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© 2004-2008 Linda Escaip
"I may be grumpy, but I like you."
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The Suns and Moons of the Grumpiest Girl in the Room.
Welcome to my journal, flutterbuns.
Some Saturday Morning 29-March-2005
If I don't end up being a successful writer (what is success anyway?), I'll become an archaeologist who digs up lost, unrealized dreams. I'll put those relics on display in some museum I will build with my own hands out of old cell phones and junk mail. I will invite to this museum all the people who, instead of following their hearts, ended up staying in dissatisfying jobs, talking to their loved ones more on cell phones than in person. I'll pass out Kleenex tissues and cheeseballs and pretty heart-shaped stones. It will all be just so fucking gorgeous.
Until then, I am hard at work on my third book, this one a self-help novel titled You Really Can Heal Your Gums, Tap Dance, And Remodel Your Bathroom At The Same Time. Please tell your friends and any strangers you fancy who have shabby bathrooms and look as if they may have the signs—early or otherwise—of gingivitis. (This may or may not be a cry for help.)
I have a text document on my computer titled Journal Notes.txt, which is filled with a bunch of assorted little tidbits. One of them reads "Write about that time I bought an excruciatingly cheap bottle of cold duck and drank it in the bathtub." But just the note sort of says it all, so there you go. When I was seventeen, I bought an excruciatingly cheap bottle of cold duck and drank it in the bathtub one night. Hid the bottle behind the bunched-up shower curtain. It tasted wonderful, like rules being broken. Who cared that it was room temperature? I didn't know the difference.
As for the other tidbits, if I pointed all of them out like that it wouldn't be nearly as fun. I prefer to spring them on you, like unpleasant news. I am just going to sprinkle them here and there for the rest of eternity like fine organic seasoning salt. Enjoy.
And remember: No masturbating in the restaurant!
Saturday morning I experienced something magical. I woke up feeling groggy and hopeless (this isn't the magical part). I am familiar with anxiety and depression. I am also no stranger to happiness and contentment. It seems I have a plethora of goodies in my repertoire of feelings, and I don't believe I ever expected to come here and be continuously laughing myself assless, so I don't need my money back or anything. Groggy and hopeless I was, schlepping my bum through the house. The Lovely Bea called, and a few minutes into our conversation I witnessed one monarch butterfly after another breezing past the window. I had never noticed before, but they fly with the precision of birds, those monarchs. At least they do when they're on a mission, which is what these beauties seemed to be up to. None of that charming, awkward flitting about for this pack of travelers. They were flying together, following each other at what appeared to be top speed for butterflies. Of course, I don't know for sure because I've never clocked it, but they were very nearly breaking records, I am certain. They varied in size, each one perfectly, delectably orange.
Bea, the hopeful enchantress that she is, told me the butterflies were a gift for me, a sign that I am getting better. After all, butterflies are the epitome of transition and I do seem to be going through some sort of transition at this time. A few hours later when they were still flying past the window in droves, I phoned my mom to ask if she was seeing them as well, since she lives a few minutes up the road. She hadn't seen any. She also stated she felt they were a sign, and a gift. Some of my neighbours were outside, but nobody seemed to notice this delicate herd of orange lovelies. I watched a woman and her young son walk across the street from their car amid a parade of them in full bright flutter, both seemingly oblivious. I wondered aloud to my mom if perhaps no one else could see them. You know, like I'd lost my frigging nugget. So, she drove over.
And there we sat on the steps in front of my house, butterflies flying toward us, then making sharp, perfectly maneuvered turns continuing their journey west. Nobody stopped to snack on the roses or linger in the grass. No, these butterflies clearly had a shindig they didn't want to miss out on, or something. Maybe a concert in the woods. And although I felt gloomy and half-alive, I decided to quietly see the whole thing as a gift, and a reminder that life is ever-changing. Where one day you are holed up in some cocoon all by yourself, you eventually awaken on some balmy spring morning to a new life, transformed. Every single moment contains that kind of possibility. My grandpa used to always tell me nothing is impossible, only improbable.
In the Sunday Los Angeles Times, there was a small article on the butterflies, who were apparently migrating this way from Mexico as they do every year. This was my first time seeing them or knowing anything about it. How lovely that their path took them right into my front yard and up over the rooftops. I wonder who else saw them on their way and felt some of their magic.
Nicole Kidman is reportedly afraid of butterflies, which is pretty funny because I'm afraid of Nicole Kidman.
An alarming amount people are looking up "pad bulge" on a search engine, which is leading them to my site, I am proud to announce. Somebody even looked up wifes maxi pad bulge complete with the lack of proper punctuation. The search engine kindly omitted the wifes part of that query, because some search engines know I simply draw the line when it comes to writing about marital bliss. But really, who is this jumbo cad who'd be looking up something regarding his wife's pad bulge? Is he checking to see if anyone else's wife has pad bulge so he can feel better about that whole business? Get over it, dude. Try bleeding from your "little area" each month for 5-7 days, with cramps and moods and water retention. Shove it with your pad bulge concerns.
Quote From My World
"Don't worry; I didn't use my chicken fingers. But it's not like you're going to eat these."
"Don't be so sure. For all you know, you live with a closet pickle lover."
I still have the season finale of Carnivàle to enjoy. Somebody please remove the Reese's Peanut Butter Eggs from the premises, for I cannot stop eating them. Holy monkeys of glory, they're delicious. And they are much more accessible than baked salmon and steamed artichokes. There is just the unwrapping...
Well, I'm off to cut a check for the blogger I have chosen to sponsor. I received this heartbreaking "Save a Blogger" pamphlet in the mail last month, and it just about killed me. Today I received a wallet-size photo and a brief bio of the poor little bugger I will be sponsoring. For just $3.85 a day I am helping make a blogger's life a bit more livable. Thanks for reading.
Linda
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