadn't. It just injected itself into my mind in an instant.

It was me and him walking through this weird, freaky looking church I saw once in Jackson Hole. We had just said our vows and kissed, and then we flatly turned and walked out of the church without much fanfare. My dress was gauzy and frayed in some fantastically edgy, indie fashion. The church had these giant, obscene windows overlooking the Tetons. I can't imagine why that came into my head.

But it was the first time I realized I would probably marry this guy. Once you picture your Melissa Sweet "Fern" dress, and x guy by your side, it's over. Just forget it. The wedding would be in the Fall. Of course it would, because September 17th would be your wedding day, and the Tetons would be breathtaking.

Maybe my subconscious was doing it to me because he had just got my mind on it. I swear he did it on purpose. That nerd. He figured out how he wanted to proposed. He was so proud of the fact that he had a romantic idea that he told me exactly how he was going to do it. In his plane, with the words lit up on the ground in candles.

A friend of his, Ricky, called me a few weeks after the funeral, saying his girlfriend told him not to tell me this (no girl wants to hear those words). But he disagreed, and thought I should know. That the weekend before the crash when Rbf was visiting, they stayed up late planning a trip where Rbf and I would fly the Navion to Texas and meet Ricky and his girlfriend, before driving in to Mexico on a road trip. Ricky said he believed that's when Rbf was planning to pop the official question. It was going to be over Thanksgiving and my birthday. I told Ricky he absolutely did the right thing by telling me.

Because it was a lot more romantic than the preliminary proposal, which took place in the cluttered sleeper of a motocross semi.

Me: You know I am OK if we never get married, right?
Him: Shrug.
Me: Is it important to you to get married?
Him: [Long Pause]. Yeah.
Me: Because I mean, I'm putting you on the title of the house, and you said you're putting the plane in my name, and if we have that bastard child I keep talking about, I think I'm pretty much yours. I'm just saying, there's no m-word pressure, or anything. Just so you know. [I'm breezy!]
Him: I want to be married.
Me: .............OK.
Him: Will you marry me?
Me: haha.
Him: [Quietness and no smile, somber].

I realized then that he was tired of being timid with me about it, done trying to be cool, done hinting. No more jokes about Five Guy burgers being near his house, no more looking subdued when I'd tell him what a joke marriage is. The change I saw in him after his family reunion...the talk about him wanting me to be friends with his mom all of a sudden. Even the look on his face when he saw the ranch in Leavenworth my father said he was leaving me, the runways he was probably designing there, in his mind's eye. It all clicks now. And I remember this moment like it was this morning. He had his hands behind his head and he stared at the ceiling of that messy cab.

Me: [realizing he's not kidding]. Of course, Jed. Of course I'll marry you.

And there we had it, so I took his picture.

And then I kissed him and he fell asleep and snored.

And then three months later, I moved my things out of Me And Reboyfriend's, and it introduced me to a new brand of pain. It was a very pretty Fall day. I guess that's all I can really say about it.

Suppose I said you're my saving grace.

If there's anything I've learned (OMG this sounds like if narrative from Traveling Pants mated with narrative from Carrie Bradshaw) from all of this, it's that I know nothing, and that I believe very little.

I know I've had more great love than most people could come close to even thinking up in their lifetimes. Stephenie Meyer and Jane Austen don't have a clue. I know life's not fair. And I know I'm so tired of feeling like this. If you haven't guessed, this is going to be one of those posts where I am serious and heavy and I write here instead of my journal, and break my promise to you that I was going to start keeping it light (and I am glad you protested, because I was going to explode). If you're looking for something funny, Maddox and Wonkette are linked in my sidebar. Knock yourself out.

I believe...so few things. And the things I believe are bizarre. I didn't believe them before August 10th, so I think I'm entitled (well, no, indebted) to believe them now. Because if I didn't, it would be ungrateful and blind. Not to sound like that Vanity Fair/Vogue/Whatever article where Jessica Simpson talked about spirituality through butterflies, or that unfortunate post-homo-Anne-Heche-speaking-in-tongues-to-aliens spectacle...but I really think dreams are this place you go when your body is at rest - and that you can run into each other there like you can at Smith's (I'm serious, Anne Heche did an interview where she made gibberish sounds on camera speaking in a magical language). I'm not a freak. And in dreams, sometimes we imagine people, and sometimes we run into the real them...and usually don't know the difference. And most often, I doubt we remember it happening once we wake up.

I also believe in sad, weird things I probably WISH were true without having any reason to think they are. Like how sometimes a song, or a conference talk, or a conversation someone else is having...will burst into your attention at the right time, and it feels so oddly and peculiarly like someone shoved it into your mind. I know this. I am certain that it has nothing to do with my ability or efforts to focus or pay attention. It happens on its own, and it's conducted by something external to me.

Here and there, I hear songs on the radio or things I just have to turn on because they're not associated with any memory of have of Rbf, and therefore do not leave me a raw, broken down mess with creaking head bones. I had to do this when I got divorced - and it left me with no good music, so I was reduced to a lot of Taylor Swift and Lady Gag, because everything respectable reminded me of my husband. Now, Taylor Swift reminds me of the days I was falling back in love with Rbf.

These new, comfortingly unfamiliar, random songs usually just create background noise, but once in awhile, lyrics will jump through the haze--the haze of me tolerating consciousness--and pierce my thoughts. Like, rudely interrupt them...and say something to me that, I swear on my blog, I believe is almost coming from Rbf. (And my soul mixes with butterflies and glitter and unicorns and shakra and mystical chi topped with rainbows and tasting like bonkers candy!) I know, I know, I am losing it.

It's not like I think Rbf takes time out of whatever his soul is doing, to go down to Clear Channel and mess with airwaves so that Jay Sean can tell me "there's no need to worry." It's not that. It's just the information that comes my way at the times my mind tunes into it.

I turned my Zune to a random song a while ago, probably thinking about real estate or how to fix the html on this damn blog...and the song suddenly made me grip my steering wheel and freeze.

Would you want me when I'm not myself? Wait it out while I am someone else? And I in time will come around. I always do, for you.

It was just mainstream old John Mayer (hey, HE didn't mind when Jessica Simpson talked about sparkles and God and flying leprechauns, probably because she has big jugs - which I don't, so maybe you have to expect more sophistication from me. If so, sorry Charlie). But I thought, if I died, I'd freak out worrying that my sweetheart wouldn't wait for me. Rbf and I have a history of waiting for one another, and returning for one another, and so on. I'd just worry that this time, he wouldn't wait.

It made me feel bad for him a little bit. I know that's not how it works. But in my sad, warped, A-bomb-leveled mind...it makes a little bit of sense. Does he worry I don't want him anymore because he's in a different form? Does he worry that I will stop loving him because he's not himself right now? He shouldn't. I love him the same, if not more, and I sure as hell trust him without question. You and I can agree, there are no drunk Monster Girls in heaven. (Book title?)

I have had a "didn't expect to run into you here" moment, in a few dreams in my lifetime. I LOVE when it happens. It tells me there's something more than this. And that almost makes up for the drained, horrified, breathless, trampled-heart, sunken-stomach, kicked-in-face feeling I get when I hear the Pride & Prejudice soundtrack, or smell our old backrub lotion (Love Spell...cheesy, I know), or see the preview for that new Amelia Earhart movie. (Seriously? Right now? Hey, show that part again where the plane crashes into the ground, the sight feels so good on my cried-out bloodshot eyeballs, you Hollywood dickwads). And the moment's over.

In my defense, he really was on his best behavior...and I really think I've always been his saving grace. There are so very few things that I believe...but that much I do.

Sorry for all the ellipses. And for the sap. Do we need a Moses story to lighten the mood?

My dog Moses chews and eats everything in sight. Everything. He ate SH's glasses and three seasons of Six Feet Under. If you put bitter polish (from the petstore) on things to deter him, it just makes him like it more. He's such a goat. That's all. Watch some 30 Rock, and thanks for reading my diary.

When Your Lifemapping GPS Tells You

...That It's Getting Worse.

(And other reasons to write a "Favorites" blog).

Not to sound like every college-ward testimony you and I ever bore, (That's a Mormon thing if you are reading this from outside the zion curtain)...but the last couple of weeks have been bad.

Call-my-mom-and-ask-her-to-call-me-in-the-morning-to-make-sure-I-wake-UP bad. You know, because that poor woman isn't already worried enough. Then I got sick, and laid awake all night long trying to barf and not being able to, which sucked because that is like the one talent I learned from getting divorced last year, and now I'm a big fail about it. People were like "is it upset stomach, or like, sore throat?" And I couldn't decide, because my throat really hurt. Turns out it was from my finger (see post from late 2008 where I thrash my throat with my fingernail and describe it to everyone). My stomach hurt. My head hurt. My throat hurt. My heart hurt.

Anyway, I guess it's time where I have to do that thing where I remind myself of my favorite things, because I get too sad when anything and everything I see reminds me of Rbf. Like I heard a Bush song, which always reminds me of the time Rbf and I "broke in" his new car once in college - note: Honda Accords not conducive to relaxing stretches of necking, so just stay home and cuddle on his smelly dudebro couch instead. It's not even like Bush was popular then either. He was like "this reminds me of my Senior year!" and I was like "Yeah! This reminds me of 8th grade! What a perv you'd be for liking me then!"

So my Top Four for this week's emotional breakdown are:

Google Chrome - my gmail is so fast and it also reminds me upon launching the browswer, of the embarrassment of sites I visit regularly. Thanks Chrome! (Bank, blog, gmail. LOSER). It also remembers passwords (careful boys) and then tells you what they are, so if your wife thinks you're sneaking around on her, she'll probably figure out your passwords to things log into. Don't be dumbasses. Cheat the old way, like on Mad Men. OR not at all, or whatever. Psycho-enabling aside, it's just slicker than Firefox or expl***r (my apologies to the Spaniard's sensibilities, but the comparison begged its mention).

Tadaki - My friend Kelly works/sews/gossips with me. She is the best of the best even on her own, but she got a CCI service dog this year named Tadaki. When he wears his vest, he is quiet and somber and holds his leash (or her file folders or anything he sees you drop) gently in his jaws. When that vest comes off, though, buckle up. One associate at work gets T all riled up, and races him down the carpeted aisle of our office and stops abruptly, sending the Tadakster skidding spastically through the office past the cubicles and copiers. It's more disruptive than the time they hired me. It is awesome. Even when I go to her house and it's "release" time (no vest), and he is therefore allowed to greet me like Kelly's Australian Shepherd, Deacon (meaning spazzout charge you, and manhandle you)...and you drop your coat/purse/sewing machine in all the excitement, and your phone goes flying across the room...Tadaki forgets he's not on duty and hurries to retrieve it for you. He returns it gently in his big strong dog-jaws without crushing or denting or scratching anything. GENIUS. He's the most chivalrous damn dog I've ever met. Kelly lets him stop at my desk on the way to hers, just for loves. They both can tell when I really need it. Kelly waited a long time for Tadaki. We could not be more honored to have him join our team at work and our circle of family at Kelly's.

Kingdom clothing - Rbf's favorite motocross team (Rockwell), who he got to go on the road with, has a line of clothing by the name of Kingdom. That meant lots of cool free things for somebody's regirlfriend! My Kindgom shirts fit long and snug and flatter me on my puffy days.

Beyond Glaze donuts - I can't imagine they're good for you in any way except for when your soul needs nurturing. But they are these beautiful works of art masquerading as donuts. They are so good, you can eat a half and not even crave more. Even though I eat a whole. The only store of theirs that I know of is in Draper, just off 123rd west of the freeway. My only disappointment is that they close at 6. I never get there in time on my way home from work. Damn traffic.

Jedidiah T-shirts - I once took Rbf into Buckle to show him their cute earth-and-orphan-loving line of T-shirts and he just thought it was damned-right fantastic. He thought it was cute that I ordered one for myself, right before he died. I found them on antiapparel.com...but when I never got my shirt (they accepted my payment), I was sad. The whole idea of it had gone from cute to special, and I didn't even have the shirt. I emailed them my story, and they rushed to send me whatever shirt I wanted, and also threw in the new one from their Hope project. I now have three Jedidiah shirts. They are the softest fabric and my favorite articles of clothing. Antiapparel was undergoing a management shift, which caused the complications with my order. When my shirts came, there was a little note inside from the guy who took my complaint, hoping it brought a little joy to my day. It did. I'll be buying more from them, too. Hope you join me.

Good night. Tomorrow is Monday. Pick a favorite thing and run with it, because Mondays can eat our poo. xo/km

Where in the world are you now...

I love Great Lake Swimmers. In medium-sized doses, of course, because after that you need to drink Seattle-in-January proportions of caffeine and pop a benzo of some variety just to keep yourself from having a day like I had on Monday.

I know I said no more blogging like I'm that girl that needs attention for her tragedy (bring on the comments, I know you know I'm not That Girl, but still...) but my timestamps are getting ripe, and I feel like maybe I've become a crapwad writer all of a sudden.

The Swimmers' song Where in the world are you? is in my head, because I'm writing the lyrics to it in my little book of letters I write to Rbf.

OK. Little book of letters, not so much. It is actually the journal I got him for Christmas. The gorgeous leatherbound, gold-edged, soft cover lined journal I picked out just for him, the front cover of which he inked with his name, number and address, and the date "January 1, 2009" in. And nothing else from that point on.

We had been talking and catching up just before the holiday, and we sat down to dinner a few days before Christmas to catch up. For the first time in three contact-free years. He had come directly from a downtown bookstore where he was buying journals as Christmas gifts for the little kids living in Grandpa Floyd's house on the farm. Their parents "rented" it from Rbf, and by "rented," I mean "occupied and trashed without paying for." They loved him (as we all do), and he decided they needed journals.

Of course he did. Why not bring a Brazilian orphan to the table that he picked up on one of his trips back there, and proceed to speak to her in Portugese in front of me while telling me Angelina Jolie doesn't know crap about orphans and asking me where I got my highlights done, before mentioning he thinks jacked-up trucks are an embarrassment to roughnecks everywhere. Hearing the journals-for-white-trash-kids story was like getting rufied. I'm lucky he didn't have impure intentions.

He filled six or seven journals in his lifetime. He loved to journal, and I laughed over our dinner as it all came back - what a huge part of his life journaling was, and how much it had made me love him back in the day. We used to sit and read to one another from our journals...and skip to the parts each of us wrote about the other. He said he hadn't been writing in his lately, that it had been a really long time. It's sad, because I would love to be able to read what was on his mind during the past several months. We still aren't sure if he had picked back up in his current unfinished journal, or where it is. It's possible the most recent one they have is his last.

I searched for the perfect one, found it, and gave it to him on Christmas Eve when we carpooled to the two towns in southern Idaho our parents lived. I don't know when he marked it January 1, but I wish he'd followed through. The blank pages of it bugged me. The journal reminded me of the rest of my life. Branded with him early on and then nothing more of him in the story, from that point forward. So I fill it up with writings of the one-sided relationship we now have. I write letters to him there. I include lyrics to the songs I hear him in and tell him about my day.

And this song always applied. When we dated the first time, and he was always traveling the world with his dudebros and leaving me behind. And when I was married, how I wondered once in awhile if I would ever run into him in a gas station or a mall what I would say, and where he was, and if he was happy, and if he knew how great my husband was, and what he would think if he could see the grownup, independent, employed, confident me that my husband helped coax out. I kept my thoughts loyal to my husband, but I wondered about Rbf. When we found each other again, and he was always on the road, I'd wonder what state he was in as I sat at my boring desk every day.

And now, all I ever do is wonder. I think I see him everywhere. My 40 minute commute every morning has more 18-wheelers than you'd believe. And motorcycles. And the sky is filled with planes...single engine ones that piss me right off. Why do those guys' wives and partners and girlfriends and roommates get to see them tonight? I see him in the traffic and I hear him in every song. It feels like I'm always looking for him somewhere. Rbf, where in the world are you?

I got a storage unit today. It was time. I haven't packed up my room at the boys' house yet. It's still right where I left it. Bed made, sheets unwashed, a bridal magazine dog-eared and sitting on my desk. Dust on my printer. Dust on my monitor. My garbage can unemptied. It is time, now, for that dreaded task that makes it really over.

When I filled out the application for the unit, I got to the line that said "emergency contact" and robotically put the pen down to write his name, and it hit me. Shit. Ow, that one hurt. OK that was the sad part, now here's the embarrassing part. I kind of looked up and stared ahead trying to think of who else I should put since he can't be my emergency contact anymore for stuff, and my mind went, "oh oh, I know, Reboyfriend!" DAMMIT. I'm such a moron. I had to have that kick to the face twice. I kept wanting to write his name anyway. I should have. What are the chances of an emergency with my storage unit? Duh.

The thought of just putting his name down anyway, just depressed me. It reminded me of this guy that bought a bunch of home-made soap from my sister Scoot in this one scent (she made them in all kinds of pretty smells). He said he wanted just that scent, because it was his wife's favorite. Scoot found out later that day that the guy's wife had died like two weeks earlier. Sometimes I still refer to Rbf in the present tense. I'm getting a new snowboard here soon, and I'm only looking at Forums, Rbf's longtime board of choice. I'm soap-wife guy.

I'm at the two month stage - Rbf's sister told me that she took a little grieving seminar thing, where she learned that you are in shock for the first two months. You are blogging and laughing at work and bragging about the two times you did your hair since the funeral and everyone is going "hm, well she's taking this well." Nope. Wrong-o. Suddenly, out of the blue, you REALLY realize he is not coming back.

I have dreams where I forget he is gone, but I'm acutely aware that I haven't talked to him FOREVER, and it really has been awhile since he called, so maybe I should just call HIM. I wake up to do it, too. And I then have that DAMMIT moment.

I have severe sinus issues. I'm due for my third operation on them. Basically they all grow in and close off my nasal passages, and I have to get them roto-rooted every six years and it's like $16,000 and you have black eyes for weeks and it hurts like a bitch. You might understand why I'm putting it off.

When I cry extremely hard, and all the tissues in my sinus cavities swell, there is literally no room for them to expand. My head hurts like it's been hit with a hammer, and I can hear the little bones above my palate and septum and in between all the sinuses, creaking like an old ship under the pressure against them. It's super gross and creepy.

My hair comes out in handfuls when I brush it. I have zits growing on top of other zits, scattered over giant wrinkles. I have zits in my wrinkles you guys. W!T!F! I weighed myself today and I'm about a damp kleenex away from two-digit territory. (Sounds extreme, but keep in mind I don't even clear 5'3"). When you drop a bunch of weight and your skin is still a blanket of cellulite, it's not called weight loss...it's called dehydration. Gross. (I'm not single, but I'm not getting married anymore, so it's a weird mid-air/matrix/relationship limbo that equates to not having to shave and still being in love. Awesome). Sorry, I just had to get up from my laptop to go pick my face since I haven't been able to stop thinking about it since I just wrote that. It wasn't helpful. Nothing got smaller and now I look like I have shingles.

I haven't blogged because I have nothing to say but sad things about my fat dimples and hair loss. The cupcakes and flowers I buy myself are still nice, and they still make a difference, but the past two weeks have been heinous. It has hit me. It is real.

And I don't have much else to say.

"I've been looking in churches and looking in bars

Thought that I saw you in the oncoming cars

It was your reflection cast off by the light

And into the sky of this dark city night

I looked for you up in the tallest of trees

Swayed back and forth in the mid-autumn breeze

When the leaves reddened and left too

I knew then that it wasn't you

Where in the world are you now?

Where in the world are you now?

Oh where in the world are you?

Oh where in the world are you?

Where in the world are you now?

And I looked for you then in music and song

'Cause I thought I could find you there

They were only notes pulled from the air

Not the kind I could read or breathe if I dare

Where in the world are you now?

Where in the world are you now?

Oh where in the world are you?

Oh where in the world are you?

Where in the world are you now?"