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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, shozbot.
Free The Knickers! 19-December-2006
I have some pretty good ideas. Then I have some awesome ones. Like tooth sweaters for people with sensitive teeth. Ever take a big swig of iced tea only to feel the sting of hell in your choppers? Then you understand the necessity of tooth sweaters. I have it all figured out: buy some fine lint-free yarn in a plentiful array of colors, hire a handful of skillful knitters and pay them handsomely in sexual favors (after which I will sell "I made it with a knitter" bumper stickers, because it will be true), and sell tooth sweaters online via eBay and website called ToothKnits dot com. Please know that you have this chilly tooth problem and you need my assistance. I can help. I take all major credit cards and I'm nice.
I caught a cold, which I think is pretty lame. Colds are about as pointless as dust and the word basically. It's the end of it, where you cough your kidneys into the next galaxy and sometimes produce an oyster of sorts. You wouldn't want to eat these oysters, less'n you have some kind of booger fetish. Man, I don't get fetishes. I sort of want to acquire one in order to derive some understanding from that whole business, but holy snotrags, I don't want a fetish involving bodily secretions. I wonder whether there's a pastry fetish? You know those Entenmann's chocolate doughnuts? I remember liking those in an almost alarming way. I'm going to work on that.
I wonder whether I would recognize myself were I not wondering where the hell I am. So much of my time is spent feeling like a displaced person. Everything seems to be in its place and everyone knows their lines by heart, but I am a foreigner in my life, every day. Maybe it's these last ten years spent aching that have landed me this role of the stranger. Whatever it is, it seems to stick. I am constantly questioning how I can possibly know where I'm going if I don't know where I am.
When my friends and I were finally old enough to drive, I remember waiting for whomever was stopping by to pick me up. I'd go outside and walk along the curb, probably not unlike a hooker, save for the fact that I was a virgin. (Why do I say these things?) Anyway, I would wait in keen anticipation of their arrival. And like when I was a child, I'd sing little songs to myself. Or perhaps since I was older, I sang bigger songs. If my friends were running tragically late, I would every now and then stop the song temporarily to privately inquire after their whereabouts with a mumble containing the words hell or fuck. Or sometimes both: "Where the fucking hell are you?" Either way, I liked knowing that soon they would arrive to collect me and we would be on our way to wherever.
All these years later I realize I am still waiting. For what, heaven knows. The feeling is constant, and sometimes to placate it I will imagine myself standing on the curb outside mom and dad's house, where I used to wait for my friends, hoping that whatever it is I am waiting for will show up. It never does. And the longing leads me back to the question I mentioned two paragraphs up.
We drag the past with us wherever we go. This is no obligation, we just do it. Things remembered become the souvenirs we share with anyone who'll lend an ear, an eyeball maybe, and a bit of time. We say things like "Look what I did!" and "Look what was done to me." Badges and Purple Hearts—those are our memories. For me, the past often looks and feels clearer than the present moment. Mostly because I knew where I was and where I was going.
I have had a difficult year. So much of what I've experienced through it is too personal to share here. It paces back and forth inside my head and heart, waiting to be filed away. I don't know where to put all of it yet, so there it lingers. What do you do with everything?
Have you ever had the realization that one day everything you ever wanted will never be yours if you don't do something about it? Regret is cruel. It is what scares me most of all. It's what bites at me as I try to fall asleep without furrowing my brow. Everyone deserves peaceful sleep without accumulating wrinkles and sifting through guilt. Guilt is just goddamned useless anyway. Nothing good ever came from wallowing in that quicksand.
I recently went to see my nephew's holiday pageant at his school. That kid has a way of ripping my heart open and melting the contents. He calls me on the telephone now—his idea. What it does to me knowing that somewhere not too far from here, an impossibly cute four-year-old pauses whatever delightful, magical activity he's involved in because he gets it into his head that he'd like to give me a call. That kills me.
Anyway, what I wanted to say about the pageant was this: I saw more women's underwear there than I do when I go underwear shopping. (I don't use the word panties, so if you're lost, underwear means the same thing. And I reserve the right to clock any man who uses the word panties within 30 miles of me.) Women, it seems, are retaliating against having been subjected to countless shows of male underwear peeking out of pants whose waists have wandered down to the wearers' knees. Dames are showing off their own undergarments now. The entire row in front of me displayed women whose hip-n-ass-huggin' pants exposed powder blues and pinks, lavenders and yellows. Reminiscent of Easter, really. So, I have an idea for both sexes: Let's cut off the legs of our pants and wear them with garter belts attached to our underwear! Come on, it'll be great. Every day will be a parade of full-blown knickers clinging to pant legs. No more half-assed attempts at sharing our underduds.
Quote From My World
"I don't turn you on, do I?"
"Linda? We're eating fish."
Well, I'm off to do whatever makes it all easier. I got a new watch last night and I'm feeling kind of stuck-up about it, so I'm going to try it on and look at myself in the mirror whilst performing gestures with my watch-wearin' arm. It's the thing to do here on the farm when you're the only one home and no one's looking (except extremely understanding cats). Thanks for reading.
Linda
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